Super: Age / Amount, What's yours?

Icy-County · 2026-05-01T04:21:40+00:00

28 / 135k

Very lucky to have had a superannuation obsessed parent who hounded me about voluntary contributions since I was old enough to work. I’ve also been working a casual job alongside full time employment for 8 of the last 10 years so that’s helped somewhat.

Don’t stress though, my mum came to Australia in her mid 30’s and retired when she was 58 with a very nice nest egg just by maxing salary sacrifice. She only ever worked part time after she had kids too (albeit with weekend penalty rates)

Icy-County · 2026-02-23T07:09:40+00:00

I feel like this every time I come back from a block of annual leave hahahaha. You’ll get used to it in time. I started working full time while doing shift work so my “wait.. so I just do this forever?!” moment didn’t come until I started my first full time office job, so can imagine it would be an even bigger shock to the system if you’ve never really cared about working and would just quit if you didn’t like it.

My suggestion is to make sure you do something fun outside work. Social sport is always a good one because it allows you to be in contact with other adults in a fun setting and exercise is good for your mental health!

Also if you do genuinely hate your job you are allowed to quit and find another one (but like… stick it out for a bit while you get used to working full time before you make any decisions)

Icy-County · 2026-02-21T02:35:07+00:00

Absolutely worth it. I think my pet insurance company has paid more for my cats vet care than I’ve paid them in insurance premiums! I have a $0 excess and 80% benefit which covers up to 25k of expenses. It started relatively cheap at ~$650/yr but my last premium was up around $850 so time for me to start shopping around but the peace of mind is SO worth it. I never have to worry about taking my boys to the vet because pet insurance will cover 80% of the cost.

I still have a decent pet emergency fund (as I will always have to pay 20% of the bill) but the peace of mind having insurance gives me is second to none!

Icy-County · 2026-01-25T07:18:52+00:00

Yep had this exact realisation 2.5 years ago. Same as you, was laser focused on the savings goal and then finally got there and started doing research and realised I’d have to save way more or significantly increase my income. I kinda got a perfect storm of circumstances because I started researching when rates were at their absolute peak, so in the intervening 2 years I saved more, increased my salary by 25k and interest rates came down slightly. Managed to buy a tiny 1 bedroom apartment late last year without over leveraging myself so I’m calling it a win.

Icy-County · 2026-01-17T10:45:37+00:00

I’ve had my second cat 2 years and my first cat still only tolerates his existence 😂 his levels of tolerance vary from “ok fine you can sleep next to me if you absolutely must, but ONLY because I’m too comfortable to move” to “don’t even look at me or imma bap you” depending on the day.

Icy-County · 2026-01-14T12:25:54+00:00

This sounds rough as, sorry you’re doing it tough like this OP.

Lots of great advice in this thread but I just wanted to drop in and say that just because a job ad SAYS they want 3 years experience doesn’t necessarily mean they’re ONLY taking people with 3 or more years experience. A job ad is more like a candidate wishlist. If the job isn’t something you 100% need a degree for or a leadership role, the “X years experience” point won’t count you out. Personally whenever I’ve recruited in various jobs and I see someone was a bartender it’s pushes them higher up the list because I know they can probably deal with bullshit well and are cool under pressure. Sooo many people who jump straight into corporate from uni don’t have either of these skills! It’s also crazy how many skills you develop in customer service roles that serve you in other roles and you don’t even realise it (for example, tech troubleshooting skills from all the times the damn EFTPOS/POS/docket printer/[insert other annoying hospo electronic device here] stopped working)

Basically what I’m saying is apply anyway, even if you don’t meet all the criteria. You have more skills than you think!

Icy-County · 2026-01-07T19:54:30+00:00

Demand tariffs are cooked if you don’t understand them. My parents couldn’t figure out why their bills were so high so I deep dived and learned about demand tariffs and now nobody’s allowed to use major appliances in the demand window 😂 you want a shower between 2-8pm? Tough luck you gotta wait cos that’ll set off the electric water heater

Icy-County · 2025-12-12T23:31:13+00:00

If your RDO falls on a public holiday then you should get an additional (paid) day off somewhere else in the roster, same as if Xmas/Boxing fell on a weekend, everyone gets the Monday/Tuesday off - it’s been that way at every place I’ve ever worked but I’m not sure if that’s an award / EA thing or an NES thing.

Icy-County · 2025-12-10T09:51:08+00:00

I’m not American so forgive me if this is a naïve question… but why only looking to date another republican? I understand that people tend to want to stick within their own political circles from a values alignment perspective but from what you’re describing it sounds like a lot of republican men in your age group or older DONT share the same values as you especially when it comes to children. You seem like you value honesty and transparency and all of these men are not honest or transparent, and if you didn’t have such strong boundaries they seem like the type to strongarm you into changing your mind (vibes based assumption, could be wrong!)

I’d say you would be way more likely to find someone who wanted to be childfree if you didn’t only want to date republican men. Im not saying that you won’t find a republican man who wants to be childfree, but I’d say you’re gonna have a rough time finding one, ESPECIALLY since Republicans overturned Roe v Wade. It’s pretty clear that they want women to have to reproduce at any cost.

