Help re-structure my finances, I want to buy a house, save and invest

Añadido: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]Having structure of your finances is so important. It can determine whether you are going to be successful in terms of managing your finances or you're not going to be successful. And so that is why I'm noticing a lot of people writing to me saying, "Jen, can you please help me just have structure on my finances?"

[00:00:17]Because it is such an important element.

[00:00:19]You want to know what are you working towards and how can you make sure that your finances have order? You can only achieve that through having structure of your finances. And this provides you an understanding of what is happening in that bank account. With that being said, we are here to look at the money dilemma. You know that each and every Friday I bring you a money dilemma from one of our community members looking for assistance. And so today I'm bringing you another one. If you want to be part of it and just learn more about what is going on in anonymous finances and also given your input, do make sure that you stick around. And with that being said, let us cue that intro.

[00:01:02]Hi and welcome to my channel. If you're new here, my name is Luchanalo. I'm a content creator and in this channel we do personal finances, lifestyle as well as career growth content. So if any of those things are things that tickle your fancy, do make sure that you join us by clicking that red subscribe button on the bottom. And also don't forget to smash that like button because it does indicate to YouTube that you're enjoying my videos and thus they push it to more people to see. Before we get into anonymous's case, I do want to share that this with you. If you want us to look at your financial dilemma, your money dilemma, it can be either you want to pay off debt, you want to have stretch off your finances, you want to start saving, you want to start investing, but you don't you don't know how to go about doing all of these things and you want an input from someone that is outside of your life, someone that is not really close to you and someone that can be very objective.

[00:01:48]Do make sure that you drop us your money dilemma at [email protected] and I will bring it here and obviously you will always remain anonymous. And so let us get into anonymous's case for this week. So writes to us and says, "Hi Jen, I hope you are well. Please help me restructure my finances so I can start saving towards buying a house and the legal cost and depos and the deposit for the house. My other goal is to have an emergency fund of 60,000 by the end of the year. start investing for long-term.

[00:02:18]I'm also not sure if I should find I if I should finance a small car or save or get a demo car cash. I stay with my 7-year-old daughter. I do not have a car. I walk most of the time and I or I use Uber. And here's my budget. So her budget is her salary is 555,000 and then rent is 5,500 electricity school fees 1,800 medical aid 4,000 funeral cover and education fund 500 funeral cover and education fund 500. Okay, that's a very weird combo right there. Life cover 700. Rage 300. Credit card one it's 1,500 that she pays but then she owes 24,000. Credit card two she pays 700 and she owes 13,000. Loan she pays 1,500 but she owes 40,000. Wi-Fi 550. Wi-Fi am I saying Wi-Fi? Wi-Fi 550. Tertiary fees 66 66,000 in total. I studied with Manosa and I pay for myself. My employer doesn't pay as I work on a contract term. I pay 2,000 per month for for now and I will pay a bigger lump sum on the next month I have extra groceries. I buy bulk. I only use 2,000 for meats, veggies, and lunchbox items. So, I'm assuming that in your monthly budget, the 2,000 now goes up there. If you also have any of those envelopes for savings and budgeting, I really need them. I do not have savings or investments and I want to start this budgeting from May uh from the May salary and start paying off some of this debt. My credit score is currently at 610 which is good and I wish to also increase it. So thank you so much for anonymous for sharing your case with us. Um it's also not a complicated one. When I was looking at it I was just like okay I know where to where you should start. What I did was I looked at your budget and I said okay you're working on 55,000. plus minus everything that you are paying for. And then when I did that, I think it landed me around 32,540.

[00:04:23]I could be wrong, but let me just verify with my calculator.

[00:04:28]So it puts you at 22,550.

[00:04:31]So I was not wrong. So your expenses are costing you 22,550.

[00:04:37]These are your monthly expenses. And then what I did was I then said minus uh 55,000 minus this 22,000 which leaves you with 32,450 to work with which is good. It's a substantial amount for you to work with.

[00:04:57]However, and I know that with looking at this someone would say ah that's good.

[00:05:01]She can just go straight into into investing and also and also saving. No, we're not going to do that. If you write to me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me, we will do things the right way and we are definitely going to do things the right way anonymous and I hope that you are here for the ride. You are here to to take this and just come along for the ride because if you do the right thing, trust me, if you do the right thing with for your finances, you will set yourself up, you will set yourself up and 10 years from now or 5 years from now, you will thank yourself. Here's what we're going to do before and J we go to saving for the house saving for deposits and so forth. We're going to stop it there.

[00:05:40]Stop it, Lori. Stop it. Stop it there.

