Money Milestones Q&A: Rupert, Early Startup Founder

Tell us a bit about yourself!

My name is Rupert, and I live in beautiful Dunedin. I moved here three years ago from Melbourne, Australia. I was a teacher for 10 years in metro and regional Victoria, where I worked predominantly in lower socio-economic status schools with high trauma-affected student cohorts. I was, and remain, really passionate about working with these kids to improve their educational and life outcomes through education.

When I moved to Dunedin, I made a bit of a career shift and went into software and web development, which I had largely self-taught throughout the lockdowns during the pandemic. At the start of this year, I finally went all in on my own startup, returning to my educational roots and love of reading and reading instruction.

I recently released my first product to market: Spellcaster. Spellcaster is designed to support older readers who still need to work on foundational literacy skills but don’t want to feel babied by the resources. It’s currently being used in a few schools around New Zealand and Australia, as well as in a few speech therapy and literacy tutoring clinics which is very cool to see, but it’s just the start of the journey.

What is your approach to managing money?

Honestly, pretty bush league.

I just have a Google sheet with all my outgoings, revenue, and incoming money. I try to keep all of my subscriptions, contractors and the like clearly laid out so I know how much things are costing me, how much runway I have, and when my “drop dead” date as a company is.

When I’m preparing for a feature sprint, I budget out how much it will cost in terms of additional labor so I have a good handle on what it’s going to cost me to achieve that sprint.

I don’t really use any form of software. I have a Xero subscription which costs me money, but I haven’t used it yet! I’m waiting for my accountant to show me how to use it.

How do you measure financial success in your life?

For me, “financial success” is simply having enough to not feel stressed. It means having some buffer and enough disposable income so that you can do things that you enjoy: For me, that’s eating out, buying books, having friends over for dinner, and doing a bit of travel back to Australia.

Nothing too extreme. I just seek to be able to do those things without any stress. I like working; it is a wonderful sense of purpose and meaning — especially when I am working on Spellcaster. I think it is a necessary ingredient to a balanced and happy life, so I’m not looking to, like, exit the workforce and live on a yacht.

I just want to earn enough to do the things that I enjoy without feeling like I have to cut back or sacrifice other things in my day-to-day to afford those things.

But that is fine because my personal life satisfaction has definitely gone up because I get to work every day on something that I’m passionate about and care deeply about. I know that if I do this well and do this right and execute properly, I will probably be okay in terms of my personal net worth again.

How did you manage your personal budget alongside your business budget in the early stages?

I manage my personal budget by always making sure I spend more than I earn.

Ha, joking… but it’s also true.

I have a pretty haphazard approach to managing my money. I definitely live a La Croix lifestyle on a soda water budget. I tried doing The Barefoot Investor stuff with the buckets and found it was totally counterintuitive for me — it didn’t work. Basically, I just have a pretty well-built Google Sheets spreadsheet that I use to just manage outgoings and incoming, and then I watch my bank account trickle down slowly 😀

The best thing I’ve done is probably documenting all of my outgoings and then systematically removing what we didn’t need and things we weren’t using regularly to bring things down a bit.

But other than that, not great with managing my money.

How has starting your own business impacted your personal net worth?

Negatively. But in a good way!

As the founder of a very early-stage startup, I obviously can’t pay myself the sort of salary that is concomitant with my actual career stage or skills. But that is fine because my personal life satisfaction has definitely gone up because I get to work every day on something that I’m passionate about and care deeply about. I know that if I do this well and do this right and execute properly, I will probably be okay in terms of my personal net worth again. I’m not on a mission to be a squillionaire.

How do you balance your personal financial goals with the demands of running a business?

I don’t really have many personal goals at this stage. I’m sort of just hoping to be happy with where I’m at personally, so it’s not like I see having additional money unlocking more stuff — I’m not looking to buy additional houses or do any major life events that require a lot of money.

Obviously, I’ve got my mortgage and everything like that, but at this stage, my financial goals are just to have that financial freedom. I see the business side of things ultimately leading me there again. I think that if you’re given my skill set and my career so far, and my ability to do whatever I can, I will be able to build a successful business that will allow me to have that additional layer of financial security to just do the things I want to do — without feeling like I need to sacrifice other things.

What tips do you have for maintaining a healthy work-life balance while managing business finances?

Managing my business finances doesn’t take much time, maybe because of the stage I am at. I keep my spreadsheet up to date and meet with my accountant occasionally — so all in all, no dramas for me! Maybe a good tip then is don’t overcomplicate things? But I am a solo employee of my own business with a couple of contractors, so what would I know!

How have your personal financial habits influenced the financial health of your business?

There is an inverse relationship. I am very, very careful with my business expenses. I am largely bootstrapped, so I have to squeeze every dollar; while personally, I tend to be a bit lush, professionally, I am quite the opposite.

This interview is part of New Zealand Money Month 2024. NZMM is coordinated by trusted personal finance resource Sorted, in partnership with the financial capability community, and it involves events all around the country to encourage New Zealanders to talk about money and develop greater financial capability. To further the conversation about money, we got in touch with everyday people to explore how financial priorities and challenges evolve through different life stages and milestones.