You might have noticed that you have some friends earning big income but at the end of the month, they run to you to come borrow money and you keep wondering how they spent all their money and had nothing left. Well the answer is money has wings and it can fly.

The thing is if you don’t learn to manage your money, you might just spend it all without knowing exactly what you’ve spent it on.

A good way to manage your income is by saving and investing part of it, that way you will be able yo have extra funds asides what you earn and you can use it for some other projects.

One thing you should take with you in this post is that you shouldn’t spend more than you earn, I know you’ve heard this a lot of time but I’m reemphasizing it because that’s one of the main principles of financial success.

So I will be giving you some tips on how to save and invest your money wisely in Nigeria.


Don’t spend on betting

I’m always surprised at the number of people that are into gambling especially sport betting and these people see it as a means of making money.

Let me just tell you now that it is a sure way to waste your money. I even see some blogs and e-books showing you strategies on how to play and win from betting sites. Sorry to burst their bubble, there’s no winning strategy for betting so just forget about making it an extra source of income.

The way betting works is you play 10 rounds, you lose 8 and you win 2 or let’s say you lose 7 and win 3, at the end of the day it’s the betting company that’s making profit and that is why you see them getting richer.

If you want to go into betting, don’t be part of the customers  losing their money on the game  instead you should be the owner of the betting company making the money.


Don’t spend heavily on drinking alcohol

Hey! I know this a NO for a lot people because that’s the way they have fun but let’s face the fact, just try to do without drinking for a month and save the money instead, you’ll be surprised at the amount you would have been able to save at the end of the month.

I know you’re thinking I’m going to tell you to stop drinking but I won’t. My advice is you reduce your intake of alcohol. Maybe if you’ve been taking 5 bottles before, you can reduce it to 2 bottles.

But really I would prefer you stop drinking alcohol if you can because there’s always that tendency to keep increasing the number of bottles you take if you are someone who drinks every day and you know that taking too much alcohol can also lead to health issues.


Patronize mama put restaurant instead of fast food eatery

One of the ways you can spend less is by visiting eateries less often, I’m not saying you shouldn’t visit eateries at all but it shouldn’t be every day because you can actually get same food from mama put restaurant at a lower price. So why not just patronize mama put more.

From my experience some mama put restaurant cook better than some of these eateries then why should I pay more at an eatery when I can get something better elsewhere at a lower price.

If you earn big and you feel like eating in an eatery every day, it’s not bad but if you still struggling and you don’t even have enough savings then just eat more at mama put and don’t mind what people will say.

Another option is you can cook your food yourself as this will save you a lot of cost but from what I’ve been seeing these days some people don’t know how to cook any food except noodles while for some people they don’t just have the time to cook. So if you are in this category I suggest you buy your food outside.


Reduce the number of events you attend

It’s good to go for parties and event but for some people it’s already part of their weekly plan. If you attend wedding ceremonies every weekend, it shows that you don’t really value your time except maybe you are an MC, a DJ or a party planner then it’s okay for you to go for parties regularly.

Some other people’s obsession is going for music concert, they are always at every top music concert, if you are in the entertainment industry then it’s cool to do such but if you are not in the entertainment industry then I see it as a waste of time.


Have a budget

Having a budget helps you control your spending. At the beginning of the month you should budget for the funds you want to spend that month.

Imagine you walk into a store with your ATM card and you start shopping, if you don’t have a budget you might just buy about half of the things in the store and before you know it, you’ve spent all the money in your account shopping.

When people hear budget, they think it’s about reducing your cost to the barest minimum but that’s not totally true because in a budget you determine how much you want to spend, if you want to spend big it’s allowed. The main purpose of budget is it helps you know exactly what you want to do with the money you have.

So a man with no budget is like a man who is confused and can be easily led astray.


Make use of coupons and promos

There are different types of promos and coupons we have these days. Some company award you reward points when you buy from them then when you have enough points you can you is to purchase something from them. Some other companies give discounts during special seasons like Valentine’s Day, Christmas seasons, new year period and even the black Friday.

