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Personal Finance for Young Professionals

April 18, 2012 in Career, Financial Planning, Happiness, House, Income, Insurance, Investing with Comments Off

Investing to improve your personal finance can be a particularly tricky situation and there are different roads to achieve this common goal. It is entirely dependent on you to decide how you want to save your money, but we will surely lead you to get the best routes!

Investment market is the best way to save some money as well as discover some returns. Many young professionals think of the present only and fritter away money in chase of happiness now. However, what they forget that the infinite future lays ahead when they would also need to meet other commitments in life. Therefore, it is always wise to plan for your future now and here.

Story of Dave Ramsay

You must plan for your financial stability unusually early in life. In fact, you must think about it as soon as you are out of the hallowed portal of college! You can darned well see the example of Dave Ramsay who became the youngest brokers to enter the Graduate Realtors institute in Tennessee.

Nevertheless, with the Tax reform Act initiated in 1986, Dave’s financial support began to falter. Dealing in notes led him to bankruptcy. He was not left with any finance in hand, but he was not running low in spirits. He analysed his awkward plight and put his book out called Financial Peace to assist young Americans towards financial security. Dave Ramsay has been instrumental in preaching the tit-bits of financial investing via television and radio.

In a dilemma- mutual fund or 401k plan

Most young professionals are in a dilemma as to where and how to achieve financial security. Most people will encourage them for stock and mutual funds, but before that, he must line up his salary and budget. He must organize the budget such that it is not particularly tough but is still not extremely flexible. Employers will also provide you with 401k plan, which cpuld be a compelling choice because your employer will give you the idea that will fit your availability of funds, but yet again, you must know where your money is being invested. Do not use 401K plan in the emergencies, as it would cost you penalty taxes.

Mutual funds are exceptionally strong options for people who want to invest further on. For example, a young professional can invest in small rise with calculated risks or high growth with many risks. There is the multi-sector, short-term corporate and so on investment category.

Use the credit card judiciously

Many young professionals overused the credit cards and quickly caught up themselves in the dire financial situations. Use credit card with a responsible approach and do not be trapped in the marketing gimmicks of shopkeepers.

Attain information about investing

Try to understand the distinctive schemes yourself and keep your eyes and ears open to different financial schemes to save the hefty fees of the financial adviser or broker.

Creating a Lifestyle Business

November 1, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Income, Make Money with Comments Off

Did you know it doesn’t take a million bucks to live like you have a million bucks? That’s what Sean Ogle writes over at GetRichSlowly. So why don’t more people live like millionaires?

It isn’t the money, the job, or one’s personal situation that keeps people from living a more exciting life. It’s the fear of making a change.

Ah,yes, the “C” word. More like the battle of the “C” words—we’re too comfortable to make change. To his credit, he’s not talking about living beyond your means or racking up a mass of debt. He’s referring to the one thing people who have more money typically have…time. He did that by purposely moving to a low cost of living place and building a lifestyle business.

Creating a lifestyle business was one of the best decisions I could have made in order to bring about the change I was looking for. This was a core component in my ability to free up time and live like a millionaire.

The best part about creating a lifestyle biz?

You don’t need a million dollar idea — you just have to be able to improve upon one that’s already out there.

What can you improve upon that’s already in the marketplace? It could be the way something is delivered. Customer service is so shoddy that taking care of each customer could be a differentiator.

Visit Sean Ogle and GetRichSlowly for more inspiration.

When There’s Movement – Stuff Happens

October 29, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Lessons Learned with 2 Comments

Goals

I had a whiny, way below my age breakdown yesterday. I’ve been putting in a lot of time with BudgetSnob but I haven’t seen the results I had planned by this point. So, I was a little lot down. I felt like I was staring at the Himalayas standing at the bottom of a dry lake bed in Death Valley. 

Then I read something that profoundly changed my outlook. It was a newspaper article about a little (or maybe not so little) obscure blog called TheAwl. I knew the rest of the article would be good after reading this…

If you were going to assemble a business plan for a Web site, you would look closely at everything The Awl (theawl.com) did and then head in precisely the opposite direction.

