If you’re considering diversifying your income, you may be wondering about the best way to go about it. It actually isn’t very difficult at all.
In fact, many of us already have more than one income stream, we just aren’t aware of it, or we do not utilize the available opportunities. The aim of creating multiple streams of income should be to get the most out of each stream available to you.
Of course, it isn’t reasonable to expect that you’ll become a millionaire in each stream overnight. Things take time and years of hard work to succeed.
If you start by maximizing your income potential from your main salary, you’ll have excess funds available to reinvest. So that’s a good starting point. Longer-term, it’s worth bearing in mind that millionaires have an average of seven income streams.
Here are some of the most common ones.
Primary income (salary) and earned income.
This is the main income stream for the majority of people.
Everyone starts this way, in fact. In order to maximize this income stream to generate funds to invest in your next one, you’ll need to secure the highest salary you feasibly can. That might involve you asking for a raise.
Before you approach your boss, use a service like “Glassdoor” or any similar site which is famous in your country that shows you how your salary compares with others in the same role.
One of the best things about your primary salary is that it typically comes with certain benefits like health insurance that keep you protected while you’re considering additional income streams.
Interest income.
Anything you earn and save in bank will generate a small fraction of interest, if you have never thought of making money from money then better widen the scope here. Interest income is the money you get as a result of lending your money to someone else to use, such as in a savings account, fixed or recurring deposit account, and certificate of deposit.
If you live in a growing country like India, you’ll always have an option to increase the interest income, you can opt for PPF (Public Provident Fund) with a lock-in period of 15 years.
Capital gains.
Capital gain is the income generated after an increase in the value of an asset that you own. Let’s assume if you buy shares at $100 and sell them at $120; the income we gain of $20 will be capital gains. If you buy a house for $500,000 and sell it for $600,000 the $100,000 are your capital gains.
There are different tax laws in different countries on capital gains and you need to follow them accordingly and surly it will affect your gains marginally.
But, there are ways to come around taxes as well.
Investment income.
There are a number of reasons to invest.
One is because we plan on using the funds at some point down the line.
Of course, many people look at investment as savings for their retirement years. Then there’s investing for a rainy day, I mean an emergency day.
Investment isn’t just for putting more sway for an emergency, however; that’s an emergency fund. It’s about having sufficient funds to make more money with.
Investing makes money through interest and return of capital. You want to maximize the first and avoid the second as much as possible.
If you do your research, you can make money by investing in companies.
There are markets such as Nasdaq that give you a good idea of those companies you should be investing in. If you look at a company that has listed its shares on the stock market, you can see the opening and closing share price for the day, week, month, year, and years.
So it’s worth spending a bit of time crunching the basic numbers. Once you’ve gotten the hang of it, however, this can be a very lucrative stream of income.
Rental income.
Not dissimilar to investing but there are a number of expenses that are different, such as property taxes, utilities, and, of course, a mortgage.
Each of these needs to be considered when calculating your return on a property. There is a problem with this income stream in that it requires an outlay to get started. Most people in the early stages of diversifying their income don’t have the typical 20 percent down payment required to buy a property.
That’s why this is typically an income stream pursued later on in life. There are ways around this, however, with avenues such as real estate crowdfunding. This allows you to become a limited owner for a smaller amount of funds, so it’s a great way to get your foot in the door.
Conclusion.
There are numerous ways in which you can diversify your income.
One by one, you can work with each of the above categories and create a diversified portfolio. It isn’t difficult to get started, either. It isn’t a requirement that you be super-wealthy and you don’t even need to set aside much time in order to get started. Of course, there is a degree of time that you will need to invest but it doesn’t have to take over your entire life.
You can continue to work at your current job, use your excess income to invest, and start your next income stream without breaking too much of a sweat.
Financial freedom is just around the corner, waiting for you to get started.
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