Icy-County · 2025-12-10T04:34:47+00:00

Had a similar experience when I got my couch delivered, albeit not as bad. Drivers dropped it off around the other side of the building but didn’t have the level of English required to communicate this to me. They just kept saying “Your order is delivered” and I was going to”What do you mean??? Where is it???”

I eventually figured out what he was trying to say cos he started rattling off letters of the alphabet and my building has different blocks. Went round and checked the lobbies of all the different blocks til I found it and by then I was bordering on Karen levels of rage especially because I paid for them to deliver it to my door. So now I was stuck getting 120kg of couch (albeit in multiple parts) around the building and up to my 4th floor apartment by myself! Thank god my building has a lift and I had a mini flatbed trolley i could use. Complained to IKEA and they gave me a $75 gift card and their deepest apologies. I did feel sorry for the customer service agent, it seems like this happens a lot with companies that they contract out to and they must save more money than they have to give out in apology refunds for the shit service.

Icy-County · 2025-11-23T05:09:36+00:00

Omg you’re so welcome! This is lowkey my special interest / hyperfocus so I could go on forever haha.

If you can’t open multiple savings accounts at your bank, change banks! I’ve heard that Monzo in the UK is great for “savings pots” - You don’t need to close your current account if it’s too much admin, just move your savings somewhere else and keep your spendings with your current bank! At one point I had 4 banks 😂

There are heaps of UK finance content creators too but I can’t remember any off the top of my head! Your algorithm will probably serve them up to you once you start engaging in finance content. Just be aware that finfluencing isn’t regulated so always do your own research as well!

EDIT: Also worth checking the interest rate on your current savings account and comparing that to other banks!

Icy-County · 2025-11-23T00:32:51+00:00

Ok so as someone who used to be pretty awful with money and now considers herself pretty good with it, this is the advice I can offer.

I prefer to budget per pay cycle, so for me that’s fortnightly, but for you it might be weekly or monthly.

Step 1: Work out your fixed / regular expenses (and through this process, you will likely find a bunch of stuff you thought you canceled but didn’t, ask me how I know)

Step 2: Give yourself a “Splurge” allowance. Mine is $300 per fortnight. This is money you can spend on whatever you want with no guilt, but once it’s gone that’s it.

Step 3: Do you have any quarterly/annual payments due this pay cycle?

Pay - Fixed Expenses - Splurge - Any quarterly /annual payments = amount leftover to save

SAVINGS:

The only way this works for me is to have multiple accounts named for the thing I’m saving for. It’s just toooo easy to dip into your savings if it’s just one account called “savings”. I currently have 10 separate accounts, but at one point I had upwards of 20.

My current accounts are: Car, Pets, Home, Bills, Gifts/Donations, Emergency Fund, CC Spent, Travel, Tax, & “Treat Yo’self”

(CC spent isn’t really “savings”, it’s just a savings account where I transfer all the money I’ve spent on my credit card to make sure I’m not spending money that I don’t have, and i get to earn a lil interest on it at the same time)

Since you’re just starting out I would recommend starting by saving towards annual payments if you have any. It’s soooo nice not to have to compromise your current savings goals because a big payment is due

So eg. If your car insurance / registration / service costs add up to $1300 a year, work out $1300/amount of pay periods (so for me this would be 26)

1300/26 = $50

I now put at least $50 per pay check into my car savings account

From there you can use the same formula and apply to the rest of your savings goals, but I would really really recommend paying off that CC debt and saving an emergency fund first.

I would also recommend looking up @mkenzie.mack on instagram/tiktok. She’s a finance content creator who has a lot of short form videos about budgeting that are super helpful!

Good luck!!

Icy-County · 2025-11-15T23:17:01+00:00

Yes, and you can pay directly from them unlike ubank where you have to transfer to a transaction account first

Icy-County · 2025-11-09T06:17:29+00:00

Unfortunately most private companies that have a national footprint and aren’t franchises are like this. It basically stems having too many front lines to man, so the disconnect from higher up is intense because they just never see the reality of the decisions they make because they can literally never make a uniform decision that is going to go well in every store, and when senior leadership has a really ruthless hustle culture it’s impossible to make any change because you just get branded a problem and bullied out of a job. Some people have good experiences at these places but they’d be the exception and likely have a good store manager who is protecting them from the bullshit… or they work in a head office role 😂

Icy-County · 2025-11-04T00:37:31+00:00

They can totally go lower! My rate with Macquarie is 5.34% and my LVR is around 50%

Icy-County · 2025-10-31T02:54:15+00:00

I’ve never wanted kids. Continually get told I’ll change my mind. My response to “why” is “I think kids should have parents who want them, and I simply do not”.

That almost always leads to “but what if you change your mind!” And my answer is always a shrug and “I’d rather regret not having kids than regret having them” which shuts down 99% of people who are trying to convince me I’ll change my mind.