You might be the type of person that does not care about getting discount because you feel it’s just a little percentage off what you are buying but you should also know that every penny counts.

So if your aim is to spend less then you should watch out for these discount periods and take advantage of the opportunities it presents.


Open more than one bank account

It’s good you open an account with a bank but I think is better when you have two bank account. I know some people wouldn’t like this idea because they believe that when you have more than one account, you’ll be spending more money.

My reason for suggesting opening two accounts is because you need an account where you should be keeping your personal savings. You might not even have an ATM card for this account so that it is not easily accessible to you. The main purpose of the account is just for saving your funds.

You should also have a main account you run which you can use for shopping; doing transfers, paying bills and any other transaction but such account can’t be where you keep your personal savings because you’ll easily spend it if you do that.

You can also decide do have more than two accounts in case you want to save for other projects.

One of the reasons I prefer keeping my funds with the bank is that you can always get an accurate report of your accounts.


Save funds in piggy bank

One of the ways to also save money is by saving your money in a piggy bank. You can keep that extra money you make in the piggy bank.

Although I’ve not tried this recently but I think I’m going to try it soon and I think you should try it too and see the result.

When you save in a piggy bank it’s going to make you realize that little drops of water make a mighty ocean and little grains of sand make the pleasant land because you will be surprised at how much those extra funds can amount to at the end of  one year.


Save funds with cooperatives

Another way you can save money is by saving money with a group of people and you all benefit from it mutually. The most common one is called Ajo.

This actually works best if you want to save money for a big project. You can form a group of 10 persons and you all contributeN50,000 monthly for 10 months. Each month different person gets the whole bulk of money contributed by everyone. So that means if it’s your turn to get paid, you’ll get N500,000. I think that makes sense.

Definitely it’s not everyone that’s going to like this idea because you need to be disciplined to do it. I tried once and really it wasn’t easy but it gave me the result I needed, I was able to raise enough money for what I wanted to buy.


Make investments

This is like going a step further than saving your funds in the bank. Let’s say you have some funds in your bank account, you can decide to invest it with bank for a period of time.

The interest you will get on your money wouldn’t be high but I can assure you that it is better than just leaving your money in your bank account and it is also one of the safest means of investment.

There are different types of investments you can do which include fixed deposit, treasury bills, treasury bonds, treasury notes and you can also visit your bank to make enquiries about their investment packages.

Having an investment is a source of passive income because you don’t do any activity but you get interest on your money.

There are other good investments aside the ones have mentioned and you can try making your own research on it.

Before you make any investment decision, get advice from professionals. Don’t make the mistake of investing in High-Yield Investment Programs (HYIP) because you might use lose your money.

If you see any investment program promising you more 40% interest rate in a month, you need to assess it thoroughly or you just run.


Conclusion

It is possible for you to spend less and save more but that’s only if you are focused on doing it. A lot of people haven’t been able to save much money because they’ve never tried to do it.

But I’m challenging you today to try it using some of these tips I’ve written above and you will be surprised by the tremendous result you are going to get.

Happy savings!

In this post I’m going to be realistic as possible in showing you some home business ideas with low startup cost in Nigeria.

I know you must have come across several lists showing about 20 businesses you can start at home, but the question you need to ask yourself is how realistic are these lists.

When you hear home business, what comes to mind is business that’s easy to do but that’s a wrong perception about things. For you to do your business at home you need discipline, motivation and you need to work hard so as to get result.

You will definitely face the same challenges every business face in the Nigeria business environment even if you are doing your business from home but you can definitely overcome the challenges of the Nigeria business environment.

When starting a home business, you’ll definitely need money to start. There’s hardly any good business you can start without money. It’s actually possible to start a business without money but it is rare.

So if you want to start a home business, you should be ready to invest enough funds into it so that you don’t waste your time.

