# They Took On a $1.2M Mortgage. 90 Days Later, Everything Changed | Jodie & Matt | First 90 Days S1E8

An episode of [Money Mentor Podcast™](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1632604767), 23 Sep 2026, 21 min.

Audio: https://episode.flightcast.com/01M35Z40247GNBX5D11D17GCZQ.mp3

Jodie and Matt took on a $1.2 million mortgage, then found a plan to pay it off in 10 years and 7 months. Jodie and Matt had just taken on a $1.2 million mortgage, plus a handful of advisors who never talked to each other and left the big calls to a couple who felt out of their depth. In their first 90 days with Infinity they refinanced, found an extra $100,000 in equity, bought a 2nd investment property, and cleared a car lease and a credit card debt. Their own numbers showed the mortgage could be gone in 10 years and 7 months instead of 30, saving them close to $1.2 million in interest. 90 days ago retirement felt decades away. Now they're dreaming bigger. Want to improve your own financial future? Our free webinar is where to start: 👉 https://bit.ly/43V2jKN #ChangingLivesPodcast #MortgageFreeJourney #FinancialFreedom

## Transcript

[0:00] We've literally got a brand new 30 year mortgage.
[0:02] Yeah.
[0:03] What can be done?
[0:04] There's no equity to pull, but I was wrong.
[0:07] It changed very quickly and drastically.
[0:10] 90 days ago, we were looking at our 30 year mortgage, going, okay, well, we're just going to knuckle down forever, then figure out what we're going to do for retirement.
[0:18] But in that time, it's kind of cracked open a different way of us perceiving the future.
[0:24] That was the first time I've seen Matt say something that he wants to do that he believes is real.
[0:33] Today we are joined by Jodie and Matt.
[0:36] How are we guys?
[0:37] Good.
[0:37] Well, thanks.
[0:38] How are we feeling?
[0:38] A little bit nervous?
[0:39] Great.
[0:40] We will have you back at some point in the future, just to look back at where we are, but we want to talk about the first 90 days of your infinity journey.
[0:47] But before we jump in, I want to hear about where you were before infinity, where we were financially, with our family, what you both do for work.
[0:56] We'd just taken a big whopping bite into a new mortgage.
[0:59] He had a huge mortgage.
[1:00] A big one.
[1:01] Big one.
[1:02] Yeah.
[1:02] So just under 1.2?
[1:03] Yep.
[1:04] After selling a family home for, we were living there for quite a while.
[1:08] So.
[1:09] Prior to infinity, we thought we were doing really well with our finances, but, um, yeah, um, we, I think what...
[1:17] Where we were at in our lives were we had not been, not earned a lot of money previously.
[1:25] And we, in late or mid career, we started to see the tide change.
[1:30] Like I started learning more, Matt started learning more and we just became a bit more savvy with our money.
[1:35] Our kids are a little bit older, so they didn't require daycare and things like that.
[1:39] Um, we'd been living in our neighborhood for about 13 years.
[1:43] So, um, and we could see the real estate market, um, jumping a little bit.
[1:49] And while we never intended on leaving our neighborhood, we were at the stage where we were ready to buy an investment property or just take the next leap.
[1:57] Yeah.
[1:57] Um, and yeah.
[1:59] We were starting to outgrow the townhouse we were in with one adult, one teenage kid.
[2:05] And a schnauzer called Bowser.
[2:07] Bowser, I love that.
[2:09] So, yeah, we were sort of ready to, because we had a bit more stability as far as income and, you know, it wasn't a silly mortgage originally.
[2:21] We wanted to sort of, I guess, grow our wealth.
[2:25] Yeah.
[2:25] Yeah.
[2:26] Take the next step.
[2:27] Yeah.
[2:27] And did you have other advisors in your corner at this time?
[2:31] Had you sought advice elsewhere?
[2:33] Yeah.
[2:33] Yes.
[2:33] Yeah.
[2:33] We had plenty of, we had quite a few, we've always pretty, pretty much used advisors, financial planners and people who know what they're doing.
[2:43] Yeah.
[2:44] But I think because they were sort of operating in their own silos and not,
[2:50] Talking to each other.
[2:50] Not talking together.
[2:51] Yeah.
[2:52] And not all, still rowing in the same direction, but not, but kind of their own, their own direction.
[3:00] Yeah.
[3:00] I don't know.
[3:01] So it was like, you know, advisor A wasn't talking to advisor B and they weren't considering what each of them were advising and if it holistically made sense for you.
[3:11] That's, yes.
