There is an old story that goes like this:
A man walked into a bank in New York City one day and asked for the loan officer.
He told the loan officer that he was going to Philippines on business for two weeks and needed to borrow $5,000. The bank officer told him that the bank would need some form of security for the loan.
Then the man handed over the keys to a new Ferrari parked on the street in front of the bank. He produced the title and everything checked out The loan officer agreed to accept the car as collateral for the loan.The bank’s president and its officers all enjoyed a good laugh at the guy for using a $250,000 Ferrari as collateral against a $5,000 loan.
An employee of the bank then drove the Ferrari into the bank’s underground garage and parked it there.Two weeks later, the guy returned, repaid the $5,000 and the interest, which came to $15.41.
The loan officer said, “Sir, we are very happy to have had and this transaction has worked out very nicely, but we are a little puzzled. While you were away, we checked you out and found that you are a multi millionaire. What puzzles us is, why would you bother to borrow “$5,000?.
The millionaire replied: “Where else in New York City can I park my car for $15.41 and expect it to be there when I return”
Now obviously this is a fictional story (as far as I know). However, finding ways to leverage knowledge and a unique perspective to make money is the cornerstone of any wealth building strategy.
Making money is easy. Think about it. As a kid I used to buy candy, specifically Jolly Ranchers, BlowPops, Starbursts, Mambo (like Starbursts) and bubblegum from the 7-11 between my apartment and my elementary school (I was in the third grade). I would net about $20.00 a day selling candy on the school yard. I eventually had kids in other grades and classes selling for me and got up to about $30 a day. I had a captured client base. I had a product that was in demand and had little spoilage and fast turnover. My limitation was only how much candy I could sneak onto the playground. I was netting $30 ($60 gross) a day at a time that minimum wage was $3.75 an hour. I was 9 years old and I was making $10 an hour.
When you know what you are looking for you will realize that there are more opportunities than you have time to explore. You will be forced to choose Option A or Option B or even Option C. If one doesn’t work, drop it and move to the next one. There are literally a million ways to make a million dollars. Look around you. What is at your fingertips? What do you do now? Who are you exposed to? What do they want?
Here are a few ideas to get you thinking…
Do you work in an office? Is everyone on a diet? Do they still buy fast food or microwave lunches? Would they be willing to throw a few bucks your way to get a real low fat, low calorie or low carb meal? Yes, it’s work – but it could be an extra $50 a week doing something that you are already doing (making your lunch).
Do you hang out at the park or go jogging at a regular populated place? Throw 14 half frozen bottles of water into a small ice chest and sell them to the other runners for $1. You should net about $10.00 a day. And it will motivate you to exercise.
Do you know anyone at a tow yard, a salvage yard or a scrap yard? Tell the owner that you will sell parts and trim pieces online and split the profit. You have no out of pocket expenses and if you don’t sell it in a week, they can send it out to salvage and make their money anyway.
Did you know that many bars and restaurants throw their used bottles away instead of recycling? They dont want bums and street people tearing apart their dumpsters and it takes up a lot of room in their trash containers. Do you have a car or truck? You can drive from place to place and either they will give you their bottles for free or you can offer them $.25 to $.50 on the dollar for their redemption value. You can make an extra $50 to $100 a day doing this. I know because I have done this myself. All they care bout is that you are clean and professional.
These are ideas off the top of my head. Eventually I will get around to posting all the jobs I have had and all the things I have done to make a buck. Until then, look around – there is a million dollars laying at your feet. You just have to find it.
Love your blog. These are some clever ideas but scaling any of them to a million bucks seems unlikely, these are more like ways to add some pocket change. Anyway, I have more million dollar ideas than I know what to do with but not the time or resources to pursue them. Can you write about outsourcing or otherwise getting shit off the ground?
You are right – by themselves they are not worth a million bucks. I didn’t make my money on any one idea. I had and still do have several businesses that all contribute to my income. That is the idea with this post. It is just to get your mind working. They are low cost startup ideas that almost anyone could do.
I have had million dollar ideas. I came up with cd players that played MP3s about 4 years before Sony put one on the market. I have business plans written up for advertising subsidized MP3s that would rival Apple’s iStore while still providing revenue to the studios.
The challenge with these ideas is that they are incredibly expensive to get rolling and where do you start? I went to engineers and programmers that told me theMP3 CD player was impossible or that it would be 3x the size of what was currently on the market. It turns out that they were wrong.
Each of these ideas is scalable. Let’s take the “Boxed Lunch” concept. You could easily sell them to your coworkers. But if you devise a menu and sell them to your whole building or Business Park, you have a business work a few thousand a month. Expand that and sell them to coffee shops or gas stations or expand to breakfasts, then you have a million dollar company.
What I want people to understand is that they can start small. They can even stay small and multiply their efforts. Anyone can do it. They don’t have to be smart. They don’t have to be rich. They just have to get off their ass and try.
Really enjoyed your post here. Money really is easy and fun to make when you have the right strategy, and there are so many ways – you just need to be creative and leverage that right side of your brain. One of my affirmations that I repeat regularly is I am always open to new ways of making money. This mantra has made me tens of thousands of dollars over the years. So totally agree with The Hustler here.