What resources are at your disposal that can generate more income for you?
What gifts, resources, and experiences, as well as money, can you use to generate more money?
Do you have money sitting on the sidelines?
What opportunities aren’t you seeing?
Learn how to quickly find your “assets” and turn them into cash flow generators! You might be surprised just how easy it is to make more money.
Tune in now!
Chris Miles Bio:
Chris Miles, the “Cash Flow Expert,” is a leading authority on how to quickly free up and create cash flow for thousands of his clients, entrepreneurs, and others internationally! He’s an author, speaker, and radio host that has been featured in US News, CNN Money, Bankrate, Entrepreneur on Fire, and has spoken to thousands getting them fast financial results.
Chris consistently teaches audiences how to do what no other financial advisers can or will – achieve financial prosperity, NOW AND IN THE FUTURE, while spending time doing what they love most!
—
Listen to the podcast here
What Assets Do You Have That Can Generate Income?
Welcome to the show. I’m excited to have you on because there’s going to be a great three-part series that we’re going to start. Let me ask you a question. How many of you have ever wanted to know how to earn more money or have more income? Specifically, how to have more income without having to work for it as hard as you have been in the past?
As a reminder, make sure to check out our stuff on our website, MoneyRipples.com. Also, if you have questions or other topics you would love to hear from us, be sure to shoot me an email at Chris@MoneyRipples.com. Let me know. Let me hear from you guys. I love to hear from you. Ask the questions. We’ll keep them anonymous. Give us some good topics that you want to hear that create value for you.
Let’s talk about income because I know this is one I get honestly asked by clients and people at events. Everybody’s asking how to earn more money. Let me start with this caveat. First and foremost, you making more money does not mean you’re going to be in a better place. You do have to have the right principles of stewardship by applying the right strategies to manage the money that you receive. You’re not making more money, but you keep what you make and then make more money on top of it. That’s the number one key. That’s a whole other type of topic that we can go on another time. Ultimately, if we’re going to make more money, it’s not just going to be consumed.
I’m talking about how we make more with what we have. What are those assets that you have that you don’t even realize they’re there that are not giving you the returns you want? In this episode, I want to talk about the three types of assets that you can make money from. The first one is financial assets. The second one is intellectual assets, and the third one is relationship assets. I’m going to start with financial assets first. It’s the one that most people think about. It’s also the one that people don’t always see. That’s the thing I want to focus on.
I had somebody I talked to whose assets were all tied up. They’re not asset rich by any means. Although I’ve met with those people, too, that are asset-rich and cashflow poor. In this case, they do have assets. They’re technically debt-free even though they have loans. If they could sell off all their assets, they could be debt-free, but that’s not what they want. Their question is, “How are we able to get ourselves out of this place? We’re struggling month to month making ends meet and paying the bills.”
This is someone that’s not even a client yet. When we looked over their situation, we found about $2,200 to $2,300 a month we could free up over the next few months. That’s almost $24,000 a year we could have back in their lives. It would be tremendously huge. It would take a ton of pressure off them. We can even get them to where they’re living off with just one income if they did that.
Just because you make more money does not mean you're going to be in a better place. Click To TweetWe were talking about that and a lot of what was in their situation was financial assets that were tied up. Financial assets, for me, to find things to do are very easy. If somebody’s got savings sitting on the sideline that they’re not doing anything with, that’s one thing. I love those people, too, because it’s great. We find ways to create cashflow with that money, whether it be inside of their business or outside of their business.
On the other hand, there are a lot of times when people will have equity in properties. They’ll have money tied up in 401(k)s, IRAs, and other retirement plans that they can’t get access to or they can’t get access to very easily. We find creative ways to do that, and I love getting creative. When we start to look at this, we try to figure out where it is.
What I want you to do is consider what your financial assets are. What are the things that you own? These could be things that are smaller that you could sell, donate, give away, or whatever it might be. You couldn’t get a tax write-off on those things that you donate, but what about those financial assets that could be used to produce more? Could it also be put into your business to make more money as well? Is there something that you could be investing in your business that would add a lot more income? It could also add even more to your bottom line in general and make you more profitable in what you’re doing.
I had one client in particular who wanted to get a piece of equipment for his office. He was renting out another one and leasing it from another person. If he were able to buy it himself, he would save himself a few thousand dollars a month. The thing is, it was into the tens of thousands that it costs. However, if we were able to finance that or find the assets for him to do that, he’d be able to at least free up at least $1,000 to $2,000 a month. That’s what we did. We said, “Let’s invest in that.”
That’s better than investing in some mutual fund that you hope and pray will give you some money. Let’s invest in something that will increase your profitability. It could be something like that in your business. It could be something like this particular situation. We were saying, “How can we use these assets? Can we use some ways to consolidate? Can we free up some cashflow by doing refinance?” In this person’s situation, we had to get pretty creative because there were some credit issues that they had. We were like, “How can we use that money there?”
In fact, in one case, we even said, “Maybe instead of refinancing one of these properties, you might want to sell it off,” even though they were making cashflow from some of these rental properties. Somebody would say, “Why would you get rid of those rental properties?” If the rental property is only paying you $300 a month, by selling it, you could free up $1,500 a month or $1,800 a month in that case. Wouldn’t we want to do that? There are some possibilities there.
