Multiple Income Streams
If you have read the article, So You Want to be a Millionaire? you would have seen how becoming a millionaire can be achieved in relatively simple fashion. The drawback is that it could take 20 to 30 years. In this article, we want to start focusing on reducing this timeframe. This is not meant to replace the plan outlined before. You should still strive to implement it, as a security measure.
The term multiple income streams has been bandied about quite a lot, as the way to get out of the rat race. Sometimes one can hear people throwing around the phrase as if it gave the secret answer to becoming rich. The truth is, it is just a term to describe precisely what we’ve intuitively known, or could have known by applying some common sense.
As one would expect, the term multiple income streams refers to having more than one source of income. Now this can be good, and it can be bad. On the negative side, let us say you work 9 to 5 at a regular job. That would be one income stream. Now if you took another job from 7pm to 10 pm, then this would be another income stream. We could also extend this and throw in a weekend job in the mix, giving you 3 income streams. Think about that life for a moment. Does that sound attractive to you? Is that something you want? I bet not.
What we see then, is that going by the technical definition of the term, multiple income streams is not necessarily a good thing. However, when most people use it, they do not mean to portray such a hard life. Let us look at an alternative picture. We could still say you have your regular 9 to 5 job. But instead of a night job, suppose you had written and sold a song, for which you collect royalties. Those royalties would be considered another source of income, though probably a bit smaller than your salary from your day job. Suppose you also had investments that brought in dividends each year. Well that would be another income stream. You could count another still, if you happened to own an apartment which you rented out.
Now how does this picture compare with the first? No doubt this is the more appealing scenario. In this one, you have 3 sources of income as in the first, but in this case, you hardly do any additional work outside your regular job. Just imagine if you had enough such income streams that brought in more than your 9 to 5 job. Imagine if you could quit your job and live off the other income sources!
This kind of income that requires little effort to keep flowing, can be considered passive income. Most of the work would have been done one time, at the start. This is what you should be thinking of when you think multiple income streams. If you were able to implement something like this in your life, then losing your job won’t be so detrimental. Likewise, if any one of them were to dry up, you’d still have some income. Another benefit which is probably obvious, is that you’d have more money, which you could use to do more investing and hence accelerate your journey to financial freedom.
“Okay, so having multiple income streams sounds great! How do I get this?”, you ask. Well that is a good question. It is something you need to spend some time thinking about, and answering for yourself, as no one knows you like you do. Your answer to this should be tailored to your inclinations, and your situation. But fear not! We will help you to get the ideas flowing.
There are essentially 4 main avenues you can take to build your income streams. These are:
1. Real Estate
2. Equities/Forex Markets
3. The Internet
4. Brick and Mortar type Businesses
Some of the above might overlap a bit. But you get the idea. Depending on your desires and your strengths, you’ll probably be drawn to one of the above more than the others. What you need to do, is decide where you want to focus your energy. Once you have determined that, then you must begin to get educated in this area. Read as much as you can, jot down your ideas, ask questions, build your plan, then of course, implement it!
Check out the other areas of this site to get ideas of what you can do, and also to learn how to go about doing certain tasks in your field(s) of interest.
Tags: income, millionaire, wealth