Today’s immigrant had an interesting journey that I would like to split into two; the first you will read today and the second first Saturday in October.

In today’s piece, my key takeaway is “even in the midst of things where things are not going according to plan there are opportunities”.

Profile​​
​Gender: Female
​Country of Residence: United States
​Profession: Medical Software Analyst

The first question I always like to ask is, why did you decide to leave your home country?

It wasn’t a specific decision for me. I was already out of school, and I wanted to further my education. I had been working for a while, and so I traveled to the US to get an admission and continue with my further education plan. But the plans were taking longer than expected, and at some point, I couldn’t go back to work at home.

So I decided to have a plan B by just staying back. It was never an initial plan to immigrate to the US at that time.

I see. Okay, so let me take it back one step. The plan was to come to the US, have your master’s degree, then go back home?

That is correct.

Okay, so how did you plan to fund the MBA, sorry, the master’s degree?

Family. My family was responsible for funding the entire thing; tution, accomodation, upkeep etc

Okay.

So the actual reason that I didn’t bother to go back was I had lost my job back home, and I also was struggling to get my official transcript for my school.

And at the time, the national university body was on strike, so it was taking longer than expected, and my school kept trying to tell me; “Hey, you have to send your transcript in by so, so, so” the deadline passed. I couldn’t get the transcript sorted.

I then lost my job back home.

At this point, I had to make another decision. In fact family and friends out here were like, “why do you want to go back now? You don’t have a job to go back to. School is already out of the question. Why don’t you have a plan B of staying behind?”

So I had to drop out of school and pause the idea of furthering my education at that time.

Wow. Before I ask the next question, why did you lose the job? I am assuming that the agreement was you are going to be on study leave and then come back. Why did they renege on that agreement?

My path was kind of different. So I did not get a student visa from Nigeria. I came to the US on a visiting visa and I had taken a month off of work. The plan was to come here and process my student visa from here, by which time I will have to stay in the country within 30 days, and also speak to an academic advisor for whatever school that I am trying to work with. Get the necessary papers and then go back home to get the actual visa.

That was my plan.

Unfortunately, when I got out here, I realized that it wasn’t going to be that quick, so I kept extending and asking for more time from work; one month became two months and then three months. At some point they just let me go.

To be fair, 3 months was a bit of a stretch. Okay, cool. So what then happened? So I’m assuming that by this time, you had had your student visa.

The school had issued my I-20 which I needed to apply for the student visa. All I needed to do next was to go out of the country and get that visa stamped on my passport, but technically on file, I was already a national student.

However I had to drop out because I could not produce the transcript.

Around this time, a family member out here had started talking about starting a business (a medical-focused one), and needed someone to help with running the business. I was like, oh, “you know what I can do that”. I mean, I have some work experience. At the time, I was about 25.

They were paying me very little money. To be fair It was supposed to be for the short term and pay under the table because I wasn’t qualified to be working visa. For me I wanted to use that time to restrategize with some income to cushion costs for any daily needs.

How long did you do this for?

I did that for three years.

Oh!!

In the early weeks, I started talking to people about the options available to me and everybody just kept pointing me in the route of, “You need to get married to an American”. I was actively meeting people, and the putting myself out there.

In fact I had met someone I was introduced to and started dating. But after a short while I thought, no, this would not work. So I stepped back.

By this time, I had become an overstayer. I could only stay in the US for up to a maximum of 6 months on a visitor visa, which had lapsed. I was not able to get my transcript sent over so school was out of questions.

Two and a half years into the US, I didn’t have legal documentation, no social security, and my driver’s license had expired. I was getting frustrated. A lot of things happened in between; trying to date somebody else, talking to other people. It was just a mess.

Because this is a newsletter more focused on the finance side of things; In that period when you were undocumented, how did you cope financially with the little pay you were earning?

Because I had been working back in Nigeria, for a few years before I came out here; I had some savings. I was working for a multinational organization that was paying quite well so was able to save about $20,000.

I also had stipends from family coming into my account every month. At that time the exchange rates were not so bad. It was about N150 to a dollar.

Then the little income I was earning here.

However, after about a year of living in my studio apartment, the first place I lived in, I got the idea to rent a two-bedroom apartment; a luxury one.

The goal was to rent out the second bedroom to people who were coming in from wherever to have their babies in the US. Around this time it became a thing

Because of my exposure to the medical field, healthcare in general, I could help them with finding the hospital out here, the doctor, pointing them in the right direction, etc so that as soon as they landed from whatever country, they had everything sorted. Including accommodation and transportation.

So it was a concierge service?

Yes, a concierge service with a contractual agreement.

That’s really interesting. And what were the numbers like? You don’t have to give me specifics, a bracket is fine.

It depends. If they had all the hospital side of things sorted and needed just accommodation, I charged $1,500 per month. At this time my rent was exactly $1,500 but I needed to bill this person that high to cover utilities, damages etc. Feeding was not included.

But if they needed the full concierge service, meaning finding the hospital, getting hospital appointments etc then the fee was much higher.

I was able to subsidize my rent, and also with the little income that I was earning I could live comfortably.

I did that for a while, actually did that well into when I had my documentation sorted, and up until the time I actually relocated from I used to live in Texas to California.

What was that transition like? I mean, this is you who used to work in a multinational in Nigeria. Clearly, they were paying really well. You were quite comfortable. To become somebody who was undocumented, now working for a startup healthcare company. What was that like for you?

Oh, it was tough. It was very tough. I came here at a very young age and it wasn’t the initial plan to end up an undocumented immigrant. I didn’t have a roadmap for this. This was something that just happened and had to pick myself up.

I remember that initially, I didn’t get the support of my family for staying back and going through all of that. Emotionally, I was constantly unhappy. I was depressed. I didn’t know who to trust, I didn’t have friends. I felt like people had too many bits of advice.

I also dealt with a lot of, when people don’t know where you’re coming from, they don’t know your story, and people tend to talk to you or advise you based on where you are in that phase.

It was a lot of struggle for me, because I was comfortable while I was back home, visited a lot of countries for work. And at that age, too, I was pretty young, so I got pretty exposed to things early on in my life.

To then deal with someone who’s a truck driver; who had never had a corporate experience, happens to find themselves out here because of visa lottery, have American citizenship, and because of that, think they are better than you.

I had to snap out of it. I asked myself “Am I going to settle in this space forever, or am I going to make something out of it”?

Yeah, so it was tough. I’ll tell you that much.

But one thing I’d say, though, on the flip side, is getting introduced to medical healthcare system logistics was one of the best things that happened to me. I didn’t know the importance of what I was learning,

Even though it was not a major corporate America but a very small office, it helped me to understand the importance of documentation, accountability, being a leader, and being a manager, in a very different world that I was not used to. I was able to gather those experiences when I had my documentation sorted and I was ready to plunge into real corporate America.

Let’s now talk about the journey back to corporate life; even while you were undocumented, you still had that entrepreneurial mindset, and you were able to carry on. What was the journey to getting the papers sorted, and then how did you move on from there?

At some point, I was dating someone who was from Nigeria, and the talk of marriage was actively on the table.

One thing about me is, I never lost sight of my faith. I’m a Christian, so I would always pray before I took any steps. With this particular person, something was just off but I couldn’t place it for a long time.

A couple of days, or, I think, a couple weeks before our planned wedding date in the US, I found out that this person wasn’t even an American citizen. He had outrightly lied to me that he was.

What was he trying to achieve by doing that?

I think he wanted to marry me and just put me there

That’s another thing I would say for anyone coming to this country; if they’re not good with research or like reading, they need to get themselves well-informed by developing a habit of reading or asking questions that would take them further.

