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You know that moment when your stomach rumbles so loudly you wonder who else heard it?

That was me a couple of Fridays ago.

Sitting on the set of Sunrise with a spanakopita straight out of the oven and some hot butter chicken in front of me — turns out a hungry stomach doesn't care about etiquette, even at 7:50am.

But the food wasn’t really the story, the numbers were. What we found was that switching Friday night takeaway for supermarket ‘fakeaway’ could save a family of four around $60 a week. Not bad at all.

Takeaway: ~$80

Fakeaway: ~$20

= savings: $60

But what if you redirected that money to somewhere it could really cook, like the mortgage?

A $60 weekly investment into a $600k mortgage with 25 years to go — you’re talking about an estimated saving of more than $80,000 in interest charges alone.

There are ways to keep your Friday night takeaway traditions and knock your mortgage down at the same time, the most effective being to put a blow torch on your rate. The RBA might be on hold, but smaller lenders are anything but, with Canstar data showing 23 lenders have cut at least one variable rate since the start of May, but only for new customers. That’s competition in the market you can use to get yourself in a better financial position although it will probably require you to kick something to the curb: your big bank.

Many telcos raise their mobile plan prices each year, and if you’re in a household with several phone users, those costs can start to add up. If you’re looking for ways to save on your phone bill per month, here are some tips.

While it might sound vain, neutral colours like white, silver, grey, and black typically appeal to the broadest range of buyers. Model and brand name are other key factors affecting car depreciation rates

Years ago, my then-fiancé and I migrated our finances to Up Bank. Be it ignorance or forgetfulness, I hadn’t provided the bank with my Tax File Number (TFN) on my joint account, and consequently, the Australian Tax Office (ATO) held onto nearly half (47%) of the interest earned on money in our joint account.

Between 2023 and 2025, we lost a combined total of over $950 — leaving us mortified!

The good news is you can claim back extra tax paid by submitting an amendment to previous tax returns, specifying the type and amount of interest withheld — I pulled this from our joint interest summary statement. Because the tax withheld was from a joint account, my wife and I had to submit amendments to our individual tax returns for our respective shares.

Let my slip-up be a cautionary tale; submit your TFN immediately after opening up any bank account, lest you lose out on the interest you rightfully deserve!

Kevin Goh
Senior Energy Journalist

Small switches could save you $11,513 a year in our cost of living comparison.

The fallout from the Telstra outage continues as the telco has offered compensation for customers who were impacted — but there is, of course, a catch. This is for business customers, not simply for most customers who experienced a loss of connection. Business customers who rely on Telstra for their operations, such as EFTPOS payments or ordering services are eligible to apply for compensation but they do need to prove the impacts, putting the burden of proof onto businesses. For those who saw business losses during the outage, this surface-level good will gesture could be a bitter pill to swallow.

Bunnings has refreshed its loyalty program for tradies and small businesses. The upgraded program, which was previously limited to trade discounts and payment tracking, delivers new perks, including cashback rewards — you’ll get $100 in rewards dollars for every $2,000 spent, then $50 in store credit for every $1,000 spent after that — fuel discounts, and the ability to earn Qantas Points via Qantas Business Rewards. Of course, like any rewards program, the end game is to get you spending more in-store, sometimes meaning shoppers miss out on better prices elsewhere. But with Bunnings' famed "we'll beat it by 10%" promise, you might just score a gold-plate finish for a tin-shed price.

Property prices might be on the slide, however, there’s little relief for renters in sight with Cotality data out this week recording a 1.6 per cent rise in national rents in the last three months of data. Over five years, rents skyrocketed over 40 per cent, adding an average of $204 weekly to housing costs — dramatically outpacing the prior five-year increase of just $55. While there’s no silver bullet when it comes to rents, knowing your rights and how to approach a rent increase can potentially help you keep a lid on costs.

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