Before you can begin to Compound Your Life, you need to destroy your debt by attacking it from both sides. On one side you can cripple your debt by increasing your income. From the other side you hammer it down by lowering your expenses.  Combine the two and you exponentially increase your debt destroying power!

Increasing Your Income

This can be done in several ways and it always helps to diversify yourself so you’re not too reliant on any single income stream. Some of the ways I managed to increase my income:

Online research opportunities

Most of the online surveys pay pennies for each one completed, however a couple offer better rewards. Don’t waste your time on any that offer points which cant be redeemed for cash. You’re trying to destroy debt, not acquire goods!

Mystery shopping

Even while saving a huge percentage of my income I still visited restaurants frequently.. and got paid to do so! I personally use MarketForce which is one of the biggest mystery shopping companies and has many different opportunities including restaurants, pubs and shops. Click here to sign up with MarketForce.

Sell your junk

Do you really need all those pairs of shoes? How about that hedge trimmer that’s sat in the garage for the past 5 years? If you’re in debt can you really afford to have rarely used items sat around gathering dust? Get them on Ebay or Gumtree!

Get a 2nd job

Unless your current job offers alot of overtime, get a 2nd job! Even working one shift at the weekends can bring in an easy £200 a month.

Lowering your expenses

Increasing your income is great, but the real debt destroying power comes from lowing your expenses. While income levels can go up or down without much warning; lowering your expenses helps increase your debt destroying power permanently. Not only do you need less money to live on, you gain more money to chuck at that debt!

Ditch the phone contract

I’ve got friends who always struggle to pay their rent yet still fork out £45 a month for their phone contracts! Thats over £500 a year! Do you really need the absoloute latest handset with bucket loads of mobile data? Almost everywhere has free wifi these days. Consider ditching the contract and going pay-as-you-go and making use of the free hotspots.

Save on the car

When was the last time you compared your car insurance quote, or do you just accept the auto-renewal each year? Use a price comparison website and! Also think about whether you really need your car for a journey. If the shops are nearby why not walk and get some exercise in the process. Finally, are you paying for oil changes and basic maintenance? Stop, now! 5 minutes on Youtube will show you how to perform basic tasks on almost any model of vehicle.

Save on restaurants

Use the mystery shopping tip above for some restaurant meals but for others there are a few tips to save. Order water with your meal instead of a soft drink, consider splitting big portions with friends and buy desert at the corner shop on the way home.

Think before you buy

Advertisers and shops love impulse purchases! These are the purchases you make without thinking about it or sometimes even noticing it. It’s why you’ll find dips next to the crisps and sweets at the checkouts. Don’t become a zombie to the supermarkets! Make a shopping list before you leave home and only buy what you came to get.

What great ways have you increased your income or decreased your expenses? Contact me or leave a comment below.