Giving up a stressful life of working long hours at a blank, soulless office in a bustling city and becoming a B&B owner instead can seem like a very quaint notion. However, that’s before financial matters arise and, potentially, you notice that the monetary sums aren’t quite adding up to your liking. Still, with a small B&B, you can help produce more buoyant revenue if you follow these tips…

Make your own home a B&B

The upfront costs of setting up a B&B can be eye-watering; buying one costs £572,000 on average, according to The Telegraph. Now, consider the comparatively measly £127,000 in average turnover! Nonetheless, you might not have good reason to be too concerned by these figures…

David Weston, the Bed and Breakfast Association’s chief executive, has pointed out that most people starting a B&B do so at little or zero capital expanse; hence, they use their own home as the B&B.

Pay off your mortgage before you start

If you have decided to indeed go down the route of making your residence the B&B, it would still be wise for you to make sure that you have paid off the mortgage on that property first.

The website Start a Bed & Breakfast says that this would significantly ease your financial sums, as you would not even need to factor in any mortgage payments. This, in turn, would enable you to see your B&B’s financial picture in greater clarity and so help you discern how to boost revenue.

More rooms don’t always equal more money

Logic might indicate that the more rooms your B&B has, the more rooms it can fill and so the more revenue it can make. However, this doesn’t account for the costs of maintaining those rooms and an array of uncontrollable factors which could affect your occupancy rates.

Reassuringly, with just two guest rooms, you could still easily bring in £30,000 provided that you charge £70 per night and the occupancy rate does not fall below 60%, Weston has estimated.

Choose a location conducive to better revenue

The weather and seasons can both affect a B&B’s occupancy rates. For example, B&Bs can be very busy during summer but turn quieter in winter. However, the B&B’s location could affect that pattern. For that reason, you might want to think carefully about which location to settle for.

In helping yourself to decide, you should research and understand any area where you are interested in setting up a B&B, This is MONEY.co.uk advises.

Make it easier for people to place bookings

If there are people interested in staying at your B&B, it would obviously be a pity if they attempted to book only to abandon this attempt out of frustration over the booking process.

Fortunately, there are hotel reservation systems which can be used for B&Bs and ease the process of booking a room at one. However, carefully research different systems before selecting one; consider, for example, that eviivo would let you advertise your B&B on many major travel sites.

There are many things that you need to learn to become a successful trader. If you do a background check of the expert traders in the United Kingdom you will be surprised to see their depth of knowledge in the trading industry. No one is born talented. Every trader needs to learn the basic elements of the market with strong devotion. But the new traders don’t want to spend quality times in learning the art of trading. They simply consider trading as a shortcut way to secure their financial freedom in the global market. To become a profitable trader you need to have a clear idea about the structure of the Forex market. If you don’t develop a balanced trading system, it will be really hard for you to deal with the dynamic price movement of currency pairs.

In the past, trading was limited to large banks and institutions. But due to the recent advancement in technology, the retail traders in the United Kingdom can easily trade this market in a professional trading environment. For instance, high class brokerage firm like ETX Capital is now offering high leverage trading accounts to their clients which allows them to trade with big lot size even with a small amount of trading capital. But having access to the high leverage trading account doesn’t mean you will become a profitable trader. You need to educate yourself and learn the three major forms of market analysis.

Professional trading course

Many novice traders often buy signals from expert traders. If you can do the perfect research you might find some high-quality signal provider in the United Kingdom but do you really think that this is the ultimate solution to become a successful trader. You need to teach yourself how to trade this market with managed risk. Take professional Forex training from the expert traders who have a proven track record in the financial industry. Never rely on other people’s advice and always remember that no one can give you 100 % profitable trade setups. It’s your duty to master the art of trading through hard work.

Some retail traders say that they are not ready to invest money in trading education. But sadly they have the money to fund the trading account. If you don’t learn the basic trading system it won’t take much time to lose your investment. Always remember, making profit consistently in the Forex market is an art. You can’t trade this market based on gut feelings and become a successful trader. You need to take some professional forex training. When you start investing money in a trading education you will see a dramatic improvement in your trading career.

Embrace the losing trades

The majority of the novice traders don’t want to embrace their losing trades. They simply don’t understand that losing are just a part of the trader’s career. You need to trade this market with managed risk or else you might even blow your entire trading account from a single losing trades. Make sure that you have learned the precise art of trade management so that you don’t have to lose more than 2% of your account capital in any single trade.

