Income is what sustains us, it is what pays the bills, and knowing that this income will be there tomorrow is truly freeing. Having to stress about money is never fun but there are easy tricks that can make you relax and enjoy life. If you are like most of us and work for income, you are generating active income. You are basically trading your time for money. This can be risky depending on your health, life events, or any major life changes. Would you still bring in as much if you got sick? Would you still earn as much if you wanted to work part-time? What if you wanted to take a year off to travel the world? Wouldn’t be better to have some passive income coming in to sustain your expenses?
For most people, active income comes from their job and if you are like 76% of Americans that are living paycheck-to-paycheck, you might be a lot more dependent on that paycheck that you might think. However, there is a remedy to all this. You can live a happy, stress-free life, with passive income and of course; living below your means and saving.
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22% of the 1,000 people it recently surveyed had less than $100 in savings to cover an emergency, while 46% had less than $800. – CNN Money
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Earn in your sleep
Passive income will bring you the security and leisure to enjoy life like you should. By passive I mean, whether you put in more hours or not, the income will come. A perfect example of this is dividends; you work once to accumulate and invest into a dividend-paying security, then dividends will roll in without any additional effort.
If you are somewhat creative, there are so many things that you can do today to earn a little side money; selling digital music, writing books, writing a blog, making apps, creating online courses, making games… Or you can always invest in others to earn you some passive income.
Passive income is not easy and does take commitment to start up. Success doesn’t come overnight and you need to continue pushing before earning enough to live comfortably off of it. Some might build empires in a few months, it is possible now with the massive client base found online but for the rest of us, you need to be patient and continue at it.
To summarize passive income, you need to do only two things:
- Invest your time, or
- Invest money
You need to see the long-term prospects of your work or money and stop thinking in hourly-wage-mode. The hundred hours spent to write an Amazon book might generate income for years and years to come without any additional efforts.
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Size does matter
When starting to earn, you might not be impressed by your first checks, but you should be! Let’s say you start a website and earn $100 a month in passive income. You might have invested a few hours of work into it and feel like you wasted your time but think of it as a dividend.
To earn $100 a month in dividends, you roughly need to invest $50,000 in index funds (assuming 2.4% annual). Now to put that in perspective; how many hours do you need to work at your day job to earn $50,000?
On top of this, that additional $100 a month is a great start to financial security. Having a buffer lightens the load and will allow you to focus on other things in life.
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Diversify
Having multiple income streams is a great way to increase your income and have a more secure revenue if anything would happen. By diversifying your income, you could be able to face a change of employment or layoff from your principal job much easier than if you were living paycheck to paycheck.
In my case, I have 4 different income sources to support my family. This blog, for example, is passive. I spend a lot of time researching and writing but my work has long-term earning potential. Then I created a few apps in 2015 and they continue to earn over $10 every day in ad revenue. I have not worked on, promoted, or changed anything at all on these apps since 2015.
In addition, I have my day-job and invest over half that income. Investments are a great, truly passive, source of income that anyone can start with a very low initial capital or time commitment.
You need to find your passion and find a way to monetize that said passion. I suggest you focus on one thing at the time and try to work hard on that one thing. Focusing on only one project at the time will allow you to optimize it and become a pro at it.
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Start earning more today
The secret in building a strong stream of passive income is to be motivated and invest that initial time needed. It can get challenging to stay constantly motivated but it is crucial to your success. Start today and keep a regular schedule for a while. If you don’t know where to start, you should check out 23 passive income ideas you can start today by
Investing in index funds are a great, truly passive, source of income that anyone can start with a very low initial capital. With indexing, you do not have the concern of choosing the right stocks or knowing when to buy or sell individual companies. I suggest you go with Vanguard given their free commissions.
Starting a website and monetize it with affiliate programs or ads takes creativity but can be passive after an initial time investment. Affiliate programs can be very profitable and are easy to implement.
Agencies are quick to signup and let you choose which product to promote. Once you mention a product on your site and close sales, you’ll get a cut of the sales. This is how this site is run and I find it much less intrusive than ads.
If you have a passion and you would like to blog about it, WordPress Hosting will be ideal for you to start a blog and monetize it.
Writing a book can be hours and hours of work but could be a great source of passive income for years and years to come. Now with Amazon, it is easier than ever to self-publish and promote your book yourself. It’s something I am considering myself since you can write about any subject that you want and have recurring royalties coming in for years to come.
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I hope this helps you start a long stream of recurring income to secure your financial freedom. Good luck and live happily, Xyz.