SPEAKER_00 0:10

Hello and welcome back. We've recorded over 250 episodes and we've got our little cute badge to celebrate that. So thank you so much to all those listeners. Today I have James in the house and we're going to talk about the state of the nation. Hello, James.

SPEAKER_01 0:23

Aloha.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Aloha. James, the state of the nation.

SPEAKER_01 0:27

Oh, yeah. This is a tough one, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 0:30

It is a bit of a tough one, but at the same time, not, right? It's plain simple economics.

SPEAKER_01 0:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

People are feeling the pinch.

SPEAKER_01 0:38

Yeah, and the thing is, we were just turning a corner, right? The same as last year. Early on at the beginning of last year. Things were just beginning to turn around, a little bit of growth, and then something happens internationally, and we're sort of on the back foot again. And these things we just have no control over. Yeah. Um, you know, there's nothing we can do in in New Zealand about the things that are impacting us.

Fear Versus Opportunity In Property

SPEAKER_00 1:02

Um and that's the thing, right? We just thought that things are getting better. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, the rates were dropping, things were good, and then boom, boom, actually happened. And now we're in a state where we're getting a lot of panicked clients. Some are panicking in terms of fuel prices, the cost of living. Yep. It's the election year. We still don't know what the party's actually proposing and who's doing what. And it's for those that are worried, we can't do anything about it. Like they're just worried. But then at the same time, I'm seeing an interesting trend where I do have some investors that are seeing opportunities. And they're going, hey, I was just in this house, you know, drop down 30k and then 30k again. This is the good time to buy.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

It's a great time. And that that you know, it's been a great time even for first home buyers for a long time now. And so we just get a little bit, they've got a little bit more time now. I've been working with clients who have been trying to get their finances just to get that little bit of extra that savings, just to get it to the 10% and get their salary up a little bit so they can service a sort of low-end type property. And I was a bit concerned end of last year that they're going to miss the boat. Yeah. But now those guys have got an opportunity because those house prices aren't moving. The the sales, there's still really good turnover. So it it it works, it doesn't work for some people, but it is still a great time for first-time buyers and investors.

SPEAKER_00 2:35

Because the way I see it, you still have to pay rent. Yep. Right? Regardless whether you want to buy, skirt, to buy, whatever's going on in your life, you're still living somewhere. Unless you're living at home and mum and dad covering all your expenses.

SPEAKER_01 2:49

It's a great idea, by the way. I might go and do that myself.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

You're still living somewhere, you still have the cost of life. So um you might as well then look at those opportunities to buy a house. Because the rates, even though the rates have been increasing since we recorded our episodes last, the rates have been increasing. But they're still not at the level that they have been, at the highest level that we've had over 18 months ago.

SPEAKER_01 3:11

They're still very pretty low by historical standards. Like I'm looking at at mine at the moment and I'm going, wow, I I can uh refix and I can get uh one 1% lower than what I was sort of paying. So it's really good. And look, with the international stuff, you know, this happens quite often. We're I know we're in the middle of it, but you know, there's always throughout the last hundred years. Well, people forget there's always this we're in this moment where everything's really uncertain and stressful. It was only a few years ago that we had the U Ukraine, the Ukraine-Russia conflict.

Zooming Out With Market History

SPEAKER_00 3:48

Yep. And then prior to that we had COVID, prior to that we had financial global crisis, prior to that we had Iraq war, you know, there's always been something. And I think people forget that often there's always something going on, but unless you're living in it, you don't feel it as much. Yeah, so the idea, I guess, is to look back through the history and go, okay, that happened before, what was the outcome? That happened before, what was the outcome? And we've got this beautiful graph now in our office. And I was looking at it the other day and I was going, oh my god, actually, every time something happened, yep, things went down a bit, but then it bounced back stronger than ever.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

Yeah, we're going to be able to do that. We should share that uh graph with people. That that's a really interesting thing. Just and I'm showing this to my kids now. Uh uh giving them that chart and say, tell me what this means. And I'm like, Well, but basically, everything what all property and the financial markets, the shares and so forth go up really well over the long term, yeah, medium to long term. So it's a it's a long-term game, and you've got got to take advantage of these drawbacks, these pullbacks. Yeah. So if you've got a strong financial foundation, if you've got a job and you've got your savings, now's a really good time to be actually looking, not waiting for things to turn around. Yeah. Because if you've in that position now, you can really take advantage of it.

KiwiSaver Checks And Emergency Buffers

SPEAKER_00 5:09

Yeah. And also, like just a friendly reminder to those that do have those Kiwi savers and are looking to buy a house, you know, to make sure they review what sort of fund in. Yep. Because often people forget to review what's what sort of fund they're in.

