RTÉ’s financial advice guru has missed out on a career as a Riverdancer
Financial advisers don’t often get much limelight but EOIN McGEE is currently the RTÉ TV financial guru on the hit show How To Be Good
With Money. Here he shares moneysaving tips – and how Riverdance could have been his path to fame.
What’s the biggest personal finance problem you come across?
People running out of money before they run out of month. Even if somebody is on a really good salary, they can fall foul of overspending. This can be fixed very easily by just a little bit of planning. Identify the stuff you have got to spend money on – mortgage, savings, insurance, pension – and do that at the start of the month. Then spend what you have left for the rest of the month.
Best piece of financial advice?
Money mindfulness! In all the episodes of How To Be Good With
Money, the biggest surprise people got was where their money was going. It is fine when it is going to things you think are really important or value. But it is a real kick in the teeth when you place no value on what has cost you dearly.
Any choice tips on specific products – savings/mortgages?
Don’t put your child benefit in a secure but low-return bank account or State savings cert if you are saving for college – don’t use a short-term vehicle for a long-term goal.
Any deal you don’t like?
Personal Contract Plans (PCPs). Roughly two-thirds of all new cars on the road are bought using PCP. There is no way PCP suits two-thirds of new car drivers. Sometimes people understand what they are buying. Other times… I am not so sure.
First step to fix our finances?
Write down everything you spend. Don’t change any habits – just write it down. When you buy something, whip out your phone and record it. At the end of the week, write down what you have spent. Does the way you spend money reflect the things that are important to you? This is usually enough for people to want to change where their money goes and makes fixing things so much easier.
Any weird financial behaviour you’ve come across?
Somebody was borrowing money to put into savings – with the same bank! (Bank loan interest can be 100 times more than savings rates). It had some logic behind it. They felt they wouldn’t have the discipline to save but would have the discipline to repay the loan. They also felt it was good for building a good credit record. However, when they calculated how much interest they were paying the bank versus the interest on their savings, they accepted there was a better way.
Tell us one surprising thing about yourself.
I could have been in Riverdance. Well, kind of. In primary school I was taught Irish dancing by the school that provided the dancers for Riverdance in The Point. When Riverdance happened, some of the girls I went to school with ended up touring the world. I still remember when leaving primary school the dance teacher asking would I join her private dance school. I said no.
Biggest financial mistake?
I own a mobile home. It’s a depreciating asset and I have to pay site fees to have it sit on a site almost two hours from home. You can’t get near it five months of the year and it is tiny. (I have four kids and a big golden retriever.) But I wouldn’t change it for the world. It is the best worst investment I have made.
Guilty treat?
Cars. I like cars even though they are a waste of money and a cheap reliable one does the same job as an expensive, shiny one.
Three things you’d do as finance minister.
1. Make tax relief on pension contributions work like SSIAs did. Instead of putting in €10 and getting €4 off your tax bill, you would put in €6 and the government would add €4.
2. We have a maximum limit of €2m on a pension pot. This should be changed to maximum contributions – not the size of the fund (after it has grown).
3. I’d bring the exit tax rate of 41% on investments in line with Dirt tax on savings, which is heading for 33%. Eoin is founder of Enough.ie and Prosperous Financial Services in Naas, Co. Kildare. How To Be Good With Money is on RTÉ One on Thursday at 8.30pm.