Some Tips for Achieving Goals About Financial Independence

We know that being financial independent is not merely about being rich, but having freedom to afford the lifestyle a person desires without having to work.

If you are like most of people, who put the goal of being financial independence near the top of your long-term-goals list, you'll have a long way to go. There is a lot of financial advice that you can hear about in your daily life. You can seek advice through the personal financial books, or from your financial planner. It seems that every person can offer the most professional advice, but they will confuse people who only want to accept all of them, because everyone has their own opinion on where to put the money, how to spend it, and how to make their money grow.

However, there are some simple truths that can apply to the advice that you can find. Let's see what they are.

1. Spend less than you earn, i.e. use credit card carefully.
This is basic and pretty obvious but a lot of people don't pay enough attention to it. It is the only way that helps you to get out of debt or make advancement on your savings. You can set up a rate that you will put into the saving account instead of spending all the money you get.

It is more likely that people using credit card can buy things they want in advance, but it is also an easiest way for them to load with debts. Learn to use credit card wisely.

2. Use cash rather than cards.
People will think more when they are using physical cash than a plastic card. If you have set a daily budget that you have $20 to spend on entertainment this week, you are more likely to think twice about spending all of them on movie rentals tonight when you have other plans for the weekend.

But if you use a credit card, you are less aware about how much money you are spending. And it seems an $8 and a $20 product doesn't seem like a look unless you see the total amount in the bill. Those small single purchases can add up to a lot.

3. Nobody will care as much about your money as you do, so do take more control of your money.
There are many people in the market who seem more professional than you because they have training, experience or fancy job titles that make you think they are best for you when it comes to your money. But actually nobody will care that much about your money as you do. So if you want to achieve your goal of being financial independent, even though you can seek help from the fund managers, investors or bankers, you should also be active to take control of your money. Knowing where your money is and being able to make informed decisions.

4. Budget.
Make your budget realistic rather than difficult. A budget allows you to see through the who situation and help you to know where your money is going, and where you can reduce your spending to improve your financial situations.

The budget you make should accurately reflect your spending habits and expenses, otherwise it won't be a useful tool at all, from which you cannot get closer to realize your financial goals.

5. Pay yourself first.
It doesn't mean that you should go shopping and buy something, no matter a new computer, phone, or anything like that, not mention things that will overspend the budget. It means put an amount of money into savings. Many personal financial books will contain this clue. They recommend that you should pay yourself first such as putting some money into the saving account or other investing accounts, instead of credit card bill or other bills, except the due day.

The money you put into saving can be a very small amount but that's ok. At least you have started. But I think at the beginning, you can only put a fixed proportion of your income into the saving account. Then when you can, increase the amount you are saving to 10%, 15%, or more of your income.

6. Separate needs from wants.
Actually there are very few things we really need. A person who earns $300,000 a year doesn't necessarily live better life than a person who earns $50,000 a year. That's because the person who earns less has put much more attention to things he needs. He may do the purchases that really work for him, and try his best to improve his quality of life without spending too much money.

So every time when you want to buy something, you can ask yourself some questions like this.

Is it a need or a want?
Can I delay this purchase to see if it's really what I want?
Can I get this cheaper or somewhere else rather than buying a whole new one?

So, if you want to accomplish your financial goals, the first step is that you should get out of debt, which means you may have to reexamine your way of spending and see what you can do to speed up our financial goals.

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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Sharon_Clara

The 3 Most Common Mistakes Every Entrepreneur Makes

Maybe it is because entrepreneurs tend to be optimistic. Maybe it is because entrepreneurs are willing to take risks. Or maybe it is because many entrepreneurs are just plain dumb, but there are some mistakes that almost every entrepreneur will make at one point in their career. These are the three things that you should never say when pitching your company to a potential investor or banker:

No Competition - At one point or another every entrepreneur will say it. "I have no competition." This is typically during the pre-revenue stages of business because once you begin to offer your product or service you will quickly realize that every business has competition. You might be the only one in the world that manufactures your product, but that does not mean you have no competition. Whether you have direct competitors or not you are always competing for dollars with someone or something else. If you have no competition then everyone in the world should buy your product, and if they don't then what is it that is keeping them from purchasing your product? That is your competition. It could be a child's college savings account, a date night with the spouse, or the mortgage payment. These are all competition because they consume dollars that are not available for your product or service.

1% of the Market - The second biggest mistake that almost every entrepreneur will make is believing that capturing 1% of their market is a conservative estimate. Just because 1% sounds like a small number does not mean any joe blow can steal 1% of a market from the competition. Entrepreneurs must have this urge to pretend that they are conservative, when in reality almost every entrepreneur has some bit of optimist in them. Rather than just assuming you can capture 1% market share out of a $100 billion market, you need to build bottom up, data driven projections. Your market potential is defined by your geographic location, your capacity to fulfill sales, and your ability to secure financing to name a few. Take these things into consideration when making claims about your market potential.

Return on Investment - The third biggest mistake that all entrepreneurs make when talking to potential investors is claiming that the investor will make some specific return on their money. For instance, entrepreneurs will come in and say that you can double your money in 2 years with their business model and their projections. Any investor that has been around for any length of time will immediately know that you are ignorant in this subject. As an entrepreneur you don't know what might happen tomorrow let alone 2 years from now. You don't need to convince an investor that they will make any level of return. They understand the game and then know that 9 our of 10 of their investments will fail or only break even, but that 1 single business that hits it big makes all the difference. Spend your time on showing these investors how you are going to hit it big, not how you are a safe investment, because you aren't safe.