[3:12] They also had their own silos that they operated in.
[3:15] Yeah.
[3:16] For example, company we were working for didn't touch property.
[3:19] Yep.
[3:20] And that was something we were interested in.
[3:22] We'd been with a financial planner since we were in our mid-20s and thought we were getting ahead of the game by working with professionals that know what they're doing.
[3:30] Yeah.
[3:31] So that's where we were introduced to being insured properly and working with a decent superannuation account.
[3:39] And then as life evolved, we started working with a new financial planner.
[3:46] And then we had a chartered accountant and we had real estate agents and buyers agents and conveyances.
[3:53] And we were feeling like we were a pinball machine, but gain them all.
[3:57] And sometimes one person would say, and I remember having a chat to my accountant going, I'm sick of paying so much tax.
[4:04] Like, what can I do to reduce it?
[4:06] Um, should I look at a family trust or, um, should we do a novated lease or something?
[4:12] And, uh, they're like, no, don't do a trust.
[4:14] Maybe you could do a novated lease.
[4:16] And then I go back to the financial planner and say, we're thinking of doing a novated lease to reduce our tax.
[4:22] Is that cool?
[4:23] Should we do that?
[4:23] And, uh, they're like, yeah, you could do that.
[4:26] And so that'll reduce your tax.
[4:28] Yeah, but when you don't talk about all the fees behind it.
[4:31] Yeah, or the fact that, you know, you're reducing your taxable income and that's like period, like you take this out.
[4:38] They're not looking outside.
[4:39] Yeah.
[4:40] So we felt like.
[4:41] Borrowing capacity too.
[4:42] Yeah, yeah.
[4:43] And so for us, we felt like unqualified puppet masters just going, okay, well, let's orchestrate this.
[4:51] And then that financial planner would say yes.
[4:54] And then we'd change our mind and they'd also say yes.
[4:57] Yeah.
[4:57] And we're like, hang on, we're not actually qualified to foresee what's going to be the best outcome.
[5:01] Yeah.
[5:02] It's like, we need you to make the decisions.
[5:05] And sometimes the accountant's information would contradict the financial planner.
[5:10] And it's like, well, who trumps who?
[5:12] Actually, the decision falls back on us, but we're less qualified than them.
[5:15] Yeah.
[5:16] It's a bit of a jungle.
[5:17] Yeah.
[5:18] Yeah.
[5:19] And apart from the mortgage, what else did we have?
[5:20] Yeah.
[5:21] So I had a hex debt of 44K and we had the Novated lease in the end because everyone thought that was a great idea.
[5:28] Hey, don't be knocking the gold car.
[5:34] Yeah.
[5:35] And then we've also got, we had a $2,000 credit card.
[5:39] Okay.
[5:40] And then talk to me about finding Infinity and how you came across it.
[5:45] That was me.
[5:46] So I, uh, I saw an Instagram post from Graham talking about, uh, exactly the situation we were in, which made my ears prick.
[5:56] Um, so I think he was saying, you know, so many people, they go to buy another investment property when they're sitting on a gold mine and, you know, don't get emotional about the family home.
[6:06] The kids don't want it anyway.
[6:08] Um, and you've got to use it to your advantage.
[6:11] And so at that exact moment, we were looking for an investment property, a two bed, two bath in Brisbane, one of the most highly contended pieces of property at the time.
[6:22] And we're like, oh my God, we're competing with all these first home buyers that are just like dropping as much money as they can into it.
[6:28] There's houses that are getting, or units getting, um, you know, 10 to 20 offers day one of open for inspection.
[6:36] Um.
[6:36] So we're like, why are we competing with these guys?
[6:39] And then just that Instagram post made me think, shit, you know, we're paying for two lots of body corps if that's going to happen, two lots of rates, and we own none of the land.
[6:51] And so we're like, why don't we upgrade?
[6:53] Why don't we sell our family home?
[6:56] And then upgrade and then we can maybe get a unit out the back or we started thinking dual living mindset.
[7:03] And this is an asset in one day we can sell and maybe pay cash for the next one when we sell it or something like that.
[7:13] Um, so at that moment I joined the, uh, free webinar that came up next and I still hadn't really told Matt too much about it cause we're both uber skeptics.
[7:25] Um, but Matt's a super skeptic and I was pre-skepticking.
[7:28] Yeah.
[7:31] So I, Matt went out with a friend.
[7:34] I attended the webinar and thought.
[7:36] So you did it by yourself.
[7:37] I did it by myself because I needed to vet it.
