Comments on: Financial Focus In Your 20s – Part 1

By: Jordan

Jordan — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 21:32:27 +0000

Gail, I think what you are doing, with your articles, and your TV shows is awesome. You are the Wealthy Barber of Debt in the 20th century. I always thought everyone was doing better in my 20’s with all they did. The older I get (now 40) I realize they just decided to pay for it later. Besides a mortgage, we are relatively debt free.

By: white cardboard gift boxes

white cardboard gift boxes — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 16:51:37 +0000

I’m often excited to have a look at this blog in the evenings.Please keep on churning out the content. It’s very entertaining.

By: This and That: Housing, Retirement and more… | MoneySense

This and That: Housing, Retirement and more… | MoneySense — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 11:58:34 +0000

[...] Gail Vaz-Oxlade wrote a four-part series to help 20-somethings put down a solid foundation for financial success. The first part deal with probably the most important lesson — Learn to live on what you earn. [...]

By: This and That: Housing, Retirement and more… | Canadian Capitalist

This and That: Housing, Retirement and more… | Canadian Capitalist — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 01:34:51 +0000

By: Kayla

Kayla — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 07:14:32 +0000

@youngandthrifty
Thank you so much for your reply.
18+ college student = broke well it shouldn’t but usually that’s the case.
I’m definitly going to look into that
Cheers

By: youngandthrifty

youngandthrifty — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 03:20:17 +0000

These are all great stories!

I am turning 27 this year and I totally agree that life is really moving at warp speed! I’m considering buying a place, and being financial sound is so important!

I have come a long way from 21. I think I had about $1700 saved and now I have about $85,500. I learned a LOT from investing mistakes, spending habits etc. but there’s still a TON more to learn! (like this housing market!)

@Kayla I think if you make less than $36,000 a year, a TFSA is a better choice. The amount you put in grows tax free and isn’t taxed when you withdraw it. The great thing about a RRSP is the ability to get a tax deduction from the government. Since you likely make less than $36,000 a year (I hope I’m not jumping to conclusions here) because you’re 18, you wouldn’t get the bigger RRSP deductions.

Re: ING accounts I have an ING RRSP GIC and I love it too! The great thing about ING is that they give you $25 bonus if you put in $100 and are referred by someone. I think this is allowed for any ING account, be it high interest savings, or TFSA, or RRSP.

By: Kayla

Kayla — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 00:08:27 +0000

Hey,
Although I’m not in my 20’s yet (18), I’m trying to figure out the best way to save money. As weird as it is when I was younger(11-15) I saved constantly. However once I turned 16 and go my first car my savings started to drop off slowly. At the end of graduation, I spent a month in Greece. Which knocked my savings to practically nothing. I invested in a GIC at 17 @ 4% which is doing well and I plan on rolling it when the time comes. I recently invested in an RRSP builder account. However have been reading more about the TFSA accounts I am wondering if I made the right choice. Would setting up a TFSA ING account be practical? Is it better than getting another RRSP?

By: Mary

Mary — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:33:32 +0000

–Offer twenty-somethings some strong advice on debt repayment and you may hear, (said in a smoky drawl) “Everybody’s got debt, man. Chill.”–

That’s hilarious. Sounds identical to one of my friends who’s currently in $20,000+ consumer debt (none from school, all consumer). My other friends and I try to talk her out of dumb purchases and give her tips on her debt, but she just doesn’t listen. She says it doesn’t matter whether you die $100,000 in the red or a $100,000 in the black because she’ll be dead and it won’t matter, and she also pulls the “everyone’s in debt” thing. I don’t think she understands that going this route, she won’t ever be able to afford that giant house she wants and she’s going to run into a lot of trouble.

I’m very glad my bf and I are pretty smart with saving… yes we enjoy life’s little luxuries a little too much (trips to Vegas and Jamaica, going to pubs on the weekend) but we always do it within a budget and make sure have our savings and RRSPs untouched.

Thanks for writing this Gail! I’m off to read parts 2 and 3

Mary (25)

By: tlily

tlily — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:44:37 +0000

ING: I agree, the ING TFSA is great. And ING’s main sales message is NO FEES. That is also awesome. I’ve been dealing with them for a couple of years, no problems, very helpful. You need to be able to use a computer, though.

By: Lis

Lis — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:47:37 +0000

I am on my late 20`s and I managed to go from an annual salary of $14000.00 to $45000.00 in the past 8 years. I started at a big box store as a cashier and then moved up as cashier supervisor. Then when the store adminiastrator post became vacant I jumped on it. After 5 years with that company a position similar to mine came up with a different company. As I was close to maxing out my income at my current job and the starting rate at this new job was what I was making at the time I made the move. I was in that job for a few years and I did all I could to learns as much as possible. I then made one more move about a year ago into a government office using the administrative skills I learned on my previous jobs. I now have a nice income with potential and a oppurtunity to go to school and actually get my diploma.
My advise if you want to increase your income is never turn down an oppurtunity to learn something new even if it `not part of your job“ and work hard to give your best. If you have accomplished something good you can alway bring it to your managers attention and ask for an increase. Hey collecting $800000.00 of outstanding moneys owed to a small company by vendors in 2 months is pretty significant. Just make sure you are proffessional in your approach. What`s the worst they`ll say: no but we can discuss it at your next review.

By: Kerry

Kerry — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 13:41:32 +0000

@S, regarding raising income levels over time: I found in my 20s there was nothing like job-hopping to increase salary. You could stick with the first company out of university & slowly increase your wage or you could switch companies every year or two. I went from 40k right out of uni (1997), to 60k (1998) to 80k (1999) to 100k (2000). Had I stuck with my first company there is no way I would have increased that fast.

Having said that, as an employer now, it drives me nuts to train people only to have them ‘jump’ to another company in a year .

By: Sharon

Sharon — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 07:59:57 +0000

Oh, boy ‘if wishes were fishes, no one would starve’

In my 20’s I read every finacial advice book I could get my hands on, the problem was i didn’t *apply* any of it. Partly due to the expensiveness of where I chose to live, partly because of the people I chose to hang out with, all because of the choices I made for myself every day.

Of course, I facepalm when I start thinking of all the money I wasted, but that was then, and this is now. Everyday I get smarter, mostly through the necessity of falling hard on the cold hard ground of reality. In this case I had to live it in order to be able to apply it.

By: Lena

Lena — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 00:51:53 +0000

What a great topic! I was fortunate to be debt-free in my 20s-thanks to my parents for picking up the tuition. I did a lot of contract work yet I was still able to max out my RRSPs and save big time. Plus because I lived at home, I also gave my parents rent money. By the time I hit 30, I bought a condo (pre-construction) and put down 25%. Then I focused even more on saving to ensure that I could pay off my new furniture and start an emergency fund – which I did. Now that I’m living on my own and have a full-time job, I’ve learned to appreciate the value of a dollar more. I can’t go running back to my parents home if I have money problems and I’ve learned to live within my means.

By: Catherine

Catherine — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:53:42 +0000

Ah……..the lightbulb flickers…..I make deposits on the internet not TDCT per se. I’ll dazzle my son tomorrow with my ING savvy – he won’t know what hit him!
Thank you Rainbow and joanne!

By: joanne

joanne — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 21:30:51 +0000

Catherine; once you send them the initial cheque you will not need to send them another one (well I guess if you want to you can ) – once the account has been set up with the cheque as the deposit – the “pull” and “push” (ie; deposit and withdrawls) are done from the ING website (or via phone) – not your everyday banking account (ie; TDCT).