15 Fail-Proof Financial Advice for Young People

There are a million and one talk about finance out there, but very few of these are financial advice for young people. Most are targeted to the boomers who are retiring and the like. So, in this post today, I am going to share with you the top fifteen fail-proof financial advice for young people.

Needless to say, starting one’s finance on the right footing -early in life is going to give him or her an advantage over their mates later on. Understandably so, the foundation to build wealth -and enjoy it, has been laid early on in life.

Of course, this is not an ultimate list. It is almost impossible to get such a list. But a post that carries all the basics would do -and that is exactly what we have in this post. You are free and encouraged to tweak the points listed here to suit you. But I assure you, these tips cover many aspects of financial literacy for young adults.

Why are money management skills for young adults necessary?

“If someone told me these when I was young, I would have…”
“If I knew this 10 years ago, I would have”
“If only I started earlier, it would have…”

How many times have we heard statements like those above? I have heard them a thousand and one times. And they are proof that money management skills for young adults are a must as they grow.

The onus is on every young individual to learn the necessary skill required to navigate the muddy financial waters of life. And as you already know, one’s finance affects every other aspect of their life, including their health and love life.

So, money management skills are very necessary, else, you may bite your finger later.

Since the school don’t teach you how to be rich or manage your finance, no one owes you that. There’s very little if any financial advice for young people while they are in school. Consequently, the onus is on you to learn how to start, grow and maintain your wealth. Money management skills for young adults is a must if you want to grow financially.

So, let’s get to it. What are the 15 steps to abundance for young people? These should be simple and straightforward for you. But you need conscious effort to make them work. What are they? Find below;

15 InspiredFully financial advice for young people

Start early

The saying goes, whenever you wake is your morning. Not everyone started life on the right footing, but everyone should find their footing at one time or the other. Don’t wait to be financially comfortable before you start building wealth. Start now. Start early.

Financial literacy for young adults should be taken as seriously as we should take basic education. Because let’s face it, the majority of the crimes in the world today is a result of the desire for wealth.
So, if as a young adult, you start your journey to financial literacy early, you will avoid the rat race that traps a lot of adults. There are various books for financial literacy for young adults (check here for some on Amazon), there are videos online. Start learning about money now.

Don’t leave home (until you have to)

Yes. If you don’t have to, don’t leave. You’d be saving yourself a lot on bills and feeding if you remain with your parent(s) or guardian.

Of course, you won’t be able to live like your friends who live alone, and we cannot deny that you may miss out on some fun that comes with youthful exuberance. But, if I could, I would return home. A lot of young people I know wish the same. So, if you haven’t left home yet, or if you are planning to, you may want to rethink your decision -do you have to?

Whatever you save on rent, feeding and bills, you can invest. And in one year, you’d have your capital and interest.

Do you know how that feels? Let me try to explain: You know that feeling when you find some forgotten money in your clothes as you prepare to wash them? (I can imagine your smile)…Exactly!!!! If you have ever felt that joy, that’s similar to how you feel when you withdraw your invested money, which you’d have spent.

I don’t want to feign ignorance that your parents or guardian may annoy you -in fact, I want to promise you, they would. Why? You are a grown-up now, you have your way of reasoning, and an idea as to how things should be done. But, you’re under their roof. And it is said that there can only be one captain on a ship.

But you have a choice. Put up with it for the meantime, and be better financially, or leave and join the rat race -you know which I’d choose.

But here is a caveat; you may not be able to keep late nights, nor fornicate as much as you want…lol… I couldn’t help but add that. We aren’t going to pretend like that’s not one of the motivations why young people leave home, are we? Erm, I agree with you!. On to the next one.

Learn a high income skill

Bills, Bills, Bills. We grow up only to pay bills. If you are not prepared for that, I don’t know how you’d cope with life.

Learning at least one high income skill is easily one of the best and first financial advice for young people. Whatever skill you learn will help you sort your bills when they are due.

There are a lot of high income skills you can learn (and we shared a few high income skills here and some other digital skills here too). Be sure to read and start your learning process as soon as possible.

A quick word, be careful when choosing or selecting a skill to acquire. Of course, no skill is bad, but ensure you choose a marketable skill.

Get a job

Well, maybe I should have placed this one before the high income skill stuff -because, to be frank, your skill won’t start to sell immediately. Unless of course, you’re extraordinary (you could be, why not!). But for the rest of us who are regular humans, we had to put in the shift to start getting paying clients.