These are the 3 mistakes that you must avoid like the plague as an investor seeking angel investment funding or a bank loan.

I am the Founder & CEO of http://www.theexecutiveplan.com, which offers entrepreneurs extensive guides, templates and articles to help create more powerful, effective, and memorable business plan executive summaries.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Adam_Hoeksema

Financial Independence Course

I reorganized www.renegadeuniversity.com to be more streamlined and more like a course on financial independence.

Drop by and see how I can help you get seed money for a business or for investments.

Use the Master Mind and chat sections to meet up with finance guys and gals that can help you reach your goals.

90% of people that I know that visit my site tell me its very motivational. So what are you waiting for?

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24/7 Live Finance Chat

If you miss the old Yahoo and other smaller chat rooms, where people used to chat about investing, visit:


http://www.renegadeuniversity.net/Chat.html

Free University Education

If you think it would be great to drop in college seminars and classes, I have an idea for you. Drop in www.renegadeuniversity.net and take a look around.

At the site above, you can learn hard won lessons about personal finance, investing, and success. Unless you buy a life changing book, you will spend nothing.

Renegade U will be overhauled soon with new templates and an entrepreneurship section.

Take a look!

Step One to Becoming a Millionaire

The first step you need to take in becoming a millionaire is TO TAKE A STEP. Act. Do SOMETHING. Nothing will happen if you just sit there. Nothing will happen if you just read articles.

Begin some study program, sign up for a conference or seminar, email a millionaire and ask for advice (only if you are willing to take it), get some books from the library. Spend some time learning, but then jump in and DO something.

Maybe build (or get) a website. Partner with someone. Write a business plan.

You do not need to know everything, to have it all down perfectly before you begin. But beginning is KEY. Here are the steps I took in beginning, yours might be the same, they might be different (these are not in exact order):

• I attended a Millionaire Mind Intensive seminar.

• I attended a few other seminars.

• I got a website (I got help building it and setting it up).

• I joined Toastmasters to assist my speaking career.

• I bought a fantastic memory course and speed reading course (and DID it).

• I designed and printed business cards.

• I wrote down my goals and a time line for them

The trick here is that if you begin, if you are moving, in ANY direction, you are on your way. If you are moving in the wrong direction or sideways, adjust your course. It is easier to steer a moving ship than one sitting still.

Remember the old saying, "Look before you leap"? Well, yes DO look before you leap, that is simply being prudent. But you still have to leap! Do not just sit on the sidelines looking.

Being wrong will happen. You just keep moving, adapt, learn from and correct your errors. Mistakes will not make you any worse off than you were, and if you are wise, you will be better for the knowledge gained from them.

You may be thinking to yourself, that is really stupid. All he is saying is to do something. No, it is not STUPID, it is SIMPLE. Let me ask you a question: Are you a millionaire? If you answered yes, then I KNOW you took action. EVERY millionaire has (and continues to do so).

The specifics matter, which particular action you take, but they matter much much less than TAKING action. My original plan was to patent an idea I had, and develop and manufacture a product. I may still do that sometime, but have changed direction in my quest.

Every one who is NOT a millionaire has NOT taken action. Like I said, simple. If you take an action and it does not lead you where you want to go (where you want to go is another article itself), then change your action, take another, a different action.

Most of becoming a millionaire is NOT some special formulas or key undisclosed method. It is applying basic, simple principles, working and reworking them to achieve your goal. Learn them (even imperfectly), APPLY them (even imperfectly), and you will be on your way.

So, let me encourage you to meet me in person at the upcoming (Oct 15-17) Millionaire Mind Intensive in Minneapolis. Personally think it is a GREAT action to take! I am Peter Szymanski, the 18 year old TeenageMillionaireExtraordinarie ©, in the making. http://www.teenagemillionaireextraordinaire.com.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Peter_Szymanski

Passive Income Article

We are formally trained to generate active income at a job, however it is difficult to truly generate wealth unless one begins to generate passive income. Most of us think of going to work at our jobs every day. Day after day we labor for our boss or business for payment. This is active pay since it is income that goes away if we do not regularly contribute something in return for pay. To maximize wealth, a person needs to train yourself to make passive income instead of actively earning income.

Some examples of passive income would be if you owned stock in a company that pays a dividend, if you owned rental property that was managed by someone else, or if you owned a business that was managed by someone else. In each of these instances, you, as the owner of the stock, rental property, or business could have no daily, weekly, or monthly interaction in the daily operation of the business and still earn money. In other words these are passive income streams that earn money regardless of your actions.

To become wealthy, you need to begin to think of different sources of passive income that you can use to generate income. The most common passive income which requires no interaction except filing taxes on a yearly basis is owning stock. It is possible to become rich doing this, however this requires twenty to thirty years of pouring large portions of your income into these companies. If you want to accelerate this process, you will need to closely buy and sell different companies. The problem with doing this is that the process then becomes an active process and not a passive process. Some people do this task of buying and selling their stocks daily and we call them day traders since they basically do this day in and day out.

Some better Passive Income ideas that will generate larger quantities of money with little starting capital are the ones you should pursue. Of course coming up with these ideas is easier said than done. Starting a business that others can operate for you is probably the ultimate goal for passive income, however this is a difficult process. Usually this requires you actively start the business by yourself and grow it until it can support the employees to run it on your own. If you eventually can free up your time to think about more passive income ideas, you will begin to get ahead of the game.

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