Meet the maker: Lof lights
15 September 2026
We chat to Sophie Poelman from Lof, a Waiheke Island lightning company making products as beautiful as they are sustainable.
Money Matters: Nadine Higgins
AA Life Insurance ambassador and host of personal finance podcast The Prosperity Project shares her top tips for finances.
Tell us about yourself.
I started my career as a radio journalist, where I found a passion for business and economic news. I moved to TVNZ and then went to work for a financial advisory firm. Finance journalism and financial advice have a lot in common - listening to people, finding ways to make complex things easy to understand, solving problems, and working at pace. I love both.
Were you taught about money growing up?
Most things I observed or learned by osmosis. I think kids learning just by watching can risk giving them the wrong impression, though. All they really see is how people spend, not what’s going on under the hood.
Do you use a budget?
Each month our money gets divvied up into a bills account and each week our day-to-day account gets topped up, to ensure the regular expenses don’t blow out. I also put money into our investments each month, and I’m setting up investment accounts for our two boys.
Nadine Higgins is an AA Life Insurance ambassador.
How do you reward yourself? Do you splurge, go shopping, or save up for a special treat?
Once upon a time I’d buy myself a nice new dress but these days I’m far more likely to buy cute kids clothes if I feel the need to spend money!
How would you advise people keen to become financially independent or improve their financial stability?
My one tip is that financial success is not created by one big dramatic change, but by a series of small changes, done consistently. It’s ensuring that the weekly food, coffees and restaurants budget isn’t over by 20% every month. It’s ensuring that you put aside funds for debt reduction or investment, consistently. It’s considering the risks to your situation and thinking about how you can mitigate them before they have the chance to pull the rug out from under your feet.
"Financial success is not created by one big dramatic change, but by a series of small changes, done consistently," Nadine says.
New Zealanders are good at insuring their things (home, car) but not so good at insuring themselves – why do you think that is?
I think we either believe the worst won’t happen to us, or we just don’t think through the consequences if it did. But the reality is the worst does happen, and the financial outcomes can add an extra and unnecessary layer of stress to an already stressful situation.
We all know someone who has been affected by cancer, and if you or your spouse can’t work during treatment and recovery, you exhaust your financial safety net very quickly, and then you find yourself in dire financial straits. Everything comes undone fairly quickly when you can’t work and earn money – that’s usually your biggest financial asset, which makes losing it your biggest financial risk.
How would you suggest people get started on thinking about life and living insurances?
Consider what your life costs, how long your savings or buffer could cover those costs, and what you’d do when those funds run out. Your circumstances will help dictate what combination of life and living insurance makes sense – for example if you’re single with no dependents, life insurance probably isn’t the right fit, but you still have to pay the bills if you get ill and can’t work, so living cover might be.
Don’t be daunted – it’s simpler, and often cheaper, than you’d expect. Thinking about the problem doesn’t solve it of course, so the best way to start to get it sorted is to get it sorted!
To learn more about life and living cover, watch Nadine’s video series for AA Life Insurance at www.aa.co.nz/lifeambassador
This story is from the Spring 2026 issue of AA Directions magazine.