This person had goofed by asking me to print out their social security number card for something we were trying to put together, and as I printed it out I noticed the date the social security card was issued.

And I was like, wait a minute, this person came in a year before me. I began a mental calculation from the many research I had done; I knew that if you got your green card through your parents, you would need to have stayed five of residency before you become a citizen. I had that information from my own research, so when I saw the date on that person’s social security number, I realized that they were just three years in the country.

What does that mean for you?

That means if I had gone ahead to marry that person I would have just been in limbo for another 2 years just waiting for him to get his citizenship before we began the journey of sorting mine. We had been together maybe a little over a year but I didn’t like the deceit, and I felt if you can deceive me on something like this, I wonder how many of the things you’ve deceived me on. So I ended the relationship.

Remember that person I dated when I initially stayed back? We got back in touch. I remember the first thing he said to me was, “are you ready to be my wife now?”

One second, this is a personal question; What was your concern in those early days that you broke things off?

For context, remember I was just fresh from Nigeria and was a bit of a church girl.

The guy was covered in tattoos and wasn’t working in corporate America. He was working at some manufacturing company or something as a floor worker. For me, it didn’t match what I had in mind for myself as a spouse

We met up and started dating again. Going out this time around I got to know that, oh, this person is actually really cool. He treated me so well, significantly better than the men from my own country.

Before long I got married. And he was the kindest human ever (I say was because we divorced after about 7 years together). But this man was just a nice human being, and I am thankful to God that I did not judge a book by its cover, by its appearance. Oh, my goodness, the love, the care……it was such a breadth of fresh air being treated so well.

I am assuming, of course, that meant you could then have your paper sorted?

Correct.

What did that do for you from a financial point of view, as in, how did that then propel you to move forward?

Oh, it did a lot eventually. But I had to cross another hurdle.

By this time I had about $10,000 saved, and never touched the money because it was supposed to be for rainy days only. In my head, I thought if I ever had to sort out my resident documentation, I wanted to be ready for all the associated costs. So the minute we got married, I waited about a few more months, I filed my application, and …

…..to be cont’d.

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I talked about this person in my newsletter on the 8th of June. Coming out of that interview I could not be amazed at how much the subject achieved in partnership (or maybe the word is strong alignment) with their significant other.

Profile​ ​Gender: Male ​

Country of Residence: United Kingdom

​Profession: Business Analyst

I always like to start the question with why did you decide to leave your own country?”

I had the opportunity to take a second degree, my masters degree. something that was almost like, “yep that’s the next thing to do”.

How was it funded? Did the Bank of mommy and daddy fund it, or was your own savings?

It was the bank of the village: Mummy and Daddy, Uncle…..

O wow, how old were you around this time and do you think it is because you were young that they had to pull funds together for you?

I was around 23/24 if I am not mistaken. I was 25. No it wasn’t because I was young. It was mainly because an uncle could and was willing to pay for it. I asked and he said yes so…..Masters Degree it was.

Ha I see. Why the UK though?

America was where I wanted to go for a while. I wanted to get into an Ivy League university because my dad went to Cornell University and his brother went to Harvard University and Oxford University. So it was my goal to continue on that path. But I didn’t get admission into any plus I applied for visa to the US once or twice for just holidays but I got rejected.

The UK was the next best thing.

So how was your settling down in the UK? If you remember, was it hard…….

It was harddddd!

Wait wait, was it hard from a finance perspective, or ………

Ok so the main hardship came from the transition of post studying and entering the job market.

School was just school for me. My routine was classes, library, church, thats it. I did understand the importance of using that period to gain significant UK work experience as much as possible and so I was working in the school library as an IT trainer.

But then after school I found myself working in a factory for a couple of months.

Ha, wait how did you go from IT training in the library to factory work?

So the rule is, you can only do that kind of job, I mean the library job only if you are a student and once school is done you need to resign.

That makes sense. But were you under financial pressure that you have to go and do factory work? O yes, I had bills to pay!

This was the period in between finishing school (aka dissertation submitted) and the actual graduation ceremony that wasn’t until a few months later. So it was either going back home and be asking my parents for money (which was not on my own agenda) or rely on my uncle who lived in London at that time and on paper was my guardian. But throughout school,
we did speak once or twice and exchanged messages occasionally. I remember visiting his home in London once and also after securing the role in Woking, I stayed over at his house (while looking for a flat to share, which was closer to work) a tier one visa . 

Funny side story I remember this uncle was very upset with me for not inviting him to my graduation ceremony when it eventually happened. Honestly, all I was thinking at that time was “Why should I be disturbing all these people, I need to get on with this graduation and get a job asap! Came with some small family drama.

Anyway back to the question; I was in school accommodation during my degree so I had to move out after my dissertation to a shared apartment. I needed to pay for the bills attached to that. And it definitely didn’t cross my mind to ask any family for the money.

Growing up, uncles and aunties bought me stuff all the time and that to me meant they had tried enough. I didn’t want to be that family member. who was always collecting. My learning from that period was “don’tthe wait until you need something to reach out to family to check in on them”. It is something my mom says all the time.

You did the warehouse job for two months. Was that two months because you got a job within that period?

Yes! In fact I remember it like yesterday. I was so grateful for the good news of getting the job while I was out that I knelt down at the bus stop just saying “Thank you God”.

Haha, I can imagine! Ok let’s call that your first job post masters degree. When you compare it to your last role back at home before you traveled, was that like for like, or was it a demotion?

Definitely like for like. In fact I got introduced to different types of work experience at that job; I immediately became responsible for a project acting as the go-between a consulting company and the government agency I was working for. It required me to be very independent. The most important thing the job offered me was the pay that allowed me to switch to Tier 1 without a sponsor. This was years ago when you had to earn at least £26,000 and at the time (2009) Expat immigrants could apply for Tier 1 visas in an individual capacity without sponsorship from a corporate organization.

Okay, okay, you have come to school, you settled down. You’ve done two months of warehouse. You got your first job. I mean, looking back now, your story seems to be a bit……..

Rosy?

I don’t want to use the word rosy. It almost seemed like you had a good landing, is what I would say.

Maybe. But mentally and emotionally it was quite difficult for me. But yes compared with other stories I hear these days I would say privilege has its hierarchy. For one I didn’t need to work and study, and I knew worst case scenario I had a place to go for a roof over my head and eat at zero cost. I even remember coming into the UK my mom & dad gave me £3,000 cash and my uncle also gave me £500, plus the money I earned from working, this sustained me for the entire year. For context, this was from 2007 to 2008 but I know I did a good job of managing that money well so much that it lasted me for the entire year of school plus paying for the visa fees after school. Actually I don’t remember accurately but think mum recently told me I called to get money for post study visa application fees.

Right! Looking back now, from where you were as a new settler in the UK and where you are now, what has been your top five money mistakes and your top five money successes?

Good question!

The first money mistake was, not saving. I always thought saving was a lost opportunity because you need to either invest or spend money. I didn’t believe in having cash in reserve. But that should have been a priority.

So you didn’t have an emergency fund somewhere?

No, I didn’t. And to be fair I was in a emergency situation for about six months in between that first job and the next one. This was something my now wife, could not understand while we were dating. She made me set up something almost immediately she heard.

Second is, not understanding the financial markets or will I say financial landscape early enough which meant a lot of lost opportunities. Especially during those periods when I had a lot of excess cash with a lot less expenses. At some point, I started contracting and was earning up to £250 per day and living in a shared house, so was paying about 500 a month on rent which meant I had a lot of disposable cash at the time. I guess that’s a function of the people I had around me. Those who knew shared. While some just didn’t know much as well.

