Speaker: Simone & Peter G., Part-time worker & FIFO, New South Wales — 🏡 2 properties secured
Please tell us who you are and what you do.
Simone & Peter G.: Hi, my name is Simone. I live in Orange, New South Wales with my husband, Peter. Peter works away from home. So he's in Wagga at the moment. He does FIFO, he works in construction. We have a blended family, so I have adult children, and Pete's two school-age children, they are with us every other weekend.
Before working with Access Wealth, how would you describe your overall financial situation at the time?
Simone & Peter G.: Before working with Access Wealth, we actually felt we were in quite a comfortable financial position. Between the two of us, we had a decent amount of super. Pete works obviously FIFO and I work permanent part-time. We don't really have any children with us full-time. Like I said, Pete's 2 kids are with us every other weekend. So we were in a pretty comfortable position before working with Access Wealth.
At that stage, what challenges were getting in the way of you actually making financial progress?
Simone & Peter G.: So we didn't really see ourselves having any challenges at that time. We were basically just doing what everyone else is, going through the motions, working, and everything like that. We hadn't really put too much effort into retirement planning much more than what you already kind of would do, putting super away, etc. Etc.
Did you have any hesitations about working with Access Wealth before starting?
Simone & Peter G.: We didn't really have any concerns or doubts about property investing before we went to Access Wealth, mainly because we were just curious to start with. Hadn't really been anything that we were looking for specifically. So we kind of came in at the point of just curiosity, and then we just kind of went along with the figures and the information, and everything else like that. So we kind of came into it from I guess a different perspective, and so we didn't really have any kind of doubts or hesitations or anything like that.
If anything was holding you back at first, what made you decide to move forward with Access Wealth?
Simone & Peter G.: I think any form of financial, major financial, major life decision will always come with hesitations and concerns. It is a big leap of faith to trust people with such a significant portion of your life. So, yes, we had some, obviously, but a lot of the time we're really impressed with the information. The amount of time taken to explain things, time taken to answer questions, just to make sure all that was hesitations and concerns or anything like that was really kind of clearly explained, and we were just really impressed with the amount of information really that came along with the decisions that we had to make.
If anything was holding you back at first, what made you decide to move forward with Access Wealth?
Simone & Peter G.: We didn't really have any major hesitations. Like I said, when you have um a lot of really thorough information and you develop a rapport with people, you really kind of have a feeling for if it's right for you. And, yeah, so we didn't have too much to worry about, we personally felt that it was the right thing for us.
What was your experience like working with your strategist and the team throughout the property journey?
Simone & Peter G.: When we came on board, we actually went and purchased two properties at the one time, which was very full-on. The day after we signed on both those properties, my husband was diagnosed with kidney cancer. It really did mean a lot to have the support of John and Shannon and everybody else in the team to get us over the line. We did have hesitation and doubts at that time as if we were biting off more than we can chew, and we probably did sometimes, but at the same time, yeah, we found that we did have that support when things had to get done and everything was over our head and we had a lot of other things to worry about. We could basically just go, I don't want to worry about this, tell me what I need to do and just get it done. And we did get to do that, which was good, we were still signing documents the night before Pete was going into surgery, so that was pretty full-on. And then the back end of 6 months of last year was also very, intense, so, if you want to talk about a major life experience, doing a lot of major other life experience, yeah, the support of these people was valuable to us to be able to work through everything we had to go through personally. But, yeah, so we couldn't have continued to do what we did, in regards to investing in our future without the support of John and Shannon and everyone else who we didn't know behind the scenes. That did help, help us get to the end of last year.
Since working with Access Wealth, what progress have you seen?
Simone & Peter G.: So I think the biggest progress that we've kind of seen is more so in our super property. That's been pretty straightforward, and we just basically get set documents to sign and things like that, so and everything and it gets paid and organised and everything just basically comes straight out of super. People just tell us what to do and we just make sure we get it done and people are there to answer questions or to follow things up, so that's been really good. Equity House has just been a little bit more full on, obviously because it affects us a little bit more directly than the SMSF the super fund, so that one's been, yeah, that's just been a little bit more of a learning curve. But a long-term strategy, we know that land prices have gone up already, house prices have gone up already. So, even though we've only had the property for a few months, realistically since it's been finished, yeah, it seems to have already been making a bit of money, which has been good.
How would you describe your confidence now compared to before you started working with Access Wealth?
Simone & Peter G.: Yeah, so we've just recently rented out our first property. We're looking forward to seeing how all that develops over the next couple of months. I'm quite confident that we'll be able to see the benefits then.
What would you say to someone sitting on the fence about property investing with Access Wealth?
Simone & Peter G.: I would say you could be pretty confident with going ahead with Access Wealth. We've always found for us, especially for Pete being a very black and white type person, the information has been incredibly thorough on what you need to do, and how the figures work and everything, so you can be very confident going in and knowing that information is there for you and that it is accurate. And it is designed to do the best for you. And as with actually having to work with the people, like I said, we've worked with John, he's been a great support for us, on many levels, and he especially helps me when it comes to having to understand everything. I'm one of these people who asks a million questions and still doesn't get it. So that's been really good, but yeah, it doesn't hurt to learn. It doesn't hurt to wrap your head around what's happening and why it's important and if it fits you, but confidence wise, I'd say, yeah, I wouldn't hesitate to say that some that it's worthwhile to have a look at. If it's for you, that's great, and I think one of the best things that was there was always the option where they were quite, if it's not for you, that's fine. And I think that gave you the advantage of not feeling pressured, and at no time did we feel that we had to do anything. We were just given the options basically, and we had plenty of time to think about it on our own, plenty of time to have questions answered. We've dealt with everyone for over 12 months now, it's been a really, really positive experience, very positive.
