I greet all of you my country people. I know there may be a few other topics that emphasizes on the importance of an Emergency fund to an investor. Yes, everybody knows say Emergency funds dey important, but that's not what I'm here to talk about. With the help of this thread I'm aiming to give a detailed and step by step guide on how to simultaneously build an emergency fund while also accumulating Bitcoin. This is to prevent the excuse of having to waste more time building an emergency fund before getting started with one's accumulation journey.
DETERMINING YOUR FINANCIAL PRIORITIES
1. Emergency Fund: An emergency fund like we already know should be at least 3 to 6 months of our living expenses and this is what we should aim for. The final amount usually varies from individual to individual so focus on your financial situation and allocate 20% of your income to a readily accessible savings account. You may also choose to diversify a lesser percentage of your Emergency fund to Bitcoin too. Note that this is by choice and not really necessary.
2. Bitcoin Accumulation: 30% of your income should go to your discretionary spending, you can choose to use all 30% to accumulate Bitcoin or use a lesser percentage, it's totally up to you, but note that it should be a reasonable amount.
I know some people might already be tempted to as where the other 50% of your income should go. Take a chill pill, we'll also come to that. Now, we move to another segment which is...
TIPS FOR BUILDING AN EMERGENCY FUND
1. Automate your savings: sometimes having to manually save money can be very tiring, you might even forget sometimes and before you know it, you've used the money for something else, so automating your savings can be a pretty helpful tip to ensure you stay religious with your savings.
2. Make use of the 50/30/20 allocation rule: 50% of your income allocation should go to taking care of essential expenses and immediate needs. The mistake people often make is neglecting this aspect, forgetting that it is actually inevitable and unavoidable, even when you manage to avoid it today, it'll come back tomorrow bigger, and you'll be forced to still sort them out, thereby messing up your plans. 30% goes to your discretionary income and the other 20% towards your savings and also for debt repayments.
TIPS FOR INVESTING IN BITCOIN
1. Dollar-Cost Averaging (DCA): This is a very popular strategy and every true Bitcoin enthusiast should have heard or known this strategy. Now the reason I'm bringing up this strategy is because, if you're to achieve building a portfolio and an emergency simultaneously, then you need to marry this strategy, because it's the only strategy I know that gives you the kind of flexibility to achieve this. So prioritize investing a fixed amount from your discretionary income/spending at a regular interval that sits well with you, regardless of the market's performance.
2. Start small: Starting small is very important, especially if you're a low income earner, don't look at how much you plan to achieve just yet and just start with a manageable investment amount and then you can gradually increase your pace/amount overtime.
3. Diversify your portfolio: for starters, this isn't actually very mandatory but I just wanted to include it because there are some unique situations that may likely arise that may potentially lead to diversifying your investment beyond Bitcoin in order to minimize risk.
BALANCE BOTH GOALS
1. Your Emergency Fund should come first (for now): If you're hoping to achieve both goals simultaneously, then your focus should be more on stacking up that emergency fund FIRST, and then you may allocate more funds to your BTC accumulation.
2. Adjust your allocations: This may not also be very necessary for some, but periodically review your income allocation and should the need arise, make some necessary adjustments in order to ensure you're actually meeting the goals.
3. Be Patient: this is actually the most important one, building an emergency fund and a Bitcoin Stash at the same time takes a lot of time and so requires lots of patience, because sometimes it might look like you're not even getting it right, but as long as you're following the above steps, just keep going and being patient.
These steps may not really look like pretty much but I assure you that these steps and tips can actually help anyone (with a steady income source) to build a robust Emergency fund while also accumulating Bitcoin regularly. And don't forget that staying disciplined, patient and informed is also key to achieving this goal.
Pls you can also include other helpful tools if you've got any.