The third thing is not getting on the property ladder early enough.

Getting on the property ladder is not cheap. You need money!

Yes, but I know how much we spent on our wedding and how much the deposit was back then. At the very least we should have spent money on purchasing one property as early as possible.

Actually, that’s not true, because I did get on the property ladder before I got married. But that house was for just me. I cant explain it, but it was a big thing for me to buy a house before I got married.

Oh, so you bought a house by yourself before you got married, or it was a “we’re going to get married” so you both contributed towards the house?

No no. I bought it by myself. It took me 10 months to save up for the deposit and the other expenses.

Oh, you were contracting already by this time, right?

Yes, So I could build the deposit faster. Plus my expenses were very low. My rent was about £500 or there about. And as a guy living alone, I could live with the bare minimum.

Another mistake was not staying on top of credit card payments. After I had gotten married, my wife and I were trying to get as many points on our Amex card so we moved all expenses to the card. At some point, we changed how we made payments to clear it all up but somehow I messed things up so much that we had unpaid payments of up to £4,000. You can imagine the amount of interest that had gone in. Because the interest is calculated daily, interest plus capital added up to 4k.

The key lesson is to understand the credit card payment cycle and make sure you pay off any outstanding just after the statement is generated. I didn’t automate this payment and did not notice it wasn’t being settled monthly.

Just hearing that 4k has my heart pumping. So those were the five wrongs, what were the great money moves you made?

Without a doubt, paying more than the minimum into my pensions. At the time I had a plan to have more than a £1m pounds by the time I am 60 years old. So I had to sit with my accountant / financial adviser, working backward from 60 years he showed me the value of compounding interests and gave me a roadmap of what I needed to add to my pensions every month.

But that has slowed down though because childcare fees are not cheap!

Ok. No 2?

Deciding to invest in property. After marriage, my wife and I made it a goal to focus on building a portfolio of properties we put out for rent.

Ok. Cool stuff. Next is focusing on earning more. Going down the route of contracting is one of my biggest advantages. Because it gave me more cash aka Liquidity.

No 4?

Having a spouse that is on the same page as me. Getting into a relationship and having conversations about money is one of the best things that happened. Actually having conversations about money, values, and children are absolutely key matters.

And the last thing?

Doing our finances together as a family. We have a spreadsheet we both control that shows our income, direct debits etc and then we both agree on what gets spent after paying bills for the remaining sum left. We both have current accounts, a joint savings account (which we both have access to), pension accounts, and savings accounts.

We both have independent money pots but that spreadsheet is the kicker because it has a view of everything we are earning: income from your salary shows up on there, bonus from your salary shows up on there. Any extra income except business or side hustle.

So it’s a Profit and Loss of thing?

More like a balance sheet. At the end of the month, there is a view of how much we have earned, how much we have spent, how much we should be saving etc

Impressive. I don’t think many couples have this kind of money conversation so it is impressive.

We didn’t start off like that. It became important as we started to earn more and more. We would start working together on finances month on month and then stop. Then start again. Until we became consistent.

But wait when you do investments, do you do investments as Mr and Mrs. or as individuals?

You have to look at the financial advantage. Because we need to be careful of the tax implications. We don’t have joint investments but we make joint decisions. Whenever I am about to buy a property we discuss it first; is it a good time, is it the best option to invest in etc

But we do have protections in place in case of my demise and vice versa we are the sole executors of the estate of assets owned. And then we also have life insurance.

You guys are very smart. You’re making a lot of sound decisions. What’s your next big financial goal?

In the immediate, we have a domestic priority for us to focus on. It is something that we know historically requires significant financial investments. After that, we want to invest in more properties for sure.

One last question, what is your greatest lesson to share with any immigrant?

Surrounding yourself with the right people is key. We get most of our tips from conversations with people around us. In particular, people who are doing well because they are happy and willing to discuss money. Not sure but think some research shows that people who are in poverty rarely ever discuss the subject of money.

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xxxx Anu

Let me share another story but first……thank you for the feedback on the first immigrant money story I shared.

I am lining up more people across various life statuses and various countries as well.

I met today’s subject in 2021 through a community-like group I have been volunteering with. It has been quite interesting to see how his journey has transformed financially.

Let’s call him Mr Thames.

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Profile

Gender: Male

Country of Residence: United Kingdom

Profession: Senior Sales Executive

Why did you choose to leave your own country?

It was not an intentional move. In fact, when I think about it, I would like to say God tricked me because it was not in any plan for me.

I met my now-wife in my home church choir. We clearly liked each other but we didn’t talk about anything romantic for a long time. When we finally did and started dating in 2017, three months later she left for the UK for her Masters degree. For me, at that point, I wanted to further my education or at least get a better job.

About that time I got a job at a consulting big four but I requested to defer it and I chose to go back to school in 2017 for a Masters degree as well. I was able to secure a loan from an individual for the school fees on the agreement that when I started working again I would start re-payment.

I finished in 2018 and went back home to get married to the same lady.

The plan was simple. My wife will go back to the UK, I will remain at home and resume my job at the big four. Nothing worked out that way. Nothing.

First, my wife did a master’s in Public Health so she could switch from pure medicine as a career to Public Health. She finished and started applying for jobs in Public Health but she wasn’t getting offers. So she made the difficult choice of taking the PLAB (qualifying exams for doctors) so she could at least stay in the country along the medical line. She passed and she immediately got a job as a Doctor with a sponsored work permit.

With her work permit, I applied for a dependant visa so I could visit her as frequently as possible.

In preparation for my new job, I had gone home and resigned my former job (they had actually granted me a study leave) and went to visit my wife just before the agreed resumption date. The following week the big four offer was retracted. No actually the resumption of the job was put on hold till further notice for reasons they refused to share.

I found myself in the UK with my wife (newly-wed) with no job or means of income.

Goodness! What a twist!

I was just shocked.

Your life begins as an Immigrant. What happened next?

I started Job searching but the market was brutal! This was at the peak of Brexit. Companies were relocating their headquarters to other parts of Europe, and there were so many uncertainties so employers put hiring on hold.

I had to start the networking activities; attending conferences, connecting on Linkedin, be part of professional calls……everything. This was now 2019.

A few weeks into the year, I got a call from the big four to come back to Nigeria and resume in June. Then they called again to resume earlier in April. At that point I realised I didn’t think properly about how we will run the family from a long distance. So I turned down the offer and decided to stay in the UK

I was more confident in my job search.

But I didn’t get a job until November.

How many months was your job search?

I really started looking for a job like February of that year. Yeah February was when the Big Four told me to come resume and I turned it down. So nine months.

But in that nine months how were you earning? how were you making money?

Great thing is that my wife was earning and we were also very careful with spending. This was our first year of marriage and we lived in a studio with just basic amenities; I mean like bed and then a table/chair, no TV kind of basic. I couldn’t even afford to watch TV anyway.

Everyday, I sat on that table looking for jobs, improving myself, making mistakes correcting myself, signing up for different things. It was just a whole lot of self-development.

I’ve never been tested like that before in my life. I mean when I finished school, I went on to national service, I got into Stanbic Bank almost immediately after. I never really had to look for a job. This was my real test of life, trying to navigate the job market in another country. It was very tough.

You lived on your wife’s income. I mean you just got married! Like brand new marriage! Do you think this affected your marriage in any way or it made you closer to  your wife?

You know what people normally say about your first year marriage; that it is tough, you fight alot etc Infact the mindset is that the first year could be chaotic.

So I was looking for it, I was waiting for it to happen to us considering the additional pressure. But it never came. If anything it made us closer. An adversity that helped us fight as one.

