Ani’s journey isn’t a typical one. She bought a one-bedroom flat in Southfields in 2004 for £160,000 with a £30,000 deposit.
“I went on Oprah Winfrey to talk about my near-death experience. It changes things a lot. I had a lot of survivor guilt. Why didn’t I die? I felt like I was here to do more. I have a real sense of responsibility because so many people died. I was single and mindless, and I was having an existential crisis.”Following the tsunami, Ani, who was a project and program consultant, used her experience of stressful situations to work in Iraq for a not-for-profit organisation.
Initially her mortgage rate was 5 per cent but this went down to 2.5 per cent as she was on a standard variable rate, which tends to follow the base rate. However, in the past few years it has been much higher at 7 and 8 per cent. In 2010, however, Ani had to pause overpaying as she was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer. “I had to leave work because it was so stressful. I was between contracts when I first found out about my cancer and I decided not to take the next contract,” she says.
She became an executive transformation expert, helping senior leaders and high performers avoid self-sabotaging behaviour and achieve a work-life balance. “Many of the people I work with have the external trappings of success: the house and the car, but they aren’t happy and peaceful. I’ve learned that comes from within.”
Instead, since 2017, Ani made a concerted effort to pay off her mortgage by avoiding spending on things like expensive holidays; she’s also benefited because her business has boomed since the pandemic, and this year, she paid off the last of her balance.