Retirement can be a scary prospect to a person who has been working their entire adult life.
Although you may look forward to the time off, it may scare you at the same time. Many retirees in business started their small business to occupy their idle time and compensate their reduced income.
However, before you just jump into to becoming an entrepreneur it is important to know what you are doing. The following tips will help you start over with your second career.
Are You Ready?
Starting a small business seems like a novel idea to many people. However, not everyone is cut out for the work.
Figure out if you are prepared to run a small business. This involves assessing your motivation, drive, organizational skills, and decision making capabilities among many other things.
Read a book about starting your own business to determine whether or not you are up for the challenge.
Do Your Research
Decide what you want to do and find out what goes into starting that type of small business. Many retirees in business have the benefit of capitalizing on their existing experience; younger workers may not be able to do this.
However, if you are retirement age, then you have probably amassed a large amount of real-world work experience that you can draw on to start your small business.
For example, they can do consulting work if they worked with computers or technology or they can caterer if they were a cook.
With that said, having experience working in the industry is very different from running a business in it. Talk to other people in the industry who own a business.
Find out what it takes to successfully operate the business you are considering. Use all the tools available to you like books, magazines, classes, seminars and your local chamber of commerce.
Balance your Budget
Before you decide to start a business in retirement make sure you have adequate funding to get the business up and running.
Determine ahead of time where you will get the funding for your business. Be prepared for the fact that it may take several years for your business to become lucrative.
Make sure you will have the amount of money it takes to both run your business and take care of your personal financial responsibilities. Look into local small business loans and companies with flexible funding options.
Create a Business Plan
When you have decided that you want to start a small business in retirement, you need to develop a business plan.
This plan will act as guide for you along the way. A business plan includes a description of your business, a marketing plan, management plan and a budget outline.
You can use this business plan to guide you as you develop your small business and also to present to potential lenders should you need a loan.
Small businesses start and fail every day. If you want your business to successfully carry you through retirement, you need to make sure you are well prepared.