Following proper risk management factors in the financial industry is very hard. Novice traders become frustrated after facing a few losing trades. They double their lot size immediately to recover their trading loss. But following the aggressive trading strategy will never help you to make a consistent profit. Just have a look at the portfolio of the professional traders. You will notice one thing they have in common. None of them take too much risk in any single trade even though they have the perfect trade setups. You need to have strong mental stability or else this market will never allow you to make a profit. Always stick to your trading rules and try to trade in favor of the market trend.

Cash flow problems in theory can be easy to identify. If your outgoing payments exceed your business income and you cannot meet your liabilities as they fall due, then simply you are having cash flow problems. A negative cash flow doesn’t necessarily represent bad business, but you do need to take steps to ensure your business does not run out of cash. However, insufficient cash flow is an issue which needs to be tackled head on as no matter how big or small your business, if you don’t have any cash it will eventually end in downfall.

So what are the likely causes of cash flow problems?

For B2B business a common cause of cash flow shortages is customers not paying their invoices on time. If the business is making plenty of sales, but you’re bills are coming around before you get paid, then at some point the business will run out of cash.

Some businesses can find themselves in trouble through no fault of their own. As you may have to unexpectedly pay a large cost or bill. For some businesses, it can be a case of not planning far enough ahead, or not making sufficient provision when it comes to paying VAT.

Cash flow problems can sometimes be down to a lack of planning. It’s good practice for any business to have a cash flow forecast, taking into account all incomings and any outgoings which could absorb cash. With this, it’s vitally important not to overspend too soon and make sure that you don’t commit to too much stock or staff, if you don’t need it. If you haven’t planned effectively enough, a fluctuation of sales can sometimes cover up underlying problems a business might have, so making sure you take into consideration seasonal deficiencies, or spikes in sales is vitally important to a cashflow forecast.

What is a good indication that you are having problems?

One of the biggest signs that you’re having trouble maintaining a healthy cashflow is a failure to pay your VAT as and when the returns are sent in. If you haven’t been careful beforehand, you may not have sufficient cash when it comes to paying.  Sometimes when planning a cash flow forecast you can foresee these problems and reserve funds, or take out a business overdraft to ensure that the business is covered for these sorts of payments.

As a business owner if you aren’t taking a wage from the business, or even worse are still inputting your own personal money to make ends meet, then it’s a clear problem with cash flow. Perhaps the biggest indication that cash flow is a problem is not paying staff on time. If you have to pay suppliers, or overheads before you can afford to pay staff, then the business could end up losing one of its core elements. One thing that could help in this situation is financial modelling. With it you can build a cash flow model that will help you oversee and ever predict your spending, thus avoiding any future financial inconvenience. If you don’t know how to create cash flow models and actually use them read through this Wall Street Prep guide.

How can I improve cash flow?

The most efficient way to stay on top of cash flow, is by first planning and forecasting effectively. Monitor your forecasts and update them taking into account any variances in your original estimates. Based on your forecasts, arrange a business overdraft sufficient to cover any large costs, and seasonal variations. An overdraft will be agreed with the lender beforehand and it will be appropriate to the needs of the business, as well as the banks assessment of the risk.

If the business is struggling there are things you can do to pick up your cash flow. Make full use of any payment terms set by creditors, if you are waiting on unpaid invoices from your customers, then use the maximum amounts of days you have available to pay your creditors. If you are having trouble collecting invoices, a great way to stay ahead is to ask customers to pay a deposit and make it part of the business norm. Ensuring that you issue invoices as soon as possible is also key, and then if payment is not paid on the due date follow it up promptly.

Having a good line of communication with your suppliers can also be a great advantage. Tell them about your situations. As a customer they will want you to succeed so if you can make use of late payments, see if you can.

For B2B companies, invoice financing can be a very efficient way moving forward. This allows a business to take out a loan from a factoring company, based on the value of the invoices available. So, you’re not borrowing anything that you wouldn’t already be owed. A factoring company lends you a percentage of the invoice available, before then collecting the full amount from your customers. The factoring company will then take their cut and give you any remaining credit owed. This option, however, is only available to B2B businesses which issue invoices