Why? Because the three co-founders, newly laid off, started a blog they wanted to read. Meaning, they didn’t try to find an audience. There were the audience. TheAwl’s posts are mostly short, punchy, and (in many cases) complete nonsense.

I found myself wondering if reading these posts was like hearing someone’s thoughts. Thoughts make perfect sense to the thinker. Not so much for anyone else. Obviously, I was not the audience there were trying to reach.

After a few months of massive content generation, TheAwl founders sold out to Yahoo! for $30 million dollars. There’s only one problem. That’s not the truth. Not. Even. Close.

By August 2009, they had chewed through their savings..when an anonymous donor sent in a few hundred dollars at one particularly stretched-thin moment…which they used to buy food.

They started in September 2008. Then spent a year—full-time by the way—hammering out content. A lot of content. When I checked yesterday, they had 20 posts up.

So, after a year of posting, they barely had enough to live on. When a donor shows up with two hundred bucks and they buy food. Why? So they can quit while they’re ahead? And go find real jobs?

Nope. They do it because they have to keep posting. And that would require staying alive. By eating food.

The Awl is attempting to build a low-cost site that delivers a certain kind of content for a certain kind of audience. And the owners don’t have to get rich — The Awl has no investors — they just have to eat.

Mr Sicha, one of the founders and interviewee throughout the article, sums it up in a breathtakingly, honest manner.

“My friends keep talking to me about how they want to start a Web site, but they need to get some backing, and I look at them and ask them what they are waiting for,” Mr. Sicha said. “All it takes is some WordPress and a lot of typing. Sure, I went broke trying to start it, it trashed my life and I work all the time, but other than that, it wasn’t that hard to figure out.”

That was the end of my whining.

I don’t know where you are today. But I do know that you’re more than likely not satisfied with some part of your life that just hasn’t materialized like you thought. Maybe you’re thinking about quitting. And what makes it worse is that you’ve been doing the right things, maybe for months or even years.

It’s one thing to simply be lazy and make excuses when nothing happens. I think we all know deep down when we’re lazy. But it’s an entirely different matter when you’ve been busting your butt…and nothing happens.

But I challenge you (myself too) to keep moving. Because breakthrough is just around the corner. The activity you’ve been doing. Those seeds you’ve been planting. Neither will come back empty.

Some amazing things happened to me today. Subtle but very powerful. All because I made the decision to keep moving forward. I hope you make the same decision.

TheAwl founders were interviewed for an article in the NYTimes.

Passion isn’t Found – It’s Pursued

October 27, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Happiness, Lessons Learned with Comments Off

I write quite a bit about side gigs, starting a business, and other related topics. At least more than I thought. Here’s a sampling:

Stop Job Shopping, Start a Business
Multiple Streams of Extra Income
Why Not Start a Business?
5 Ways to Generate a Second Income

More than likely, you want to pursue your own gig doing something you’re passionate about. Which is another buzz word that’s been a lexicon of the business startup vocabulary for years.

So, that’s all good and well, but what does that mean? According to recent studies, your best option is not necessarily to go with your gut. Turns out that passion is a by-product of something else—the pursuit of it. But, passion pursuit has it’s own drawbacks.
Continue Reading…

Those Pesky Obstacles Are Your Life

October 25, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Happiness with 3 Comments

Smile

Once upon a time, in the not too distant past, I went through a period where I felt like my future self was just over the next hill. Just past the next obstacle, which there always seemed to be plenty of. I wanted to start a business so bad I could barely hold back my enthusiasm for when it (self-employment) would deliver itself into my lap.

I spent a lot of time “getting inspired”. I would read books about entrepreneurs. Then I would switch to the writing aisle and read about writing. Then I found the self-help section. And, oh boy, did I have a hay day with that one.
Continue Reading…

Can You Guess the 7 Highest Paying Jobs?

October 22, 2010 in Career, Income, Make Money, Money with 2 Comments

The job market has been incredibly scary the last few years. When I read the news headlines, it’s hard to find any good news about a job recovery. I suppose it’s a combination of news outlets competing for eyeballs and the growing sense that things are much different this time.

