I posted this in the Sharesies Reddit but this might be a good location too. I want to help save other people being charged for something that doesn't appear to offer much, if any, value.

I tried creating a will on Sharesies.

It's a few forms and then they tell you to print out the document and get it signed and witnessed by two witnesses. For some reason I was assuming they were going to look after the will digitally. I guess they can't do that. I have no idea what they're charging you for though? You could just go to one of the free sites like https://everywill.co.nz/ and do the same thing for free.

I feel like a sucker.

Plus the cherry on top is they'll charge you $50 every time you modify it. Why the hell would I tell them I've modified it if I'm looking after it locally?

Interesting article, the headline paints a negative picture but the text makes it clear there are some common positive financial behaviours. If the cost of living increases stop and wages catch up, I think everyone would be in a better place. Its awful that people are forced into debt to meet their basic needs.

https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/773464/40-percent-of-kiwis-taking-on-debt-to-cover-increased-living-costs-kiwibank

The Kiwibank State of Savings Index, now in its third year, does a deep dive into New Zealanders' saving habits.

The nationwide survey was carried out by Talbot Mills Research.
It shows that while saving remains challenging, New Zealanders' budgeting and saving habits are holding steady.

This year's report found 44 percent of Kiwis regularly saved, compared with 43 percent last year.

Kiwibank chief executive Steve Jurkovich said the research showed that despite ongoing financial pressure, Kiwis continued to budget, save and find ways to make progress, from cutting spending to using new savings tools.

However, of those not saving, 61 percent said they could not save because they were prioritising surviving and could not make ends meet, while of those who reported saving challenges, 74 percent cited the cost of living as their biggest savings barrier.

Forty percent said they had taken on debt to cover increased living costs, with 19 percent turning to Buy Now, Pay Later schemes and 12 percent getting loans from family and friends.

We are seeing a definite trend of people finding that they are having to turn to and use Buy Now, Pay Later in situations like supermarkets and other places where we probably didn't historically think that Buy Now, Pay Later would be showing up," Jurkovich said.

When it comes to financial emergencies, 28 percent of Kiwis said they would not have enough in their accounts to cover an unexpected bill of $500 without borrowing it, selling something, or putting it on a credit card.

Thirty-nine percent made deliberate changes to improve savings, such as reducing discretionary spending, changing grocery shopping habits and cancelling subscriptions.

Hi, has anyone had expereince with HNRY not paying your ACC levies? I just learned all communication for my ACC went to HNRY regarding any levies, payments, letters etc and trusted it would be taken care of.

I forgot to also remove the automatic monthy direct debit from my bank account to ACC whilst simutaneously HNRY was also collecting ACC from my pay, I have cancelled the ACC AP but now wondering where the money is that HNRY is collecting from me. I had a look into MYACC for business and there is no record of any payment from HNRY going towards my account despite having filed my 25-26 tax return already. Is this normal? has someone else experienced that?

Hello! I am trying to create a budget so I can better manage my money. I am a contractor, I will work on a job for a while and then have no job for a while, with very little job security. I enjoy the work I do so am not really looking for a more stable income source. I have a backup casual job that I work in my down periods, but I get so few shifts there that I do not consider it to be a serious source of income.

Because I have zero income at the moment, any time I spend any money (especially anything over like $20) I get really stressed out. I would like to create a budget so I don't get so stressed when I spend money. I am in late twenties, rent a house in Auckland with a few other people and am single with no dependents.

I do not count essentials like rent and bills, or subscription services and regular donations as part of my standard spending budget (I estimate all of these things together to be around $325 a week - they aren't all essentials so I could cut some of them out, been wanting to dump netflix and get a cheaper phone plan for a while).

I am only trying to figure out what is appropriate as the irregular expenses like food, petrol, entertainment, clothes/cosmetics/whatever purchases, etc. I had previously allocated myself $120/week as food and entertainment budget. I think petrol was not included in the $120 but I can't remember, I don't spend much on petrol when I am not working anyway. I am trying mostly to figure out how much people spend on food and entertainment and stuff on an average week so I can see what would be reasonable for me. I find it horrible that if I just go out for dinner with one friend it can take a quarter or more of my weekly budget for all food and entertainment so I think I am doing something wrong. Any thoughts?