Those are the kinds of things that we look for where we’re like, “What can we do to free up more cash?” What can we do to make these assets better? Could we use money that’s sitting in retirement accounts that are doing nothing, or hope and pray that it does something with the markets? Can we make more with it? Could we go to invest in real estate? Can we go invest it in whatever it is that we want to invest in that we have knowledge of and passion for ideally beyond the money?” There are things you can do that way. There are all types of things you can do with the money that you can make more with it. The key is, how do you get more money freed up? How are you able to get that money back in your control?
The second part of this is the intellectual assets. What are the intellectual assets that you have? What are the things that you can do to be able to make money with your mind, gifts, and talents? What are things you can do to make money from a standpoint where you’re able to make money from experiences, for example? Do you have certain experiences that people say, “How’d you overcome that? How’d you get through that? How’d you do that?” Those are the kind of things that you want to look for.
One thing you want to make sure you do when you’re looking at all these assets is that it always comes back to the fundamental principle you hear me say time and time again. That fundamental principle is, how do you go about creating more value? The way to make more money is to create more value for more people. How are you able to do that? How are you able to create value for people? How are you able to solve problems? How are you able to serve them and add more value to their lives? That is a thing you should be asking, not just about how to make more money.
If you keep asking how to make more money, you’ll find yourself in a big scarcity loop where you’ll feel that you’re running in circles. You’ll usually come up with the idea that’s the default, which is, “How do I work harder? How do I work more hours? How do I do more? Do I take that extra job?” That’s not necessarily the answer or not the best answer. It’s how you go about serving people in a way that adds more value. Can you serve more people with less effort? That is a big key.
When you’re looking at ideas and things that you have that way, what are some of those ideas that you have? This is something you want to write down on paper. Hopefully, you’ve already written down some possible financial assets that maybe could do something. You may not know how to do it, and that’s fine. That’s what we’re here for. If you don’t know what to do with that, at least you have those assets written down. You know that there’s potential there. What about ideas? What’s the knowledge or expertise that you have? It could be something that seems random. What are some natural talents or gifts that you have?
For the longest time, I couldn’t figure out how to use my talent in using useless information. Some of you may or may not know this, but I got to the quarterfinals of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? back in 2000. I got right to the point of the TV show and got eliminated, so I didn’t get on TV. I got to that point and I thought, “How can I monetize something where you spout off a bunch of information that you retain?” I retain a lot of information. It didn’t seem to make sense. I didn’t want to become a jeopardy contestant. I didn’t want to become the next Ken Jennings. Plus, I know I’d get my pants spanked off of me by doing that because I don’t nearly have that training and capacity that he has.
The way to make more money is to create more value for more people. Click To TweetHowever, in my line of work, it’s amazing how I’m able to see the big picture. I’m able to seek things that correlate that maybe other people won’t see. I have a bigger vision that people don’t quite catch. I’m able to create answers and find more ways to generate money or ways to free up cashflow that people don’t normally see. That’s why I get paid in my role, especially where I have financial expertise combined with that useless information and personal experiences that I’ve had to overcome.
I’ve overcome massive amounts of debt as well as massive amounts of negative cashflow. I had come out of that without any financial capital. I had no extra money. I had to figure out how to get creative to make money with no money at all. I had no credit or savings. I had to make it from scratch. A lot of that took time, and that experience has led me to where I am and to teach what I teach. How can you take the combination of experiences, ideas, and those things that turn into money?
What are things that people keep asking you? Are they like, “How do you do what you do? How do you do that? Can you teach me how to do that? Can I pick your brain for a minute?” If they’re asking you that question, they’re telling you why they want to pay you money. If they keep asking the same questions, it means other people see something in you. Maybe it’s some genius inside of you that they don’t have themselves and they want in their lives.
Why don’t you start charging for that value? Start charging for something that is worth it to people, especially if it can help them live a healthier life, have better relationships, be able to be happier, be able to make more money or free up money, or wherever it might be. If it’s able to help them prosper in some aspect of their lives, give that to them or offer it to them.
Some people will say, “I work for a direct sales company or a network marketing company where I have products. I can’t go and increase prices. I could try to sell more, but it’s a lot harder.” That’s true. I have a friend named Heather Mather. She wanted to coach people. She loved coaching people. She got the idea from one of my friends. He said, “Why don’t you get people to coach with you and charge them for it? What if they want to join that direct sales company you are a part of? Maybe you can offer them a free session as an incentive to join that direct sales company.” She did that, and the next thing you know, she starts making tens of thousand dollars a month both from coaching and the direct sales company.
People said, “Technically, joining that direct sales company is a cheaper deal than hiring her individually. I’ll do that.” Some of them bought products. Other ones even started building a business around it and making her more residual income. Although it took a little bit of time to build at first, she started to see a lot of growth and a lot of money fast because of that. How can you leverage those talents, gifts, and ideas that you have in ways to serve people?
