Bellawanana

About Bellawanana:

Tell us about yourself?

Hello! I am Bella Wanana, the blogger behind my personal finance & lifestyle blog bellawanana.com. I work in commercial finance during the day, and am also pursuing the Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA) designation in my spare time. I love sharing with my readers the best tips and tricks on making money online, saving money, budgeting, and everything else related to personal finance and living a balanced but fulfilling life.

When did you get interested in personal finance?

I first got interested in personal finance when I started university. I moved to a new city on my own to study, and that was the first time that I had to learn how to manage my own finances.

Why do you believe learning about money and caring about personal finance is important?

Caring about personal finance is important because it helps us understand and appreciate the true value of the dollar, how to save for short-term and long-term goals, how to spend our money responsibly, and how to plan for our future.

Although money isn’t everything, I still believe money is an important cornerstone for our happiness and fulfilment.

What inspired you to create personal finance content?

I watched a lot of videos on YouTube and read a lot of personal finance blogs over the years. They inspired me to start my blog to share my thoughts with the rest of the world.

What is your ideal audience, who are you hoping to reach with your content?

I’d love to reach anyone who is interested in improving their personal finance game and who embraces a balanced and fulfilling life.

What are your top 3 pieces of advice about personal finance?

Don’t spend money you don’t have on things you don’t need to impress people you don’t like.
Get paid for what you are worth.
Learn how to invest. For starters, investing in index funds is a great idea.

What is your top financial mistake you can share – how did you grow and improve?

My biggest financial mistake was when I focused too much on saving money that I neglected nurturing relationships. Now I maintain a better balance between being frugal and enjoying life.

If you received $5,000,000 tomorrow, what would you do with the money?

I’d buy a house for myself and a house for my parents so we can be neighbours. For the rest, I’d share a portion with my extended family, save/invest some for my future family, and donate the rest. Oh! I’d also take a portion to invest in my blog!

Rank the following from most important to least important – Saving money, Increasing Income, Paying down debt – Please explain why you ranked them this way?

This is a difficult question because I do think they are all very important and there are so many nuances about the three!

I think it’s better to break them down further:

Paying down high-interest debt (such as credit card debt). This is number one because the high interest can snowball into bigger problems quickly.
Saving for an emergency fund. This is the next one on the list to protect yourself in case of emergencies.
Increasing your income. After taking care of the most immediate needs, you should then think about how to increase your income. Increasing your income (without burning out, of course) is key to increasing your savings rate.
General savings and paying down lower interest debt (such as your mortgage). These can happen simultaneously.

What are your top three pieces of content that you created that are a good starting point for everyone to read?

I have so many! I cover a variety of topics on my blog, so here is just a small sample:

Where can we find more of your content?

You can find all of my posts on my blog, bellawanana.com. You can also find me on Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook and LinkedIn. I also have a monthly newsletter that you can sign up at https://bellawanana.com/newsletter.

If you’d like to drop me a message, feel free to send me an email at [email protected]!