Turn your savings into long-term financial security
No spreadsheets, no stock-picking, no stress
Is a niggling voice telling you, “I should be doing something about saving and retirement but I don’t know where to start”?
As a TEFL teacher, turned materials writer, I had a voice like that for years. But I had no idea what to do about it so I ignored it. Instead, I saved money when I could and told myself that would be enough for retirement even though it would only have lasted two or three years at best.
Educators, creators and writers like us often aren’t money-orientated people. We’re here for the love of the job, the travel, the community. I happily flitted around the world, turning a love of language and writing into (low) paid work and never thinking about money beyond having enough for the next adventure.
It was great. Until it wasn’t.
Until I confronted the fact that my savings were never going to be enough to retire on. I wasn’t investing, I didn’t have a pension and the future suddenly looked a lot closer than it used to.
Sound familiar?
A few realisations and a lot of internet research later, I’d taught myself how personal finance works and started growing my idle savings. I near-doubled those savings in about 3.5 years just by putting them to work in low-risk things like pensions and passive investments. And because I saw how easy it was once I understood it, it encouraged me to save more. Now I can see that the future will be taken care of by the money I’ve got working for me today.
Why does no-one teach us how this works?
Honestly, I’ve no idea why personal finance isn’t taught at school or university. But as an ex-teacher and with years of experience writing educational materials, I knew I could help change that for other people in TEFL.
Since then, I’ve turned what I learned into a course that makes sense to other teachers, creators and educators in TEFL. Over 50 TEFLers in Spain, the UK, France, Germany and beyond have taken my courses or worked with me 1-2-1 and turned their savings into a stress-free plan they can use to retire one day (or spend on shorter-term goals like buying a camper van!). They don’t stress about money in the future because it’s taken care of.
Working with me will do the same for you as it has for your colleagues.
Lisa Wood
Lisa hovered on my mailing list for months (and her savings for 18 years!) before doing the course. She surprised both of us by how much she got into it!
Clare Hogg
Clare went from having her savings sitting doing nothing and no idea about money to master researcher who now gives ME advice on platforms in Spain.
Genny White
The No-Stress Money Plan inspired Genny to make major career changes after switching path from “no pension, no financial security, no plan” to financially sorted.
Is there a To Do list in your head around money? Tasks that just never got done because they’re vague, confusing and overwhelming. Things like:
- be better with money
- get a pension
- sort out my old pensions – how to even start??
- do something with that money that’s sitting there
- get one of those ISAs everyone’s always talking about – PS what’s an ISA?? (UK for that one!)
- figure out how to not work until I die (will I be able to cope with work in my 80s??)
- somehow save up for my children’s futures (but what about mine??)
None of these are skills we’re taught at school and they look like they involve tools we can’t make head nor tail of. If you’ve ever tried to work out which pension to choose from your bank’s gobbledegook website and given up because it’s so brain meltingly boring, you’ll know what I mean.
It’s painstaking work to suss all of this out for yourself when you don’t really know what you’re looking for. Let alone quieting the nagging doubts you’re doing something wrong and will end up losing your money.
What you need is a coach who understands where you are now and how you feel because they’ve been there too.
And you want a teacher who knows how to turn seemingly difficult concepts like “the stock market” and “compound interest” into easy-to-understand, memorable parts of every day life.
You need a guide who can make sure you turn knowledge into action. After all, learning about how money, pensions and investing work is a lot like learning a new language and we all know you have to be actively learning and not just listening to a lecture that goes in one ear and out the other.
That’s why my online course, The No-Stress Money Plan, is made up of bite-sized videos and workbooks that review the concepts and new vocabulary and get you reflecting on what you’ve learned and your blocks. It’s why I give you 2 days a month where you can get help and support by asking me questions on What’sApp.
That’s why, when we have our 1-2-1 session, I’ll keep you accountable and make sure you know exactly what you’re doing next.
Satisfaction guarantee
As the course is payable in 2 instalments, if you get partway through and don’t think it’s for you, you can drop out and skip the second payment**.
** You’ll lose access to the course, Q&A sessions and all future lessons and you won’t be able to have the 1-2-1 session.
