Im currently single 54M.

I can expect to own my home in a country town of some kind and receive 60k from my super each year, once I hit 60.

I know the general financial stats you read would state that this is comfortable but I am concerned it might not be enough for some things like private health insurance, being able to buy nice food, visiting restaurants, etc..

I quite often stay at home and live very modestly. Occasionally I like to go out and buy whatever I want. I don't have kids or a partner. It's what I'm used to.

The idea of living near a nice pub or RSL, having long quiet days, cooking healthy food and occasionally having a meal with friends, etc. is appealling.

I might not even stop working at 60. I very much enjoy my work.

I'm just curious as to how people find the amount they work with match the statistics about what is commonly advertised about how much you need to live on to be comfortable.

Any comments from retirees or others with some insight would be appreciated. Enjoy your Sunday evenings!

Smart people of reddit, I need advice. I’m 26m with 26f wife, and 2 young children. With current cost of living plus some silly financial choices we’ve made over the years, we are currently on a mortgage hardship plan, and I don’t think we’re going to be able to come out the other side on top. We have approx 25k in debt, and $1000 of that is fortnightly repayments. We don’t have a very high combined income, 120k with 2 young kids. My parents have kindly offered to allow us to rent their granny flat at a cheap rate, and my partner is fully on board. What I need help with, is deciding whether to rent our house now, or to sell.

SELLING

Pros
- due to our equity, after all the sale fees and paying off mortgage we would have a buffer of roughly 200-300k to put towards our next house
- we could smash off all our debt and it would be a blip in our remaining total
- wouldn’t need to worry about getting a shit tenant and ruining house
- gets us out of our long running constant financial stress instantly

Cons
-difficulty to re enter the market (major concern)

RENTING

Pros
-Stay in the housing market
-if I charge the same amount as the mortgage ($600 pw) and pay mum and dad $200, we’re saving a bit of money while mortgage is being paid

Cons
- possible shit tenant/pets trashing house
- having to pay upfront for maintenance tasks I would generally just leave and fix in my own time which I can’t currently afford
-if they refuse to pay, I’m then paying mortgage plus rent
- not sure if the 400 offset is enough to get us back on track especially considering all the REA fees etc

I’m fairly opposed to renting it out due to family members horror stories, but also I simply don’t know what would be the best course of action to help our situation. Thank you

Hopefully I'm not being stupid here, but I keep reading people saying things like "if inflation is roughly half of your gains every year, then the CGT will be the same as the old 50% discount system"

Mathematically, that's not true, is it? If inflation is e.g. 4% every year and gains are 8% every year (double) then it's only true for the first year but for every year after that then it diverges from 50%

I’m looking to buy a house very shortly and I’m wondering if there are any hacks to make mortgage payments easier to manage. I remember hearing someone years ago saying that paying weekly means you end up paying less interest overall? Any other similar findings?

I’ve been with Bendigo bank for as long as I can remember. I do enjoy banking with them but their outages are just getting so absolutely ridiculous

2 weeks ago it was down for nearly 24hrs, left me feeling extremely embarrassed at the servo when I got fuel because I couldn’t get into my account to transfer. It’s happened at least 3-4 times in the last six months it’s a joke. I’ve since learned their IT is now based in India which is where the most problems started. Their communication with customers about this is also appalling they really don’t give af.

Anyway I was looking at NAB as I kinda wanted to stick to a big bank (my parents tried changing to a small bank and got screwed over) NAB seems to work the same way as Bendigo does. They have $0 account fees, and their savings/investment accounts look to work the same way too, even with a slightly better interest
I’m after just normal everyday accounts as well as a savings/investment where I can take or put money in as I please. (For example you get the bonus interest if you don’t take anything out that month)
Is NAB a good choice? I don’t really want to change to a bank that has no branches either. I’ve looked at Macquarie bank as I’ve seen that suggested a lot here but they’re online only.
Any advice appreciated. Thanks!

pointhacks and craigsaves both seem to have reduced offers, and the remaining ones are mostly conversions into QFF or Velocity (back to the old meta).

But with QFF eligible tickets being harder to claim, and status harder to maintain, the ability to realise the points is much harder.

Has anyone looked into this after the surcharge ban?

Like are we at the higher end or..?

Edit: I mean the with the new rules

For anyone else wondering, The Money Café is continuing! Alan Kohler has stepped back from his regular ABC role, but he's not retiring from financial journalism altogether. He didn’t even get allowed a sneaky plug on the way out, or maybe just not his style.

The Money Café is still releasing weekly episodes, it’s got a way deeper look at things and doesn’t need to thread the needle of political realities, financial news and ABC’s expectations now.

He’s also starting a new podcast with his son, Chris, called Kohler & Kohler.

Money Cafe used to help break up the music/history podcast during long study sessions and given I was studying financial planning I found the odd related gem that went straight into my best marked essays.

So anyway he’s moving away from regular TV work not disappearing from the scene entirely. Hopefully can be one of the voices of reason on insiders still.

What’s the best way to go about getting solar? I feel like I’m in over my head, there’s so much info and different plans and whatnot. Ideally I’d like something I can pay off. I was looking at the zelora ‘subscription’ but I’m so unsure. I don’t particularly want to give out my phone number, I know someone who was harassed for YEARS after giving their number for quotes

Western NSW 😮‍💨

I was thinking to buy a Visa Giftcard and use it on games online, but I have never bought one before, So if I'm trying to buy it from woolworth, can i just self checkout? Also is their an age limit?