Forgive me, I'm not well acquainted with Wills and Trusts, etc. I hope this subreddit is correct place.

My mother passed away a week ago, and her assets (kiwisaver and life insurance) are to go into the family trust. The family trust has nothing in it and hasn't for a long while, and we don't believe their is any bank account existing for it.

We saw the lawyers on Monday, and we all agreed the Trust was more or less defunct. The lawyers instructed us to open a bank account for the trust so that kiwisaver and life money would go into it, but that it would actually go to lawyers first? Then from the bank account we'd split the funds to beneficiaries and close the account.

Mum and dad have been with kiwisaver for years, but we don't have a branch in my city so we tried ANZ. The lady we spoke to thinks we should be able to avoid a bank account situation entirely, especially considering we'd only be opening it just to close it. We do see the lawyers tomorrow, so I can seek clarification then, but wondered if anyone else had advice or an opinion?

This is all new and confusing and I'm aware it's not going to be some quick process.

ETA: I just remembered after posting this that a legal advice subreddit exists for NZ 😅

Hello,

I'm having trouble with the IRD website.

Does anyone know how to pay a tax bill to IRD. I had similar trouble when trying to pay my student loan off. Does anyone know how this can be done?

Is there a bank account?

Thank you.

I have $40K - what should I do with it?
Don’t need it for atleast 5 years+
Currently have $80,000ish in Kernal high growth fund - should I chuck it in there

Hi all, unfortunately I'm having to relocate due to circumstances outside of my control. A family member purchased a house and is leaving town, my pets live with her, one of which has medical needs. I won't be able to find a room here where I can have them, plus I'm only currently on part-time hours and struggling financially where I am, so I'm going to be moving with her.

I've attempted to keep my job with the company I'm with and transfer to the store located in my new place of residence, but they don't currently have any positions available for me. I'm still searching for a job while hoping a full-time position with the company opens up, but I'll need an income in the meantime. I will be getting my annual leave paid out so I know Winz won't help me financially over that period, but has anyone been in a similar situation and been able to avoid the 13-week stand-down period?

Since it's a family member (mother) and not my spouse, my concern is Winz may see my relocation as voluntarily leaving my previous job without a "good and sufficient reason", which means I may be locked out of receiving Jobseeker Support for up to 13 weeks. I'm hoping it won't take that long to find a suitable job, but it's a small town with less opportunities than where I live now. Anyone know from past experience how likely it is my relocation won't be considered a good enough reason for leaving work, and if so how long a stand-down period they put you or someone you know on for a similar reason?

Thanks for reading!

Edit: I forgot to mention my mother has a dependant mother here in a retirement village who relies on her for shopping, to take her to regular appointments, and for emotional support. My mother will be travelling back here to stay with her two nights a week, until she eventually agrees to go into an assisted living facility.

If I remain here and manage to find new affordable accommodation, all of our pets will be alone for two nights a week, as she won't be able to take them with her. They're all ex-strays and aren't comfortable with strangers, the one with medical needs refuses to eat when put in a vet clinic cattery, so they're unable to medicate him. I will still be left struggling with the cost of living, and will still need to find a new job as mine isn't able to give me enough hours to live comfortably on. I'm tired of struggling to get by.

The Jobseeker Support Benefit is my last resort and will not cover all my living expenses, I'll most likely have a job within 13 weeks or am hoping to, as I'm already searching for a job at my new location. I'm living paycheck-to-paycheck right now and don't know how to manage the transition period between jobs without an income, if I don't manage to find one within the next couple of weeks.

Just spent a few weeks getting my 15 year old son a Kernel account. What I've realized is he cant actually access it, no ability to log in himself which defeats the purpose as I want him to feel he is owning it (will be his funds he is adding).

Any other providers that would do this?

