I am in data and it feels like salaries have gone backwards lately, while jobs are also harder to land.

Is this mainly a data or tech thing, or are people seeing it across the board?

Also curious if people’s mindset around job hopping has changed. A few years ago, moving every 1–2 years felt like the easiest way to get a decent salary bump. Now I am considering staying in a role I really don’t like just because the market feels rough.

Author and former banker Satyajit Das describes the US economy as the critical "stress point" for the global bond market.

Major financial players are already stepping back from their once considerable exposure to the US.

It was recently revealed that the Reserve Bank (RBA) reduced its holdings of US dollars (in its foreign reserves portfolio) by 10 per cent in 2025, taking it back to 2012 levels.

the manager of Norway's $US2.3 trillion ($3.2 trillion) sovereign wealth fund has proposed reducing its exposure to US Treasuries.

The manager of the fund, Norges Bank Investment Management, is now looking at reducing its investment in government debt from 70 per cent to 50 per cent of its total bond holdings, with US Treasuries getting the biggest cut.

It’s my birthday in the coming months and want to invite a few good friends out to dinner to celebrate my birthday. I’ve always grown up with the idea of everyone paying for themselves. The wife says we should pay for everyone since I’m inviting people out. Is there a right answer?

I was set to receive an inheritance of about 125k but over the 10 years it’s been compounding the balance is now at 235k. I will receive this money in the next year. I’m 23, currently doing my Masters abroad so will use some of it to cover some related costs (but I don’t pay tuition as I have a scholarship). When I get the money what’s the best course of action? Chucking it all into a HYSA? Spreading it out across a few accounts? Buying a property? I’m very lost with finance and the market right now. A few years ago everyone was telling me to get on the property market ASAP but it seems that sentiment has changed and the market is fluctuating right now. I also wouldn’t mind buying a house overseas somewhere to live in for a few months of the year and rent it out for the rest of the year. But would like to have the money for a few years to see if it can gain any more interest. Any advice is appreciated! I currently bank with Commbank who has a 4.5% interest rate but up to balances of 100k.

If housing prices are falling due to tax changes surely that means that the prices were not driven by supply as much as we were led to believe.

Perhaps I am a novice but why is the falling house price touted as a negative impact from the tax changes. Surely this is a positive thing, as it provides a pathway to home ownership for more. I understand the negative equity part but realistically if you bought a place recently chances are you want to live in it for a while and price fluctuations in the short or medium term should not matter as much. And for those whose wealth dropped, in Australia since wealth is tied to housing it probably dropped in line with everyone else and such your purchasing ability hasn’t changed?

I’ve been rejected and called a ‘red flag’ by one guy I was seeing for having a significant HECs debt doing an essential degree which has been reduced by the recent policies luckily. He asked and I answered honestly as it was 8 months in and things were going well.

Another guy (tradie) found it a negative because he was looking for someone to build a future with and by a property it affects borrowing capacity significantly. He owned a unit and didn’t want any hurdles to get a PPOR.

Is this the new normal?

Everyday, I get bombarded by articles on how the bond market is fecked.

So, if the bond market really starts a crisis, what would be a way to protect your assets (shares, super, cash)?

Hi all, I’m curious to do a sense check to see what you think a household income needs to be in order to send your kid/s to private school.

Obviously a lot of factors go into this decision, such as number of kids, existing debt, school choices, family upbringing etc., but have you seen any obvious “tipping point” in households where the thinking is “we earn x and we choose to send our kid/s to private school”?

Hoping to hear any thoughts out there on what’s common in your circles (and also what’s you think would be a reasonable HHI), thank you!

You save about $50K of expenses per year on rent, food, utilities and internet.

Supposing you finish university at 21, and you stay at home until 35, that is 14 x $50K of after tax dollars not even accounting for inflation = $700K saved.

Enough for a house deposit and a bit left over for your offset.

I cannot think of a greater guaranteed ROI.

Hey all,

It’s not something that I have seen discussed here very often but I wanted to know if anyone has some cleaver strategies for helping keeping medical expenses down.

I don’t have any diagnosed condition, but you go to the GP then they send you off to a blood test, then you have to go back to the GP, then wait six months and go back to the go, back to the blood test, back to the GP. In my situation they sent me to a specialist because my LDLs are persistently high, the specialist sends you off to a scan of the heart, then you go back to the specialist. So far all the tests except LDLs have come back healthy, which I am happy about but it’s been a long expensive journey to find out nothing is wrong.

It just adds up, especially the repeat visits. The costs are kind of hidden. $100 for a GP visit is actually $200 because you need two appointments. The specialist is a romping $500. And that’s all after rebates.

For private health insurance I have hospital cover and accident with small extras.

I wouldn’t mind so much if I knew what I was about to walk into but it’s so unclear, inefficient because you need to keep coming back, and transparency… forget about it. You really have to ask about costs and get an explanation then it somehow costs more than what they expected.

Am I doing this like an absolute battler or is this just the way.

Anybody have experience in the long term debt recycling ETFs against your home ?

I've been doing rough calculations purely on the numbers side. I understand it eventually because of a matter of risk tolerance and I'm hoping to get other opinions or real world examples.

There were a few assumptions/averages I used.