It was a nine to ten-month journey of trying and trying again. My wife was there to keep encouraging me as she held the home income-wise for the period.

What was clear for us was that I was better in handling money, so it was easy for her to allow me make sure that we used our money for the best things. And it was easy for us to manage things that way. We were not stressed.

During that time I decided I was not going to do any of the survival jobs because I kept thinking I am good enough to get a proper job in this country. I didn’t want to settle and then it will affect my mentality in trying to get into the corporate work.

Okay so next question, this first job you finally got, was it at the same level of the last job in Nigeria you left or you had to start all over again?

I had to start again. When I applied for jobs at the level I was told I didn’t have enough experience. When I went for the junior roles, I was told I had too much experience.

It was a sales role; far from my experience of pure finance. But I took it because I had to learn how to talk. At that time, I truly was an introvert.

I know that you’re kind of a manager now, so it has taken you about four years to get back to get back to the same level you were when you left Nigeria.

Actually, there was some drama in that job. I lost it within four months.

Wait what?

Yeah. Looking back now, one thing I will say is, put your best wherever you are no matter the circumstances. You see when I took the job there was another one in the horizon and I was working with the hope it will come through. So I carried the attitude of “this is temporary”. So I gave the wrong impression right from the beginning.

This was plus there was somebody that exposed me to UK work politics. There was this somebody in that team that kept poking me and will go to the manager to tell some funny stories. But the manager will just go ahead and document the things without even asking me. When I challenged it, the manager will then say “oh sorry, this is already recorded. How can I change this now?”

I never had any kpis as I was still onboarding and I thought I was doing well. By month three or so I was having my one on one. My manager was saying you should have been doing this and that within one month. I didn’t have the boldness to challenge any of these things as it was my first job here. I kept going hoping for things to change.

It got worse. It was a very very bad experience. They let me go in February of 2020 as Covid was starting.

To be frank I wasn’t overly pained because this time I was confident; I felt like I’ve done this before.

But the timing was off. Around this time my wife had gotten pregnant and was due soon. She decided on a one year maternity leave because I had got that sales role. This meant less pay. She was getting the full salary for the first three months and then 60% 50% for the next three months then 30% for the rest.

It was going to be back to square one but this time it was going to be three of us living on 30% of my wife’s salary.

One thing I am grateful for is that when I got that sales job I was able to quickly look for another accommodation; a two bedroom because the baby was coming.

What a season…Back to the job market with more domestic pressure.

Yeah. I went back to searching, applying, interviewing.

My wife had put to bed so I was helping her alot and I took time to also volunteer with some non-profit organizations.

I remember I had to speak to my Landlord to discuss a payment plan for our rent. I said to him, “I have lost my job and unable to pay my rent in full but we will pay you 50% of the rent sum every month until I get a job. I can also be sending reports on my job application to show you that actually been looking for a job.”

Imagine moving into a new accomodation and months later, we couldn’t pay. We were running out of cash. Thankfully the Landlord agreed.

I also went back to speak to the person who loaned me money for my masters fees. I had to pause repayment because immediately I got the first job I was paying back but I went back to explain the situation of things and the need for me to pause payment.

In July, I got a freelance role as an operations associate for one of the organizations I volunteered with. Not a lot of money pay-wise but it was good money considering the stage we were. It was an initial contract for a few months but that continued until December of that year.

We began paying our rent again. But we had to also clear our outstanding rent. So we came up with a payment plan with our Landlord to pay a percentage of the outstanding rent every month in addition to the standard rent.
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​So the next thing was to focus on house purchase?

We now had a stable income but the first priority was to sort out all debts – rent and loan for masters.

After that, we looked at our finances. I didn’t have to pay back anymore loans, we now have two sources of income that was now a constant flow but I also felt like I was already behind on so many things. I was a little beat up. I knew that we needed to maximize this thing and use it properly because you never know when the season will shift again.

The next things was to attack the goal of buying a house. Because we have always had it as a goal, once I got that initial job in November in 2019, I had started putting away £200 in an account but not the LISA.

Why not the LISA? That would have gotten you more money?

I wanted the money to be accessible so I can have it in case life happened and we needed money. You know the limitation of accessing the LISA.

Yeah. True that.

Even when I lost that job, I insisted that we didn’t stop. But God saved us because we were just looking at the money and could not touch it. We knew we could cut down expenses and live a minimal lifestyle.

Now with the savings combined with the help to buy scheme we had some money to do a deposit and get a mortgage. But nothing else for all the additional cost e.g extras for the house, fees for solicitors & broker…..all those side things that came to almost 5% of the house cost.

Honestly it was a bit of a shocker for us.

They build the house and you have to pay for flooring. For example, they will build the garage quite alright, but everything inside you have to pay for it as extra. There is fridge/freezer, cooking burner and washing machine to buy. My wife even wanted a wood like worktop, we had to pay for that.

We ended up paying this cost from our salaries monthly.

So the next project after the house was visa visa renewals. 

Yep. It’s a lot of money. What we did was instead of spending money on decor for the house, we got the house to a point where it is habitable. We had the basics, windows have curtains etc and that’s all. We moved in and focused all monies towards visa renewals.

See I am a firm believer that God is our source but that also means we can do things with wisdom and practicality. A simple system of putting 200 each pounds aside even in the midst of extreme pain is what has helped us to get things that we have now. Sometimes you don’t got one lump sum from somewhere, that simple discipline turns out something beautiful later.

This conversation will be read immigrants, if you will give them a word of advice or perhaps two things you did wrong that you don’t want them to repeat, what will those be?

Something I did wrong was, I should have fought my mindset at the time I got my first job. I know they did me wrong in a number of ways but this is me being self-critical now because I try not to always put the blame on the outside all the time.

Whatever you get to do, do it well. You must give it your 100% commitment. Let people see you as well being 100% committed the way you are getting the job done. I don’t know if it is just my own personal self-critical experience and I know it might just be that they had their own candidates but I should have done better.

Another thing most important advice I’ll give them, if you are coming over with your wife or husband, whatever you do, make sure one person is working.

I mean a lot of people say that let the spouse with the job go first no matter what it is. And I agree. Because the way this country is, every month you must pay bills. As you land money needs to be spent. Back home you can borrow money and pay your rent in a year so you can rearrange yourself.

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When it comes to children that is a different ball game.

You have to think about it well because children will restrict your movements; you cant go out and just work any shifts because somebody has to be with them. You have to think about it well. If you can keep your children with family, please consider it. I mean it’s not easy to give this kind of advice because I don’t know the kind of connection existing at home.

If you have some support and people can help you initially to settle that’s great. At least try and be sure that there is a flow of income otherwise you can put pressure your marriage. I remember my family the period when my mother in-law came during covid, that was a blessing because she was there to help take care of our son. So I could go full out looking for my job. During that period my wife also started baking cakes to sell. We really needed the extra hands.

It’s quite interesting how you managed your journey because people’s marriages would have been destroyed. I mean coming from a place where you were getting offers to a point you were going back to ground zero, somebody telling you’re not good enough too…..it’s great to see where you are now. Thank you so much for sharing.

What is the next goal for you?

I know this is very ambitious, but the plan is to pay off our 35 years mortgage in 5 years. The how, I don’t know, but we will do it!

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Thank you.

Now…… 

Todays subject is someone I met when she was starting out her career and I’m so proud to see what she has built for herself.

Let’s call today’s subject “Enka”.​
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​Profile​
​Gender: Female
​Country of Residence: United Arab Emirates (Dubai)
​Profession: Growth Marketing Manager

Why did you leave your own country?

Why did I leave……

I am going to start by saying I was always an advocate of country will always be my place of residence and nowhere else. My plan always was, I would travel to explore other countries but Nigeria will always be home for me. 