[7:39] I could go to Matt with a fun, cute idea that's going to change, potentially change the course of where we're going.
[7:46] So I thought I'll see if these guys for real.
[7:48] And, um, and the webinar was great.
[7:51] Um, I caught on very quickly to everything that was being put out and then it came to committing to the masterclass.
[7:58] Yep.
[7:59] And I thought, uh, I'm going to do it because, um, I don't know, like it's like a gamble to go and am I going to put my trust in this?
[8:08] And I've got to kind of decide, am I in or out at this point?
[8:11] If this story has inspired you to take control of your financial future, your journey starts with our free educational webinar.
[8:19] Click the link below this video to get started today.
[8:22] And then when did we finally sign up for the masterclass?
[8:24] I did it within seven days.
[8:25] Oh, wow.
[8:26] Very quick.
[8:26] I don't like to like ruminate.
[8:27] Muck around?
[8:28] Yeah.
[8:29] It just takes up too much rent in my head for free.
[8:31] It's kind of like Jodie was doing a lot of the underwriting to then present it to me because I need to look at it all and I need to sit with it and ruminate and think about it.
[8:41] And whereas, as I said earlier off, off audio that Jodie's shoots from the hip.
[8:49] Yeah.
[8:49] Whereas I'm more considered.
[8:52] Yeah.
[8:52] Um.
[8:53] But I feel like that works really well for us because we kind of cover the balance.
[8:59] Yeah.
[9:00] I like that you call it balance.
[9:01] You used to say that I'm the accelerator, you're the brakes.
[9:06] Well, you've got to kind of balance each other out at some point, right?
[9:09] Stepping in a second.
[9:11] So, okay, you were within seven days from webinar to masterclass.
[9:15] Did you do the masterclass?
[9:17] Okay, perfect.
[9:18] And how did you feel?
[9:19] Obviously skeptical at first.
[9:21] Yeah.
[9:23] And on top of that, I was packing up the house to move.
[9:26] Yep.
[9:27] So I was packing boxes in the background of watching and listening.
[9:33] We had it on all day and I would periodically jump in and listen to quite most of the first day.
[9:41] It's funny, our daughter walked downstairs and we had the volume up on the Zoom and it's, you know, Graham just blasting out at someone writing on the screen during a live Zoom.
[9:53] No one needs to write on the screen, guys.
[9:55] Never understand how that happens.
[9:57] But yeah.
[9:58] So Matt and I were watching the screen and so our daughter Ella came downstairs and
[10:03] And just to see us both like watching one of the examples during the masterclass.
[10:09] And she's like, what are you doing?
[10:11] And it was obviously she can hear Effin there.
[10:14] Yeah.
[10:15] Yeah.
[10:16] You know, Effin and Jeffin everywhere.
[10:18] And we're like, oh, we're watching this financial, like an online conference essentially.
[10:25] Yeah.
[10:26] She's like, and she was even just like really skeptical at that point too.
[10:31] But anyway, that was, that was our whole day, Matt intermittently packing and me paying attention closely.
[10:37] But as it, as it evolved, as it continued on, like I did, I won't say I was turned off, but the first few hours or so where there's a lot of promotional stuff, like after a little bit, I'm like, okay, I get it.
[10:52] I think that's biased because you work in an advertising agency and I am a marketer and have no soul.
[10:58] So we get it.
[11:00] We understand the promotional side.
[11:02] But what I can now see.
[11:04] Which is like it has to be in there.
[11:06] Yeah.
[11:06] Because we're trying to give you foundation of who Infinity is and what we do and our community footprint and all of that.
[11:13] So I know what you're referring to.
[11:14] Yeah.
[11:15] Yeah.
[11:15] It's a lot.
[11:16] But that's the one and only time.
[11:18] I was kind of waiting there going.
[11:20] Come on.
[11:20] You're like, I want the good stuff.
[11:22] Come on.
[11:22] But then when the good stuff arrived, it was just like, I was like, okay, this is dope.
[11:28] Yeah.
[11:29] I love that.
[11:30] No one's called us dope before.
[11:31] Well, I was going to say something else.
[11:35] Dope as fuck, but...
[11:36] You can say that.
[11:37] Yeah.
[11:37] This is infinity.
[11:38] Yeah.
[11:39] So yeah, when I, for me, when I started seeing, I'm going to call them the live strategies, but I know that there's taking information, you know, the day before and all this stuff.
[11:49] But when Graham in particular was doing the live stuff, um, and showing different people, all different walks of life.
[11:57] going, Oh yeah, we can work with that.
