Millionaire Challenge

try_harder

Sorry mistake ,i meant
£400=£800 pressed the wrong key

droopsnoot

As you say, I think the early steps on that path will be relatively easy in a number of ways - easy to sell cheaper items, but also easy to not worry about risking a relatively small amount of money buying the things to sell. My concern would be whether, once I'd got to a reasonable point in the list, whether I'd be prepared to risk the next step, whether I'd be able to compartmentalise and say that I was only risking "found" money, or whether I'd simply go "well, £400k is enough, that'll do". Still, if I was more of a risk-taker, I'd probably be in a very different situation that I am in.

elephantrosie

doubling money is difficult

try_harder

I think that as the number got higher you would break it down into smaller amounts so for example if you were trying to double up £3200 you could buy 32 items at £100 that you would need to sell for £200 or 64 items at £50 that you would need to sell for £100 and they dont have to all be the same items that way you spread your risk by buying 32 items that are different .Only problem would be storing them all .Then if you couldnt double the £3200 to £6400 and say only made £4200 you would still have gained and then would continue doubling until you reached the £6400 ,you just have to make sure that you can get your money back at least on an item so that you never lose any .As to reaching £400000 then wondering what to do next wouldnt it be nice to have that dilemma droopsnoot ?

Chesapeake

cazmanian_minx wrote: »

I've got croft land, which is a bit different thanks to crofting legislation, but similar enough - currently have 15 acres and if we manage to buy this house will get another 18.

Your main issues will (a) be getting planning permission on agricultural land, (b) if you do get planning permission, convincing the council not to slap an agricultural residency restriction on it, which will devalue what you build immensely, (c) antagonising people living in the area of the land who don't want it built on.

You will pay stamp duty on it - stamp duty's full name is Stamp Duty Land Tax (or Land and Buildings Transaction Tax if you're in Scotland) and should you be successful in what you're intending to do, factor in capital gains tax as well.

It can be done, but most of the profitable sites for it got snapped up by developers a long time ago.

If you have over 15 acres you get permitted development rights for barns, polytunnels etc. You can live on site for up to 5yrs while constructing said buildings which gives you time to make the land profitable and meet planning criteria.

Thanks for confirming the tax bit, will have to see what the % are and do some sums.

Kayalana99

Well productive day, changed finances round a bit so I have a small pot that is having such small amounts taken out I won't notice.

Also got £210 from signing up to Marriage allowance (backdated), they did say I'd be entitled to around £400, but the £210 was the figure quoted for one year, so not sure if there is a reason it didn't get back dated 2 years or another payment is coming.

They did say they would send two cheques seperatly from the wording (so the hope another payment may be made) but for some reason it was paid direct into one of our bank accounts even though we didn't give them the details for it, I think through my business tax they have it but it was such a random account not even the business account...

Also opened a 5% interest regular saver, I thought I wasn't entitled to it with my bank as you need a 123 current account but as we have a 123 credit card I was entitled with that anyway and it was opened in seconds, so I can pay £200 a month in there till it's full. Going to drip feed the E/F into it.

I really could do with an easy access savings account, Santander do a 123 current account that pays 1.5% interest (amongst a bit of cash back) but our bills are so low that it doesn't pay the £5 back unless we have about £1,000 savings in the current account - but even then it's only break even...so seems a lot of effort for a few pence...

However, they do give 1% cash back on Santander mortgage payments and I've done their calculator and we would be able to transfer (and good interest rates too) but there is a £999 product fee and our mortgage would charge us around £750 to get out early, something to think about when it comes to re-mortgaging though or if we do move we'd be selling up anyway....so would be worth it if that happened.

Husband didn't get his payrise but still got 2% after that (not giving pay rises to anyone in the division unf this year) and with the marriage allowance and increase in personal tax this year, we're still £50-£60 a month better off.

Job promotion still in the works but even if he gets it, I have a feeling this will be dragged on into June so I won't mention it again unless I have news (although I will let you know if he doesn't get it too)

It's all a few pennies here and there but it's adding up, and I've decreased the food bill to around £50 a week too, and the car we purchased is great on petrol so even though my Husband's car share has now changed jobs, it should still break even, if not be a bit cheaper.

On a mission still to get bills under £1,000, but we'd need to pay off the CC (only a £1,000) that we used to pay the bathroom as that's draining £40 a month off us. We could pay less, but give or take £100 or so it will be paid off in full by the end of the 0% interest period at that rate so I'd rather not pay less. I should be able to get the money together without going into our savings pots for the car insurance to be paid off soon to, so that will be another £50 a month saved + £100 already is saved on the shopping bill at the rate I'm going.

Broken_Biscuits

elephantrosie wrote: »

doubling money is difficult

I found this article today and found it interesting.

http://actionecon.com/double-your-money-again-and-again/

It ties in both with the doubling idea and the million challenge. I'm much more of a fan of this buy and hold approach than the idea of buying and selling my way to a million.

I think personally I have only 2 (or 3 at best )doubling periods left before I would like to stop working and so do really need to crack onto the 250k mark!

Some of the 20 somethings here should walk comfortably into their million.

lessonlearned

Biscuits......thanks for the link.

I think you're right - those in their twenties now could easily hit the £1m purely through compound interest and getting to grips with the rule of 72.

The best way to get cracking is not to just maximise income but also to reduce expenditure and save as much as you can. The old traditional advice of 10 per cent or even 20 per cent isn't enough, at least not if you want early financial independence. Keeping a tight rein of cash flow to maximise savings is crucial.

It's often easier and more efficient to make more money available for investing by cutting expenditure to maximise savings than by trying to earn more.

For example - If you are on a relatively modest income of say around £10 per hour then shaving £100 off your monthly budget is better than working extra hours. To get £100 extra net you have to factor in 20 per cent income tax (standard rate) and 12 per cent NI contributions. If my maths are right then you would need to earn £132 gross - which is just over 13 hours extra work. If you are on a minimum wage of £7.50 then it's even worse - you would need to work 17.6 hours extra.

Cutting costs to maximise savings is infinitely preferable.

So well done Kay on rejigging the finances, reducing costs and making your money work harder. Definitely the way to go.

ms_night_ryder

Hello all.

I've been lurking. Today I sold my first item on etsy! Yay!

I started it in October and had 0 sale's, lots of views, favouriting my shop and items, enquiries about bulk orders from Australia etc but no sales. I relisted as its only 15p to relist every 3 month's and today a sale. I was planning on putting up some spring summer item's to see how they went so I Will be going ahead with that. See how that goes.

I joined a thriving business group on fb and it has encouraged me to do more, put my site back up more promotion etc, so that's where I am heading.

Hope everyone is good.

Broken_Biscuits

ms_night_ryder wrote: »

Hello all.

I've been lurking. Today I sold my first item on etsy! Yay!
.

Well done on your first sale. Hopefully it's the first of many!

If the sales don't keep coming it would be worth re-reviewing profit margins and competitors prices. No point working for free by having ridiculous low prices but it's better to sell multiple items at a slightly lower profit than to sell very few at a higher markup.

It's it's the sort of thing people only buy once or very rarely your customers may not notice if you drop and then raise your prices later. (Hoping that because the product is good, increased sales when the price is dropped will lead to more positive reviews and more positive word of mouth... Resulting in again more sales even when you creep the price back up)

Best of luck