Got a Skill? This is How You Become a Millionaire from it like Charlie Mullins

Happy New Year. It’s Sunday 7th January 2024, and in this week’s roundup, we are covering skills skills and more skills to pay those bills.

In this week’s email, learn in 5 minutes or less:

• Career Story: How Charlie Mullins built his £70M+ plumbing empire

• High-Income Skills: A simple strategy to start a business

• New Tax Laws: Side hustle tax for even Vinted clothes sellers.

• Weekly round-up: What else happened this week, from Winter sale deals to the top 5 cities where your money can go further/

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Need to Know

Side Hustle Tax UK

Selling items or seeking alternative income online has grown in popularity in recent years. As the cost of living crisis continues, people have started selling old items, offering out a spare room, carrying out part-time food delivery work or even selling handcrafted goods online to generate additional income.

But previously, it might not have been thought of as additional income, or referred to as a regular side hustle. However, things have now changed as from January 2024, firms like eBay, Vinted, Etsy and Airbnb must now collect details of its users and share them with HMRC directly. 

So however you make additional income through online ventures, you must understand the new tax rules that came into force in the UK on January 1, 2024. 

What are the new rules?

The new rules are actually aimed at online sites and apps in the first instance. If you are a casual seller, chances are you will be exempt from the law. 

But with the first date for firms to report this information being at the end of January 2025, it’s important to be aware of what’s being shared and what you need to do. 

HMRC have set out their new rules, which now go beyond HMRC’s existing power to access information from UK-based platforms. Under the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) rules, digital platforms in participating countries that facilitate the sales of goods, short-term accommodation lettings, food delivery services and more will now be required to share information with HMRC. This includes tax IDs, bank account details, the number of sales and the amounts made by its users. 

Why it matters?

While these are new rules for digital platforms primarily, we’re always responsible for our own tax obligations, and that’s not changed. But with the introduction of the new rules, it’s more important than ever to be aware of what they are, particularly if you don’t already keep a clear record of any additional earnings. 

We all have certain allowances each tax year before we need to pay tax. 

You can earn up to £1,000 through property - such as renting out a spare room through Airbnb - without needing to pay any tax on it. 

You also have up to a £1,000 allowance on other income streams too, such as selling second-hand items, selling handcrafted items or offering your services for a fee. 

That means that so long as your earnings don’t exceed these tax-free allowances, you don’t need to do anything. This is why it’s important to keep a clear record of your income, whether it’s a regular side hustle or an annual clear out.

If your sales exceed these amounts in a given tax year, then you’ll need to do a tax return.

Remember, these new rules came into effect on January 1, 2024, so if you think you might need to fill in a tax return for 2023/24 then it’s a good idea to contact HMRC sooner rather than later and possibly speak to an accountant. The last thing you want, is a tax evasion or an investigation from HMRC over selling a few items and exceeding the allowance.

9to5 ‘Coffee Break Convo’ of the Week

Let’s talk about Charlie Mullins and see what we can learn from his ‘come-up’ career story…

Mullins is the son of a factory worker father and his mother who worked as a cleaner. When he was born, they "lived in a couple of rooms in Camden", before moving to the Rockingham Estate in London's Elephant and Castle, where he grew up, and left school at 15 with no qualifications.

Mullins was apprenticed to a local plumber at age 15. In 1979, he founded Pimlico Plumbers operating from a basement in Pimlico.

Pimlico started as a one-man band after Charlie completed his apprenticeship with a second-hand van and a bag of tools solely serving the Pimlico area.

Eventually, an increasing amount of work came from the recommendations of Pimlico Properties, a local estate agent in Sussex Street, who eventually offered Pimlico a small, dimly lit room in their basement as their first business premises. The ambition was to change the public perception of plumbing and build a reputation.

Fast forward 37 years later, in 2017 Pimlico’s rapid expansion meant that they had scaled to Multi millions in revenue and profit, had arrival at their 250th van, and had recruited over 50 tradespeople in the final three months of 2017 totalling 160 engineers in their books.

Charlie Mullins is another rags-to-riches story and went from rented room to penthouse all from a high-income skill.

Learn more about the story of Pimlico Plumbers and Charlie Mullins here.

