This week I've been watching new properties come up in the coastal town about twenty minutes away from us. Longingly watching. Living in my folks backyard has renewed my desire to move closer to the sea, though I'm not sure we can afford it. Neither of us are working in permanent jobs, for a start, and we have very little savings. We are debt free, and have no mortgage, and a great property on 5 acres. We'd be downsizing considerably if we moved - most houses in the area are on 500 m2 to 700m2 - but, the coast.
Dad insists that money doesn't matter and we can afford it. It bugs us a little. We have that slight resentment the younger generation has toward 'boomers' who had the opportunity to get on the property ladder, buy an investment property or two, and retire well. That's out of sight for many of us, and the younger generation behind us are even begging early inheritances to get a house they probably can't afford.
I get Dad's point. If we got another mortgage, it's just rent we're paying to ourselves. Feasibly, we could rent the house out during holiday season to pay a good chunk off every year.
But we're pretty adverse to risk.
Jamie tells me not to worry about money so much but I can't help it. I see us getting older and less able to make the money we've been making - and more to the point, I don't want to make the money we've been making because to get it, we have to sacrifice a lot. There's no work life balance in teaching. We're both disillusioned with the system and tired of being overworked.
Having less seems an answer to this, but how much less can one survive on in this climate? How do we prepare for being old, or sick?
Jeff Kennet's Surf Team
I wasn't as worried about money back then, which is almost impossible to fathom. Life stretched out with all it's possibilities.
I was perfectly happy to take advantage of the government and receive benefits, which was enough to put petrol in the tank and buy a few groceries and some beers. People who travelled Australia on the dole were jokingly called 'Jeff Kennett's Surf Team' - the state premier at the time.
The system was easy to get around. You had to lodge your form in person every two weeks, but you could post it if you weren't able to (only every other fortnight) but if you left two weeks before lodgment and then got a mate to lodge it, then posted one, you could feasibly be away for six weeks with no one being the wiser. You could also move office, but only from a place of higher unemployment to lower employment or if you got work in that town. That was easy as well - a shift or two at the local bar or some grape picking would do it.
I lapped Australia doing this. Money came when it was needed - for a set of new tyres, for a new surfboard, whatever. I never worried about it. I lived off lentil dahl and vegemite on toast, and this luscious custard and pecan syrup yoghurt I was addicted to, and of course, beers. Hey, I was young, resentful of a society pushing me into conformity, and absolutely little concept of getting older.
Single Parent Pension
And then at 25, I was a mother. Just like that. This year the birth rate in Australia is at it's lowest it's been since the '70's because people worry they can't afford kids. I never thought about the expense of having a child.
I worked in restaurants and bars a little on the weekend whilst my parents babysat, but a lot of my income came from the single parent pension, which in those days seemed to stretch okay. I never thought I had no money - I had enough even to save for a trip to Europe, and you could receive the single parent pension overseas for six months without having to lodge a form.
In Europe I made $3000 AUD last nearly a year, combined with the single parent pension and a little bit of child maintenance occasionally supplied by my ex. We often housesat or stayed with friends we met along the way, or I stayed in dorm rooms in hostels with my boy in the same bed as me. I never ate out - I carried a plastic bag which had some cutlery, crackers, cheese, cucumber and other snackable vegetables, peanut butter, hummus, and tins of tuna. We never felt we didn't have enough.
And having a child wasn't expensive, not really. I don't think I bought clothes for him for years - they were all secondhand or from opshops, and it was never that expensive to feed him. Later on, his schooling was taken care of with a scholarship to a good school. I tell you what though, I was glad to buy the last pair of school shoes when he finished!
Okay, I Better Adult Now
By 29 I thought I'd better do something about 'proper' work, probably because I was keen to actually have a little bit of extra money but also use my intelligence to put toward a career. I'd finished my Bachelor of Arts and at that time you only needed a Diploma of Education over a year, with most of that in schools, so I did that, and then promptly went overseas again, met the love of my life, came home, packed up what little we had, and moved to England.
I had three suitcases and $3000 bucks, and I still wasn't worried about money. I moved to be with a man that had less - he lived in a truck and had 90 quid to his name.
And we made do. We bought an old Peugot 405 for 1500 bucks, and I got some emergency teaching, and my husband to be worked as a landscaper. We lived paycheck to paycheck and were happy as the summer days were long. We couldn't afford holidays on the continent or fancy restaurants but I tell you what, a picnic after some Aldi cheese and crackers, ginger nuts and dark chocolate after a long walk in the woods was like heaven on earth.
