Hilary Mushamuviri
Entreprenuer
Simply put, more income channels equals more security. It’s extremely hard to rely on a 8am-5pm job for your entire life with layoffs and pay cuts. With multiple channels of income, on the other hand, you can avoid putting all your eggs in one basket and use several channels of cash to grow rich.
How to grow multiple channels of income:
I will list the ways and then continue with our discussion
1. Diversify your investments
2. Offer a service or sell something
3. Create a product
4. Start a passion project
5. Invest in real estate
Diversification:
Remember we talked about not putting your eggs in one basket. There are several ways of diversification:
Stocks/shares:
This is quite scary for a lot of people. Most think it’s only for those who have a lot of money. You can actually buy shares in thriving companies like Innscor/Simbisa brands/econet/cassava smarttech,etc. you can visit www.ctrade.co.zw if you want to invest in companies on the stock exchange
Crowdfunding/ peer to peer lending:
This market is growing faster than ever before. More startups are raising capital fast to jumpstart their ideas. You can tap into businesses that have…
Offer a service or sell something
The fact that you are on an 8am-5pm job does not mean that you cannot sell something to earn extra money. There are many services that you can offer without compromising your core work. Think of what you can do, your abilities that you already have. You can even learn something new and start to offer it as a side business. For example, you can create business proposals,plans, tax services,accounting services,etc. You can sell perfumes,cosmetics,chickens,etc.The list is endless, as long as what you are selling is needed then you will not have much difficulty in building your side business. Don’t worry about committing time to it, you can even employ someone to help you do it. Remember your job cannot sustain you forever. Someone might say but I am doing well already. Then you already have a problem of stagnation and being in a comfort zone.
Creating a product
Ideas to create products never end. Ideas are always flying in the air. It’s up to us to utilize our minds in the right direction. Imagine you are computer programmer/software developer. You can create an application that can be used by so many. Rather than sticking to your job. Get out of the comfort zone and create an amazing application that will be used by the masses and you can earn money from it. Many of us we have great ideas but we are not daring enough to do them. Successful people are doing people. I just gave an example of software engineer, you may be a graphics designer, fashion designer, a photographer,etc. It doesn’t make a difference, you can create a product that could earn you multiple times your salary. Food for thought
Starting a passion project/business
Every one of us has something inside of us that we are passionate to do. Take for an example, you love writing, that’s a passion. You could starting writing articles,books, blogs,etc. Imagine that you love numbers(accounting), you could start your own accounting consultancy. Don’t worry about the size of how you start. You can start small and grow it. Everyone knows their passion that could actually be turned into a project or a business. Turn your passion into a project that earns you money.
Invest in real estate.
While it’s smart to diversify your investments among different investment classes, real estate is an entirely different animal. Becoming a landlord, for example, involves a lot more than shuffling money around or maintaining an investment account. Not only do you have to manage your property, but you have to deal with tenants and their issues.
But, there are huge benefits, says California financial advisor Anthony Montenegro of The Blackmont Group. “The benefit of diversifying via real estate can include leveraging a bank’s money to buy property, tax deductions, and appreciation,” he says, adding that “the main reason to own real estate is the steady cash flow.”
But, let’s say you don’t want to own physical real estate. In that case, you could always invest in REITs (Real Estate Investment Trusts) or through a real estate crowdfunding website like Fundrise.com.
There are plenty of ways to invest in real estate without ever drafting a lease or shampooing dirty carpets but, like every other strategy on this list, you need to think outside the box.
Jeff Rose :contributor