I have sold a family property in Cyprus. What tax obligations do I have in Australia, after paying local taxes in Australia ?

Curious to see if contracting is common in the tradie industry.

Was in a bbq yesterday, different people from different background, but nobody was from Finance/tax.

We were talking about cost of living, yada yada.. the carpenter said he might need to change job as it doesn't cover being one-income and new baby.

I asked the carpenter would his situation improve if he changed to becoming a contractor? My logic is small businesses under massive pressure with lots of things including payroll obligations, paying a contractor alleviates the stresses that come from having employees. Owners can even pay suppliers/contractor invoices with credit card as last resort. Tradie contractor can have other benefit like claiming their ute and tools fully under business expense.

I am curious if this overly simplified thought process has merit. Is this a win-win? I see this in corporate world all the time, employee quit then they come back as contractor.

I welcome opinions, insights, education, etc. TIA

My kids say that they want to go to a school where they overseas leadership trips and international competitions. They also want to do the IB as they find school “too easy”.

My wife says “10k a year per kid = 120k for 6 years”.

It’s a lot of money. It’s like a deposit basically.

We’re on the fence about it. We can JUST afford it, but we’d be eating beans on toast on the weekends.

I became an Australian tax resident after moving from overseas. My last overseas employer paid out my accrued annual leave after I became a resident.

I know the leave I accrued as a resident is taxable. What I’m unsure about is the leave I accrued before I became a resident. Is that taxable in Australia because I received it as a resident, or is it exempt because I earned it as a non-resident?

My understanding is that income is taxed when it’s received, which would make it taxable. I can’t find ATO guidance that confirms this.

Has anyone dealt with this? Thanks!

For my budget, I have enough of a deposit for 5% down payment but it would take me another year to get to 10%. Should I get into the market now or wait another year with a higher deposit?
I would be getting the first home buyer benefits.

I have been offered a % profit share from a family owned and run (pretty successful) as part of their surface extraction division.

Anyone had experience and is it worth it?

thanks.

Good afternoon I’m a 30 year old female needing to have a medical surgery done and was thinking of taking 11,600$ out of my super under compassionate release instead of using my savings $44,000 for a home deposit, I’ve had mixed advise some say I’m still young I can rebuild my super some have said to use my savings first just scared I won’t get ahead taking such a large chunk of money out for the surgery I understand I’ll be taxed and also my 11,600 could be worth so much more in 20-30 years but if I don’t get into the housing market soon I may never, does anyone have any advice ?

Morning AusFinance, I got a question regarding home loans as I'm new to this space and I'm not sold on my recent experience with the bank (ING).

For context, I purchased my 1930's 2 bedroom apartment last year for 775k, and at 92% LVR on a 1 year fixed rate of 5.44%. My home loan is now maturing this Tuesday and ING have offered me a standard variable rate of 6.94%, I called them to question why it was so high and they advised me my property had gone down and my LVR was now at 95.8% so I had to pay a top interest rate.

They then advised I could contact my broker to request a full valuation as sometimes the desktop valuations can be incorrect, anywho, I did the full valuation and it came back at my original purchase price of 775k and put me at a LVR of 89.8%. My broker then tried to request a rate drop to be inline with ING's advertised rate of 6.49% for a 80-90% LVR loan and in short ING to her to beat it.

I then contacted ING to follow up and if they had any offers or if there was a better product with a lower rate they could put me on, they told me no they can't do any better as all the advertised rates online are for new customers and that LVR doesn't count once the loan is already established. I though this part was a little bit extra, but the lady then advised if i wasn't happy she could send me a discharge form.

I don't think my request is unreasonable as all I'm asking for is to be on a rate they have available online that fits within my loan criteria. I guess my question is, is there anything else I can do to lower my rate or do just have to suck it up?

TLDR - ING offered me a 6.94% variable rate when my fixed loan expires, claiming my apartment’s value had dropped and my LVR was 95.8%. We completed a full valuation, which came back at my original purchase price of $775k, putting my LVR at 89.8%. Despite this, ING refused to match their advertised 6.49% rate, saying advertised rates are only for new customers. Is there anything else I can do to negotiate a better rate?

Hello lads

i used to have up money account

they requested for source of income and proof of financials throu the app.

and I missed that notification (there was no email or call/sms) simple message in app

when the next arrived that my account is closed I submitted all the documents however they are not accepting it and I’m not getting my account back

i tried ombudsman as well

but had no luck..anyone experienced similar situation and got their account back.

i am really keen on getting that account back

it was good for overseas travelling and as well as daily use

if anyone can help

that be great…

thanks

My mom sold our apartment in HK after my dad died and her accountant told her she wouldn't be taxed on it if she lives in HK for a year before coming back to Australia. Is that true? It doesn't sound right to me.

Four weeks ago I went to my accountant to do my tax return. It wasn’t a great experience and my lesson should be not to choose HR Block. There were repairs being undertaken on the roof and it was incredibly noisy and she kept stopping to complain.

I rang last week because they still haven’t submitted my tax return to ATO. I was given the excuse they haven’t had electricity in the office and they are working their way through the lodgements.

My problem is, I purchased the home with Vic Homebuyer Fund. SRO has requested as part of the annual review my completed tax statement. At the moment I have lodged everything, except this, and told them that I am waiting for accountant to
Lodge my tax return before I can supply the tax statement. It may give me a couple of months reprieve.

At what point should I be concerned about the failure to lodge my tax return?