‘How do I fix this?’: Young Aussie went from being in debt to becoming a homeowner within three years
An Aussie who spent years saving up for an apartment in Melbourne got it valued two years after purchasing and was left in shock.
A savvy Aussie mortgage broker has revealed how she went from drowning in debt to owning her own home within a few short years.
Back in 2020, Jasmine Brennan, now 25, found herself heavily impacted by Covid-19 lockdowns and restrictions.
She lost her job in hospitality, and being unemployed and stuck in lockdown made her face the amount of debt she was in.
She owed around $35,000, split between credit cards and a HECS debt, and she felt incredibly anxious.
Ms Brennan was 20 at the time and living at home, but having the debt hanging over her was torture.
“When I lost my job, I was like, ‘Oh my God! I have no money and I’m in debt. How do I fix this?’” she told news.com.au.
The silver lining of being in lockdown was that she had a lot of time to learn about finance.
“I went crazy,” she said.
“I had so much time. I read books, listened to podcasts and became obsessed.”
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Ms Brennan began speaking to friends and family about money “non-stop” and really committed to having a better understanding her finances.
After lockdowns eased, she secured another job and then took on two more, working three jobs for over a year to pay off the $35,000 debt.
“It was so relieving. It was like a huge weight off my shoulders,” she said.
“I could make the debt repayments but it made me stressed. I couldn’t focus on budgeting or saving because I was so worried about being in debt.”
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Her interest in her own savings introduced her to the finance industry, where she began working as an administration assistant for a mortgage broker.
Paying off the debt also meant she could focus on new financial goals, which led her to deciding she wanted to become a homeowner.
She saved up for over two years and, by 2023, she had managed to scrape together a modest deposit of $17,000.
By this point Ms Brennan was 23 and she was really keen to buy, but it was unfamiliar territory.
After a less than smooth experience attempting to purchase her own property, she found a cute two-bedroom apartment in Melbourne that she ended up snagging for $340,000.
Two years later the home has just been valued at $615,000, almost doubling in value.
Ms Brennan says she feels “very lucky” that it has turned out to be such a good investment.
“The whole process was super scary,” she recalled.
“My parents have never owned a home before. They didn’t know how to help.”
Ms Brennan said when she went to inspect apartments, she was often ignored simply because she was a young, single female.
Real estate agents weren’t taking her seriously and, if she took her parents along for support, they would completely blank her and talk to her mum and dad instead.
On one occasion she wasn’t taken seriously by a real estate agent selling a property, despite putting an offer in.
“He was so rude to me. I didn’t tell him I worked in finance, and he treated me like I was nothing,” she said.
“He said my offer wasn’t going to be accepted because it was such low quality.”
Ms Brennan explained that the agent’s gripe was that she had made the offer conditional on financial approval.
That means that if, for some reason, she couldn’t get final approval by a bank for a mortgage, she could pull out without facing any financial penalties.
The condition isn’t uncommon, and Ms Brennan was just being extra cautious; her mortgage broker had encouraged her to do whatever made her most comfortable.
When the agent demanded to know why Ms Brennan had added that condition to her offer she explained that her mortgage broker said it was fine.
“He said, ‘whoever your mortgage broker is they are absolutely stupid’,” she recalled.
The agent’s bad attitude stopped her from buying the place altogether and she told him not to bother taking the offer to the owner.
“He was extremely rude. In the end I didn’t even put an offer in on that house,” she said.
Interestingly, it was Ms Brennan’s own rocky experience with buying that spurred her on to become a mortgage broker.
She loves helping other nervous first-home buyers through the process and strives to make real estate feel less scary.
Ms Brennan said she has definitely noticed that it’s really “difficult” to buy right now, and even young people who have inherited wealth aren’t finding the process easy.
“They are really struggling because your family can only help you so much. At the end of the day, it is still your loan, and a lot of people don’t have high incomes,” she said.
The 25-year-old said that, generally speaking, only young buyers who have lived at home well into their 20s or have inherited wealth can afford to buy.
The mortgage broker is also seeing people needing to constantly renew their financial pre-approvals simply because 90 days isn’t enough time to find something in Melbourne.
“It is very difficult,” she said.
“A lot of my clients are extending their pre-approvals because they are getting outbid.”
Ms Brennan doesn’t think things will get any better any time soon. In fact, she says it could get even harder.
“I’m no economist but I think in 2026 it is just going to get worse,” she said.
“My advice is that your first home doesn’t have to be perfect, and don’t try to go buy a million-dollar house, stick to the basics.”
