Piggy Bank Disaster Turns Millennial Into Money Master

Notes from Chris

Episode 779

In 2011, Iona Bain was in her early twenties, working as a music teacher, scrimping and saving every penny she could. There was no real organization to her finances, no proper bank account or credit card. She wasn’t your typical millennial—half of them have zero savings—but she wasn’t far off.

In fact, Iona was trying to do what she could to avoid that trap. But she made one critical mistake. No, it wasn’t spending too much on clothes or partying every week. Hers was an error of a more unusual kind. Instead of using a bank account, she kept all of the money made from music lessons in a good old fashioned piggy bank in her bedroom. And the money was piling up, that little piggy bank was full to the brim of sweet cash.

But little did she know, disaster was about to strike! Iona was about to have her own Global Financial Crisis. Although it was no laughing matter, what transpired feels like it was pulled straight from the plot of a Seth Rogen movie.

Her piggy bank… was stolen from her home!

What followed was one of the most embarrassing and surreal moments of this young millennial’s life. There she was, a grown adult, explaining to a police officer, that her piggy bank had been taken by thieves in the dead of night.

To add insult to injury, the officer asked all sorts of questions to try and identify the piggy bank, should it be recovered. Where did you last see it? Was it pink? Did it have a squiggly tail?

It was at that moment that Iona knew she had to make a financial change in her life. She needed some common cents. She resolved to learn everything she could about the financial world, and take control of her monetary destiny. Step 1: don’t actually keep your money in a piggy bank.

Iona was studying journalism at the time, so she decided to write about everything she learned on a blog. Luckily—since she was broke—the cost of launching a blog was tiny. She registered a domain name and The Young Money Blog was born. There’d she’d write about financial matters that concerned her and other millennials.

She earned £15,000 (or $19,202.10) in her first year, but that annual figure has more than tripled in the last couple of years since giving up full-time work and pursuing her "side hustle" more efficiently.

For Iona, the wealth has only just began. She plans to take things to the next level by publishing more content from both herself and other contributors in 2019. She also plans on launching a course for her readers that may be struggling to improve their financial position. Along with that, she’s producing video content, as well as doing some consulting with British financial brands.

So far she has no regrets, other than not taking the blog more seriously from the very beginning. Oh, and she now keeps her savings in the bank.

 

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MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• The Young Money Blog: Ditch the piggy bank and pick up some financial cents over on Iona's blog!
• WordPress: Iona used WordPress to setup The Young Money Blog, and here you can learn how to install your own WordPress site in 5 minutes

 

SEE ALSO:

• Indian Personal Finance Blogger Rings Up $4,000/Month: Writing about money-saving hacks and passive income for readers in India yields big money for a software company employee
• Accountant Starts Net-Zero Personal Finance Hustle: An accountant finds a way to bridge the gap between financial advisers and tax professionals by transferring some of the skills from his day job to his own self-employed income
• Queer Punk Artist Starts Personal Finance Workshop: A manager for a non-profit organization who describes herself as a queer punk artist creates a series of personal finance classes

Inspiration is good; inspiration combined with action is better. Now get back to work!

Yours in the revolution,