Behind the budget
Behind the budget

Ben's money journey

Ben, a flight instructor from South Canterbury, shares how self-funding his aviation training taught him to be disciplined with money. With BudgetBuddie, he’s now tracking his net worth, setting savings goals, and building toward a more secure financial future.
June 11, 2025
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4 minute read

Tell us a bit about yourself

I’m 22 and from South Canterbury. I’m a flight instructor with the local aero club teaching people how to fly and achieve their aviation goals. I’ve always been careful with money as my flight training was/is super expensive and starting at 14 years old paying for it myself took a lot of hard work and budgeting.

What's your money story?

To fund my flight training I started with a paper run, then got a permanent part time job before school at the local supermarket, which then turned into afterschool as well. Working this much funded my flight training and I had to watch my pennies to ensure I could afford my flight lessons when I needed

What drew you to BudgetBuddie?

I saw posts online about the upcoming app and was interested. I wanted a way to track my money better and the UI looked easy enough to do. When early bird sign ups came out I signed up before app release and was eager to get started when the app released and more features released as we’ve gone.

How has BudgetBuddie changed the way you think about and manage your money?

For me it’s allowed me to save better. Setting goals in the app has kept me on track and reaching these goals is a great feeling. It’s allowed me to save for things I want such as further flight training and also the needs like paying for wisdom teeth removal. It’s also allowed me to have a better picture of my overall financial situation, with a huge student loan the net worth feature helps me understand where I stand and again allows me to set goals based on this picture. The budget feature keeps me on track and it was scary how much I was spending on things like eating out, but now it’s more controlled as I don’t want to just my budgets

What’s a money goal that really matters to you, and how is BudgetBuddie helping you work towards it?

For me my main goal currently is to have a positive net worth. With the big student loan I’d love to get into a positive net worth which I can easily see in the app. Both sides are improving and tracked with my student loan decreasing and savings increasing. With student loan being 0% interest putting my savings to work in investments seems smart and again can be tracked in the app.

What would you say to someone thinking about using BudgetBuddie?

Do it! The app has helped me have a better understanding of my financial position and achieving your financial goals is so much easier when you have this understanding

Still need help? Get in touch.
Date:
June 11, 2025

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