Having a budget, a savings plan and a long-term strategy for how you’re going to use your money is important if you want to be financially independent. However, no matter how well you plan, things don’t always go the way you’d expect.
Sudden emergencies and changes in your life could mean you suddenly have to not only empty your savings account but find other sources of money too. Life is packed with expenses we can’t always prepare for, whether it’s an unexpected medical bill, a lost job, or a natural disaster causing damage to part of your home.
Many households experience at least one financial emergency per year. If the last thing you want to do is turn to a short-term loan when you’re low on cash, you’re going to need to find some other, more creative ways of dealing with sudden expenses. Let’s look at some of your options.
Liquidate Some Physical Assets
First, it’s time to examine what kind of physical assets you have available to help build on your savings. As hard as it may be to sell things like the guitar you love, or the diamond pin you were given by your grandma, it can be a valuable way to make some extra money in an emergency.
You can even sell all kinds of unwanted items on channels like eBay. Sorting through all of your storage can give you a handful of products available to sell quickly. Although you might not make all the cash you need this way, you’ll at least make a dent in the initial cash you need.
This could help to contribute to you affording everything later. Try to make sure you’re getting the right price for anything you sell by doing plenty of research in advance.
Consider Less Tangible Assets
As unusual as it may sound, not all of your most valuable assets will be physical items like games consoles and television sets. There are some things in your life you can often trade in for higher amounts of cash if you know where to start selling.
For instance, if you already have a lot of your mortgage paid off, you can get another mortgage to unlock some of the value of your equity. Though this leaves you with a longer mortgage to deal with in the long-term, it can be worth it in some cases. You can also look into the option of selling your life insurance policy.
While a lot of people overlook the option of selling a life insurance policy as a potential solution to cash problems, it’s a great way to get the money you need. You just need a company that offers life settlement options. You can visit here and check out a guide on that explains everything you need to know about selling life insurance policies to get started.
Find Additional Jobs
One of the easiest and most reliable ways to get extra cash when you need it fast, is to take on additional work. If you can physically manage to work extra hours at the office, offer your boss some overtime. You can also look into things like odd jobs to make some money.
Walking dogs, washing cars, babysitting and more might not be your idea of the perfect future career, but they’re great for getting extra money in a hurry. There are so many tips for making money part time these days. The internet makes it much easier to find additional sources of income fast these days.
You can join the gig economy for a short while and make some money selling your services as a virtual assistant, a content writer, or a photographer, depending on what your skills are. You never know, you might enjoy these part-time roles so much you decide to change your full-time job too.
Borrow from Friends and Family
This can be an uncomfortable option for a lot of people with a high amount of pride. However, borrowing from friends and family makes a lot of sense if your loved ones have access to extra cash you can potentially take advantage of.
Try to swallow your sense of shame and remind yourself you would do the same for these people if things were the other way around. Generally, borrowing from people you care about should be a last resort, next to things like taking out additional loans.
This is because it can be too easy to ruin relationships if you’re slow to pay back what you owe. If you want to reduce your risk of any problems, try sitting down with the person you’re borrowing from and working out a scheduled payment plan.
Donate Plasma
Although this might sound like an extreme option, it really does work out quite well for a lot of people. Donating plasma is a great way to give something back to medical research and treatment development.
Donating plasma is similar to giving blood. Really, the only difference is how the blood is processed after it’s removed from you. The amount you make from donating plasma depends on a lot of things, including the company you choose to work with when giving blood.
You shouldn’t expect to make a fortune this way, and it’s really only an option for people who aren’t afraid of needles. However, if you can push yourself to give blood (and plasma) on a regular basis, this might be an option for you.
Finding the Cash You Need Fast
If all the options above don’t add up to enough extra money for you, then you can always look into things like getting a loan and paying the money back over time. However, the reality is that when most people sit down and start really pulling apart the pieces of their budget, they can usually find the extra money they need to deal with an emergency.
It helps to have some extra funds saved away for a rainy day just in case – of course. Make sure you’re constantly putting any extra cash you can away into an emergency savings fund, and the next time disaster strikes, you should be better prepared to handle whatever happens.
