September 28, 2016/InvestmentOne Research

It is no longer news that the recession has hit and might be with us for a while.

Just in case you haven’t taken the necessary precautions, we have some tips to see you through this period. In the event that you took precautions; have a look, you might find a tip or more that would be beneficial:

• Downsize your expenses and make do with a few changes such as get by with one car instead of fuelling and maintaining two vehicles. The rule of thumb is to think thrifty
• Do not rely on a single stream of income or your day job, consider other types of income(charge for your hobbies, stock dividends, real estate (sub-letting) etc)
• Review, rebalance and diversify your investment portfolio
• Reduce your debt exposure; this is a good time to think twice about taking on more debt (loans) as you would not want to be bogged down with more financial obligations.
• Restrict the use of the alternate source of the power supply (generators/inverters) to specific hours of the day to take care of necessities.
• For your grocery shopping, stick to the basic requirements.Curb wastage when you buy perishable groceries in bulk, they might go bad before you need them.
• Rather than drive short distances, take a brisk walk. You would save up on fuel as well as get a little exercise.
• Restrict your airtime usage to calls with a purpose (business or work)
• Do not tie down all your funds; retain some liquidity so you can have cash available to meet immediate/emergency needs.
• Save money allocated to dining out at fancy restaurants and opt for homemade food prepared to suit your taste.
• Instead of going on vacations abroad, opt for a tour of the sights in Nigeria or preferably save your money and stay home.
• As for clothes and shoes, stick to fashion staples which would not go out of style such as a black dress, a white shirt, a black suit etc. Provided they aren’t tattered, there is no need for regular purchase of clothes/shoes just to impress people and depress your bank account.
• Save up on Tv Subscription (DSTV/cable) by opting for the smallest bouquet as you do not need to pay for all the channels
• Try DIY (do it yourself) projects, to augment dwindling disposable income