In that sense, I try to highlight positive aspects about earning and spending for individuals as I cull the interwebs for interesting, entertaining, and enlightening stories.

Known for it’s annual “Best Places to Live” comparison, in conjunction with Money Magazine, the researchers at CNN.com put together other “Top” stories throughout the year.
Continue Reading…

Two Income Generating Ideas

October 18, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Income, Money with 3 Comments


I know I’ve been on a “making money” roll the last two weeks or so. After running a few eBay auctions and doing a small bit of consulting on the side, I believe even more now that earning a few extra bucks can dramatically alter your financial position.

So, I took Friday off last week and fired up the brain cells to come up with two more, maybe a little unusual, money making ideas. These are based off my own interests—one food based and one art based. But hear me out. These two ideas are interests I’ve had but, for one reason or another, I didn’t feel they were ready to bear fruit. Until now.
Continue Reading…

Stop Job Shopping – Start a Business

October 13, 2010 in Career, Entrepreneurship, Happiness, Income, Money with 7 Comments

Stop Job Shopping

I quit trying to find the perfect job. After nine years of high expectations and much disappointment, I decided the perfect job was more elusive than real.

And if I wanted to work hard and earn a living in the process, I would have to be the career I was looking for instead of relying on luck and someone else’s good graces.
Continue Reading…

Multiple Streams of Extra Income

October 11, 2010 in Career, Income, Lessons Learned with 4 Comments

I’m always on the look out for ways to generate additional income. So I was especially interested in the extra income guide put out recently by Pinyo, owner of Moolanomy.com.

The guide is for those who are interested in earning more income so they can become less dependent on their job. Income diversification is as much about spreading risk as it is about doing something you love. We’re moving from the traditional, single employer for life to depending on ourselves—our skills—to create income now as well as in the future.
Continue Reading…

Need More Money? Why Not Start a Business?

October 1, 2010 in Career, Income, Make Money with 3 Comments

Talk surrounding the “I don’t make enought money” phrase is usually about getting a part-time job. Though many people do start a side gig to make more money, make ends meet, or start a new career, most people typically shy away from small business ownership.

When I’ve suggested the same idea to friends, I’m quickly brushed aside. They stare downward while tapping their foot. Why is part-time work noble but the thought of starting a side hustle…taboo?

The Financial Blogger thinks it’s a matter of overcoming your money fears. Having a job is…easy. I work. I get paid. That doesn’t translate too well into the self-employment world. Because sometimes effort does not equate to earning—at least not in the short term.

But there are ways to help make that connection. The object isn’t to quit your job one day and start your business the next. The idea is to start slow.

Moonlight. From all of the books that I’ve read on entrepreneurship, it seems that the authors always started off on the side. This is probably the last thing you want to hear, but if you want to be successful and safe, you’re going to have to lose some sleep to get your side gig off the ground.

He’s right. People don’t want to think they might have to work and build up to something. It doesn’t fit the American culture (even though most millionaires started this way).  Give it to me now we exclaim. We don’t want to wait.

As I’ve grown older, and wiser hopefully, I sense the need to slow down and do things right. If you do things right, the results will take care of themselves. I strongly believe that if you want to make the entrepreneurial leap, and your job is stable, then you absolutely must start part-time.

That means you’ll have to build your cash reserves. Funding your business as it grows from a crawl to a walk.

Save up. This sort of ties in with moonlighting and multiple incomes. You can slowly build up a savings buffer so that you can have your expenses 100% covered in the event that your business venture doesn’t earn you enough money.

I remember the first time I made a few bucks online. I was ecstatic. I remember laying in bed the night I made $20 in a single day. My giddiness wouldn’t let me sleep. Or at least I didn’t let it.

There’s no reason to be afraid of starting a business. Especially if you’re not worried about paying the bills because your current job is sufficient. Moving slow and learning the ropes as you go is actually a good thing. Don’t let the lack of immediate results deter you.

Read more at The Financial Blogger.

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