I created a course called Find Your Divine Genius that I created earlier. In fact, it happened at the end of 2014 because people kept asking, “I want to know my purposes. I want to know how to monetize my passions, but I don’t know how to do it.” I came in and said, “It’s this simple. I’ve taught hundreds of people how to do this, but I haven’t done it for five years.” A lot of people wanted to know the answer. They said, “How do you do that?” I caught on.
When people start asking questions and you have an answer for them, that’s the time to start delivering on that answer. I came back and I asked people, “Out of curiosity, how many of you would be interested in learning about this?” Several people liked the post on Facebook. I turned around a few days later and said, “I’m going to be doing a webinar for only $50 a person to the first twenty people. Who wants on?” The twenty seats were all filled up. I made $1,000. It was a piece of cake.
I recorded those and paid my assistant to then go and edit them to make it easier. I made a workbook for them and everything else. The next thing you know, I have this new Find Your Divine Genius course that I sell online for about $300. Voila. There you go. There are awesome ways to create. That took a little bit of time and effort, but I was able to leverage that ability. I got paid for it even before I did anything. I just announced it and people wanted it. It was something that people wanted. It was about figuring out how to deliver on it.
There are so many ways to do that, but start asking yourself. What are those ideas that you have? What are those ways, strengths, and talents that you can serve people with? What are the education, training, or unique experiences that you have that maybe can solve problems? You might not think anything of it, but other people would say, “That’s amazing. How’d you get through it?” Write those things down.
The third one is relationship assets. What are those relationships in your life? Who are those people that you know that you can also either serve yourself or leverage their abilities to help serve others? This is the one that has the best rate return. For those of you that have heard some of my stories, this is how I was able to retire with $2,000 in my checking account. I was able to leverage other people’s abilities and experience and use that to serve people. It didn’t have to just be me. I didn’t have to be the know-it-all. Even though I can retain a lot of information, I don’t want to know it all. I don’t want to do it all, but there are people that are willing to do those things that they’re good at.
I was good at matching and connecting people up saying, “This person is amazing. This is where they’re experts. This is where they shine. Go use their talents here.” I did that a lot in the financial realm, but I did that with other businesses too. I was making streams of income from referral fees because what business owner would not want to pay referral fees for a good referral? We all do. We’re all willing to pay referral fees for that, whether it be a dollar amount or a percentage. Who can you help benefit?
Get creative to essentially make money with no money at all, no credit, and no savings. Click To TweetThis creates a win-win scenario for them and a win for you as well. It’s a triple-win scenario. How can you go and allow somebody to be served by somebody else and you’ll be able to get the kickback? It’s the same thing with affiliate relationships. This is how affiliate marketing works. This even ties with direct sales and network marketing. If you’ve got people on your team, how can you connect them with great opportunities to then go and take advantage of that? Those are all part of the same equation.
There are also other things too. How can you leverage people? Can you hire people into your business? Can you hire people into your life to help you and help do things better than you do yourself? Hiring a good accountant or a good bookkeeper can make you more money and save you more money than it would be doing on your own.
Let’s say your time is worth $100 an hour. If you’re going to spend ten hours at the end of each year doing your own stuff, that’s $1,000 you wasted. Anybody that has done taxes knows that ten hours is not much. I’ve seen a lot of people spend days on their taxes. You can hire an accountant to do it for you in a matter of minutes versus the hours that it would take you. Why not hire people to do that? It will save you time and money.
Ultimately, as long as you go and produce with that extra time saved, then it makes it worthwhile. If you try to do nothing and consume everything or sit back and do nothing, it doesn’t work. If you could turn around and say, “How can I leverage this person in a way that makes me more money than it costs me?” that’s a good investment. Invest there, whether it be time or mainly money, where you’re going to put that into that kind of relationship. Who are people you can go and leverage? Can you leverage systems or tools?
This is why I do episodes because I want to create things that are able to be out there. These are things that I don’t have to keep saying over and over. I can record it once and it’s done. If somebody has a question, I can say, “I went more in-depth in this episode. Check it out,” and give them a link. It saves me a huge conversation. I’m not saying I won’t talk to people, but it’s nice when you can leverage things, especially when I could teach many people through those multiple relationships. There are multiple means through technology or whatever it might be. There are so many ways you can do that.
That’s what you want to consider. Write down those relationships. Who are the people you can serve? Who are the people that can serve you or help serve the people you know and leverage that? Those are the three types of financial assets. What assets do you have financially that you can use? Those are things that are net worth and equity. What are things that are not doing anything for you? What are long-term savings that aren’t doing anything for you? How can you turn that into cashflow? How about your ideas, experiences, education, and training? Lastly, how about your relationships? How can you leverage those? Those are the three types of assets. If you do that, in many cases, you can make money without money or make a lot of money with very little money utilizing these very ideas.
Thanks for your time. Be sure to join us again next time. If you’ve got questions, email me at Chris@MoneyRipples.com. Let me know your ideas. Let me know your questions. Let me know how I can best serve you, create value for you, and leverage the relationship that we have together. Go and make it a great and prosperous week. We’ll talk to you soon.