I believed that Nigeria was going to be great. I really did believe.

Then 2020 happened. October 2020.  

Do you mean #EndSars protest?

Yes, the #endsars protest and what happened on 20th October, 2020. 

That was just one of it, another reason I left was nothing was working anymore: Security, Depreciation of the currency, Electricity, life’s basic needs increasingly becoming difficult or too expensive to access. It all just seem to be getting worse. 

I will give you an example; dollar exchange rate was  N365 to a dollar in March 2020 and just a couple of weeks later it became N400+ to a dollar. It hasn’t stopped spiraling out of control since then.

Then with the pandemic it all became obvious we were all one disease away from being wiped out. And this is happening with the supposed leaders we had. And much later in the year of 2020, the protest happened, leaders gave orders for people to be shot at! I mean actually shoot at youths calling for a better system! Who does that?

I decided it is time to leave. 

To be fair, these are good reasons. So how did you decide on Dubai?

My brain works in a very weird but particular way.

I knew I didn’t want to go for a master’s degree. I also didn’t want to go somewhere  I didn’t have a job or I willl go there and start hustling. I mean I had a very good job in Nigeria. Very good one and I was doing financially okay.

I also didn’t want to go to a cold country. Hahaha.

After some research I decided to focus on Dubai; those in my line of work; digital marketing, were in high demand.  And it was one of those countries that getting an offer from Nigeria was possible back then, difficult but possible.

I put all my eggs in one basket with this one. I didn’t even bother trying other countries at all. It was Dubai or nothing. And I also had a friend who was living in Dubai already with his wife who really encouraged me as I started on the journey of finding a new life in Dubai. They gave me really good tips about applying for jobs.

What kind of tips?

The wife in particular taught me the trick of applying for a job, then going on LinkedIn to search for a senior person(s) in that role or HR manager in that company and then send a message letting them know you applied for that role.

I also had an excel sheet that I documented all my applications; company name, role, date of applications and sometimes names of the hiring manager. 

I treated the whole thing like a second job.  I still had my 9 to 5 job and I made sure I played to the Dubai work week pattern then of Sunday to Thursday. So from Friday Afternoon till Sunday evening, I spent all my free time applying for jobs.

But despite all the consistent hard work…..no positive results. I either got the standard “Unfortunately….” email or I went through interview stages and then told they went with someone else. Some of these roles were ones I am very sure I was overqualified for.

I remember one of such jobs, was a role that my friend in Dubai sent to me. Infact he was one of the hiring managers and we thought this was surely a done deal and I was just going through the stages for formality. Alas he called me and told me his bosses approved hiring of someone else. Honestly, I was distraught.

But I had to solider on. At this point I had a folder with nothing less than 100 versions of my CV that I had tailored specifically for every role I had applied for. It was a lot of work! You know when they say looking for a job is like a job in itself? Yep that was exactly how it felt…

And then I planned I will move to Dubai for 3 to 6 months with a visiting visa to go and search for a job from within.

How were you going to fund that?

When I made the decision on Dubai, I started converting my savings to dollars and as at this time I had saved about $10,000. I started selling off my things, furniture, home appliances etc. The final plan was to sell off my car once I was ready to fly out. With my projections I would be leaving with at $22,000.

That’s sizeable.

Yeah. And I knew I would need to live quite frugally too so the money can last long.

So what happened?

I cant remember exactly when but a couple of weeks later you sent me this role with the global streaming company. I read it and told myself no way will I get it so why bother. But then another friend sent it to me. I said you know what, I will just apply and expect the rejection email.

But I was shortlisted for an interview and then was told there would be 6 interview stages including presentations etc. But that turned into 11 stages!

11 stages?

Yep. 11. Apparently by stage 6 they were down to 2 candidates, myself and someone else. The bosses determined they needed more people to be part of the selection process.

I got the job. And it was a very very good one. Aside from the very cushy pay package, they paid for my relocation cost to Dubai. Initially, because there were still some travel restrictions I was flown to Kenya and housed for 2 weeks. All expenses paid.

And then to Dubai all-expense paid including one month of housing paid and then handed over to a real estate company to sort my house search. Very Bougie style! Hahaha

What do you mean?

Anytime this company wanted me to go for a house viewing, they came with a sleek range rover to transport me. I felt like a VIP most times.

Bougie Much!

I know right.

So I know there was a talk of moving your role to South Africa. So how did you navigate that?

Yeah. Okay so now…….

Sorry sorry before we do that, how much were you saving from your income and what were your investment choices?

I have always been saver from with my nine to five incomes. Before Dubai I always saved at least 30% of my income and getting into Dubai I was awash with money.

So I automatically saved more, that increased to 50%. I only live on 50% of my income now. The rest of it goes into savings and investments.

Remember I had $22,000 saved prior moving and then I received some good money from my employers as part of my relocation bonus. This meant I had about $35,000 in loose cash. I had to seek out investment advice so I could make the right choices with where I put in my money. I contacted an investment company and got some advice from a finance advisor.

Did you have to pay? And what did the advisor say?

O yes, I paid but it was tiny sum compared to the money I had to invest, and it was one off. I saw it as an investment for my finances. The advice was to do a mix of mid to high-risk investment; Index Funds, Real Estate, Cypto etc. 

I immediately started investing in Index funds mostly called s&p 500 up until today and they are all in the US.

Nothing in Dubai?

No nothing in Dubai for now. All in the US.

But Real estate is a major plan for me now in Dubai. I was given an eviction notice from my current flat because they owner wanted to sell. I decided to buy it and this is in the works. I have reached out to my bank for a mortgage and they have come back to me with how much maximum they can give me and  it was very enough to cover what I wanted.

Ok now back to you losing the Job that brought you to Dubai.

Right. Yes.

My employers had a reputation of retaining talent no matter what. Unfortunately, the global technology layoff came calling, and that came with restructuring of my team. This restructuring meant my role was moved to South Africa with a 75% pay cut.

To be fair while I interviewing, they did mention the role is originally supposed to sit in South Africa and will eventually move there at some point. No timelines given.

My manager, bless his heart, tried to push for my role to remain in Dubai but it was shot down fast. Moving to South Africa with that pay cut was not an option for me so I let them know I was happy for my contract to be terminated. They gave me until December 2023.

And so the job search began again. With the global brand on my CV I did get interviews but was not clinching the job either because they went for someone else or they were not able to match my pay. In fact more than half of the time it was because they could not match my expected pay.

By end of December, I still didn’t have a job and was now officially out of a job. With the Duabi laws I had between 30 to 90 days to find a job or I had to leave. In January of this year the global streaming platform put me on a contract for 3 months for a particular project. Honestly those guys came through for me.

Every day of that 3 months was nerve wrecking because I knew I had to find a job asap or at least before the 3 months contracts ended. Thankfully I got a Job offer at the end of March 2023. The company not only matched my pay expectation, they added some more on top  it as well. And the role was actually a promotion because now I am covering and responsible for all the markets they have operations in Africa.

Whew. Thank God!

Yes o. I prayed like never before. Going back home to Nigeria was not an option and still didn’t consider any European or North American country.

How is the role going?

Very good actually. I am enjoying the challenges and knowledge that comes with it.

Apart from the property purchase that is in the pipeline, what is like the next big financial goal for you?

Buying another nationality passport.

Huh?

Hahaha. Let me explain that better. No matter how long I stay in Dubai I can never be a national. What you guys call permanent citizen in other countries. 

So I know the passport I currently have is one of the weakest in the world at this time. But there are other countries with relatively strong passports offering immediate citizenship if I invest some sizeable sum in their country.

