Pepper Raccoon, artist and merch designer, shares her tactics for creating a proper living out of being an artist.

There’s a common belief that when you’re making career choices, you have to choose between doing what you love, or making money.

While that’s sometimes true, it’s doesn’t have to be true.

Even creatives, the ones most famous for becoming starving artists, can find systems to make a living without selling out to the man.

It does, however, take a strategy. After all, if it was easy, everyone would do it.

Well one such creative was nice enough to take time out of her day to walk me through exactly how she makes a good living as an artist.

Wellingtonian Pepper Raccoon has been going for seven years now, working as a fine artist who makes pins, t-shirts, and other merchandise.

It’s going so well that she’s even had to upgrade from being a sole trader, to a registered company, a big milestone.

Here’s how she makes it work.

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Frances Cook shares listener tips for being money smart over Christmas, for everything from presents, to food, and bringing in extra cash to fund it all.

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Welcome to Ask the Experts, where each week we talk to people in the industry to get the inside word on what’s happening right now, and what that means for the tactics that you should use to make the most of your money.

This week we’ve partnered up with AMP, which has kindly leant us their expert, client adviser Devon Walen, and we’re talking about if there are times when putting more into your KiwiSaver can actually be a bad idea.

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Frances Cook talks kids and money with Chris Chang, on TVNZ's Breakfast.

Last week I was on TVNZ’s Breakfast, talking to Chris Chang about some strategies to talk to your kids about money.

Particularly with Christmas coming up, can it be a present? What’s the best way to go about it?

I get these questions in my inbox all the time, and the Breakfast team were nice enough to say I could put the audio up here as well, for you to listen to. Enjoy.

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Rachel Leutele, also known as the Savvy Saver, shares her tips for staying on a budget as a family, and changing your money to prioritise life.

Becoming a stay at home mum is something that many people would like to do, but don’t necessarily have the funds for.

It’s easy to think it’s only possible if one of the parents has a six figure income.

But this mum, fresh out of getting her law degree, decided she wanted to make the stay at home mum life work even if it meant being on a string bean budget.

She’s become really focused on ways to cut back and manage expenses, and shares that journey on her Instagram account as @the_savvy_saver.

Here’s how she finds ways to cut back, but also, throw just a few treats in there too.

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Follow Frances Cook on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, or join the Money Memo newsletter for a free weekly money tip in your inbox each week.

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Welcome to Ask the Experts, where each week we talk to people in the industry to get the inside word on what’s happening right now, and what that means for the tactics that you should use to make the most of your money.

This week we’ve partnered up with Kiwibank, which has kindly leant us their expert Hayley Tito, senior product manager for everyday banking, and we’re talking about the different bank accounts that can make the most of your money. 

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Follow Frances Cook on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, or join the Money Memo newsletter for a free weekly money tip in your inbox each week.

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Frances Cook talks cryptocurrency with Jim Mora, on RNZ's Sunday Morning.

You might have noticed that there was a fairly significant election recently, with Donald Trump once again about to be President of the US.

Well this has impacted all sorts of things, including the financial world, and one of those big impacts has been on crypto.

In true Trump style, he’s done a 180, going from calling it a scam in 2021, to now starting his own cryptocurrency, and saying that the US government is going to boost bitcoin. As you can imagine, that’s increasing the hype and sending prices, to the moon.

Well, the lovely Jim Mora from RNZ Sunday Mornings asked me to come on the radio and detangle this for him. He’s one of my favourite people to be interviewed by, so of course that was a yes. He also agreed that I could re-run the audio on this podcast, which was very kind of him.

So here’s a special bonus episode of myself and Jim talking all things crypto. Enjoy.

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Angela Strang, property investor and business owner, shares her tips for reaching financial independence.

Sometimes a difficult experience early in life will shape you, for better or worse.

For Angela, it was an early experience of finding herself as a child with her family in women’s refuge, that made her determined she would create financial stability for herself, and any future family that she had.

So as a young adult she looked for highly paid jobs, and funneled that into property investments.

But after hitting financial independence at 33, she didn’t want to stop.

Now she’s on the cusp of buying a business, too.

Why not stop and kick back a bit?

Well, because she wants to help other kids who might be in a similar situation to what she once was.

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TV presenter Brodie Kane shares her co-ownership journey, and what she learned from hosting the new TV series On The Ladder with Kiwibank.

Buying a house is far from easy, because let’s be honest, they’re expensive

Building up a deposit, getting approval from the bank, then keeping paying it off, it’s all a bit of a mountain to climb

Not to mention, if something goes wrong with the house, you’re now in charge and have to figure repairs, maintenance, and all the other very adult stuff. 

Well some people are teaming up to make these problems less scary. 

Rather than buying with a romantic partner, you could buy in with family, or friends.

Big commitment there, but for some, the only way to get into property. 

So what can go right and wrong with this, and how do you do it smartly? 

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Follow Frances Cook on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, or join the Money Memo newsletter for a free weekly money tip in your inbox each week.

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