So, if you don’t already know, I am a stay-at-home-mom to 4 + kids, I also home school. My husband works from home when he can but also has an office and occasionally drives trucks to support our family. We do most everything together!
A few months ago he was out on the road in a bad snow storm in the middle of the night. My stomach was in knots and my heart sore from the worry. My initial thought if “something” were to happen was, ‘how do I tell the kids they will never see their dad again?’ Then I thought ‘what will we do without him?’ He loves us, keeps us safe…he supports us!
A flood of worrisome thoughts raced through my head, the biggest one: ‘How would we survive?’
That is a loaded question because we depend on him for so much more than money, but money was what I was thinking.
I will have to get a job! I don’t have a degree or any recent experience in the work field, I’ve been a baby factory for 6 years.
My kids will have to go into daycare and public school! We want them to be individuals who are free thinkers, public school and daycare does not facilitate our goals for our kids.
Our home is too expensive; we would have to move! We want to do that anyway but to move, to go through the process of selling, packing, buying and moving without my husband would be a huge struggle.
I was up all night waiting for him to come home safely. He did.
But the whole thing kept me thinking: ‘WHAT WOULD I DO?’
I started brainstorming ideas. Ideas that would disrupt our children and their everyday life the least. Ways to bring an income that would require me to do little or nothing(I’m busy enough what with the kids, schooling and household). HA! Like that exists. I’m in la-la land over here but I came up with a few ideas you might be interested in as well.
“Work from Home” is a very popular search term on the internet. There are the regular answers like medical transcription and multi-level marketing. Then there are the more creative ideas like freelance writing and blogging(eh.) Or making a product and selling online… Call center associate…. and so many more…just search!
A passive income, this is the term, is what I am looking for. Something that will virtually run itself, and hopefully not into the ground. Something I can invest some money and minimal time allowing me to keep doing what I’m doing with my life and kids but generate an income.
My realtor brain goes right to investment property. Being a landlord is not without its struggles. The first being to have the money to invest. In real estate, as with many business opportunities, you need money(to spend) to make money. Next, is the return on investment. Shelling out upwards of $100k upfront for a monthly check does not sound like a good idea but what draws me in is a steady monthly income – granted you have a tenant(s). Having a set monthly income would be ideal for my situation having a family to support and all. Oh, and the $100k + can be mortgaged for a portion of the rental income, making it all work, financially. As long as the furnace doesn’t blow up! Which brings me to another struggle for landlords: maintenance and repairs. Hiring a handyman and landscapers solves this problem but at a cost. All of these things weigh into expenses and whether this opportunity would be worth it. The answer: with the right property and the right tenants for the right price…it would definitely be worth it!
The next business opportunity for passive income I came up with would be an actual business. One that does not require very much overhead. It’s overhead that puts businesses under! So, no inventory, no products, no employees…just a building where people pay to come in. Not very many options but I thought of a few. A coin Launderette. An Arcade. A pool hall. An automated car wash. A bank of vending machines in a mall. All these options need regular upkeep and maintenance but with the exception of the pool hall, run themselves!
After toying with both ideas I thought, ‘Why not both?!’ What if I invest to buy a commercial/residential multifamily property? One with a Laundromat and arcade with a bank of vending machines on the ground level, an automated car wash out back, and two or three apartments upstairs! There. problem solved!
But is it?
I’d still be without a husband and have the stress of operating all these businesses and properties. It would be risky because in this hypothetical, I’d be investing our life insurance pay out to make do with what we had. I couldn’t live with myself if it didn’t work out. Hello! I couldn’t live with myself without Darryl!!!
What would you do?
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