[00:05:42]So, the goal is going to be fixed so that we can start in a clean slate. So, we're going to fix first. And what are we going to fix? We're fixing this debt that you that you have here. You have no business having this debt. Honestly, looking at your income, your responsibilities. There is no need for you to be carrying this debt. To be paying about 1,500 here, 1,200 then there 300. You have no business doing that. You have no business doing that.

[00:06:08]So here's what we're going to do. You are going to pay off this debt. That's the first thing you're going to do.

[00:06:13]We're going to pay off this debt. So what are you going to start with? You're going to start with the loan loan that you say that you owe 40,000 on. We're going to pay that off. And you're going to pay it off between June and July.

[00:06:25]We're not going to stretch it. We're not going to pay. We're not going to put biggie by biggie ning ning. No. June July you are going to be June you're going to allocate 20,000 July another 20,000. So you'll be done by July.

[00:06:37]Personal loan carry too much of an interest for you to be carrying them around. You know, you don't need that backpack. You don't need it. So it's time for you to put it down. Put it down. Pay it off. Right. And then the second thing is we're going to pay off Rage. You have no business having Rage.

[00:06:54]anonymous. You do not need to have a store account. Actually, let's just say that you do not need to have a store account. You can well afford to buy anything cash if you decide that you want to do that. You have no no business having a store account. And maybe you got it because you want to build your credit. You don't need to have a store account, especially because you've got a a credit card. Credit card, a one credit card actually is a perfect uh thing to use to build your credit score. Anything else you don't really need. So, pay off that Rage account. You're going to do that now in June. You're going to pay it off now in June. You are going to pay off credit card one. You're also going to pay off credit card two. So, how are you going to do this? Pay off the the credit card two, which is 13,000 in August. And then credit card one, put 20,000 to pay it off. And then you'll be left with about 4,000 that you are owing. And then the following month, you are going to make sure that you are actually paying off that 4,000. I don't want you to carry any debt. I want you to have some form of credit in a credit product for your credit score, but you don't have to carry debt on it. So, you pay off your credit cards. You close off the other one and you keep one. You're no longer going to have a personal loan.

[00:08:03]You're no longer going to have a store account. You're going to have one credit card and then in this credit card, you are not going to owe in it. Instead, you are going to put money in it and use from it. For someone that is getting paid 55,000, you should really be utilizing a credit card to pay for majority of your things, but use your own money, not the bank's money. So that means that when you're paying your rent, when you're paying for electricity, when you're paying school fees, when you're paying for all of these things that you are paying for, pay from them from your credit card. But what you will do is that when you get paid, you transfer your salary into your credit card and then you pay for those things. So the goal here is to not carry credit. Still use the credit product or credit facility, but don't owe on it. That's the whole point. So this will not obviously when you pay off your loan, it will deepen up your credit score a little bit, but it will pick back up because you will close one credit card, but you'll still have one line of credit that you're going to keep. The goal here is not to close all of them because when you close all of them, honestly, your credit card, your credit score will go down. But you're going to keep one, which is going to be your credit card one. And then what you're going to do is that you will then focus on building your credit score for the next 6 months after paying off all of these things.

[00:09:20]And honestly, with the the next part, we are going to be looking at saving and investing. It's not like you're going to buy the house this year or probably not next year. Maybe you're going to buy your the house in 2028. And honestly, I would say pace yourself. Don't rush this process. By the time in 2027 or 2028, your credit score would have picked up and will be well within the 600. Next part that we're going to do point second part now we are going to be starting from a clean slate. And how do we start from a clean slate? We're going to be saving and investing now. So first part we're going to focus on paying off the debt. As soon as you're done paying off the debts, from September going forward, we are focusing on saving and investing.

[00:09:59]So from September, each and every month, you're going to be saving 20,000. You're going to be saving 20,000 per month towards your emergency fund. The goal here is so that you finish these things quickly. You need to sprint. We're sprinting here. So we're going to allocate 20,000 towards your emergency fund. September, October, November, 3 months you would have gotten to your goal and maybe a little bit of December just to get to 66,000. And then from January 2027 up to March, you are going to up the game. Now you're going to add another 60,000 on your emergency fund, bringing your target now to what?

[00:10:37]120. So you've already have saved 60,000 this year. And then next year, the first 3 months of the year, I want you to save for another 60,000, making your emergency fund 120,000. Looking at how much you get paid and your responsibilities. Remember I said 22,000 is just for 1 month. When you times it by 3, it's 66,000. So that's 3 months.

