Millionaire Challenge

Kayalana99

Luckystepho wrote: »

Kaya's hit the nail right on the head- creating something once (or getting a property ready) and then making a recurrent income from it for no or very little effort. If you have enough of these income streams you've separated time from money- I can go and work 8 hours at my day job and know I will get paid x amount per hour but no matter how much I get done I won't get paid any more, but then come home and realise I have earnt £10 from my kindle book without having done anything... I could have been in bed or on the beach.

It is quite hard to continually promote a Kindle book unless anyone else knows a way? I guess we could give away free copies in exchange for honest reviews...

I would perhaps focus less on promoting the book if I was in your shoes and more about promoting myself as an Author, build a fan base on Facebook and promote new books through that. (Although guess there would have to be a recurring theme with them for this too)

Guess it's not an easy path but unless your book is great and hits a wide audience, it will just get lost in any marketing tactics unless they are directly aimed at the niche audience.

Don't know enough about your book but perhaps turning a small copy in local bookshops or newsagents near the place where it's based would be a good idea? Or join local running groups and say 'this book was really helpful' lol

lessonlearned

Interesting discussion about how to market yourself as an author.
I second Kay's suggestion of promoting yourself through social media.

Since the car crash I have been seeing a different Physio.......she was personally recommended to me which I often think is the best route for these kind of services.

However I have noticed that she uses technology and social media a lot in Order to promote her business. FAcebook, twitter, the local "spotted"' etc

I suppose it depends on your intended market and how it's best to reach them but I think in its way social media is another form of "word of mouth" and therefore will be effective.

Traditional advertising is very expensive and often not very effective so it makes sense to try something which is free.

Well February looks a lot more promising that January.....the sun is shining for a start!! Always makes me feel more energised.

Hope you are all well, happy and making lots of money.

Have a great month.

Broken_Biscuits

Happy February everyone ( where did January go?)

Not much to update. Still saving about 50% each month and still trying to spread it about in a mix of normal and higher return/risk investments, but thought I would share the calculator I found.

https://financialmentor.com/calculator/best-retirement-calculator

It's the most useful one I have found to date as allows one off payments (say a work based pension being accessible ) or ongoing additions ( say the age the state pension kicks in) and allows you to fiddle around with expected rates of returns and inflation etc.

Worth a play around, especially for the younger contributors looking to retire early.

No point working a job you are indifferent to or worse if you can prove to yourself that you will never run out of money as you are.

Chesapeake

Hi All,

Had a bit of a crazy few weeks and to cut a long story short I've also had to revert to a new username on here due to an IT error

I was TDQO so the background is the same.

Unfrotunately my immediate finances suck right now as I had to buy a car (£1,000 inc new tyres) and pay for insurance upfront (£900) as my credit rating is now totally shot. However I do have a new shiny laptop (£1000) which has greatly helped me start to work on my business plans.

I've had another job offer and more consultancy work come through this week too, on top of picking an allotment today

angelicious

Hey everyone,

Could I join the group please? I dream of the day when I can retire and just take life a bit easier. I'm 42 at the minute and would love to be able to retire in my mid 50's, whether this is achievable or not is another matter:D but if I don't try I'll never know lol!!

I'm at work at the minute so over the next couple of days I'll take a good look at my finances and try to work out how I'm going to achieve this and I'll be back then to update.

Broken_Biscuits

Just had a count up and I'm 6k** better off than I declared only 2 months ago. #Winning.
Most of it is just good old fashioned markets going up and return on capital, some is due to a new process I'm trying out on p2p* and the rest is just slogging away with a high % of savings rate.
I put myself on a spending ban on house related items this half year but look set to break it early. Had a bit of a tidy up and found some fairly bad damp on one of the wardrobes in the spare Room. Wardrobe wasn't up to much good anyway and so chopped up the worst bits and took it to the tip. Took the opportunity to throw some old clothes too. You know the ones that you keep for years just in case but never wear? So all a lot lighter here but in need of some new storage space. Dehumidifier is back on now and the issue looks fixable.
IKEA or from a second hand shop/ forum are likely to be where i get my wardrobe from when issues are fixed. The last one was a freebie!

*Some p2p sites have a secondary market where people pay a premium. So have been buying more than I would normally and am finding that I can get quick (a few months after buying) sales of 20% mark ups. I don't understand why people are paying so much, but they are so let's roll with the good times. If they stop buying at a premium, I'm happy to hold so there is no losing event for me.

**So I'm now officially 1/7th of a million and rising and am already 30% into my years target in February alone.

Kayalana99

Thanks for sharing and well done!! I tried P2P sites but it just feels risky for not much return....I appreciate 3-6% in scheme of things is considered good but I guess I like instant rewards....

I've turned around my blog idea (which I've had for over 5 years might I add?! I didn't realise but I think I mentioned before I have an online blog that is just for me and my 'financial plans') and going to create a book.

I've got it all designed in my head, just got to work on the content which I've started. Going to be a long road but I'm going to keep at it.

Doing so well on the time issue, no weddings to edit right now, eBay is slow, and I've just submitted two essays today (one wrote today, one restructed) so my next one isn't due till 9th March although that's an end of module assement.

