This story is part of CNBC Make It’s Millennial Money series, which details how people around the world earn, spend and save their money.
When Phoebe Merrick first arrived on Waiheke Island in New Zealand, she thought she’d only be there for two months.
It was June 2023, just before Merrick’s final year of college, and the Virginia native planned to work a summer internship at a winery on the island. “I was like, ‘This cannot be real,’” Merrick tells CNBC Make It of the view while ferrying over from Auckland. “I just thought it was so beautiful.”
Two years later, Merrick is still on Waiheke and getting ready to move into a new house with her boyfriend, Reuben Sandoy, who grew up in the area. The two met during Merrick’s summer program and, by autumn, Sandoy had traveled to meet her family in the U.S. and the two decided they would live together abroad.
Merrick, 22, works remotely as a freelance marketing and social media manager while Sandoy, 29, runs his own plumbing business on the island. Together, the two make roughly $132,000 U.S. dollars per year.