There was always money for Jarrah's school uniform and there was always food on the table and the rent paid.
Travellers site, UK. Ours is the green truck.
To save some proper money, we moved out of our rental down in Dorset and onto a traveller's site in the UK. These were people who lived in vehicles long before van life was a thing, and squatted land and lived in a community together, supporting each other to get by. Jamie had lived like that before and it was easy for me to fit right in as I was no stranger to living in a car and being on the road. We had an old Bedford TK horse lorry and a little caravan for Jarrah. We'd go into the forest to collect firewood to keep warm and dumpster dive with the best of them to supplement our grocery shop. In that way we saved enough to move back to Australia, including Jamie's permanent resident visa and a bit toward a house deposit.
Moving Back to Australia
By this time, we knew we were never going to get ahead in England. We wanted some land to grow vegetables and have chickens. Jamie had finished his teaching degree and we walked straight into teaching jobs whilst living in a bus in a paddock, saving for a deposit for a house.
When all else fails, live in a bus.
We bought one just as the market nudged up after the GFC, and in hindsight, we wished we'd stretched the budget back then to buy a house on the coast but - you know, we weren't risk takers. The bank had offered us more than enough money but we chose to live well within our means. For a good few years, we made do. The holidays we went on were always camping trips. We had cheap cars that Jamie fixed. All our money went on the mortgage and fixing up the house and garden to our standard.
Our holiday in Tassie with a banged up old Econovan. He has a kombucha, btw - not a beer.
The extra money we had from two jobs went on some pretty fantastic holidays - something we'd never been able to afford to do. Trips back to the UK, to SE Asia. We could afford hobbies. We ate well - we even went out to dinner sometimes. We bought nice clothes. For the first time in our lives, we had money.
We never did buy an investment property.
Back to Being Broke Again
It's funny, being mortgage free. You have a house, but it still costs you money - bills, repairs, and so on.
It had enabled us to make decisions about our careers though. We were both desperately unhappy with our jobs and could no longer sustain that level of stress and anxiety. What we saved, we put into a year off, with a vow to never coming back to that way of life again.
Even if we were broke again.
We have a lot of skills we've learnt over the years to help us manage our finances. We don't get into debt. We have a vegetable garden and chickens. We know how to eat well for little expense. We don't eat out - we take picnics. We don't buy take away coffees. I buy a lot of my clothes at charity shops. And goodness - we just had an overseas trip where we shipped an old Landie to the UK and drove it to Morrocco and through Portugal and Spain. I honestly think it was cheaper to do that than fly everywhere and stay in hotels.
Funny how a lot of my 'broke' stories involve living in vehicles.
I do wish we'd taken more risks - we'd have a little more to fall back on now. Perhaps we could have even properly retired. Retirement seems a dream - we don't have enough superannuation for that yet (super is the enforced savings for retirement in Australia, whereby your employer contributes to the fund and you can make voluntary donations if you like).
We think about selling up and letting the money sit there until we find a house on the coast, and going travelling in the meantime. Tasmania is always a dream.
I try not to stress about money so much. I never used to. That financial anxiety seems a side effect of being older, and the financial fuckery of a climate we're in.
But I think my memory fails me a little - we've lived through so many times where we've been down to our last dollar and we've survived.
I try to listen to Jamie. 'We'll be okay, babe' he says. And he's right. We always have been.
This is in response to @ericvanwalton's question of the week, which is about how we have managed periods in your life when you had the least money. I've gone a little bit beyond the scope of that I'm afraid, but so be it - you can write your own for #memoirmonday too!
With Love,
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You know what's wonderful and mindblowing about this whole read? The "wish we'd taken more risks" bit when practically the entire life story you just described there would come off as one big crazy ass risk to most "normies".
You're amazing. Cheers to you for being a single mom. And not acting like it's the end of the fucking world which seems to be the popularly accepted version of the story now. And for not giving up on your dreams and for giving your son a unique, beautiful experience of this life. Seriously. It's touching beyond words.