So, get a job. Managing to do so guarantees you get a regular income for the period you are employed at the job. Depending on your age, you could be in college (or a university), or you may have chosen the Mark Zuckerberg -no university education route. If you chose not to get a higher education, you must have got a plan. Getting a job will help you in your journey.

For those who are university graduates, this goes without saying. You need a job. It is irrelevant now if it is a good-paying job or not. You just need something to pay bills and feed, while you sort yourself out.

So, get a job while you’re learning your high income skill. Or get a job while you’re looking for your first/tenth client who will pay for your skills.

Remember, even while you’re starting a business, keep your day job.

Save

No! I don’t mean you’d need to save your way to abundance. No one ever succeeded in doing that. I mean, save so you’d have the capital to start your investment or business -or both.

Again, saving is not something you can do to break into abundance. In fact, I agree that saving is for the poor. It is a lazy practice, loved by people who do not want to or can not invest for better yield.

However, as you are beginning your journey, there is a need for capital. This allows you to diversify. If you are planning to follow a career in paid employment, your saved capital can help you set up something on the side for added income. It is called a side hustle. You must earn from multiple streams of income to be financially free in adulthood.

So, remember, you are only saving to gather the capital needed to start your business, or needed as the entry into any investment plan out there. Some savings accounts offer better interest rates than others. The offers from banks and financial institutions depend on the country you live in. so, you should speak with your account officer -or visit your bank, and talk to customer care.

Practice Delayed gratification

Delayed gratification is one of the greatest tools in the arsenal of a young person. And in fact, it doesn’t matter at what stage you are, if you are starting anything new, there is need a for delayed gratification.

For any financial advice for young people, delayed gratification has to be talked about, because you don’t want to eat the seeds you should be planting.

As a young person, the urge to live good is ever before us. We always want to show our peers who aren’t doing as good as we that we are doing better than them. Sometimes, we want to show those we believe are doing better than us, that we are either on par or better than them.

Unless you were born with a silver spoon, if you will go far, you must practice delayed gratification. Oops, wait, what is delayed gratification?

what is delayed gratification?

Simply put, delayed gratification is not taking your profit immediately they arrive. You put it back into the business and get even more returns.

As a graphic designer, for instance, you may ask; “how do I practice delayed gratification as a graphic designer or as a singer?” Whatever your skill, you may have a question similar to that.

Well, if you have a high income skill, you need people to know about your skills and expertise -the more people who know your ability, the more job offers you get -because what is not seen, does not exist. To do this, you may run paid advertising. Now, regarding delayed gratification, you can reinvest your profit into promotions. Start with the cheap Facebook ads.

“what is not seen, does not exist -Robert Green, 48 Laws of Power”

Also, you may want to get better and superior tools. As a graphic designer, for instance, you want to get a better computer or software -which may not come cheap. You may reinvest your profit in these tools. As a YouTuber, you may want to get a better camera, improve your studio, etc.

As a blogger, I’d get better hosting, premium plugins and run better promotions.

These are to help you get better at what you do, so you can deliver better services and charge higher fees. Simple. So, delayed gratification is underrated finance advice for young adults.

Invest

Have you saved already? Your jobs now pay better or your skills has got you better and higher-paying clients, right?. What do you do with the improved revenue you generate? You invest a part of it.

This is when your money starts working for you. If you don’t find a way to earn while you sleep, you will work for the rest of your life. No one wants that. So, you must start investing early on. Investment is common financial advice for young people and adults alike.

Be careful when choosing an investment plan. Do your own research (DYOR) and ensure you are investing in businesses that hold promise, and that you will be getting your return on investment when due.

“if you don’t find a way to earn while you sleep, you will work for the rest of your life.” – Warren Buffet.

If you are in Europe and North America, you’d want to think of stocks, bonds, real estate and the likes to invest in. If you are in Nigeria, you want to look at the emerging fintech industry to invest in the various investment plans available. Though a better and more reliable investment option, stocks and bonds are not something you can rely on in Nigeria currently -but real estate is.

If you are more tech-savvy, you may want to consider investing in Crypto. Of course, you already know the risks involved in crypto. So, before you begin, ensure you do your research.

Re-educate yourself

Get it. Get an education. By now, you are already a graduate (or your mind is made up not to attend college or a university). Although very important and, I advise everyone who hasn’t got it to do all they can to -if possible. I don’t mean a university education.

Education is learning. It doesn’t have to be formal or within the four walls of a classroom. It could be anything. Just learn, and keep learning. Read, read wide, and voraciously.

You are made by the decisions you make. And the decisions you make are a function of what you know. So, don’t stop learning, so you can make better decisions.