[11:58] Like, and you know, being able to, one in particular for me was, I forget the couple's name, but they were almost, um, retirement age and they're like, yeah, we've got a bit of super, we've, you know, we don't, we're still renting and, you know, within minutes of having the information, being able to show that they have a strong position and strategy to be able to own their own home.
[12:23] Yeah.
[12:23] That's pretty cool.
[12:24] Was that your biggest takeaway?
[12:25] Yeah.
[12:26] Those examples, yes.
[12:28] Not that one in particular, but all of them to see how you can just strategize things to...
[12:35] Well, I think it started making us think, oh, that's like that friend we know, or that's like our sister and that's like our brother.
[12:40] And we could see how this would work for multiple people.
[12:45] The sort of the one, my major takeaway at the time was probably back to the beginning of where I used to go to my chartered accountant and go, how do I reduce tax or how do I pay less tax or, you know, how can I pull dividends?
[12:59] And then it was when Graham was explaining just the pay, pay YG tax variation.
[13:04] I was like, oh my God, of all these years and this guy's just- Such a simple way to reduce tax effectively and legally.
[13:12] Why would I never heard this?
[13:13] Yeah.
[13:14] So you liked that part of the- Yeah.
[13:17] At that point I was in, I was like, boom, that's it.
[13:19] And I appreciated seeing everything else.
[13:22] Like, you know, the strategies built around investment property and how different people from like a FIFO worker versus a defence family, how they could all work with that.
[13:37] Yeah.
[13:38] Awesome.
[13:38] And so signed up from the weekend.
[13:40] Didn't have to think about it.
[13:41] Were you pretty good?
[13:42] No, yeah.
[13:43] We, yeah, we arm wrestled a little, um, cause we had to give context.
[13:49] We had just sold our primary residence and.
[13:53] had not yet purchased, uh, maybe we had just, so we had a little bit of cash ready for renovations.
[14:00] Yeah.
[14:01] And so Matt wanted to hold onto that and just go to ground and like put that money away and I was like, and I think that was the first time after going through refinancing and everything going, babe, we've got this million dollar mortgage.
[14:13] We're going to need all the help we can get.
[14:15] We're out of our depth already.
[14:17] Um, my, my, I remember back then, originally I first thought, hang on, we've just got a new mortgage.
[14:26] How are they going to be able to do anything?
[14:28] Like we've, we've literally got a brand new 30 year mortgage.
[14:32] Yeah.
[14:33] What can be done?
[14:33] Like it's, there's no equity to pull or anything like that.
[14:37] So initially that was my thought, like maybe let's hold off, let's reassess in six months when we've potentially got equity to pull or whatever.
[14:46] But
[14:47] I was wrong.
[14:48] It's, yeah, it changed very quickly and drastically.
[14:53] Because ultimately you just decided you would sign up despite some of the hesitation at first?
[14:59] Yes.
[15:00] It was mostly my hesitation thinking that there probably might not be anything that could be done straight away.
[15:06] I thought we might get asked to, hey, just hold off six months.
[15:11] Yeah.
[15:12] But that wasn't the case.
[15:14] And that's what we would have told you if it was the case and we would have just given you your money back.
[15:18] So that's good.
[15:19] You've eventually signed up.
[15:21] Are you happy that you moved as quickly as you did?
[15:23] Yes.
[15:24] That was a quick yes.
[15:26] Being able to form the structures and stuff that we have in place and having the team of people that are interconnected is invaluable.
[15:37] Yeah.
[15:38] And do you remember what your out-of-debt results were from the weekend?
[15:41] You're at 30.
[15:42] Our teams were looking at 30, yeah.
[15:44] And I think it came down to 10 years, seven months.
[15:47] And nearly $1.2 million mortgage.
[15:50] Yeah.
[15:51] Yeah.
[15:51] Crazy.
[15:52] That is crazy.
[15:53] Yeah.
[15:54] And that's before we've even thought about investing or anything like that.
[15:58] Yeah.
[15:58] So talk me through, okay, you've signed up, you've now been given a team of people, your finance strategists and so on.
[16:03] What is that first 90 or just a bit shy of, you're signed up in March, a bit shy of the 90 days, but what does that first, you know, couple of weeks to months look like for you guys?
[16:12] Uh, it was a real whirlwind, uh, especially because we had a month before signing up with Infinity, we had already done the biggest financing we'd ever done.
[16:22] Yeah.
[16:23] So, uh, I think in the call, our wealth strategist said, um, yep, cool.
[16:29] We can work with you.
[16:30] Um, this is what, this is the landscape in which you can operate to do it.