As for resentment, hell yeah. I'm lucky, my grandmother struggled tooth and fucking nail to buy the house I'm living in now (well, when I'm there obviously). And left it to me. So yay. I can't really say I can relate to the memes my peers share of how lucky previous generations were and how woe-be-me ours is. At the same time, you watch ours squander their paychecks on Starbucks and bullshit online shopping, spend all their money on takeout 'cause they're too precious to learn to cook... Well, that certainly can't be helping you save for a house. It's like a lot of my peers, I feel, have resigned themselves to oh well ours is an unfortunate generation where everything's mean and unfair, might as well treat myself.
💛 (thank you for being living proof that happiness doesn't come in the bank and that the life you dream of doesn't need to be a dream.)
Wonderful read. One big adventure. 😊
It surely works out every time.
Nowadays it is so hard to get on the property ladder. Parents and the older generations just don’t understand. It is such a mayor shift.
Enjoy your week!
@tipu curate 2
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 37/57) Liquid rewards.
I am sure, the happiness from those would never match anything else. Quite an intense post and a testimony to the fact that we don't need a lot to be happy. And you said it quite well : That financial anxiety seems a side effect of being older, and the financial fuckery of a climate we're in.
Yeah, it's harder as we get older, isn't it?
Great read about all your travels and experiences. You have done so much. I love it. I have thought about down sizing too but worry all the cost, fees and taxes nowadays might mean we would just be better of staying put.
!PIZZA
Ha, I never think I've done a lot but I guess looking back it's a different story. And I keep coming to same conclusion - we're better off staying where we are. But then...
$PIZZA slices delivered:
(3/15) @new.things tipped @riverflows
You've made it half way through your life, living the life you want, bagged yourself the love of your life, a wonderful son and now a beautiful grand kid, plus you're financially debt free with your own place. That's not something everyone can achieve. Enjoy life with those around you coz you never know what's going to happen tomorrow!
Shit yeah, thanks for the Uber summary that reminds me yet again I'm.doing fiiiine!!!!!
👏 Keep Up the good work on Hive ♦️ 👏
sagarkothari88 to upvote your post ❤️
🙏 Don't forget to Support Back 🙏❤️ @mysteriousroad suggested
It was really an awesome, inspirational read. Your thoughts, your way to live your live, your way to be a single mom (I was a single mom for many many years, so I can understand you), everything in this content make me feel you are a wonderful woman! I send you a warm hug from Italy and all my best wishes to you and your wonderful little boy. ❤️
Thankyouu!
It always felt like we had a great deal in common. This post makes it clear. Not exact time lines or anything, yet a single Dad who has always rocked the system and a belief that life will provide. It does, or at least has for me and there have been times to test that theory. Down to my last few bucks in a pup tent in a Moroccan campground comes to mind. Or rolling into Tehran from India with not much more than change and landing a language teaching job. That kind of faith is important if being a slave to a system is not on your radar.
Exactly. I don't know where it came from. These days Jamie has more faith than me.
Yeah youth has its advantages in that regard. There is a dilemma currently in my life which highlights that. With complications about insurance for the boat, yet not legally bound to have any, in years gone by it would have been raise the jolly roger, insurance be damned!.
However as my house closing is not until the end of the month this could put my daughter's dream on hold should my assets be seized for the pollution cause by a sinking vessel. The plan is that she can take the funds from the sale of the property to get something she likes.
After the end of the month we shall sail regardless, once the only asset in my possession that they can come after is the boat in Davey Jone's locker. 🏴☠️
Well let's hope you get insurance then! Oh for the uncomplicated life we used to have long ago.
Travel in itself is educational, a path taken venturing to many places.
Too many no longer able to afford to buy a house, pricing has gotten out of hand. Not all boomers were able to buy what they wanted, many battled doing without.
Obtaining a loan in 1970s was easier if you had permanent employment, never allowed to exceed a third of combined earnings paying house off.
Home ownership cost in upkeep it is staggering, plenty of time and effort goes into it. Coastal experience it's a costly place to live when 1km inland.
End of the day free spirit, roaming far and wide!
!WINEX
Great story and great life really when you think about it.
The freedom that you had and have, the simple, but seriously adventurous life that you have lived so far- and taught your kid to be resilient, adventurous, self reliant, frugal, flexible- all the important thing that most kids/young adults wouldn't have a clue about these days....and that's what most oldies told themselves just as their about to get married in the late teens and early twenties...'its ok, I'll travel Australia/the world when the kids grow up and leave home and so some of them do, some of them try, but many never do and die first- like mine did and so I learnt from their mistakes, left home at 17 and spent years traveling, going from job to job, backpackers and so on and living in Melbourne since 2005 is bar far the longest I have ever lived in my 53 years and heading back up to the Daintree next Monday to do some recon in Cairns as I'm thinking about moving back up there again when my lease runs out in Feb, but then I'm also wanting to go back to Thailand to just do nothing but volunteer in animals sanctuaries again, and I am really dying to go OS to Europe for a while (never been for more than a couple of weeks) and I have to remember that I now have Mum's parrot, so I may or may not go anywhere OS...
