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Do you ever have occasions when you sit down and think “I need money right now.” Well, all of us do. Life is such that it is often fraught with uncertainty, and we have to deal with that uncertainty as best we can.
Some of it can be financial, such as when you have a medical emergency or some repair work that you need to do urgently. When such times come, you need to do whatever you can to get money.
The situation can be made even worse when you don’t have a good credit score. When that happens, the traditional loan is out of the question because no bank will even look at you twice after seeing your credit score.
Besides, even if you do have a good credit score, bank processes can be so painfully slow that they won’t give you the loan in the time span that you need it to organize your finances.
So, what do you do in such situations? Well, you go for ways to get emergency money. In that case, you have quite a few options. All you have to do is consider what alternatives are available to you.
1. Your Family
Your family can be a good lender because you will probably feel most comfortable borrowing from your family. It could also be the reverse. It all depends on your relationship with your family.
At the end of the day, however, your family is ideally the source of your strength, and so they should be your first option when you are in an emergency and need some quick money. Whether you’re looking to borrow some of your mom’s jewelry so you can pawn it or want to ask your well-off uncle for a loan, you should try it.
If you want, you can make it official and agree on the mode of repayment and the payment period and put everything in writing.
2. Payday Loans
If you don’t need too much money for your emergency and you need it extra fast, then you can consider getting a payday loan. It is a common and extremely easy to access. The only security is your salary.
3. Your Home
This is the kind of asset you should look to when you need to take an especially large loan. You can tap into the equity you have in your home.
However, you should never borrow too much, shouldn’t take a long-term loan and should only go for fixed interest rates for your safety. The last thing you want to do is lose your home over an emergency.
4. Personal Installment Loans
Another option can be to apply for a personal loan with a soft credit check. Here you will find competitive rates, and it will be easy to access your cash quickly, especially if you have a good credit score.
5. Sell Old Furniture
If you have any old or unused furniture lying around in the house, then you can consider selling it to get some money. You can start by asking your close relatives and friends if they would like to buy it.
If it’s special to you, then you might be able to buy it back from them. Alternatively, you can ask furniture stores if they buy used furniture or advertise your furniture in newspapers and online.
6. Your Credit Card
Most credit cards offer advances that you can access through checks, bank withdrawals or ATMs. You will be charged interest and a transaction fee.
The interest rate might be a little high, but at least you get access to some quick cash to cover your immediate expenses. The amount of money you can get from your credit card depends on your existing credit limits, so be sure to check first.
7. Get a pawn shop loan
Pawn shops provide no-questions-asked loans with no restrictions on how you use the money. So Aunt Mildred’s fur coat can keep you warm by fetching a large enough loan to cover your heating bill.
However, pawn shops only lend a fraction of what your items are worth. They also charge sky-high interest rates. And if you fail to repay the loan, you lose your possessions. Only take this route if you need the money desperately, and are sure you can repay the loan quickly.
8. Cash in your investments
Cashing in investment instruments is not an ideal means of obtaining cash. But if you’re facing an emergency and you have the resources available, they may be your best option. Just be careful.
If you cash in bonds or stocks, you may have to pay taxes or even tax penalties – especially if those funds were in a retirement account.
You are also unlikely to walk out of your bank or investment broker’s office with cash, so they’re not the best choice if you need money immediately.
9. Rent out a room on Airbnb
As you likely know, Airbnb is a popular website where people can rent out a room or apartment from ordinary folks and bypass a hotel.
So, if you’re comfortable with strangers and you live in a fairly well-visited place — a large city, college town, or tourist area, for example — you could make some money renting out a room in your home while you’re there, or renting out the entire place while you’re gone.
You can expect to make less than whatever nearby hotels charge, but that can still top $100 a night pretty easily. In fact, Airbnb is the most lucrative of all the sharing economy gigs, according to one study.
10. Sell your digital assets like your blog
Nowadays is not unlikely to own a blog or an website for many people. Besides anything else, this is an asset you can cash out pretty well if you manage it right. The process of the sale of a blog in the price range of five and six figures isn’t something that you can do overnight. It requires an investment of both time and money.
If your goal is to sell your blog and cash out, make sure you prepare for any legal issues well before you put your blog up for sale. This way everything will go much smoother and with less last-minute hustle.