I received an early inheritance 18 months ago in the form of an investment property. I sold it last month as the yields were low and capital growth was falling and now I’m looking to grow this wealth. Initially I was just going to wing it as I’d done pretty well with my stock picks on Sharesies (+55%) in a year. Luckily I didn’t invest as my portfolio has plummeted -38% in 6 weeks and gave me a massive wake up call.

I’m in the process of setting up a trust account for Kernel but realise I need some professional advice around tax obligations and structuring for the future.

My accountant is more blue collar, ok with my business but not suited to trusts and stocks.

I guess I need a financial advisor? I don’t want a cookie cutter approach as my situation is rather unique and have plenty more wealth to come + a good income. I want to be aggressive yet sensible with this early 1 million inheritance.

Long story short: I’m not after budgeting/ investing / pay off mortgage quicker advice.

Situation: middle aged NZ couple with mortgage, stable income, kids and all the usual expenses. I am the one who deals with our finances.

What I need help with: over the years while income has grown we have continued and ended up with a mishmash of various accounts, a main Bills account, and a credit card that we somehow use like a debit card - meaning we’re getting all the inconveniences of a debit card and none of the benefits of a credit card. It’s all got a bit messy and I’m about to set up an offset facility again on home loan so felt it’s timely to streamline the basic structuring of how we manage finances and cashflow.

Question: WHO can I sit down with to help me organise it all? I feel like it’s the kind of thing a parent should be able to pass on but I didn’t get that. Mortgage broker doesn’t go deep/detailed enough, Bank obviously won’t give advice, financial advisors only seem interested if we want to invest a large chunk of funds. So who the heck can I get this basic practical advice from??? I’m talking real back to real basics for streamlining stuff.

Any constructive suggestions? TIA

My partner and I are sitting at about $600k net worth at 36/38 (so, $300k each, mostly tied up in property).

We've been pretty much flat lining for a good few years for a few reasons...

• We've just gone through the young kids phase, and we're now home schooling, so effectively have been/will continue to be on one income (partly because my partner is a qualified teacher who's really passionate about high quality education, partly because we live 45mins from the nearest school, partly because we value the flexibility).
• My industry (residential architecture) has been in shambles for the last 3 years, and since then my business has only been doing about 30-40% of what it can do in a healthy economy (only around $40k revenue lately, abysmal).

For the last 3 years we've been going backwards by about $10k per year (drawing down on our revolving credit mortgage).

Other than the cashflow stress since the economy turned to shit, we love our life.

We live in a beautiful part of the country, on a lifestyle block that we've created from scratch to suit us. We have plenty of autonomy/flexibility, the lifestyle we enjoy costs bugger-all, and when the economy picks back up I'm confident we'll be able to start moving forward again (should be able to put away about $60-70k pa).

But!

I don't really know where others are at/whether we're falling behind in a big way, and whether the state of the economy might just be the new normal/my business may not pick back up food a long time.

Just looking for a little perspective I guess.

Hi there, just wanting to know how tax would work once working in the UK.

Do we also pay tax in NZ?

We want to send money back weekly to invest in NZ from the UK. Would we pay tax on any of that? Or if we save up a good amount and send back to help pay off the mortgage?

I’m buying a home with KiwiSaver. $123,000 available for a 30% deposit, but my broker is suggesting putting down a 20% deposit and leaving $40,000 into a “revolving credit facility” that I can loan against at 5 % interest. I don’t really understand why I would have to loan myself my money?

We’ve got a 3 bedroom home in Canterbury and average around 1000 kWh per month in usage between 2 ppl and our cat.

Harrisons Solar is coming tomorrow to give us a quote for solar panels and give us their spiel but wondered if people with solar panels can advise on:

1. Selling back to the grid - is it easy to do/setup or something you need to manage all the time? We’re particularly interested in selling back at peak hours if possible.
2. I haven’t seen anything about maintenance, do you need to clean them or anything? Is there a cost?
3. If you’ve sold a home with solar panels installed did that add any value to your home? And did it make your house harder/easier to sell?
4. Has anyone ever rented a home out that had solar panels installed? How did you make that work?
5. Any other pitfalls or advice about what to look out for would be much appreciated.