So if you do ever enter in the home ownership bubble, you'll soon be missing that fresh air and freedom that you guys have now, so well done and be free.
Cross the pension bridge when you come to it.
Even if you have stuff all super and have to live off a meager pension, atleast you'll be used to living frugally and it won't hurt so much.
That's what I'm going to do..(no choice there either...lol...)
Yeah frugal living it's gonna be I think.
Moving somewhere warmer would save on the leccy bills! Been cold down here this winter.
Go on your adventure love. Sounds like it's about time.
You know that's what I was thinking when you said you'de love to live down in Tassie- Huge power bills for that place- specially in winter...
right now Cairns is only down to 19, so don't even have to pack a jacket!
Though it does get a bit colder at night up in the Daintree.
Now tell me, have you ever been up to the Daintree?
I reckon thats right up your alley in sooo many ways...Even the Atherton Tableslands- Mareeba, Yungaburra...(very Tassie like up there- including the temp but not quite as bad...)
I have been to the Daintree, only in 2021! We escaped between lockdowns. The woman at the air bnb we were staying at showed me down to a swimming hole at the bottom of the property where blue butterflies flittered and palm trees swayed. I cried. 'Don't worry', she said 'we've had a lot of Victorians cry recently here'. Lol.
Queensland is always just too far for me! I've booked Tassie again for Jan.
Oooh who was the woman? Was her name Marion? Mara?
Was the swimming hole the bluehole, hutchy's or the causeway?
Did you stay at the Butterfly house?
OMG so many questions! 🤣
And did you hear about the Yoga retreat when you were there?
If not here it is, this is one of the places I used to live and this is where I'll be staying https://peakd.com/hive-120078/@chocolatescorpi/an-epic-post-about-an-epic-area-of-truly-magnificent-and-magical-natural-medicine
Yeah no Tassie is gorgeous and admittedly, I haven't seen near enough of it, I just know I don't want to be anywhere near it if it's not peak summer- which doesnt last long enough down there, so I pass and head north to the sun and the much cheaper cost of living- with everything, including rentals, plus cairns is booming with work now too, especially in the creative and tourism sectors, with the massive screen qld studios set up and lots of projects being filmed up there..
So if I head north and you head south then we'll have each side of the equator covered! 🤣
When are we going to meet IRL?
I'm in Southbank remember...I would absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE to catch up with you!!! 😃
Aw, I'm never in Melbourne! Jarrah's in Kensington and that's as far as I usually get!
Well next time you get to K'ton, let me know I can come meet you!
When I get back from Cairns anyway...
I'm actually going to have a pop up stall at the Sth Melbourne markets in October selling Mum's vintage stuff and my own creations so maybe you might want to wander in...?
You are having a fluffing wonderful life. Look at things you have and that you have done. Now you even have no mortgage and still with your partner you love.
Loads of people would give their hens teeth to have achieved what you have!
Must admit though I am biased and love the coast, always have and always will.
At least I'm only twenty minutes away from it... No real problem that'd not a first world one!
hehe well 20 isn't far!
As a teacher with no work-life balance and no savings to survive when old or sick, making retirement a dream that only a mooning HIVE or BTC can grant me, I totally get you.
Great story!
From one broke and tired teacher to another, commiserations xx
The whole time I was reading this my mind kept telling me please don't let her starve please don't let her starve. I'm so glad you didn't experience that.
The amount of work you do is inspiring and finding your soulmate is wonderful I'm so glad you both are perfect for each other you both work hard and the way you manage your finance is perfect not many people care about budgeting it's sad but true.
Thank you again for your comment on my post if not I would have never seen your beautiful stories here.
You have been living a very colourful life and you have also taken risks as well. You should write a book about your adventures, especially you and J's love story, but of course in your style.
I have a lot to say about this topic, I'm a bit late to enter but think I might anyway. I'm going through a time right now where I don't have much money, but it's bloody interesting that's for sure xxxx