I have therefore set it out as a goal. As soon as the house sale is done, my next goal is citizenship of another country.

So leaving Dubai is out of the question?

O no. I loveeee Dubai and definitely not leaving anytime soon.

Thanks Enka!

Another story to inspire you on your immigrant journey.

I asked our last subject if I could speak to the guy she referred to in her interview, and he agreed. And he also agreed to share his immigrant journey.

Let’s call today’s subject “Oti”.​
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​Profile​
​Gender: Male​
​Country of Residence: United States​
​Profession: Program Manager

The first question I always ask is, why did you leave your home country?

Hmm where do I start from?

I left in 2014 December. But the desire to go abroad and experience life outside of what I knew started from many years ago when I started learning to read and write in English from about 9 years old.

I grew up in a town in Osun state, Nigeria and until my parents moved to Lagos state. We were an aspiring middle-class family money wise so the cheapest way for me to engage with anything at all outside of my environment was books. I read everything readable. Not being able to speak English I couldn’t even interact with people so I just used to listen to my friends talking and I couldn’t contribute much. While my friends had visual representations of what abroad looked like, I had to use my imagination a lot. I could story map everything as I was reading, I had to create things in my head.

So I always desired to see what the real thing looked like. I didn’t want to just imagine it anymore.

When I was in secondary school, I saved some money and wrote the SATs exam without telling my parents. I used that to apply to a lot of schools. This was back then when schools sent brochures across the world for intending students. I remember I used to get a lot of mails addressed to me at home and my family was wondering what was going on. I applied to the University of Washington and the University of California, Berkeley because I still wanted to go to the United States.

Nothing came out of that really.

I went to University at home and started working with one of the major telecommunications company in Lagos. Then again I started reading a lot about investments; this was my introduction days to Crypto: Bitcoin, Ethereum and the likes. At that time these were things that I couldn’t do in Nigeria. For instance I will dig deep about buying a particular type of stock, gain a lot of knowledge but do nothing with it.

Fast forward to 2010, I took the GRE exams but did nothing about it until 2014. A couple of conversations and events, I took the bold step and moved to the United States for a Masters Degree.

How did you fund the masters degree and your cost of living?

It was not an easy ride and so many stories to get me to the finish line but I will share as briefly as I can.
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My course was four semesters and I had saved some money from my paid employment. But it was not scratching the surface.

After some research, I found out that American citizens paid a subsidized fee versus what international students paid(Resident vs Non-resident tuition). So I applied through the course advisor and requested to also pay the discounted sum. They agreed under a condition, I would pay the full fees for the first term, then I must get a grade of at least 3.3 after my first term. On that premise I can then pay the discounted fees for the rest of my course by maintaining a 3.3 CGPA.

Now the United States school system also had a loop-hole I could take advantage of. Because most of the students went to University funded by federal student loans which took some long processing time from the government, the university allowed them to start and take classes for the duration of the full term/semester without making any initial payment. This also applied to international students. The only caveat is that you would not be able to register for the next semester due to financial hold. This is unlike the United Kingdom schools, this meant I didn’t need to pay any deposit for fees to start a semester.

The last bit that made everything align for me; I was supposed to resume in September of 2013 but the visa processing was late so I was advised to resume in January of 2014.

So I went to school without paying a deposit, went ahead for the full first semester and wrote my exams and got my results well above the agreed 3.3! This meant I didn’t need to pay anything from January all the way to August. (I didn’t take any courses during the summer (May to August) so I took different jobs on campus- IT helpdesk, Laboratories etc”.

I also took on some tutoring jobs – teaching maths and science courses to high school kids. By the time the second term started, with the money I had saved before school, I had enough to pay my fees for the outstanding first term with the discount applied. I was now ready for the second semester with little to no money. You are eligible to get a proper job outside the school system after a full semester.

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O nice! That really worked out well for you!

Yeah but then things got even more difficult, there is always the next huddle.

How do you mean?

After paying the outstanding fee for the first semester, summer was over so I was limited in the number of jobs I could do (20 hours) . I mean I had a job but the income was just barely enough to cover my expenses. What I had was not enough to register for the third semester of school (or clear the second-semester fees).
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The first plan was to access 25% of pension in Nigeria (the criteria is that you must have been out of a job for more than 6 months to legally access the money) Even that was not enough. The exchange rate from the Naira had shifted so much, the sum it would amount to was a mere percentage.

Calling mom and dad was definitely out of the question. The last time I called them for any financial support was at the beginning of my final year in undergraduate school so doing so at that time was not going to happen. But I just didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t sleep or function properly.

As the due date to pay my fees approached, I called up a friend and shared my predicament with him and he immediately said “Why didn’t you call me since??! The solution is easy. Just write a letter to the president of your school and make sure you emphasize the issues you are facing with the currency devaluation at home and all the struggles. And state that you will like to be paying about $400 monthly until you finish paying.

Guess what? I did exactly what he suggested, and the president replied saying the university has been made aware of the exchange rate issues in various African countries. They recognize how difficult it has been for students so rather than pay $400 monthly, he was recommending I pay $300 monthly. It was such a huge weight on my shoulders. I remember calling up all my friends in other schools that were international students and telling them what to do immediately. It was a miracle

That was how I got through to the end. By the time I finished school, I still had about $13,000 in outstanding fees. The school allowed me to write the final exams. For a few students, their schools held onto their certificates till they paid back all the owed tuition.

What a Journey! How did you navigate the job market after school?

It was very very rough for the first few months. About six months.

I still had the job from my school days but I lost it because of work permit. I had to get it renewed after school but instead of the standard 90 days, for some reason, the processing time took way more than 90 days. My office had to let me go. By the time my tiny savings was depleted, I had to let go of my flat and ended up staying on a friend’s couch. At some point, his family came to visit from India, so I had to leave and I started staying in my car for another couple of days until another friend came to help.

Listen! It was rough!

Those days I questioned myself and the decisions I made. I was hustling just to survive. While in school, I had started scalping; buying tickets of popular sport games at low prices and re-selling them at a high yield all on online, I signed up to various freelance sites but these two https://fieldnation.com/ and https://www.mindsumo.com/ were life savers. I was lucky to get some jobs that kept me afloat. I also tutored other immigrants who were trying to write their GEDs.

In all of this I kept applying for roles and was not getting anywhere. There were interviews but no offers because companies were not interested in filing for work visa. Looking back now, I realised the city I was in was the problem. As much as my engineering friends could get roles in an Automobile city, my own skill set was not in high demand in the city I was in. I moved to another city and within weeks I got three job offers.

I will tell anyone this “move to larger cities, move to where your skillset is in high demand.” The job I eventually settled for agreed to sponsor my work permit but the pay was not great and it was a tiny company but I took it anyway. About 2 months in, I was looking forward to finally filing for the work visa (I had been working on student visa – allows STEM students to work for 2-3 years upon graduation) when I got a call for an interview for a contract(temp) position at a big tech firm. It was a 16 month contract job from one of the major tech companies and they also offered the role with visa sponsorship. I knew it was a big risk considering this was a contract role vs the permanent one I already had that was about a month to my filing. I took the interview but I was not selected . 2 weeks later, I got a call from the contracting company and they wanted to consider giving me the role again. This time, when I joined the call for the interview, they didn’t realize I was on the bridge call already and I heard the hiring manager say “whatever Oti says, just let him know he has gotten the role and he has nothing to worry about”.
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I have never been so happy In my life.

I really needed a big name on my CV. I remember when I was in Nigeria I got a job offer from KPMG on two different occasions but I turned them down on both occasions because the pay offer was lower than I was earning. I should have taken the offer because having the global brand name on my CV would have been of immense advantage in a foreign market.