[00:10:58]You need about 6 months worth of living expenses, right? And remember, you said you're on contract as well. So you definitely need more than 100,000 of your emergency fund. So next year you're going to up the game and then you're going to save 20,000 again in next year and you're going to be pushing it from January to March. Then you'll be done.

[00:11:16]Second thing that you're going to be saving for is going to be your home savings, right? You say you want to buy a home eventually. So I'm putting here a target of 100,000. 100,000 can cover legal cost and maybe a bit of you to buy any furniture or anything like that.

[00:11:31]Deposits, I'm not really sure about that. you can um continue saving maybe add and say another once you're done with 100,000 as the first goal then you up it again and say okay I'm going to do another 100,000 then that 100,000 becomes the deposit but we're going to start first with the legal cost and other other things right so it's going to be 100,000 and then each and every month from September to June from September this year to June next year 2027 you are going to be saving 10,000 towards this goal from April next year remember from September nomber to June, you're just saving 20 uh you're saving 10,000 but then from April you are going to increase the amount cuz you would have been done with your emergency fund.

[00:12:13]So you are going to increase the amount you're going to top up with 10,000 making it now 20,000. So that means that from April to June you are now going to be saving 20,000 which means that you will reach the goal of 100,000 even much faster. So that's why I'm saying if you feel that in June I I really want to do another 100,000, you can just say June to maybe end of the year you are putting 20,000 again and then you are going to reach the goal of you're going to have you're going to end up sitting with about 200,000 just saved up for a house fund. So we're going to start first with 100,000 and then if you feel like you want to push even more to 200,000 you can push. The third thing that I want you to then do is to get into investing.

[00:12:54]So each and every month you're going to invest 3,000 towards shares. You're going to be going to to stock market.

[00:13:01]You're going to buy shares and 3,000 per month from August up until November. You are going to be putting 3,000 every month allocating it to investments, right? You're going to be buying shares here. We want you to get used to investing. Want to see want you to to get used to also seeing your money, you know, growing and just doing its work.

[00:13:20]But then from December, right, from December of this year, you are going to increase the amount to 5,000 per month.

[00:13:29]And then you are just going to continue.

[00:13:31]Here we don't have a target. We just continuing. We're just going to continue continue. Maybe next year you can then start looking into utilizing a TFSA. But we first just want to start with the ZR account and invest towards that. And then the first thing, fourth thing you're going to save for a car from April of 2027. You're not going to do it now. We're going to do it next year.

[00:13:52]2027, you're going to save 5,000 per month towards a car. There's no target here. It's just to say, okay, we are getting used to paying for the car before we buy it. So, by the time you buy it, you would have been used to just patting away with 5,000. But then now you're going to going to have this 5,000 accumulating. By the time you want to buy a car, you will have savings that you can either use as a deposit or you can use it for something else. But these are the four things that you are going to do to set yourself up. Emergency fund, uh, home savings, invest, and then you're going to save towards a car. So, we're going to make sure that uh we are going to make sure that you are setting these things up. So, you may be asking yourself, okay, how can what what platforms can I use for savings? Think of look at Time Bank. Time Bank is perfect for an emergency fund. look at Frank Group for for for emergency fund uh for or for any of your goals as well.

[00:14:47]Also look at your bank. I don't know which bank you use. Also look at the products in your bank. But I would say that do not have all of these things in your bank account. If you are banking with let's say for instance ABSA do not have your emergency fund, saving for home, car home in e investing all in one place. Don't do that. Don't do that. You want to make sure that it's in different places so that you don't get confused easily. So have time bank for your other goal. Have the nice thing with time bank is that it doesn't really come with a lot of charges. So carrying that bank account is really not going to affect you in terms of your budget. Right? So look into time bank. You can open it at forip and pay box and other places. I sound like I'm sponsored by time bank.

[00:15:29]I'm not. And then look at frank group as well. Frank group is a great platform to use when it comes to savings goal as well as investments as well. you want to start out in investing, it's a perfect platform to use. Uh saving perfect platform to use and then look at your bank as well. Maybe have one saving goal under your bank as well. But I would say that for your bank, use it for your emergency fund when you're starting out, but then when you get to 100,000, you need to use a better facility that comes with a better interest rate. Like right now with my emergency fund, I don't keep it in normal savings. I keep it in a money maximizer because it has a better interest interest rate compared to just the normal savings. And the nice thing is that I can access the money anytimes.

[00:16:11]I can just go to money maximizer and transfer the money. You don't want to have your emergency fund on a 32-day notice or 7-day notice. You want to have it easily accessible, but they're not too easily accessible. Not too especially if you know that you're not disciplined. Then you don't want it be too easily accessible. So as I said, savings platform, Time Bank, Frank Group, your bank, look at those options.

