Pursue a Side Hustle When You Are Young
While writing about side hustles and money for the young, there’s one famous quote that comes to my mind. “When you’re young, work to learn and not to earn,” says American entrepreneur, Robert Kiyosaki, author of bestseller ‘Rich Dad, Poor Dad.’
With this quote, the writer aptly summarizes the reasons to pursue a side hustle when you’re young. There’re several top reasons to pursue a side hustle when you’re young. Here I’ll discuss some of them.
Top Reasons to Pursue Side Hustle While Young
Most of us would believe that money is the main reason to start a side hustle while young. The answer is yes and no. While money is indeed an attraction from a side hustle, there’re lots of other things you gain too.
Side Hustle Defines Your Career
All young people have two choices to start a side hustle. The first and easiest one is working somewhere during spare hours of the day. The second and a bit more complex is to start your own small business from home or a dorm. Regardless of which one you choose, a side hustle helps define your career.
While young, you can take a part-time or full-time job of your choice. And it’s always possible to leave the job if the work doesn’t interest you. And you can look for work that suits your passion and personality too. Or you could start a business that suits your hobbies and interests.
Starting a side hustle while young helps identify what kind of work you would love to do all your life. This makes it easier to look for courses that suit the kind of job or business you love instead of merely studying for a degree in which you have no interest.
The degree and your experience during a side hustle- job or business- actually defines your career and in most cases, the rest of the life.
Financial Interdependence
As I mentioned earlier, money is the single greatest attraction from any side hustle for any young person. But money by itself isn’t all that important if we look at what it teaches and helps gain. One of these is financial interdependence. Most young people believe that a side hustle helps them become financially independent and they needn’t look to their parents for pocket money and other expenses. However, I emphasize that making money teaches you financial interdependence.
In simple words, financial interdependence means depending on one-another to meet needs. When you begin earning money from a side-hustle, it’s possible to share expenses within the household. This helps your parents put aside some of their income and savings for your future education and other purposes.
At the same time, your parents or relatives will step in to help if you require money for any reasons, because they know you’re having an income from a job or business and can easily repay. While most parents won’t really look for repayment, they may use this condition to teach you a vital lesson about trust and interdependence.
Young people with wealthy parents might not really feel the need to start a side hustle. They have enough money to meet their own needs, is what you’ll hear them say. However, this is faulty thinking. In fact, a side hustle is useful for every young person, regardless whether they’re poor or rich. I’ll explain how.
When you have your own money from a side hustle, you can start investing it on stocks, Mutual Funds, Exchange Traded Funds, commodities, foreign currencies and other wealth-building plans. Nowadays there’re superb apps that’re available for a small monthly subscription or even free. You can start investing as low as $5, to begin with.
These apps use something known as ‘fractional shares’ and ‘fractional stocks’. For example, if a blue-chip stock costs $100 per unit, you can invest only $5 to get its fraction. By investing $5 and more in future, you’re able to buy one full share over a small period of time.
You also learn how to invest on stocks, ETFs, Mutual Funds, currencies, commodities and other financial instruments at a young age, through these apps. This is a skill that’s very useful when you grow up. You become an excellent investor that knows how to make money grow.
Seeking Venture Capital or Funds
Starting a side hustle while young can actually help you attract venture capital or funding for any future enterprise. Naturally, you’ll complete a degree in the field that interests you and open a startup in that sector because you’re aware of what it takes. The educational degree, your experience and interest matter a lot when seeking venture capital or funding for your startup.
One of the reasons that most venture capitalists and fund houses don’t support startups is because they’re copycats of other successful businesses. They lack originality and aren’t started with any purpose of helping people or other businesses. Such startups focus only on making their owners rich. Hence they flounder and fail. According to various statistics, between 60 percent and 90 percent startups fail due to these reasons.
However, when you open a startup with an original idea that you got during the side hustle, there’re more chances of success. That’s because your startup will be trying to provide a service that’s not available or very rare. And such ideas come only when you have a side hustle. You’re able to identify area where things can be better and try and do something about it.
New startups that’re unique tend to better attract venture capitalists and fund houses too. Hence, you’ll find that more people are eager to invest on your enterprise because you had a side hustle in that field while young.
Financial Security
The Covid-19 pandemic that’s going around the world is teaching us a lot about financial security. People that don’t have financial security of any kind are worst hit by the economic downturn that came with Covid-19 pandemic and its aftermath. While this pandemic is far from over, there’re no guarantees that other such disasters won’t strike again.
Financial security of having some money stashed away in a bank account or investments won’t definitely last lifelong unless you’ve made a few million Dollars. But it can definitely help you buy the vital time from being jobless or losing on business to finding new employment or restarting your venture.
There’re also a psychological advantage of having financial security. People that’re financially secure tend to take their jobs or business more seriously and are less prone to distractions and fears. Instead, they have self-confidence and are able to shoulder a lot of responsibility.
Starting a side hustle while young helps you develop this kind of financial security. It might not add up to much. Yet, with proper planning and understanding of the money markets, you can create a fund that can help overcome any immediate problems.
Respect in the Society
This might sound a bit farfetched but young people that have a side hustle such as job or business usually get more respect in the society compared over their peers that don’t have any such enterprise or work. Working on a side hustle, either own enterprise or a job imparts the general feeling among people that you’re a responsible person and are utilizing time properly.
In fact, your faculty members will also look at you with differently when you have a side hustle. They won’t mind providing you their references or even giving some vital advice that can help you become successful in life and business or job. These distinct benefits aren’t usually available for everyone. That’s because the overall perception about you in the minds of people changes when you’re using time for some gainful purpose.
Develop Superb Credit Score
A poor credit score often affects fresh graduates unless they’ve been able to fully pay off their education loan, student credit card and other outstanding borrowings at the earliest. When you have a side hustle, it’s very easy to pay off any credit and build a superb credit score.
Maybe you know that a credit score plays a very important role while applying for mortgage, credit card, automobile finance or even venture capital. The higher your credit score, the greater and better your chances of getting the money to finance anything you’re doing. A side hustle makes it possible.
Keeps Away Vices
Young people that don’t use their free time for gainful or profitable purposes such as education, work or businesses, are more likely to develop vices such as drug and alcohol addiction, among others. And it’s a well-known fact that such addictions can destroy a person’s career and life in every possible manner.
When you have a side hustle, the responsibilities will usually prevent you from falling victim to drug and alcohol abuse. Instead, you’ll learn to cherish good physical and mental health and take all steps to preserve them.
In Conclusion
These topmost benefits should encourage every youngster to take up a side hustle. It could actually open the doors for you to become a future billionaire and lead a better life. All it requires is inclination and some extra efforts.
Also Enjoy:Top 10 Side Hustles in Australia in 2020
Fun Fact
Why you should side hustle?
Even if you aren’t worried about job loss, a side hustle can be a great source of extra income to pay down debt, save money and invest. It can also have tax advantages. If you make purchases for the business, you may be eligible for tax deductions.The value of a side hustle goes far beyond the extra cash, although a few additional dollars certainly does not hurt.