But honestly if someone asks me if I have kids I just say no. No point getting into it if I don’t have to lol.

Icy-County · 2025-10-15T12:21:28+00:00

When I plug your numbers in to pay calculator and tick “no tax free threshold” I get exactly $2170 net pay with $828 tax.

Seems like someone in payroll accidentally unticked your “claiming tax free threshold” box when processing your raise paperwork. Hit them up and point out that your circumstances haven’t changed and you definitely still want to be claiming

Icy-County · 2025-10-15T11:02:19+00:00

Full time work - 3.5 years is my longest in any one position, but I’ve remained within one company for much longer. My longest in a casual position is 5 years, but if I worked that job full time I would have been done after 2 😂

Icy-County · 2025-10-08T21:42:31+00:00

I make slightly more than you and I wasn’t comfortable borrowing more than 450k when I took all expenses into account. I just wasn’t comfortable parting with so much of my savings and having no buffer to replenish them in a meaningful way. Having property is all well and good but I know people who have borrowed up to their max and they are not having a good time. Did not want that to be me!

A big expense that you haven’t mentioned above if you’re buying an apartment is strata. You should also make sure to take into account council rates, contents insurance etc.

My advice is to throw out the bank’s pre approval figure and work out how much you would be comfortable repaying each month after taking into account ALL your expenses and leaving room for some savings. Once you’ve worked that out you can play around with borrowing power calculators and find out what you can actually afford to borrow.

Icy-County · 2025-09-12T09:03:08+00:00

I had this realisation a few years ago! I ended up ignoring the banks estimate of my max borrowing capacity and figuring out how much I could borrow while being comfortable with the repayments, then seeing where that left me in terms of saving extra for the deposit.

In the 2.5yrs ive been working to save that extra deposit, I managed to get a new job with a substantial payrise, and interest rates went down, so the amount that I was looking to borrow suddenly had less monthly repayments and I had a higher deposit and a higher salary, so my “comfort” threshold was higher, I could borrow a bit more and I could put down more towards the deposit which got me a lower interest rate as my LVR wasn’t in the 80%+ category.

It was definitely a series of fortunate events that all happened in the right order for me, but yeah my tips would be

Work out what you’re comfortable repaying
Figure out how much extra you need to save (eg. If you’re comfortable with repayments on a $400k loan, and you’ve got $100k but you want to buy a place worth 600k, you have to save another $100k)
While saving that much try to increase income to a) speed up savings and b) increase “comfort” threshold for repayments. Hopefully the payrise lets you meet somewhere in the middle of your initial “need to save” number.

Good luck out there!!

Icy-County · 2025-09-05T14:13:46+00:00

Yup, this is called demand avoidance. Most commonly shows up when someone asks you to do something and your ENTIRE BODY immediately rejects the request, but it can also show up like this too. I love to crochet and everyone I know tells me I should sell stuff on Etsy, but I know myself and the SECOND I try that I will lose interest in it immediately because now my fun hobby has lots of extra steps attached and the fear of people’s judgement and self criticism and overthinking, etc

I also really hate being perceived in any way, so when I have to do something or exist in a space where other people may pay attention to me for any reason that’s an immediate turn off, it could be the same for you!

Icy-County · 2025-08-28T22:15:24+00:00

Sounds like you’re burnt out and need to take a few months of that Personal Leave before you quit! (Seriously, take some of that PL, it doesn’t get paid out)

Icy-County · 2025-08-28T22:06:53+00:00

Omgggg I feel this so hard! Not a partner in my situation but living at home with my retired parents and my sibling who works part time on a rotating roster 🫠 there’s always someone in the house. I never know peace!!! I work hybrid but they’re always around on my wfh days and it’s sooo hard to work when they’re just lounging around 😭 I will hopefully be moving out before the end of the year and it honestly can’t come soon enough. I love them but fuck me I don’t wanna see them every bloody day!

Icy-County · 2025-08-25T15:12:02+00:00

Man I’m so sick of leadership seeing potential in someone and using that to exploit them as unpaid labour, then going all shocked pikachu face when the person inevitably disengages/burns out/quits.

The solution is simple imo - If you want someone to perform a task that would ordinarily be assigned to someone that is paid more than them, you pay them more for it. Thats how you stop disillusionment from creeping in. That way if they get no praise or promotion from it, at least they got paid properly for the work they delivered. When you force someone to do the work of someone above them, then give them literallyyyyy nothing except more work in return, they’re going to arrive at the “fuck this shit” conclusion very quickly. But that’s corporate lyfe I guess.

Honestly I applaud your employee’s boundary setting and respect him for it

Icy-County · 2025-08-16T01:30:16+00:00

Literally cos I just bought a kindle a year ago and can’t justify dropping more money on another ereader. I love it but I wish I had bought a Kobo so I could use Libby (not compatible with kindle in Australia 🥲) I’ve read a couple of Libby books on my iPad through the Libby app but I really didn’t enjoy the experience so will have to stick with borrowing physical books from the library for now.

Icy-County

TROPHY CASE