The No-Stress Money Plan
Whether you have idle savings or think it’s time to start saving, I can teach you how to put your money to work so it earns money for you instead of just sitting in a bank account doing nothing, and worse, losing money because of inflation.
By understanding how things like pensions and investments work, you’ll be able to take simple and practical steps to get your money growing for you straight away.
After my course, students open accounts, put money into them and, over time, see it grow. It’s as simple as that.
With the No-Stress Money Plan, you’ll…
Make and carry out a plan for your money that you can set and forget. You’re never going to need to “watch the markets” or spend hours researching because you’ll have an easy-to-follow plan in place.
Re-evaluate and understand what is and is not risky when it comes to money so you stop being afraid you’ll lose money. (Spoiler alert: savings sitting in a bank account isn’t a risk of losing $$$, it’s guaranteed to lose you money.)
Acquire a bit of the lingo to demystify terms like index funds, S&P 500, and ETFs so you understand the accounts you’re going to open and don’t get stuck reading reams of unintelligible documents and giving up.
Lay the critical psychological foundations for not messing it up! Surprisingly, it’s not financial wizardry that you need but just the psychological ability to stick with your plan – just like any other project to better your life, health and well-being.
Be clear on if, or when, you actually need a financial advisor and how to make sure having one doesn’t cost you thousands and thousands of pounds in fees over time. (It’s that Einstein thing again.)
I’m Nicola an ex TEFL teacher and award winning ELT materials writer turned investing coach. With the No-Stress Money Plan, I’ll teach you how to put your money to work and give you the tools, knowledge and mindset to take charge of your finances without the help (and expense) of a financial advisor.
New version coming in 2026 so this format will change
Working together will give you a No-Stress Money Plan and:
- support you in getting pensions and general investing accounts open and earning interest.
- bring you priceless peace of mind for your financial future (and present!).
- get your savings growing and earning money without you having to work to make it happen.
- make you more confident about how to handle money and decisions around it.
- enable you to actually retire or make your retirement more comfortable.
- transform the future into something to be excited for, not stressed about.
- empower you with basic financial knowledge to the extent that you’ll find yourself giving other people knowledgeable advice. (I know, right? But you will!)
What you’ll get
- 5 weeks of self-paced video classes so you can rewatch new ideas and concepts until they’ve gone in
- 1 x 60 min 1-2-1 session where we work out exactly what steps you need to take after the course (worth 100€)
- Weekly support via What’sApp
- Lifetime access to the materials, and get the What’sApp support for as long as you need it
- Concrete tasks to carry out so you start taking practical steps straight away
- Downloadable workbook to reinforce concepts so you become an expert even though it might all be new to you
Case studies of people like you who’ve done the course
Jennie Reed
Jennie’s financial advisor told her that her pension was too complicated for her to understand. So she did my course and proved them wrong!
Chris Hunter
From feeling suspicious about “money people” Chris is now financially savvy enough to manage his money himself without relying on anyone else, dodgy or otherwise!
Annette Flavel
From scattered finances and burnt fingers from dabbling in stocks, Annette brought order to her accounts and is now earning more profit from her money.
“It’s a brilliant course. Nicola makes complex issues easy to understand and gives you a comprehensive overview of all you need to know before investing … and more background info for anyone interested in diving deeper. I particularly liked the chilled atmosphere. We all felt comfortable asking questions and all of the questions got answered.” Kath Bilsborough, ELT writer & Teacher trainer, Writing ELT Materials
I’m very busy. How much time do I need to spend on the course per week?
The course will take you a couple of hours a week for 5 weeks and the videos are mostly bite size so you can break it up. There are a couple of videos I’ve added of previous live classes that were too useful not to give everyone access to. But you can listen to them later or pause and come back to them. After that, none of the various accounts take long to set up.
Researching which platforms to use from your country, though many are international, will take less time than the research you’d do to plan a holiday because you’ve done the course and know what you’re looking for.
Once set up, I spend minutes a week on my investments, and you could leave it for weeks without looking at any of it once you’re up and running.