There are books everywhere, and these days, they are not only cheap, a lot of eBooks exist online for free. There are videos everywhere. YouTube is replete with videos. Learn, and don’t stop learning.

“the decisions you make are a function of what you know” -Bisco Ibitade

Don’t just live within your means -expand your means (diversify)

One of the most common finance advice for young adults is to live within their means. If you continue to only live within your means, growth may be slow. So, you have to consciously be on the lookout, for ways to expand your means.

By expanding your means, you position yourself to earn and worth a lot more. This enables you to enjoy the good things of life. After all, the good things of life are meant to be enjoyed -aren’t they? And we don’t know how much more time we have to live. So, we can’t continue to only live within our means, in the hope of a better tomorrow.

You should make a conscious effort to continually expand your means. Increase your sources of income. So, when one of those sources suffer a setback, your finance won’t plummet.
In essence, my financial advice for young people is to live within their means, while constantly expanding it.

Watch the friends you keep

They say you are an average of your five closest friends. I agree. However, I have always boasted that my friends hardly influence me. If you are like me, you may be tempted to believe you are hardly influenced by friends. But even I, agree that here and there -no matter how small, my life has been impacted (positively or negatively) by the influence of the friends I keep.

“you are an average of your closest friends”

So, while this may not seem like a bit of direct financial advice for young people, the friends you keep affect how you spend your money -and also affects how far you go in earning well.
You want to be sure your friends are on the same page as you regarding monetary issues and other things in your life.

Fornication is expensive

So, I touched on this a bit in the second point. I think I have to mention it here in detail. The ladies may attempt to exempt themselves. After all, it is the guys who mostly do the chasing, pay the bills on dates, and all -isn’t it? Not quite.

One way or the other, a lady contributes financially too. It could be buying the morning-after pills, or buying some grocery. Sometimes, it doesn’t have to be financial. Almost no one talks about the emotional cost of being in various amorous relationships.

But for the guys, we all agree fornication is expensive. You spend an unnecessary amount of money for an hour or two, of pleasure -and you effectively set yourself back by some hundred or thousand bucks.

If you add up the monthly cost and multiply it by the twelve months of the year, you’d be surprised what you’ve spent on pleasures you can’t even remember. An amount you could have spent on a vacation.

Drugs and alcohol don’t only kill, they steal time (sugar also).

It is funny how millions ignore the “smokers are liable to die young” warning on the packs of cigarette and smoke it anyway. I’m not gonna tell you not to smoke -after all, even doctors smoke.

I only want to remind you that it kills, gradually.

Drugs don’t only harm your organs and mind in the long run, they also steal your time. So, you are robbed of the time you could have spent with family and loved ones, or brainstorming ideas, or working -instead, you’re high on drugs. The best math to learn is to learn to calculate the impact of our decisions today in our future.

It’s a lose-lose situation for you. You lose time now to concentrate on your life, and you also lose the health of your organs in the long run.

Excessive alcohol use as well as a thief of not only life but money. And no one talks of the effect of sugar. Most times when such a list is made, the writer talks of the effect of alcohol and drugs, but fail to mention that sugar consumption is addictive as well -and also destroys. One of the best money-saving tips for young adults is that they cut down on the consumption of anything addictive.

“The best math to learn is to learn to calculate the impact of our decisions today in our future”.

Take care of your health

One of the best pieces of financial advice for young people is to take care of their health, so when you finally make money, you won’t have to spend it all trying to regain your health. They say health is wealth, and I don’t think it is a cliché.

We lose health chasing money and spend the money trying to regain health. If we can balance both, we’d enjoy a better quality of life, in abundance, for longer. Remember to sleep adequately, drink enough water and don’t self medicate.

This is one of the money saving tips for young adults that are most easily ignored. I figured one reason for that is because, as soon as we recover, we forget both the cost of healthcare and the pain of being sick.

“We lose health chasing money, and spend the money trying to regain health.”

Become successful overnight

It’s no news we love stories of people who achieved success overnight. We want to copy them, but they don’t tell us their secrets -or so we think. Well, I just exposed their recipe. If you do these, you will become successful overnight, like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffet, and the host of them.

Rinse and repeat

So, having found the way to your financial abundance, what do you do? As soon as you find your formula, keep repeating it. After all, they say no money is ever enough.

So, these are my top fifteen financial advice for young people. What are your thoughts on these?

Do share your opinion on delayed gratification and others in the comment section below, and don’t forget to share this on your social media and your WhatsApp status.