The plan is tomorrow to get started on EMA, and Friday I'm going to plan half-term week as I want to do more educational stuff with the children so I'm going to sit down with a site called Twinkl and work out what I can use from it to do during half term and get the house organised. Then I'm off for a week bar eBay but it won't take much up keep!

Weight wise, I've not moved and still only down 1/2 stone from starting, but I've started the couch to 5k again and doing Zumba more regularly so I will get there.

Also, as interest rates could rise in 2018, I'm *hoping* it will be a good time to buy as house prices may fall. It's speculation, but instead of worrying about a house I own 25% in, maybe see the postive of being able to buy cheaper if they do!

Chesapeake

Evening BB that's great news on the £6k, a pretty healthy amount! What is this P2P? Is it lending where you get paid back with interest?

I've had some "good" news about the administration of my old company, it is almost finalised and the administrators fees are an awful lot lower than I thought. This means that there is a lot more money in the pot to pay off creditors which means two things: I'm a lot less likely to get chased for money (I'm already paying off £20k I had a PG on) and I may also get some cash back. I don't know the % yet but it might be as much as £1,000.
I do feel guilty that I will get some cash back when some people won't get a penny but I worked hard to pay off as many as possible and almost all of them are large national companies.
Along with the redundancy money I should be able to clear all our credit card debt and store cards of around £1,500. Am hoping to use the rest to set up an emergency fund and car fund etc so that I can look at generating more income to invest.

Broken_Biscuits

Kayalana99 wrote: »

Thanks for sharing and well done!! I tried P2P sites but it just feels risky for not much return....I appreciate 3-6% in scheme of things is considered good but I guess I like instant rewards....

A lot of the property/bridging loan p2p sites pay more than 3-6%, a few offer 12% and pay monthly interest. Easy to work out the returns with 12 months in a year and 12%. Just divide what you have by 100 and that's your monthly return.

Chesapeake, peer to peer lending is described by Wikipedia as:


Peer-to-peer lending, sometimes abbreviated P2P lending, is the practice of lending money to individuals or businesses through online services that match lenders directly with borrowers.

So, a common example is when someone wants to buy some land and convert it into flats but a bank won't touch the loan as it doesn't fit their risk appetite. The borrower approaches an alternative source for a bridging loan and pays something silly like 18% for the funds. But the person they approach doesn't put their own money up. They act more like a broker and offer the loan out collectively to us in multiples of a hundred pound each. We get 12% and the broker pockets the rest.

The idea is that the borrower will be vastly improving the property to hike up resale value, to be able to justify the high percentage they are paying. Usually short term loans of a year or less.

I've been doing it for close to a couple of years now and not lost a penny. But obviously loan defaults can happen.

12% seems massive returns wise but is nothing compared to what the stock markets have returned 2016 and early 2017. My money in Russia and Brazil has around doubled and a lot of the "safe" stuff is showing high double digit returns.

If you want to read more about p2p, this a good starting point:


http://www.p2pindependentforum.com

lessonlearned

Good Morning Fellow Millionaires in Waiting.

Hello Angelicious, welcome to our little Gang. Re your early retirment goal, may I suggest you read Mr Moneymoustaches blog, a Canadian guy who retired at 30. Some really helpful stuff in there. I have also discovered one called Frugalwoods. Just started reading that one but it looks interesting.

Hi BB. Thanks for that link. I shall sit and read up on that one. What perfect synchronicity.....:rotfl: couldn't have come at a more opportune time. Yesterday afternoon was really grim here, feeezing with sleet and snow so I upped the "hygge factor" and spent the afternoon curled up on the sofa reviewing my finances.

It's was DS2s day off and he helped me set up some fancy schmancy computer system to help me get organised.....no more notebooks. I am finally getting to grips with technology - part of my "year to Change My Life Challenge".

FEbruay is designated "Frugal February". I decided to start with a financial review and a complete money makeover. Making better use of technology should help me stay on track.

I began yesterday by clearing off my credit cards, the 0 per cent deals are coming to an end and as savings interest is dire i decided that rather than hunt for new cards I would pay them off and have done.

I have decided I might want to take out a small mortgage later on for our next renovation project, so it was better to have no outstanding loans or credit cards, so I can take full advantage of some of the good mortgage deals out there.

Mortgage rates are so low and there are such good deals around ........I figured that taking out a small mortgage will free up capital for other investments or projects. Well.........You have to speculate to accumulate and all that.

BB ......you are right about the stock market, my son is doing really well and I have decided he can be my "broker". I am going to set a small sum of money aside for him to "play with" and see what he can do for me.

Other than that not much else. Viewed a couple of properties, nothing has jumped out at me so far.

My challenge is going well. In addition to reviewing my finances my first step was to concentrate on a couple of minor health issues.......so twice weekly Physio visits, sorting out my blood sugars, getting my IBS under control.

Happy to say I'm doing well. I feel much better. No more stress, sleeping and eating better, moving more. Blood sugars normal.

Frugal wise......Well did have a little spend the other day at one of those designer retail outlets. Picked up a few items for my summer wardrobe, all sale bargains. I also invested in a new four wheel suitcase.....so much easier on the back. Even though it was half price it wasn't exactly cheap but if it saves me from back pain then it will be worth its weight in gold.

Another grey miserable day here but at least it's not snowing or sleeting again so I can get out and about today.

Hope you are all well, keeping warm, and making lots of money.