How a 100% mortgage and tough love saved TV’s Charlene from financial ruin
Newscaster and TV presenter Charlene White has made a few headlines in her own right. In 2014 she became the first black woman to present ITV News At Ten. Later she refused to wear a Remembrance Day poppy while presenting a news bulletin, stating she wished to be impartial, which triggered years of racist and sexist abuse on Twitter. A panellist on Have I Got News For You, she recently became lead presenter of hit TV show Loose Women. Her latest project is a new ITV documentary examining where the Black Lives Matter movement has led us, just over one year on from the killing of George Floyd in the USA.
What did your parents teach you about money?
To work hard for it and prioritise education. My mum was a social worker and a foster mother who worked in children’s homes at weekends. My dad was a postman who also ran his own driving school business.
They would both leave for work at 5.30 each morning and Dad would come home at 9.45 in the evening. They paid for me and my siblings to go to a private school because when Mum first moved over here from Jamaica, she didn’t have a great experience with the state school system. Her teachers told her she would never amount to much. Both my parents wanted me to have the best possible start in life and that’s why they worked so hard.
I never went on expensive holidays or wore designer clothes like the other girls at my school. I remember being devastated when I didn’t get a pair of Doc Martens for Christmas. My parents spent their money on education, not on what they saw as non-essential items. Once, I bought a pair of Levi jeans from a friend and Dad hit the roof.
Have you ever struggled to make ends meet?
Yes, when I was in my mid-20s I wasn’t great with money and started spending on credit cards. I had two cards and I maxed them out quickly. But I would get my credit limit raised and keep spending. Sometimes I would only pay the minimum amount in repayments. This went on for years. It was bad. It got to the stage where I would ignore the bills coming through the door. The letters would pile up and I’d hide them. It was really awful.
Have you now paid off all your credit card debt?
Yes. I started dating Andy in my mid30s and we were thinking about buying a property together and linking our finances. He basically forced me to work out a plan to pay off the cards. Since then, I have
Have you ever been paid silly money?
Yes. The silliest occasion was about 10 years ago. A man was throwing a surprise birthday party for his wife in a posh hotel and wanted me to turn up and interview her on stage for half an hour. He paid me £700. I remember getting the email and thinking it was a joke. I got glammed up and turned up on stage to talk to his wife who was in a state of shock in a room full of 300 of their close friends. I left half an hour later thinking, ‘That was weird, but so much fun.’
The best money decision you have made?
Buying my first flat, a two-bedroom maisonette in 2005. I was 24. I only managed it because you didn’t need a deposit in those days – you could take out a 100% mortgage and that’s what I did. I took in a lodger to help me pay the mortgage. It was the most sensible financial decision I have ever made. If I hadn’t bought bricks and mortar I would have continued spending money and had absolutely nothing to show for all my hard work. And without that flat, I wouldn’t have been able to buy my family home later on down the line. I sold it in
2018 for nearly treble what I’d paid for it.
Do you save into a pension?
Yes, I pay into my workplace scheme. I began contributing to my pension when I got my first job at the BBC at 24. I don’t invest in stocks and shares outside of my pension.
What is the one luxury you treat yourself to?
It’s a £150 facial. I’ll lie there for two hours. Sometimes it’s so relaxing I fall asleep. Afterwards, I feel so fabulous and pampered. Normally, I treat myself twice a year. It’s something I badly missed during lockdown.