There are no easy ways to make money overnight. The faster you want to make money, the higher the risk you will fail.  This is evident in stock trading: you could let all your savings ride on one stock, hoping it will make you rich, but it could just as easily make you poor.

However, there are tried-and-true ways to become financially independent, methods that don’t require you to be a rocket scientist or to have a pile of money to begin with.  Then once you get one new income source off the ground, it can fund another.

This brings up a common obstacle on the path to financial independence.  We frequently come upon extra money — from an inheritance, a tax return, a holiday bonus, or an injury settlement, to name a few — and then throw it away on material goods.  While it’s not wrong to splurge occasionally, spending sprees should be kept to a minimum during our journey to financial freedom. 

Some people have their tax return spent before they even get it, for example.  But combined with some savings accrued throughout the year, it could be enough to get a new source of cash flow started. 

Imagine the money other people spend as a giant lake. What you want to do is channel some of that cash your way.  If you don’t, it will simply go to someone else.  In fact, you want to get many channels of income flowing toward you.  That way, if one dries up due to things out of your control, the others will continue to provide you with the cash you need.

The more channels you can establish, the more secure your financial status will be.  Then once these channels are established, you can look for ways to widen them, allowing even more cash to flow to you.  The key is to create these channels while keeping your current job.  Later, as your income increases from these new sources of cash flow, you can consider your options. 

One option is to quit your day job to focus full-time on the new income.  A second option is to work part-time while focusing more on your alternative income.  A third is to keep your full-time day job while looking to either widen your channels or create more of them. 

The option you choose will depend on your risk tolerance and overall goals.  Many people feel safest keeping their day job until they are absolutely sure their new channels of cash flow are sufficient.

So where are these channels of cash flow going to come from? There are four main ones: real estate, stocks, intellectual property, and what is called info-media — a way of earning money via the Internet.  These are all tested paths to financial independence.  Each channel can also have several sub-channels, which will bring in even more money. 

We will first look at your current income and saving techniques, and then analyze each of these channels one at a time.