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Home | Self Improvement | Success Have you ever wondered whether your job is safe? Whether you can ever expect to pay off your mortgage or credit cards? Whether you have enough money for retirement? If you keep doing the same things day in day out for your entire life the chances are that the answer to one or more of these questions is “NO”. Is your Job Safe? Of course there are other solutions to each of these problems; you can retrain for a different career even if your whole industry dies. I once knew an executive in a bank in the UK who had retrained as an accountant after the coal industry in the UK died in the 1980s, but trust me he was the exception. The more usual story is that you are one of a group of people from a company or industry that are all looking for work at the same time, it can take months or even years to find a similar position or even a different one that pays comparably. Will you ever pay off your debts? Something like 2/3rds of Americans are in debt, if you think about that then the likelihood is that even those in retirement are very likely to have debt. If you hold credit card debt and are making minimum monthly payments you may never actually pay off that debt, if you are the kind of person who clears a bit of the balance and then spends again it is very probable that you will never get out of debt, unless you can develop additional income and use it to clear those cards once and for all. Will you have enough money for retirement? And then there’s my favourite, retirement. How much money do you need for retirement anyway? I work in the Life insurance industry for my day job and we look at this question all manner of ways to try and get people to invest. Let’s look at it this way; if you could live on $25K a year and if you could consistently get 8% on your money, then investing $312,500 would give you your retirement income. Now $25K a year isn’t a lot of money but how close are you to having $312,500 in the bank or other assets? Now exclude your home unless you plan to sell it and if you do, where do you plan to live? Will you move away from your friends and family; your support network? At the time when you are most likely to need them? Now assuming you are at or above average incomes then you probably need 2-3 times this amount of money to retire with any standard of living, if you are still likely to have a mortgage or other debts then you will need more again. If you want to retire in style, travel and maybe buy a little holiday home, sports car or motor boat you are looking at much bigger numbers. There are many ways out! OK I’m done depressing you, there is a way out. If you are young enough simply pull in the reigns, spend less and save more you will make it with compound interest and a modicum of luck. If you are older, maybe you can retrain and move into a higher paying field, again pull in those reigns and save a bit more but it gets harder, you have less time for interest to compound and you are likely to find it harder to change jobs even if you get the training you need. Some careers will not accept you after a certain age even if you wanted to put in the hours, if you are over 30 you can pretty much forget about training as a doctor or an airline pilot. You can however get a 2nd job, work in a bar or restaurant for someone else, treat the customers well and hope for some good tips, it is certainly better than doing nothing. Start your own business I wonder if after the last 650 words I need to explain why starting your own business is such a good idea? I don’t mean the kind of business where you stand to lose what little you have accumulated or the kind of business where you need a squillion dollars to invest to get going, nor do I mean the kind of business that promises to make you a millionaire in a year through multi level marketing (MLM). I mean good old fashioned family level businesses built on honesty and sweat and a desire to succeed. The kind of businesses I am talking about are ones where you can start small, with little or no investment. You put in as many hours as you have spare to build a little extra cash flow and every dollar that you bring in comes to you. It could be a bed and breakfast, selling used cars, washing windows, shining shoes or a million other businesses that you see around you every day. All the little trades that you used to see in your neighborhood that went out of business because of the big guys still have merit. You need to market them differently, buy your stock from overseas (you can do this on the internet) to keep prices low and learn some marketing skills, but nothing that you can’t get by searching on Google or reading a book. Proof it can be done If you cannot think of any businesses that you can get into cheaply then I will finish with a story that I heard from a guy in Thailand. Mr Sirivat was a stockbroker who lost all of his money in the Thai stock market crash of 1997, he and his wife had about $20 left to their name and needed to make some money. They bought bread and sandwich fillings and made sandwiches which they then sold on the street. The sandwich business is now worth a fortune and Mr Sirivat adds to his income by giving motivational talks around the world. You can read his story in more detail here: - (http://www.sirivatsandwich.com/history/history_eng.asp) Read the self help books Think again about the first 650 words or so of this article. If any of that stuff has you worried, or if you simply want a bit more cash so you can retire younger, retire happier or maybe simply just retire at some point then start thinking today about what you can do to get ahead. Read books by the self help gurus, Rich Dad Poor Dad, The Millionaire Mind Set, Automatic Wealth, these are all great books but they all say the same thing….find a way to make some extra cash, get out of debt and if you can invest in other people’s companies and property. Benefits of owning your own business Apart from giving yourself a chance at making money, clearing your debt and retiring happy, you will worry less about job security as you will have something to fall back on. You should also be able to afford to start saving, and take some nicer vacations. You will find yourself learning more than you have in years, it can be a bit scary at first but as you start to build your knowledge you will enjoy telling people what you have found and you will get a real kick out of things that you learn which turn into cold hard cash. As you start to expand you may be able to offer employment to others, your product line may be cheaper or better quality than what is available currently in your area, you may be offering a service that people did not have access to before. All of this will increase your standing in the community; you may even become a little bit famous within your chosen field (See www.getslightlyfamous.com). Drawbacks It isn’t easy to find the time or the money initially. You will need to commit, and it doesn’t always work. Last year I spent all my free time for 8 months on a project that didn’t come off, I raised the cash to start in the food and beverage industry, found a location, suppliers, the whole Shebang and the wheels fell off at the last hurdle. It was frankly soul destroying but it cost me very little apart from time and some embarrassment. If you are prepared to put in the time needed, a little bit of money (I am talking hundreds of dollars not tens of thousands) , and keep going when it gets tough you can, and probably will build yourself a healthy second income and some of you will build new careers working for yourself and employing friends or family, the most talented amongst you may build the next Starbucks or Sirivats Sandwhiches; surely that is worth missing a few evenings watching TV? Still need help? If you still cannot think of a business that you can start quickly and cheaply then please sign up for my newsletter by emailing brad@ideas2earn.com and I will send you a new idea every day for a year by which point I truly hope you will have found something that appeals. Alternatively go to the website at www.ideas2earn.com and browse the archives. Good Luck. Article Source: http://www.articlewheel.com
Brad Emery writes for www.ideas2earn.com with the aim of providing low cost ideas for starting businesses for those who need an additional income stream. Brad aims to publish one new idea every day in 2007 on his website and by email to his subscriber list. To subscribe simply email with the title "subscribe" to Brad@ideas2earn.com or simply check out the webite at www.ideas2earn.com Copyright www.idaes2earn.com 2007
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