Edit: Thanks for all the advice everyone. Harrison’s were professional today and not sales pushy which I very much appreciated. They quoted $14k-$16k for 12 panels (more expensive if you get the fancy ones). As I work from home a day setup is likely best for us. Still wondering about selling a home with solar panels on though, is there any data about impact on home value?

I'm wondering if there's any serious savers out there like myself, I'm 31, and my bank balance is pretty postive. I've been working since I was finished school at 17, but I've only worked Hospitality jobs, so minium or just slightly above. I've been fortunate and always tried to find jobs that have been remote, beautiful places, that I wouldn't be able to usually go to for a holiday, but would happily work there, in turn they usually supply accommodation or I pay a little rent with bills included, it's been how I've worked for the past 12 years. My holidays are always very basic, where I still, even on holiday try and live really cheaply, but I still enjoy them, usually hiking, camping and cycling. Working in Hospitality has its positives aswell, as my weekly shop is small.

I'm fortune that most of my pay check I'm able to save, my only out going bill is for my phone, I don't have other luxurys.

All my saving have usually gone into term deposits, and when kiwi bank had the 6% interest rate , that was great. But for the past 6months I've changed them into funds, might be a gamble, let's just see.

But by living this way, I've managed to save 300k. I am proud of that, and it's not a brag, I'm just wondering if there are other people in the same situation as me, that have been able to save a lot of there small income over the years. I don't own anything really to my name, other than a few hobbies and clothes.

We are saving for a holiday, popping money away each fortnight, have a few grand in there. We did think about term deposits but rather have the funds easily accessible because if deals for our destination pop up, we will buy those as they become available.

Current bank interest rate is around the 1.75% with Kiwibank, though I wondered about the sharesies saving account (2.55% rate) but I’ve never used Sharesies before so unsure if I’m missing something as to why their rate is higher by more than just a couple of percentage points.

Thoughts?

The problem:

I am currently a team lead earning slightly under $30 an hour in a trade-adjacent job unrelated to my study (computer sci). I graduated a few years ago, and I've never worked in the field or anything related to it, even an office job.

I am working 40-45 hours a week. Each year out of study my skills and interview skills for the roles I seek decline. I've struggled to juggle my health and keeping my skills relevant. At university I developed high blood pressure presumably due to stress and eating habits trying to keep costs low.

I've done something similar again while trying to maintain my skills and apply for jobs while working. This past year I started falling asleep at work or on the couch due to cutting sleep and eating cheap trying to keep up with my uni skillset/apply for jobs/and keep costs down.

When properly taking care of myself, I am actually still not able to save that much because the sheer amount of food I need to eat being a big guy, working in a very active job. Same with sleep requirements, I really need about 9 hours a night to not get fatigued. This leaves me little time to do much else besides work and manage my basic responsibilities on weekdays.

My current financial situation: Save about $200-300 a week. Ultimately not a whole heap goes into investments due to general stuff that comes up. I have 10k in general savings, 10k in my kiwisaver, and a couple thousand in stocks, as well $20-30k in appreciating vehicles I have stored at home.

My options:

My family lives incredibly rurally, in a property I am inheriting at some point. If I move back home, I can work any job and save a ridiculous amount due to mimimal living costs. This would make it incredibly hard to attend interviews (would have to fly out), but it isnt really even a huge concern because Ive only had 1 interview relevant to my degree in the last couple years.

The other is to continue as I'm going right now, where I feel I am spinning my wheels, and I am barely able to keep my skills relevant, where really I feel I am stabbing blindly at getting a relevant job considering my studies have not really set me up with any particular skillset at all.

My husband and I are going overseas at the end of August, we both have American Express Airpoints Platinum cards, and travel insurance is included as a benefit. I have booked our outbound flights + accommodation on my Amex card, we have have booked the return flights on my husband's Amex card - will we be covered? I know usually the terms are at least all the flights must be booked on the card for the insurance to kick in, but not sure if it will apply here.

And yes, I've tried to call Amex, they don't know and told me to call Chubb, their insurance provider and no one is picking up the phone.