Careers Advice

Tip of the week: Learn a High-Income Skill.

From the Career Story of Charlie Mullins, there are so many takeaways. But these are my three personal favorites:

1. A High-Income Skill is a pathway to six figures and multimillions, billions, and beyond. Charlie learnt plumbing and then went on a personal development journey to become a successful business man.

2. You don’t need to create the next Facebook to become successful. Nowadays, a lot of us think we need to go to Silicon Valley and raise Billions to become successful in business. The story of Charlie Mullins debunks this theory.

3. Forging relationships are crucial for success. Pimlico Estates & Charlies relationship led to him earning a business premises - case and point.

4. Good service and recommendations are still the #1 marketing tool for the self-employed and business owner. This can save you on the costly expense of advertising, more commonly known as ‘MARKECHING!’$

5. There will be obstacles along the way, but you have to believe in your dream and improve by 1% each day.

Are there any other takeaways you would add to this list?

Personal Finance

New Year Money Reset

At the end of each year, I don’t know what it is but I feel the urge to want to go through my wardrobe, take a look at my living costs spreadsheet and really take a view of the clothes that truly still fit and where I’m at with my finances.

If you feel like its time to do a money audit and reset, you are not the only one. Here’s what I would recommend to get ahead. A Money Income/Expense Tracker to take a detailed look at your sources of income, how much you are spending and how you can cut costs. Whether that be a subscription you don’t use, an overpriced gym membership you want to switch out to a cheaper 24/7 brand. Let’s get our finances straight in 2024.

We are in the process of making an income and expense tracker and we will be releasing this by the end of January.

Side Hustle Spotlight of the Week

If you go into the office and have your car parked on your drive or travel abroad a lot for work and are not bothered about putting miles on your motor, maybe it’s time to consider Turo as a side hustle.

Did you know on average renting out your car just 7 times a month can help you earn an additional £550/month?

Check out how to get started with Turo here.

The Ideas Hub: ‘Numbers Don’t Lie’

Fireaway Pizza: Meet Mario Aleppo who had multiple failures before his big break with Fireaway Pizza.

The college dropout built a pizza chain generating over £62M a year. He originally got restaurant experience from working at Nandos before launching his 1st business in 2015. He launched the coffee shop with big ambitions in 2015 but closed it 6 months later due to cash flow issues.

In 2016 with savings and a £25k loan, he opened the 1st Fireaway Pizza.
Within a year he franchised the business & opened 2 more sites.

Since launch in 2016, he’s opened 140 sites across Europe selling in excess of £60M worth of Pizza.

Share The 9to5 Hustle

Weekly Round-Up

Celebrity News: First Black Bachelorette Rachel Lindsay’s Husband Files for divorce & ask for spousal support. 😲😲

Music:  Sometimes all you need is one song, and in 2023 South Africa’s Tyla found hers with the hit single “Water”. Her Hit song has landed her fourth place on the BBC’s Sound of 2024 list - which predicts the artist who’ll dominate the next 12 months in music. Which artist are you listening out for in 2024?

Sports: Liverpool starts 2024 at the top of the English Premier League, do you think they have what it takes to win it this year? or will Man City or Arsenal bounce back from their recent struggles?

Joke of the Week: I was going to quit all my bad habits for the new year, but then I remembered that nobody likes a quitter.🤣

Travel:Five (5) cities in your money go further in 2024: Lisbon, Buenos Aires, Toronto, Tokyo and Perth. Where are you planning to visit this year? ✈️

Health: Secret hack to improve your workouts for 2024 - Listen to your favorite podcast while you work out, this will increase your chances of sticking to your work out longer.

How to Spend it: Amazon’s winter sale deals are still going strong, save up to 75% on vacuums, Apple AirPods TVs, and more…

Why The Careerguard? The schooling system doesn’t adequately equip new adults for ‘adulting’. With our weekly nuggets of information, we spread knowledge fundamental for all 9to5’ers to know in 5 minutes to spark creativity, help someone consider a new career opportunity, and improve their financial well-being with also a little recap of the week.

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Thanks for reading,

Dominic

Created by the Founders of www.ambitiousinvestor.com & www.hustleyour9to5.com