When you start a home business, it’s also going to take your time. The truth is that you might need to work more than the normal 9am – 5pm period, you might even need to work during weekends. So you can see that it’s not as easy as people say it is. You will need to invest a lot of time at the initial level if you want your home business to succeed.

You also need to have skills if you want to start a home business. That’s even one of the most important thing because if you are not good at what you are doing, your customers won’t patronize you regularly. Learn how to make customers keep patronizing you here.

If you don’t have the required skills for your business, you can always learn or employ someone who has the needed skills.

Now let me show you some home business ideas with low startup cost that you can start in Nigeria.

Catering Services

Catering service has to do with you providing food for people at social events. Outdoor social event would not really be my main focus for this post instead I will be focusing on how you can supply offices around your area.

You can start by walking into organizations around your area with a proposition of supplying them food when they need it. You can also give them a sample so that they can have a taste of your cooking.

Why I call this a home business is because you can do the cooking at home and you only need to go and supply the food to your customers of which someone else can always do that for you.

The most important part of this business is the cooking aspect and it can be done at home. If you can cook well, you will definitely get customers to patronize you .

Blogging

Blogging is one of those businesses that are going to take your time. Blogging is not just about putting up a few post and expecting result immediately, you need to be able to write enough relevant and interesting posts before you can start seeing result.


The reason why I have blogging on this list is because it can completely be done at home. All you need is your computer system, internet connection, ability to use content management system and ability to interesting and relevant content.

One of the easiest way people make money through blogging is by accepting advert placement on their blog but blogging also provide you other opportunities.

If you want to go into blogging you need to be able to come up with good contents and promote it.

Private tutor

Private tutor entails you teaching people what you know, it can be on a course you know people are interested in. It can be secondary school subjects, international exams, university courses or even professional courses. You will always get customers no matter the group you work with.

What you need to start this business is just having knowledge about the course you want train people on.

When it comes to tutoring people, you  need to regularly update your knowledge on courses you are training people about. Imagine tutoring someone and the person has a wider view about the course  than you do, that does  not show professionalism.


Online store

Running online store is also one way you can make money from home. Online store simply means selling something online.

There are different means you can sell things online, you can sell through your website, you can sell through e-commerce site like Jumia, Konga and Jiji. You can also sell through social media.

All you need to do is get a product that people want to get and sell it to them. You can import products from abroad and then sell it online.

Dry cleaning

Dry cleaning business is one of those businesses you can start from home and it’s going to sell because there are lots of busy people out there who need to wear clean clothes. You will also notice that the percentage of house wives are reducing these days as some of them are also getting jobs to do.

You can actually run your dry cleaning business manually when you wash clothes with hands but you should do that if you don’t want to spend money. You can also decide to use a washing machine which I feel will make your work easier.

The other parts include advertising your business and making delivering at the appropriate time. If you don’t deliver at the appropriate time, your customers won’t be satisfied, but if you deliver at the appropriate time, your customers would be satisfied and you will also get referrals.


Web Designing

Web designing is another business you can do from home and one of  the major thing is having the necessary skills to design a website, which you can learn.

The reason I have web designing on the list is because there are new businesses coming up every day and these new businesses want to be seen online and they will need a professional to design a website for them and that’s where you come in.

You can also offer SEO services in addition to your website designing assuring your clients of ranking high for keywords they desire on search engine.


Conclusion

If you want start a home business, you need to have the required skills or you can develop the required skills. The quality of your service matters because everybody wants to get value for their money.

When doing your business at home, you also need to take it serious like a real business. No business is a joke except maybe you are in the comedy business.

It’s easy for you to get distracted when working at home, distraction can come from your family members, when you watching TV or maybe when you are using your phone. You can avoid distraction by consciously having a not-to-do list when working at home. For instance you can decide to switch off your phone for some hours when you have important work to do.

Home business can be very rewarding but you need to be dedicated, focused, serious and skilled at what you are doing if you really want to get the desired result.