My wife and I have private health insurance with Southern Cross and are thinking about adding our two daughters (both under 3) to our plan.

Obviously doctors visits are already free for kids and children are probably prioritised in the public system, but I'm just wondering if its worth having the private option available to them.

Our monthly premium would be increasing from $190 to $300 to add them both.

Any experiences with public healthcare for kids that made you wish you went/had private?

I am a bit late to understanding how FIF works, I have almost 100k in managed PIE funds and I've realised I should be taking advantage of the FIF exemption for the first 100k. I'm thinking of selling a large chunk of my PIE funds e.g. 50k and putting it into VOO ESG (I will not invest in oil or weapons) or a similar ETF to fall under the FIF exemption. After that first big deposit I'll continue controbuting regularly until I hit 100k then put the rest into PIE. Is this the best way to do it?

What platform is best to do this on? I have sharesies, investnow and kernel but I have heard sharesies has high fees, investnow only has vanguard select exclusions which includes oil, and Kernel is all PIE. I have heard interactive brokers is good?

Advice really appreciated!

I’m interested in knowing where other folks in the same life stage as me are at with their money numbers. I have been absolutely struggling since Covid even though I’ve never worked so hard in my life. I’m 33 now and making around $72k per year as a marketing coordinator. Been looking for a better job, can’t land one it seems

My investment portfolio is only around $500 so far. Just started again this year in hopes I’ll thank myself later.

Household income is around $88k with two people, no kids.

Our home is worth around $650k, $420k still owing

We only have $8k in savings, which is dropping rapidly.

We see our friends all going overseas and it’s really hard, how are people doing this?!

People say many are struggling and I see that but I also see a lot of my pals driving new cars, doing yearly trips, having outings often

I’ve listened to many podcasts and books on money but my situation gets worse and worse. I used to be ahead for my age!

Edit: thanks everyone for your comments and confirming what I suspected was the main issue. He really has been putting in a lot of effort to finding better work.

I fell completely stuck. I don’t want to leave him but conversations around income have been a very tough time. Often ending in tears from both. I will revisit a conversation again with him this evening.

Hi All, I’m looking for investment advice/answer.

Over the past few years, I’ve been struggling to cover my living expenses. Most of my money went toward international tuition, visa fees, and living expenses. Now I'm in a more stable position and starting focus on investing.

29, no debt, love to travel. My long-term goal is retirement and not planning to buy first home, as that still feels unrealistic for me at this moment. As a beginner, I have a few questions below

Current financial portfolio:

• Kernel KiwiSaver: about 11k, DIY profile (85% Global, 15% Global ex-US)
• InvestNow: $6500 in Foundation Series US 500 unhedged. I also have $20k in a term deposit that I'll invest once it matures. My plan is DCAing $350 per week.
• Emergency fund: $10k
• Travel fund: start saving for now till next trip

Questions:

1. Should I invest 10% of my investment portfolio to QQQM or VT on IBKR?
2. Should I buy VOO directly through IBKR until I reach the $50k FIF threshold (or even $100k later), then switch to InvestNow? Or would it be better to simply continue DCAing through InvestNow. My concern about is InvestNow doesn’t show live market price, so I'm wondering if I'm missing opportunities to buy at lower prices compared with investing directly through IBKR.
3. Should I keep my emergency fund in my savings account/term deposit, or would it be better to put it somewhere with a higher interest rate, like Squirrel or Kernel Cash Plus? (80% sure I wont touch this fund until end of this year)

 Appreciate any thoughts in advance.

Looking for some feedback on how to best split my cash reserves between my bank savings account and Kernel’s Cash Plus Fund.

​I currently have $16,000 in total cash and want to keep it liquid/safe, but I want to optimize the yield and tax efficiency

Currently $6000 in kernel cash fund and $10k in bank savings account. Adding $200 per week into kernel cash fund

My Question for the Sub:

​Does a $2k / $14k split feel right? Is $2,000 enough to leave in a standard bank account for immediate access, or do you keep a larger immediate buffer?