100k salary

100k borrowed

6% interest against home

Invest in Asx200, 3-3.5% dividend yield with franking credits. About a 4-5% average growth rate.

* This is with no money owing on your home. So it's not investing Vs keeping money in offset.

After the maths, dividends + franking against the interest on the loan with tax deductions against your income it's roughly net 1-1.3% PA to hold the 100k whilst it benefits from the 4-5% compounding growth.

So yeah. Does anyone have any experience doing these methods with larger capitals? How has it worked out for you? And when is it simple when it comes to tax time?

Web Developer, late 20s (no kids or mortgage). 4.5 yrs experience earning 90k pa. Company is being folded, so I have the opportunity to take a generous redundancy (~23k) or transfer to another with all my same benefits (employment duration, leave, etc).

I live in a fortunate situation where my monthly expenses are probably about ~2500 (inc. rent). Part of me wants to take the redundancy and look for a new job/travel, but the job market for developers right now is incredibly poor unless you are a senior. With the market also heading for a recession, it doesn’t fill me with a lot of hope.

On the other side, the rest of my team is transferring over. My head of department has told me I am earmarked to be the first person to be awarded a pay rise (110k), but that will take some time. The company I would transfer to is a well known one, with a much better system and culture than the one I am at now. It’s also a better prospect for career development than freelancing.

Our department that is transferring is quite profitable, so I don’t believe there would be another round of redundancies then.

Really looking for some advice here as I feel I am stuck in the middle.

Edit: Also to note I have (~10k) in freelancing money coming in in the next month or two and this might be a viable side income but not consistent or secure

Saw a post here from a 26yo in Sydney on $90k with ~$150k saved/invested, and a lot of the comments were basically:

“26 and still at home? Your parents probably just want you out.”

Which got me thinking — in the current housing market, is 26 actually that old to still be living at home?

If you work full-time, contribute to the household and can save an extra $20k–30k+ a year, is moving out just for “independence” really worth it?

Or do you think there’s an age where you should move out regardless?

25? 30? 35?

Curious where AusFinance draws the line.

For people that had no family, no support from parents and had to start from zero late in life, how did you build some financial security?

I'm 33m, I earn about 125k a year as an academic at a top Uni. However I only have about 10k in savings, 5k in ETF since about a year, and my super is at 75k. No debts. I have a BSc, MSc and a PhD in CS.

And yet I feel so lost and behind. I grew up in a small island in Europe, grew up lower class almost poor in a messed up dysfucntional family. I rebuilt a life in Australia after getting BSc and MSc (for free thankfully, PhD in Aus gave me a stipend) but I do not know anyone that started from nothing and idk what to do now. Every one I know who is doing well had help from parents at some point (maybe a bubble since I work at a top Uni). If it was not a deposit for a house it was help with rent or tuition, money invested early on, job through family friends or just straight up a bit of money here and there which helped them save more.

So how do people actually build something from zero? Or am I just cooked and I should resign to the fact I'll never see retirement or a house of my own? Is social mobility really this bad in Australia and a respectable life is unachievable without generational wealth??

I swear it used to be that any time u tried to cancel a plan or service the would instantly being trying anything they can to keep you but it seems that isn’t a thing anymore.

Just changed mobile phone providers with not attempt from previous provider to sway my decision.

I’ve changed electricity providers 3 times in the last 12 months only 1 of them called after the fact but it was a token offer at best. Called current provider (AGL) today trying to get them to at least match the current offering from origin. While the lady on the phone was lovely and did her best there was no real attempt.

Anyone had any luck lately trying to get companies to at least come to the table?

Is this normal? I sent 130 invoices all clearly labelled and in folders according to if it’s a deduction or income. I have only 1 PAYG job and a short term rental.

The accountant came back and asked me to total everything up and summarise it all and work out the square metres of the rental and how many days I rented it.

Basically, I thought that’s what they actually helped with? I don’t understand how they might add value at this point?

Maybe I’m just grumpy. Why bother getting that all together and uploaded when I could just do one spreadsheet for them to copy into the form… what am I missing?

One of my older cousins asked if she could borrow some money to go overseas for a vacation. When I questioned the logic she said that everyone does it these days. Has anyone else here seen this ? We're in our 30s so its not like were children anymore.

Edit: I am from Canada hence why i say vacation

I'm launching app with unique features similar to people to people buy/sell but it's across countries.

Not monetizing at start for few years so, practically no revenue, no tax.

What's pros/cons registering company in Australia, and what if register offshore but app available for users in Australia?

I got this in an email from Suncorp today:

We're writing to share an update about Suncorp Bank and ANZ. It's been Suncorp Bank's privilege to stand by our customers for over 120 years, through challenges, progress and change. Now it's time for us to grow, and we're doing this by becoming ANZ.

I know they got sold to ANZ recently, but didn't realise they'd just merge everyone into the ANZ product suite. The rest of the email talks about getting info from ANZ towards the end of this year, then basically you'll have a new ANZ account in early 2027.

My main concern with that is the fact that I don't pay any package fees with Suncorp despite having 3 mortgages + a CC with them, and never have done. Let's see if they grandfather those fee waivers.

I will appreciate the increased number of branches though. I rarely have a need to go to a branch, but when I do there's 1 in the Melbourne CBD and never more than 2 people working there.