In this era of hardship, low job remunerations, high dependency and a lot of responsibilities, people are now looking for new job opportunities whiles others want to properly manage their finances to cater for all their needs. Most people look for investment opportunities to make more money out of the little they get. One thing that serves as a hindrance is that, they do not know how to invest. Some people have money but do not know how to invest whiles others think they do not have at all to even invest.

In Ghana for instance, there are so many investment opportunities but before we look at them, let us know the necessary steps needed to start investing.

The first step to starting investment is for an individual to resolve all financial issues like debts. It is advisable to pay your debts and plan not to incur any more. Debts increase your liabilities and make it difficult for wealth creation.

Another crucial thing needed for starting investment is to develop a saving culture or habit. This means, you must get a plan to put money at the bank (recommended) or somewhere for future investments. It involves selecting a good bank and opening a saving account where you would regularly, perhaps monthly or weekly deposit an amount of money for safe keeping as you think about where to invest.

The third important thing is to review personal incomes and expenses. This involves taking note of the income avenues like your job or private businesses and expenses you make. Investors always make sure their incomes are more than their expenses and this makes it possible to get some money to save for investing. Meanwhile, if your expenses exceed your incomes, there is nothing to worry about. You can develop a rule for the use of monies that come to you. An example is the famous 10-10-80 rule. This rule means that, for all monies that come to you, 10% is set aside for investment, 10% for paying your tithe (esp. the religious) and 80% can be used for other expenses. Other people prefer the 20/80 rule, where 20% of all incomes are set aside for investment in a savings account and 80% covers important expenses. With this rule, anyone can get money to invest to yield attractive returns.

A practical example is that, assuming a person has $ 1000 expenses to make and gets $ 1000 income either through salary or any other means, that person can set aside 20% which is $200 for investment and used the remaining $800 for the expenses. And since that would not be enough, expenses must be cut down to meet the money available. In so doing, you would always pay yourself first before paying others and that would help accumulate money for investing.

It takes a lot of discipline to do this and this must be done for all incomes. You can also seek financial advice from experts on how to do this.

Please follow the next post to know the various investment opportunities available for you, where to find them, how much is required to invest in them and the risks associated with them.