This week’s interview is with Araminta from Financially Mint. On her site, you can find her dishing out great financial advice to college students and those who recently graduated. It also turns out we have similar tastes in books! Hope you enjoy the interview as much as I did and if you want to see more check out the rest of my Interview Series.
Fill the readers in on your background. What drove you to start your blog?
Like many other personal finance bloggers – by reading a mind-blowing personal finance book. I read ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ and my life changed: ‘I don’t actually need a job to earn money?’ ‘Investing isn’t only for the rich?’ ‘Finance is actually interesting?!’ I was a college student (still am) and couldn’t believe my eyes. Why had no one told me about this? I was suddenly desperate to learn as much about finance as I could. But I didn’t know where to start and I didn’t know who to talk to – so I turned to the internet. I discovered the amazing personal finance community and spent hours reading up on all the information I could find.
There was a ton of good info, but I still felt there was something missing: personal finance specifically for college students. So I created Financially Mint: a website/blog that helps other students learn about money and how to manage their money in college. I read, I curate content, I do experiments and I interview experts. Learning about money along with my audience means I explain the topics from a similar and relatable perspective, which in turn helps me understand the issue way better.
What’s the most interesting or useful financial advice you’ve ever received?
Gosh, as someone who goes through a ton of financial advice everyday I wouldn’t know where to start. I guess the financial advice that impacted me the most would be ‘pay yourself first’. It’s an amazing tactic that really forces you to be clever with your money. I also love the ‘don’t work for money, make money work for you’ mentality. Once you realise that money is just a tool you really do free yourself from the burden of spending your entire life working for money.
Related: Start Tracking Your Finances in Under a Minute
If you could travel to any period throughout history, which would you choose and why?
Good question – I think I’d love to travel to the 1960s. The Information age was just starting and things were developing quickly. New technology, new discoveries, more open-mindedness. The past 50 years have been so full of innovation and human advancements – I’d love to see it with my own eyes.
What’s one piece of financial advice you didn’t listen to, but wish you had?
Even though I haven’t been managing my own money for that long (still in college hehe) I have made a few financial mistakes here and there. I once put some money into a robo adviser platform before realising I should first be maxing out my ISA (IRA in the US). I then had to transfer all my money over which took ages and cost quite a bit. Not a huge mistake, but it won’t be happening again. Do your research, kids.
I think reading every day is one of the best ways to learn. What’s your favorite book (can be non-financial) and why?
Totally agree. My goal for the moment is to read one productive book a month and fiction on the side. My favourite book at the moment has to be Deep Work by Cal Newport. It’s changed my entire working life and tripled my productivity. Amazing.
You write a lot of great articles geared toward college students. What’s your top financial advice for someone in college or recently graduated?
Read my blog! Jokes. But yes – the underlying message is: educate yourself. Whether it’s through blogs, newspapers, newsletters, mentors, etc. I go on and on about this in pretty much every blog post I write. Before doing anything with money, educate yourself: understand it, practice it and apply it. It’s what’s missing in college, so it’s up to us to educate ourselves.
Do you think more personal finance classes should be taught in college? What’s the one topic you wished everyone had to learn?
Of course! I’m sure a lot of society’s current problems would be improved on if kids were taught about money in high school and college. Specifically, I think the topic of budgeting would go a long way – it helps student be aware of money inflows and outflows and helps create a system to manage it. Once that foundation is in place we can work on other topics: making money, investing, etc.
What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done to save money?
Wow there’s a lot of those – I couldn’t really count. The one that stands out the most is getting free accommodation to save money. I use an app called Couchsurfing that basically let’s you stay with people for free. It’s not as dodgy as it sounds: people leave reviews, you have to have photos and some have to be verified. I’ve done a lot of Couchsurfing and pretty much all experiences have been really great. Just one of them have been a little too crazy (cabin in the middle of the woods), but it turned out ok. Remember to always have your wits about you!
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