Does it matter what country I live in?
No, (with the exception of Americans). Investing, pensions and even the basic taxes that apply to them follow the same principles wherever you are. You will need to get specific tax advice when it comes to filing and paying taxes but you would expect that for the precise how-to of declaring your income too. Just like you would never wonder if a course on how to earn money from your work was applicable in every country, you don’t need to worry that earning money from money is vastly different wherever you are. The course is set up to be country agnostic as I am teaching the general principles and you’ll know what questions to ask and what you need from a platform where you are. From there, finding the answers is easy.
When does the course start?
Doors will be open again in 2026. Contact me via the contact form or find me on Linked In if you want to hear when it’s available again.
How much money do I need to have to start investing?
It depends what you’re investing in. On a lot of investment platforms you can start with as little as 10€, on others, the minimum is higher. It’s still worth investing even before you really have savings because you’re learning something that will reap rewards for your entire lifetime. You’ll start wanting to budget for the month factoring in money to grow your investments month on month, year on year.
Even if you don’t have savings to invest now, learning the habits and psychology of investing will encourage you to save money. I have my 7-year-old investing money he has from the tooth fairy for exactly that reason! Of course, the more money you put in the more you stand to earn but it’s a myth that you need to have a lot to start investing.
The important thing, by far, is just to start.
Are we going to learn how to choose individual stocks and how to research which companies to buy?
That’s NOT the kind of investing I’m teaching on this course. There is a lesson in Week 2 on why that kind of investing is much higher risk. But also researching which companies to invest in is what professional investors do and it’s time-consuming, risky and needs you to be following the market trends and those individual companies over time. There are much easier ways to put your money to work than that!
How can I learn something as complicated as investing in 5 weeks?
It’s not actually that complicated! Investing is a lifetime project but it doesn’t take long to learn the practical elements.
There are so many gatekeepers to finance that it seems like you need a degree in Finance to do it, or to pay someone a lot of money to do it for you. Neither of those things is true but there are plenty of people who benefit from you thinking otherwise.
You’re not a financial advisor. How can you teach this?
There have always been gatekeepers to knowledge about finance and advisors would have you believe the only way to invest is via a gatekeeper.
I began knowing nothing about the stock market or alternative forms of investing but, once I began learning, I was able to start earning money and continue doing so. My years of teaching and writing educational materials are what qualify me to teach what I’ve learned.
The one thing I won’t do is tell you exactly what to invest in because that would be giving financial advice.
Does the course cover crypto?
Nope! I’ve changed my mind about crypto since I started this journey in 2022 as I used to see it as gambling for tech bros. Feel free to ask me about what I think now I’m invested in it myself but I’m not ready or knowledgeable enough about it to teach it … yet.
What does continuous enrolment mean?
You can join anytime. Instead of a cohort of people all taking the class at the same time, I have set it up so the self-study material can be started any time and there are live classes once every two weeks at varying times. That way there will always be something you can attend live (and anyway, they’re recorded) and you can keep coming to those for as long as you want to ask questions or reinforce what you’ve learned. They will mostly be weekdays, varying am/pm European time. Your 121 will come at the end, when you’ve covered all the materials and you can pick a slot that suits you.
I’m in my 50s and retiring soon. Is the course right for me?
There’s no denying that time is the key factor in investing and you need at least 10 years, and preferably longer, in the stock market to ride out downturns, like crises or recessions. The course will help you understand how to approach the stock market at different life stages.
If you’re retiring soon, this is one place where a financial planner or advisor could be useful and goes beyond what I can help you with. But, doing my course and gaining knowledge of investing means you can approach them with the right questions and understand what they’re advising you and not end up in products with high fees that aren’t right for you.
One thing is certain, whatever your age: not investing at all is a huge lost opportunity to make money.
Is this course suitable for Americans?
It is designed to be country agnostic so you can learn the principles of investing and apply them to your context. However, I recommend this course by Delyanne Barros for Americans, especially those resident in America, as it covers all the details of tax specifics and types of accounts Americans can use. This is an affiliate link which gives you a substantial discount and me a small commission if you purchase.