[00:16:33]Investing, go to easyquities. If you feel like, okay, easy is too complicated for you. Frank Group is also the great platform for that as well. So these two platforms, Easy Equities, Frank Group, they're also perfect for investing. The nice thing with Frank Group is that it's good for a beginner, someone that doesn't know how to buy assets, is not sure also which shares they should be buying. they just want to invest, Frank Group is going to be that perfect place for you. And for me, honestly, Frank Group helped me to get started with investing and to be consistent. But then it got to a point where whereby I felt like, okay, I need more. I need more. I can't keep doing this, you know, over and over again. I'm now used to investing. I'm also used to being consistent. I'm good when it comes to consistency. So, I need something more that has access to a wider variety. Then that's when I now then moved to being aggressive on easy equities. But I started out on Frank group so that I can be consistent and also just get use get that muscle of in investing you know working. So you can just do those those are the options that you have. There are other options when it comes to investment platforms but I would say is equities is a good place to also start but the best one for starting is Frank and then for savings use the platform share that you check the platforms that I shared with you. None of these platforms have sponsored me. I'm not sponsored by them. They're not paying me. I'm just sharing because these are things that I use and things that I found to be useful and I'm sharing them back to you to say consider them. Do remember that this does not constitute as financial advice. This just me sharing my own insights in terms of how you can have structure of your finances and set yourself up and best achieve the goals that you have set for yourself. So you've got a lot of work uh in front of you anonymous but more than anything you just have to commit. This requires you to commit. You go back now to the drawing board. You set your budget clearly and then you tell yourself that from June to August I'm going to focus on paying off my debt. Right? And we are sprinting here. We're not we're not taking it step by step. You you don't need that. How much you get paid and the money that you're left with allows you to create yourself the runway. So do that. Pay these things off by the time it's end of August. And then from September going forward, you're then going to start with saving and investing. If you do it this way, you're going to thank yourself. If you then choose to say you're going to drag along this debt, nona, it's fine if you want to do that. But honestly, if you come to me and you ask for my input, I'll always tell you to pay off debt first before you start investing, before you start saving and so forth. I will always tell you pay off debt. Whether you can afford to carry that debt with you or not, meen I will always tell you to pay off that debt first. I do not feel think that people should be carrying debts that they do not need. And honestly, you do not need that debt. You do not need that debt at all. At all. Another thing that you can do, another thing that I just want to say before I close it off and hand it over to you guys for your own input as well. Once you've paid off the debt, you can take one month off, right?

[00:19:40]take one month off maybe let's say September and then in September you take this 30 36,000 and then you pay for your school fees and then that means that now the burden is even much lesser for your school fees instead of doing the installments then now you know that the bing burden is much lesser you can do that you do have that flexibility but I would really say pay off those debts and then maybe give yourself one month to have that sum of money to allocate it towards your education and then from there from the next month you continue or after paying off your debt you just continue with the savings and so forth.

[00:20:15]If you say I'm fine with the 2,000 and what but you continue but if you want to pay off the l if you want to put a lump sum I would say that take off one month or two months I'm with one month you put that 30 something,000 the following month you put the remaining money then you are done with your school fees for the year and then you continue now with your you continue with your with your with your other savings and then find a way to also have a saving goals for your education since it's something that you're doing and something that you are really serious about. So then what you will do is that once you have paid off this lump sum that means that you're no longer going to be carrying this 2,000 per month. So you're no longer going to be paying 2,000 per month towards your your education. So then you save the 2,000. Maybe top it up with another 2,000 from the money that you have. Top it up with another 2,000 making it 4,000. And then you save up until next year when you have to pay for your fees again. then you will know that you have about you also have a lump sum that will allow you to pay for your school fees.

[00:21:17]Try to be ahead with your things. Try to be ahead with your things. Think ahead and don't think ahead in terms of installments. Think ahead in terms of okay, how can I save now accumulate this so that when that time comes I'm able to pay for those things. So that is about it when it comes to your case anonymous.

[00:21:33]So with that being said, I'm going to hand it over to this community to you who is watching this video. you feel like you have some input for anonymous or something that you also just want to put is on and to just affirm and say yes yes yes do make sure that you leave it on the comment section tell anonymous how she can best structure her finances what she should be doing and what she should be focusing on obviously she will review decide what she takes what she doesn't take but obviously with this money dilemma is not just me saying what she suggesting what she should be doing however it's a community thing where we als also come together and give our inputs based on experience and knowledge because I know that I learn a lot from you, you learn a lot from me. With that being said, I'll see you guys on the next one. Please take care and stay safe. Bye.