SPEAKER_01 5:22

And we can put you in touch with people for to help you with that, you know, investment advisors to make sure that you're in the right fund. It is really important. Because we what we want you to be doing is growing, you know, achieving your your your investment goals. So buying a property is can be part of that, buying an investment property can be part of that. Putting aside as much as you can and KiwiSaver can be part of that. And then fourthly, you know, having a bit of an emergency fund for yourself. Yeah. Because if you're putting all your money into KiwiSaver and your car blows up, you know, or something happens, you do need a little bit of emergency money. You because you can't dip into that KiwiSaver. So if you are putting money into KiwiSaver, just make sure you're also putting a little money aside into your own savings as well.

SPEAKER_00 6:10

And just the fun statistics for you now that you did mention KiwiSaver, hardships are the hardship withdrawals are on the rise, but it does take over 31 working days sometimes to get it out. So, as you say, it's not a quick, easy fix to get the money out of a KiwiSaver, and you have to jump through a lot of hoops to get that money out. So definitely have a little emergency bucket.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

As well.

SPEAKER_01 6:34

And if you're going through good times, right? I know every a lot of people are going through bad times, but if you are doing all right and when things turn around, that is the time to be putting stuff away for when things aren't going all right. You know, so you you can't assume that things are gonna continue to go well for you, you know, just because you're making a couple hundred grand at the moment. That doesn't mean that you're gonna be doing that, able to do that in five years. There's always things that come up. So make the most of those opportunities when you have them.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Yeah, exactly. And as you mentioned, you know, by refixing your loan onto a lower rate, you may win a little bit of money back in terms of cash flow that might just take you through this fuel crisis for now that's costing you a bit more to fuel your car. And hopefully this whole fuel thing is not a long-term, you know, linger over. I believe there are a couple of ships on the way.

SPEAKER_01 7:25

So I think the argument, the sort of semi-argument, is that once the polls start uh not looking good for the Don, for the orange man, that he'll I mean the polls aren't looking very good for him anyway, that he'll stop doing what he's doing. But hey, who knows?

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Uh who knows? But all you can do right now is stop panicking, control what you can control, you know, grow your own vegetables. I see a lot of posts at the moment, you know, growing vegetables, swapping it with your neighbors. Just going back to the basics, going, you know, dropping those consumerism codes of hey, your kids don't need 10 different eggs for Easter. Like just, you know, step back a bit.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

One one thing you could do would easily offset the the the fuel prices, just go through your bank statement and see what you're still paying for, subscription-wise or whatever that you don't use anymore.

SPEAKER_00 8:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:14

Do you know what I mean? There's we just sort of buy stuff and everything's like the subscription model. Yeah, the auto-renew.

SPEAKER_00 8:21

And then you forget, you get it, you get into this trap of, hey, I'm just renewing this, and I don't even look at my bank statement anymore because it automatically comes out. But you're right, like a lot of clients we see, you know, they've got Netflix, YouTube, Disney, Sky. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

You don't need all of you don't actually need all of them. Yeah. I've just cancelled my Australian financial review, probably costing me$80 New Zealand dollars a month. And I cancelled my share site, which is a share management platform for my um for my investments.

SPEAKER_00 8:49

Oh, is that why you can afford now to drive to Waikano?

SPEAKER_01 8:51

Yeah, I'm I'm I'm rolling in it. So but that's those two things together is about$150 a month, and that's without cancelling, you know, any like this, you know, we'll keep Spotify. Spotify is pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

I have YouTube Premium, you know, because I hate listening to music with the interruptions. Yeah. So um, so yeah, pick your absolute non-negotiables, but pick one. Like, don't have five non-negotiables, just pick one. And for me, it was YouTube. I didn't do Spotify because I was like, well, at least with YouTube Premium, I can also watch something and listen to the music.

SPEAKER_01 9:23

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

Smart. So for me it was YouTube Premium, but Spotify, no.

SPEAKER_01 9:28

I would just love to go back to listening to CDs actually.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

Yeah, well, maybe and again, like maybe that's what you have to do as well, you know, go back to just listening to the radio at workplace or going back to the CDs and stuff. So there is a lot of things people can do to to to control their own life right now.

SPEAKER_01 9:45

Yeah, we go into it with an open mind. Yeah. Like, what do I actually need and what is a want?

SPEAKER_00 9:50

Yeah. So we've given a lot of tips here tonight, guys. I hope this has been useful. If there are anything else that you wish for us to talk about, please do reach out. And thank you so much again for continuing to support us through this journey.

SPEAKER_01 10:02

Cool.

SPEAKER_00 10:03

Bye.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

Doodles.