One of my goals has always been to live abroad, so when I got the
opportunity to move to London, it was kind of a dream come true, even
though it was somewhat unexpected.
My name is Imani Change, I'm 28 and I live in London, U.K.
My salary is comprised of both a base salary and stock and investments,
which comprises of money that is paid in pounds but also U.S.
dollars. Last year I was actually promoted to my current role as a senior
operations manager, and I became one of the youngest senior operations
managers here in Europe at that time.
Hi, welcome to my living room.
So this is actually a space that converts into a second bedroom when I
have friends and family visit.
This is my kitchen.
I definitely spend a lot more time in this space now that I've been
cooking more at home.
So I think the biggest expense that was a bit of a surprise for me when I
moved here to London, is that it is very comparable to New York City.
It's very expensive.
Renting is not as easy as it was when I had lived in Baltimore previously.
When you're looking for a place, the listing price is not necessarily what
you'll get it for. They do a whole bidding process to be able to secure a
place. And if it's in a high demand area, the price might be very
different ultimately to be able to secure the location.
What they wanted to see is that I could definitely pay my rent, so I ended
up paying the first 12 months upfront and then after staying in the place
for one month, I paid another four months.
Ultimately, that's obviously not something that's easy to do.
A big part of being able to do that was getting some support in terms of
what my relocation package was.
Welcome to the bedroom.
So it is a separate space from the living and kitchen, which I really
love. It gives us a separate area.
We actually just passed the half bath that I'll use when I actually have
guests staying with me.
And then, you'll kind of get to see the space, it has lots of closets,
which is not very common in the U.K., I find.
And then right behind me is where we have the full bathroom that I use on
a daily basis. My dad actually had a background of finance growing up, and
he always would try to teach me best practices for managing money.
Saving, I actually started at the age of five when I had my allowance.
I had to save 50% of the allowance that I made for college.
And it really helped me not only see the value in kind of having this
practice of saving some of your income for future things, but it also just
allowed me to have a better relationship with money.
One thing that makes me a little bit different than many students is I
don't have student debt.
It definitely was made possible through some of the support of my parents,
the saving that I had done when I was younger and also scholarships.
I actually moved here expecting to be spending more money and having a
bigger budget for my day to day life, but what I'm finding is that because
I'm in a pandemic, there's a lot less stuff to spend money on,
entertainment, etc.
So I actually end up spending about 40% less than what I had previously
budgeted for. I would say the U.K.
is a little bit more expensive.
Big things driving that is my rent is definitely more pricey.
When I was living in the U.S., I actually Airbnb'd out my second bedroom in
the place that I was living in.
So that covered the expenses of my housing and my rent.
The other thing is that I have to pay something called council tax here,
which is basically a tax for the services of my neighborhood.
And then I also find that I pay a little bit more in utilities.
My water bill is more expensive here, but outside of that, things are
pretty comparable.
Some of the other nice surprises is that groceries are way cheaper.
You're able to get a good trip with just £35, whereas in the U.S., I
couldn't get a decent trip until I paid at least $80.
Overall, my expenses are definitely higher here, but it's a big part of
just choosing to live abroad and have a different experience.
Last year, I became one of the youngest senior operations managers at my
company, which is something that was extremely exciting for me, especially
since when I started at my company about five and a half years ago, I
always saw this as a role that was kind of unattainable.
And I didn't really see people who looked like me doing this work.
It was really just figuring out how do I get there, how do I grow within,
not only my role, but as a leader and how do I help other people also move
into these spaces that maybe they don't see a lot of people that look like
them. And that's kind of been a big goal of mine within growing within my
career and hopefully bringing people with me.
I do have different cash, so I have my pounds here.
I then have my U.S.
dollars here that I use if I end up back home.
I also have some euros which have saved me in a pinch when I was traveling
around Europe for work and ended up in a taxi that was cash only and then
some South African rands hanging out.
And then I think I think that's it.
For my everyday spending I actually use my U.S.
credit card. I'm a big traveler.
I actually have a card that has a no foreign transaction fee.
So I still use it here because it has way more benefits than the credit
cards they offer in the U.K.
So I'm able to get a lot of cash back, I'm able to use my points.
So overall, I get back about $1,000 a year by using my credit card here
instead of using something that's U.K.
based. Previously, before the pandemic, I would try to go somewhere
completely new, at least two times a year.
And I think one of the biggest things that's tough right now is I actually
get more time off or annual leave here in the U.K.
And it sounds like a wonderful thing, but it's actually really hard to
find time to use all of it.
So right now, I'm trying to figure out what I'm going to do and how I'm
going to use the time, I think it just might look different.
I might be taking time off to stay at home.
When I was in the U.S., I was actually doing a max contribution to my 401k
and they have a similar program here in the U.K.
called a pension plan.
However, I do contribute less to it.
I only contribute the amount that my company will match.
And the main reason why is because I don't know how long I'll be here and
I want to definitely have some more control over my funds.
Should I move away from the U.K., I don't want it to be super complicated
to get access to those funds when I'm in my retirement age.
I have two different things I would say splurge on, one is sometimes I will
get the nice designer item, but that's something that I feel like once you
have a staple in your closet, you can kind of just keep with it and pair
it with different outfits. Now, my splurge has become app games on
my phone, which sounds really dorky, but there's nothing better than when,
especially during a pandemic where you might be just hanging out at home,
to be able to play different games on your phone.
And they honestly get me with the in-app purchases sometimes.
So I'm trying to be better about it.
But the one that I'm currently really getting into is one called Redicor,
where you basically feel like an interior decorator, but you're not
actually decorating, you're just decorating on your phone.
So it's kind of fun for me.
One of my personal goals is to hopefully figure out how to become a
millionaire by 30 and buy a home by the age of 33.
A big part of that is me figuring out how to perfect saving money.
How can I allow the money that I make to work better for me to make more
money? And hopefully it will give me the opportunity to achieve these
things and show people that it's possible.
And a big part of that is me trying to just kind of take some tips of how
I made it simple for myself.
And then I'm actually trying to start a website to help share some of
those tips and tricks with others.
It's called Mo Money No problem.
M-O, money, no problem, dotcom.
It's something that I'm pulling together to hopefully help represent women
of color who are trying to do their thing in the workspace.