What if you could get rich doing something you love? Or, TALKING about something you love to talk about?

That’s roughly the idea I’m busy working on that I’m going to be sahring with all the subscribers to this site. My goal will be to help others get R40,000 cheques in the post as well. And yes, there’s something in it for me, but you won’t have to pay a single cent!

So, if you haven’t already, then SUBSCRIBE!

Anyway, here are a few of the other ways to try and earn an income that I don’t believe would work, or at least may not be worth the effort:

Selling Avon Products

Sounds cool. There are people who make money doing this. But read this report and see what it says:

But how much does the average Avon distributor really make? According to its latest 10-Q filed with the SEC , Avon Products had sales of $2.15 billion in the first quarter of 2009. Later in the document, the company notes that “Sales are made to the ultimate consumer principally through direct selling by approximately 5.8 million independent Representatives, who are independent contractors and not employees of Avon.”

To save you some calculator time, that works out to quarterly sales of about $372 per distributor, with actual earnings per distributor making up a fraction of that amount. But even if it were the full amount, it would hardly be a life-changing income stream for most people.

Using eBay to sell 2nd Hand Goods

At the very least, you could use Bid or Buy in South Africa.

But how much profit are you going to make selling your second hand items to someone else?

Are you planning on buying cheap and then selling high? Good luck. Then you could write up about it and make a killing teaching people how to do it.

(Unless you’re doing this with something like “Bank notes“).

Become a Mystery Shopper

“It is so much fun to do this. It is so much fun,” said Anita Robertson of Greer, who has been a mystery shopper for two years.

Robertson is a paralegal by trade, but makes money on the side as a mystery shopper. Last year, she pocketed more than $1,000 “grading” stores and restaurants in the Greenville-area.

Wow, after reading this article I really want to earn a WHOPPING R10,000 a year!

Ok, not really.

It wouldn’t be bad, but is it worth the effort unless you’re a shopaholic?

Using 1 method, I made R100,000 last year. It’s just SO easy!!! And, it’s easy because you can do it from home, at night, when people are sleeping… Or, if you’ve been retrenched, you can do it all day every day! The more you do it, the more you make.

(I do it part time, so I don’t make nearly as much as I could, but I have a decent job that I enjoy).

Conclusion

Anyway… I just had to write this and get it off my chest because it really irritates me how people are telling you to make millions, but they leave out how much effort it takes and how little the returns actually are.

Thanks for reading…

Want to get something off your chest about this, then please leave a comment below.

I mean, everything just seems to go right for them.

Ok, by them, I mean us. Since I bought my new car (Mercedes Benz sports car), traffic lights are always green, traffic just seems to flow smoother, and parking spaces always seem to free up at the front when I arrive.

So, how do you afford the good life?

There are a couple of things you can do to make money in this day and age.

Finding somebody else who does it and imitating them is a good way to start. Or, asking them how they do it, and it hoping they’ll share the information…

(As a side note, subscribe to this website to find out how I do it soon).

As I read somewhere recently:

If you want to know how to make chocolate chip cookies like your grandmother, it’s as simple as finding out exactly how much of each of the ingredients she uses, and then mirroring her actions in the same amount.

Another way to make money

So, if you’re not already mirroring somebody successful, (or subscribed to this site), then you just need to figure out what you’re good at, and find out how to charge for it.

Are you a great gardener? Can you fix a plug with your eyes closed? Do you have a great skill in teaching somebody?

The list could go on and on and on…

In a few weeks time, I’m going to start sharing how you can use your skills and knowledge to help others, and make a fortune doing so. Well, it won’t necessarily be a fortune, but it will definitely add sugar to the bitterness of this economic recession.

Everybody would like extra cash at the end of the month.

In South Africa, EVERYTHING is going up in price!!!

<-> Electricity is going up 60%

<-> Petrol went up today by 61c

<-> Diesel went up today by over R1.30 (and everybody used to think they could save money by buying diesel cars or diesel bakkies).

Anyway, with all these increases, people need to earn extra money on the side.

A colleague has written an article on his site about “how to make extra money“.

He gives a few tips on how you can make money online which makes it easy enough to earn extra cash, and for almost no extra work at all…

Subscribe to this site for an EASY way to make money

In a few weeks time, I’m going to start sharing with subscribers an easy way you can use your skills and knowledge to help others, and make a fortune doing so.

Well, it won’t necessarily be a fortune, but it will definitely add sugar to the bitterness of this economic recession.

Best of all, it will be FREE!

So, subscribe to this site, free of charge, by entering your email address in the box on the top right hand side of this website!

Energy Saving Globes

These cfl light bulbs cost a little extra to buy, but pay themselves off in the energy they save, and therefore, the money they save.

You can buy one bulb which will use 6 times less electricity than a normal light bulb, and it will last longer as well.

I fully recommend you go out and buy Money and Energy Saving Globes…

In my first post about Virgin Money entitled “Virgin Money in South Africa” I gave a list of the features of the Credit Card as found on their website, and it’s proved to be exactly what I like about this credit card.

