by : Phillip Washington | Chief Investment Strategist | www.facebook.com/StoneHillWM/
This was specifically written for people who would like to add another $1,000,000 to their nest egg over time. And you can put yourself in position to do that in less than 9 months.
The number one reason I hear from people who aren’t investing any money (or enough) is, “I don’t have money”. And that’s so unfortunate because nobody is going to save any money for them.
One day I was thinking, well if someone could find an extra $1,000 per month to invest into a retirement account that earned an average compounded return of 8% a year for 30 years, that would give them about $1,359,398. With that, social security and no debt, most people could have retirement with some sort of dignity and independence.
Over the last 10 years, I’ve been in over 5,000 meetings talking with families about their money. Because of that, I’ve taken lots notes from people who are very well off financially. I went back to review strategies many of them used to find extra money to invest early on. I also recently surveyed friends of mine on Facebook to get some ideas. I came up with more than 10 ways to find extra money that should allow just about anyone to find an extra $1,000 per month to invest. (If you have any more ideas please email me so I can grow the list more). The best part is, you probably don’t need to stop drinking your morning lattes. Vices are hard to cut and take too much will power. We only have so much willpower to use and I believe it’s best to use it on the stuff that matters (like showing your spouse daily that you love them, investing in your kids and starting/running a business) , not on morning lattes.
- Start with money making ideas:
- Start a network marketing business: you don’t need to be a $1,000,000 a year earner. Just sign up your friends and family selling a product you believe in and know they use to make an extra $1,000 per month
- Start an online business: this is not an endorsement, but one of the guys I follow who provide lots of free content on how to do this is Ramit Sethi own of www.iwillteachyoutoberich.
com - Start a ride or home sharing business (ex: Uber, Lyft, AirBnB)
- Negotiate a raise: There are some great free ideas on Ramit Sethi’s site on that as well
- Next, cut expenses you don’t really care much about:
- Shop home, auto and life insurance
- Shop cable company or cut out cable completely and use streaming services (Netflix, Amazon fire stick, Apple TV, Hulu, etc)…most of the channels we pay for on cable we don’t even watch.
- Shop cell phone providers (by the way, let all the providers know you are shopping them…its helps when negotiating)
- Grocery shop with a list
- Prep your meals ahead of time
- Find items you’re not really using at home and sell them
- Try shopping at thrift stores…trust me, there are some great bargains there and items in great shape
- Reconsider buying a home or new home until you are comfortable and on track with where you want to be financially. A home has a lot more expenses involved than just a mortgage. (Think long and hard about using your line to buy a rental home or two that makes money for you and rent for a while)
- Don’t buy the cheapest gas and make sure to keep up with your car maintenance. It’s better to pay up on those kind of expenses than to pay a large bill later when something breaks down.
Spend money on the da…(dang) lattes. It’s okay because if you haven’t found the money after going through these ideas, you’re probably going to be broke for the rest of your life anyway. Saving $3 a day is not going to do much to change that.