After the 16 months contract, I started interviewing again but at least I felt like I had one leg in plus the experience. I got an offer from a big tech organisation but due to some restructuring, the company rescinded their offer a week before resumption and I was out of a job again.

Disaster!

I tell you! It felt like a never-ending circle of me not catching a break. Eventually, I got a permanent role with the same big tech organisation. This time it came with all the benefits including a green card.

That ended well…. whew. What has your financial journey been like since then?

I mean first all of all as soon as I got the job, I got a credit card and used it to pay off my outstanding school fees. But I have since cleared the credit card debt.

I started to invest heavily in stocks, securities, bonds digital currencies…….you name it. Finally, I could now put into practice everything I read about and continued to read about.

Real Estate?

Buying real estate is not a priority for me.

Even a residential one?

For a long time, I wanted the choice of the house I buy for me to live in to be done in collaboration with whoever I marry. This hasn’t happened so I finally made the decision to go ahead and buy one. The legal proceedings are in progress.

I totally agree that real estate makes good financial investment, but for me it is not an immediate priority. I will eventually add a number of them to my portfolio but for me right now, it must be funded by other streams of income.

O nice. So, what would you consider a priority or what I will call a major financial goal for you?

I want to own a bank.

Wow.

Yep! Not necessarily a commercial bank. It can be a microfinance bank. I want to own an institution that is the powerhouse of businesses and economies. I have always dreamed of this, and I am actively working toward this.

How?

A friend and I have been able to set up a co-operative of some sort for our university class alumni. We raised all the funds from the class and have been managing it quite well.

Plus I make strategic investments now. Aside from the stocks I buy, when I listen to the news I am listening for the opportunities. For example, the Olympics games will be held in the city I live in, in the year 2026. I have been actively researching the organizations that will be suppliers, vendors etc. They are currently building a 70,000-person stadium in a town; this means businesses will spring up all around it. These are the ones I am investing in now long-term.

I still do scalping but now with bigger events and I play more long-term strategic goals.

Good Stuff. My Last question…..any advise for other immigrants like yourself?

Hmmmm.

I will say this, be where the right information is. Speaking to you now, I look back at my journey and what has propelled me forward is information. Getting the discounted fee for my masters degree, knowing that when I write to the president of my university I would be able to pay monthly, the decision to move to a new city where my skillset is in high demand………. so many others I had to skip because of time.

Your progress in any new country is about the quality information you have access to and what you do with it. To be honest it all boils down to the quality of people you surround yourself with. It is what they know that they will share.

Information gets you ahead. The right information gets you to the top.

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I am not a financial expert. Far from it. I am just your average girl who uses money as a tool to thrive in the new country and is willing to share my lessons as I go along.

Let’s call today’s subject Queen.

Profile
Gender: Female
Country of Residence: Canada
Profession: Product Manager

The first question I always ask is why did you leave your country?
The one thing that I can sort of say is, the Hunger for some kind of exposure.It was a desire I had right from my undergrad days. I always wanted to do my masters degree abroad and I remember going to one of these international school/educational fairs in Lagos and this was after my NYSC. I went so I could just find out details about getting the masters and then I completely forgot about it. I mean at that point I realised I needed to get real, it wasn’t like I had the money to pay for any international degree.

So I got my first job in an investment management firm and as God will have it, it was in that work experience I got exposed to a lot of tech innovation from a fintech investment perspective.I saw how much exposure people from advanced economies like the US, UK etc had; people who schooled or worked there. They just had the level of exposure and expertise that they brought to those conversations in the office that I told myself “I really want to be like that.”

A friend that knew I was looking at international schools sent me a link to Carleton University for a technology innovation management masters program. I applied and it was the easiest application and the shortest admission process time. I resigned from work and left Nigeria.

How did you fund it?
I have a weakness, I am not a very good planner. When I got the admission letter, I saw it was a year program and I just concluded without finding out how many terms it would really take. In my mind, I would only do two terms in a year.

When I got here, I quickly realised that the shortest time I could actually do my program was four terms so I needed more money for at least two more terms than I planned for. I just prayed and decided not to worry. I remember being in a conversation at the time with a guy who actually had to withdraw for a while from the program because he couldn’t afford the next term’s fees; I got home and I was just scared. I remember after praying, I got a scripture that spoke to that fear and that really changed it for me honestly.

This is how I got the balance; while I was in school I decided to volunteer with my program for an administrative-like role so I could keep abreast of my technical skills as I searched for paid employment. I spoke to my program director and coincidentally that was the first time they actually wanted to employ students for a research study he was running. The plan was to volunteer but another immigrant (a guy from Jamaica) and I instead got paid employment; an initial contract for 6 months to begin with.

It was just miraculous because I could survive every day and also save from that job.I didn’t have to do any other kind of work.

I was saving money and at one point in time after the first winter term I decided I was going to skip the summer term and get another job so I could earn and save up more for my tuition because in Canada during the summer if you are not schooling you can work more than 20 hours. But then, my director just called me and was like “Oh you know what? There is this government-funded research I want you to be part of and there’s a related course that I’m actually going to teach in summer and I want you to take that course in summer”. I told him I didn’t plan to take summer courses because I’m trying to save up for my school fees balance. He told me not to worry but to sign up for the course. Somehow he was able to move things around and get me funding for that summer term from an entrepreneurship funding program for start-ups. With that job and tuition assistance, I paid for summer, fall, and the second winter term; which was my last term.

At some point, I was short by $300 to complete my tuition with the deadline very close by but again miraculously a couple that were friends of mine gave me the money to pay off.You can call me a miracle magnet! HahaWhen we say your lines are falling onto you pleasant places, now I have life experiences of what that means.

Indeed, so many miracles on your journey. You have gone to school, you’ve had a job that paid your fees so no debt coming out of school, what then happened next?
I was still working on a contract with that program. Interestingly the contract was getting renewed every three months which caused a bit of anxiety because, after every two to three months, I’d wonder if my contract will be renewed. But I worked there for almost 10 months th after school.I finished the winter of 2016 and I was still there but then I decided I needed to start looking for a job because I wanted to step into private for-profit sector work.

During my job search, I realised a lot of the job deliverables I had done in previous work experience were partly product management. So I wrote out my CV, highlighting my non-official product management experience and I got an opportunity to interview for a junior product manager position. It was a good first interview with the hiring manager and he gave me an offer only a few days after the interview.

And the offer came in February 2017. At that time the program I was working with had already renewed my contract in January to the end of April but I decided to resign and let them open up the position for another international student to take the job.I went on to resume the role as a junior product manager. The salary was again just okay. I had to look at the bigger picture, to be honest. Another reason I had to resign from that program from the university was I needed to start accumulating time for my permanent residency application.

Frankly, it’s always easier to find a job when you have a job.

The junior products manager role was your first official job?
Yes, I was there for a little over 2 years. In early 2019 I started feeling unsatisfied in that role but I didn’t think it was time for me to leave. Interestingly in April 2019, a former colleague of mine reached out to me and said “Hey they’re looking for a product manager where I am, are you interested?” I was like no I’m still learning, there is a lot I need to learn, I am not ready to move, I’m focusing on learning right now. He said okay.

I didn’t know what was coming.

In May 2019, I got laid off from that junior PM role. According to them, it was supposed to be a temporary layoff but with no definite day of returning I don’t know why that really devastated me but it made me reassess my life’s work and value. Thank God for things like employment insurance that Canada has and the fact that I was living well within my means.