No Annual Credit Card Fee

To me, this is one of the best features. I have a Discovery Credit Card, and even if the interest were the same, it’s ALREADY R300 a year cheaper because of this.

Look of the Credit Card

I know it’s corny, but the credit cards themselves look quite cool.

My wife has the Black “BLING” Credit Card, and sometimes I like to confuse the people behind the counter and tell them it’s the Black Amex Card, you know, the one made out of Platinum and where you need to spend a minimum of $100,000 a MONTH!

No Hassles So Far

I don’t want to jinx it, but we live in a modern world where we ALWAYS have complaints. And so far, with the Virgin Money Credit Card, my wife hasn’t had a single complain.

So so far, so good.

Titled “7 easiest money and energy saving tips at home“, it shows a few things you can do to save money at home.

And, not only save money, but save energy!

Here’s an example:

- Geyser

The geyser uses a LOT of power to heat up your water. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have a “holiday” button like your fridge. Though it should. So, when going away for more than a couple of days, I turn the geyser off at the house’s main power board (the electrical mains). It might be a coincidence, but when I turned the geyser off for a week, my electricity bill was almost 30% cheaper.

So go read it, and tell me if it helps YOU save money at home!

Shame, poor chap. He’s only the second richest man on the planet now. What is a man to do?

So, who’s the richest?

Forbes magazine has ranked Carlos Slim Helu as being richer than Bill Gates, making him number 1.

Bill Gates apparently has around 56 Billion dollars, which is a little more than I earn in a year. About 20 million times.

THAT is depressing.

How about buying a Premier League football team. And how about making that team Blackburn Rovers?

That’s what Johan Rupert, member of the world’s 207th riches families is planning on doing, according to Fin24.

Blackburn Rovers are the latest English Premiership side to come under the scrutiny of foreign ownership, press reports said on Friday.

The Sun reported that South African billionaire Johann Rupert had teamed up with the owner of NFL team Miami Dolphins to piece together a potential bid for the Lancashire side.

I have no interest in soccer or football, but I would LOVE to be able to spend the money required to buy a football team. It would mean I could spend it on practically anything.

What would you spend R3 Billion on?

They’ve got some REALLY good tips for saving and earning money, and if you can read all the way through the article, I’m sure you’ll learn something. It might even be good to print it all out and make yourself some reading material for the bath.

Of course, some of them are really obvious:

58. Don’t fly now, pay later. It is very depressing to be still paying for a holiday (or any other luxury) five years later, when you want another.

57. Beware of plastic. Store cards and credit cards may be convenient, but they are also an easy way of running up debt.

Some of these money tips were probably told to you by your grand father:

1. Save 10 cents from every R1 you earn. If you put away at least 10 percent of your income as part of a long-term savings plan, there is a good chance that you will have a financially secure future and be able to attain your financial goals.

But there are some that I haven’t heard before:

13. A product offering a range of underlying investment product choices, such as a wide collection of unit trust funds, is often not in your best interests and may come at additional cost. Be very cautious if anyone recommends that you invest in a linked investment product with a wide selection of underlying investment choices. Remember that linked investment products come in many forms and are also offered by life assurance companies. The simpler and cheaper solution may be to invest in a properly diversified unit trust fund, such as an asset allocation fund that offers underlying investments in all the main asset classes, such as cash, bonds and shares.

66. Always have a lawyer check a property deed of sale before you sign up. Also make a deed of sale subject to conditions such as a proper inspection being done, if you suspect building faults, and to raising a mortgage bond, if you need one.

80. Do not take out a life assurance investment contract for more than 10 years. You don’t know how your financial position could change. At the end of the period you can always extend the contract, but if you have to cut it short, there are penalties involved that could see you getting back less money than you paid in. The main reason life assurance sales people attempt to get you to take out longer-term policies is because they receive more commission.

At first sight, this website looks a little plain. But, at a closer look, you’ll see that they’ve actually focused more on the content than on the design. For example, the article “How to Negotiate with Creditors to Avoid Bankruptcy” has a word count of almost 1,700 words. And with gems like the following, you’ll see there is a lot of helpful information you can use to improve your lifestyle:

Money magazine reported sometime ago that 90 percent of all bankruptcies could be avoided with an added monthly income of just $250.

and

If you owe a large amount and feel you’re sinking into the black hole of debt, a budget is not the only change you need to implement. One alternative is DEBT CONSOLIDATION. This option works if you have multiple debts with multiple lenders, all at varying interest rates.

Due to the amount of info, the category pages tend to load quite slowly for those not on broadband connections, so breaking up the info might help in this regard, perhaps having snippets on each Category page, leading off to the rest of the article. Not only would this help the page load time, but might actually give a better user experience, with users being able to see at a glance whether there is an interesting article they would like to read.

Perhaps having a navigable sitemap page would help.

Enough about possible improvements. As I’ve said, there are a lot of articles that you will find interesting. With info on paying off your loans if you’re a student, to tips on cutting back your costs if you’re a business owner, there will definitely be something you can learn from the site.

Go check it out now here: “Debt Consolidation News“