[16:36] We're going to need to refinance.
[16:37] And we're like, yeah.
[16:38] We just did.
[16:40] Because we need the right loan structure.
[16:42] Yeah.
[16:43] That's right.
[16:44] And so at that point, I'm like, all right, well, if we need to do it, we need to do it.
[16:48] We're not sort of paying you guys to agree with us.
[16:50] We'll agree with you.
[16:52] And so within that time, first 90 days, we had, or within the first month, refinanced.
[16:59] But as a part of that refinancing, they're like, oh, hey, guys, we've actually found another 100K in equity on that property.
[17:07] So with that 100K, we're going to be able to buy you a second investment property.
[17:11] So not only did we take the plunge to upgrade, we also then in the end got that second property that we were going for.
[17:19] But you missed a few things.
[17:21] There was getting rid of the bad debt.
[17:24] Yes.
[17:24] So there was paying out the lease.
[17:27] Yep.
[17:28] And the hex debt.
[17:30] Yep.
[17:31] And flicking the credit card.
[17:32] Which is still huge in itself, right?
[17:34] Yeah.
[17:34] It's got two big personal liabilities gone and we can still tackle the mortgage and still use equity to get an investment property.
[17:41] Yep.
[17:41] Yep.
[17:42] Yep.
[17:42] And then beyond that.
[17:43] With doing like literally just restructuring.
[17:46] Yeah.
[17:46] Yeah.
[17:47] And then on top of that, we were able to buy a second investment property because we then kicked off a SMSF.
[17:54] As well.
[17:55] Just Indiana Jones did in under the legislation.
[17:58] Oh, I know.
[17:59] Yeah, because you signed up during quite a crazy time, right?
[18:01] We've gone through the new budget announcements and legislations that are slowly rolling out and then the SMSF changes as well.
[18:08] Yeah.
[18:08] So...
[18:09] And before both of those things, we had our first Ram, which again, I was like, I don't know if we're supposed to go.
[18:15] It's too early yet, but because we'd only just sort of signed up.
[18:20] I'm pro-Louis.
[18:21] He has to like shoot from the hip ready.
[18:23] Yep.
[18:23] Louis says we're going.
[18:24] Let's do it.
[18:26] Mighty Louie, he gets away with it every time.
[18:28] But it was a fantastic experience.
[18:30] And, again, it just further strengthened.
[18:34] I really like the fact that you, Infinity Group, kind of enforce education.
[18:41] Yeah.
[18:42] Yeah, we're really big on it.
[18:44] Yeah.
[18:44] You have to, yeah.
[18:46] Yeah, because, and you guys too, you know, with working with advisors for so long, you seem to want to know what you're doing and you want to be told the right way to do it.
[18:55] You want to make sure everyone's talking to each other.
[18:56] Am I right in saying that?
[18:57] You want to also understand what you're doing too.
[18:59] Yeah.
[19:00] Yeah.
[19:00] And that's what we pride ourselves on for sure.
[19:02] So what does the future look like for you and the family now?
[19:06] I made an observation like 90 days ago.
[19:09] We were looking at our 30-year mortgage and going, okay, well, we're just going to knuckle down forever and, you know, then figure out what we're going to do for retirement.
[19:19] But in that time, it's kind of cracked open a moment.
[19:23] a different way of us perceiving the future.
[19:26] And it was at the REM that we went to, Matt's like, I want to be in a position where I can just buy my mum a Mustang.
[19:33] It's been her dream for, you know, her whole life.
[19:36] And that was the first time I've seen Matt say something that he wants to do that he believes is real as well, like it's a possibility.
[19:45] But if we're 90 days before or, you know, 60 days before that, that wouldn't have been something he would flippantly or aspirationally think of or consider.
[19:56] So it's been really nice going, okay, well, we can actually broaden our scope now on what the future is.
[20:02] So we've got bigger aspirations we believe in.
[20:04] Yeah.
[20:05] Yeah.
[20:06] So working towards paying off the home loan, which is big, but we've got our 10-year plan.
[20:10] We've had a couple of investment properties and now we're looking at some other goals that we think we can achieve.
[20:15] Yep.
[20:16] Well, it'll be watch this space for sure because we are going to have you back so we can look back at this podcast and have a look at what you've achieved over that time and it might be in about a year.
[20:26] So smash it out so we've got an epic podcast to come back to.
[20:29] Nice.
[20:30] We can do our best, yeah.
[20:31] Thank you guys so much for coming in.
[20:32] Thanks.
[20:32] Thanks a lot.

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