I started the job search again a week after the layoff. The company where that guy had reached out to me was still looking for a product manager and I applied this time. There were a lot of companies as well that called me for interviews. I did go for a number of them but eventually, two companies were at the very top because I kept moving on from stage one to stage two and so on.I actually preferred one of them over the other. When I went for the interview at their office I really loved it and started to imagine working there. So I kept moving from stage to stage with both companies. My mind was really into that one.

I can’t remember the day of the week but right after I woke up and prayed I checked my email. The other company that I preferred sent me an update, a rejection email; “unfortunately, there was another person blah blah blah”

Just before the time I got laid off, I had planned that I was going to travel to a couple of European countries for vacation. My visa application was in progress when the layoff happened and as I looked for a new job I decided I was going to travel still. I will collect the visa and travel using some of my savings. Whenever I get a job I will start saving again.

Just as I decided I was definitely going on that trip after the rejection I checked my email inbox again and I had an update from the other of the two companies. They wanted to speak with me about an offer.

There was some back and forth with what they were offering but finally arrived at something almost $90k CAD and that was almost a $30K jump from the job I lost. But he was going to offer me maybe almost 10K less than that or so. I thankfully had learned to negotiate before jumping on any offer (even though I was really jobless and could have been desperate)On negotiating job offers, I always remember the parable Jesus told of a Man who employed servants at different times and paid them the same wage – based on what he and they agreed upon. Based on this parable, I tell myself to better insist on getting what I would not later resent my employer for because when you get in, you will most likely hear of other people’s salaries that might be much better than the offer you accepted and you don’t want to be resenting them or your employer.

You have been in that same company since?
Yes
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​Have there been any promotions?
No promotions but there have been pay increases each year. To be honest with this role/job and looking forward, career-wise, I am looking for opportunities that fit (in terms of responsibilities, problem space, etc) rather than job titles that sound good. So for me its a case of “do I really want the job title or I’m looking for the responsibility that gives visibility and significance?”

I know you bought a house. How was that journey?
That was an interesting one. So in 2018 I really started investing in stocks and yes saving.

What percentage of your salary were you saving, and investing? Also what kind of stocks were you buying?
Let me see; so my biggest cost was just my rent. I was staying in a low-rent basement apartment for the longest time. It wasn’t the very best, to be honest, but I just stayed there to be able to save more.

So, I was able to get my rent and utilities somewhere between 30 and 40% of my earnings and so could save up and invest a significant percentage (after living expenses and giving)I was saving for most of 2018 & 2019 i.e pre-covid. I also spent a lot of my free time researching companies I was interested in.

Also, importantly, there is a close friend of mine that I was always talking about companies and investments with. We discussed innovative companies, their valuation and recent IPOs mostly.. He works in the US and so we were always putting our ears down and trying to find out what companies were doing. And so based on some research, we bought stocks here and there.

He actually had more of a risk appetite than I do so he was more bullish in his approach than my conservative self. In things like crypto, I was conservative about it because I didn’t understand it and did not invest in it. I simply didn’t see the value crypto was creating for users at the time, all I saw was money exchanging hands but no solution, product, or value was being created.

I don’t regret that decision to date. I was always trying to look for companies that I believe in, that I saw what they’re doing. I mean there are some stocks that I still have to say that those companies are still good to believe in. Let me give you a good example of those; Blackberry I still believe in. They are not just phone sellers, they are also doing cyber security which will always be relevant and they are actually advancing there so it’s going to be a long ride. (Disclaimer – not a financial expert 🙂 )

In February of 2019, I started looking at Shopify because I really really liked what they did. I even interviewed with them and got rejected. But I remember praying on a Saturday and the thought I had was “If you believe so much in their mission, then why don’t you invest in them?” and so I got a few of their stocks too. When covid happened, I slowed down on buying any company stocks and I stuck with index funds and that’s mostly what I bought all through 2020/2021.. Instead of buying company stocks, I started focusing more on index funds. I’m not good at speculation so I started playing it safe during the pandemic.

That formed essentially the deposit for your house.
Yes absolutely. The truth is I always wanted to buy a house as far back as 2019 but at that time there was a subconscious belief in me that as a woman, buying a house when you’re not married was somehow. So, I had settled for the dream of buying my first house with my husband.

Buying a house pre-covid was the best time but I didn’t buy. By 2021 house prices had gone up. Then 2022 happened and honestly the catalyst for me buying a house you won’t believe it, I was in a relationship that I thought would end in marriage but it ended. So for me, it was heartbreak that pushed me to move forward. I was just in a bad place emotionally and my lease was going to be up. In my mind I had planned to leave where I was staying at the end of June and had informed my landlord; via email.

By the time the relationship ended I was actually going to change my mind and extend my lease instead. I told the landlord to extend my lease but it was too late as he had already arranged for a new tenant – he was probably happy that I was going to leave because I was paying him the same amount for the past four years so the moment I told him I wanted to leave he had the opportunity to increase the rent. So I had to leave but the prices of rent I saw for one or two-bedroom apartments were just ridiculous. It just didn’t make any sense. I then decided to have a realtor get me a house to buy while I took a sublet for a few months until the house closed.

Buying a house was something I had put off for like two or three years prior and it happened in like two to three weeks. Now, looking back and I am like why did I not do this earlier on? But as the saying goes: “never let your crisis go to waste”; this was me living this out.

I finally saw it as a good financial decision. It is not just a house but an investment. And as a single woman, it is an advantage, not a disadvantage. It also means anyone I am meeting now is meeting me at a good financial level and we should be joining “forces” to do greater things.

And yes, , it would have been great to have a partner to share the bills with, because my God, the first few month’s bills were no joke. Even to save money was so tiring but now, I realise it’s actually a good thing because before I had this as an investment, I had “idle” money in savings and then you know people just asked me for money and I would just give even if it meant not spending on myself.

Thank God I started saving and buying stocks because If I didn’t buy then I would not have been able to buy the house. Now I am a better receiver rather than the person that just gave, gave, and gave. It has made me humble enough to receive. If anyone gives me $50 now I will pray for you because there are a lot of bills. Haha

The other day my other sister who works in Nigeria, our last born for my birthday bought me a Disney ticket and I gladly collected it. It’s not like I still don’t give but I don’t have as much idle money lying around. Another benefit of buying the house is that I’m also learning how to take care of things and really maintain a house because when I was renting, I just made a call to the landlord whenever any repairs are needed, but now It is my business to take care of.

If I ask, as an immigrant in Canada what is the one thing you will say to other immigrants?
I think the first thing I would say is guard your heart. I guess what I mean is immigration is actually a very defining/redefining process. I mean, when I lived in Nigeria around my family, there were some things that were just on auto-pilot and that’s the case if you live in the same environment where you grew up in. You are comfortable even when things are tough because you’re still in a bubble of family and friends that you’re not very appreciative of.

When you move to a new country, it’s like you are given this blank slate and all of a sudden everything that used to be on auto now requires you to define them right. All of a sudden I have to go search for a church and make new friends because the ones I had from growing up are no longer there.

Who do you expose yourself to? what information are you exposing yourself to on a daily basis and from what people? You need those things/people to be right because your decisions and actions will just flow from your interaction with them naturally. I talk about this friend of mine with whom I discussed investment a lot and was really majorly what we were talking about for years and because of that relationship, I always paid attention to the stock market and investment opportunities.

So guard your heart and surround yourself with the right people and the right information, especially as an immigrant. You have a blank slate now, you get to define who you surround yourself with and what kinds of information you expose yourself to. Those are the most important for an immigrant.

I’ve learned a lot from you in this conversation. The most profound one for me is “Do I really want the job title or I’m looking for the responsibility that gives visibility and significance”

Thank you so much again.

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