Money and Friendship

 Money often does not mix well with friendship, as so many promising friendships are lost based on money issues. In most cases, this happens when friends borrow money and refuses to pay back or when there is a business deal between friends and one party decides to play the smart one and cheats the other. And because of this personal experience, most of us have put our friends in different buckets, hear say, and characters exhibited by the friends in question.

The truth is you are also being placed in buckets too based on the same measurement by some friends. Let us do a quick evaluation of your friendships, quickly list five friends you can do business with without fear of losing your funds, and now list the friends you can never trust with your money (You need not write them out). You see how easy it was to put your friends in one of these two buckets? You reached this decision based on a few parameters best known to you, which might not be correct in its entirety. It is not strange that many people have a lot to say on money and friendship and the need to exercise caution but, the beautiful thing is that we can have a sustainable balance wherein our friendship is secured and our ‘business friendship ‘ is also very secured

Some yardsticks that can guide money and friendship includes:

Insincerity: when you confirm that your friend is not sincere about some things it is better to be careful about dealing with them financially. And when you want to, always limit your exposure to what you can fore-go.

Trust and Honesty: Very similar to sincerity, but slightly different. Trust is never given it is earned, so friends who have not being proven should not be trusted blindly when it comes to money issues. Let them show you that you can trust them with a little funds before you entrust them with bigger funds.

Never neglect past Experiences (Both yours and others): we always have common friends in our social circle, it is best to work with other friends’ experiences and your own past experiences, remember the idiom ‘Once bitten twice shy’.

Financial behaviour: you must study your friends’ financial management skills and how they behave with funds in their custody be it theirs and other people. This is a strong litmus test that you must carry out periodically on all friends.

Be cautious dealing financially with friends with whom you have being separated over time, let them earn your trust again. I will say it again people change and you also change.

Note this is not a cast in stone, as you might have other yardsticks for measurement which I did not mention.

Other important issues:

-          Never lend money you cannot afford to lose, this is a golden rule, and when borrowing always ensure you pay back, it is an integrity issue. And always give the lender a head up if repayment date might change and do it on time and with all sense of sincerity.

-          Remember life is all about give and take, if you are all about ‘Take’ and you never give. Frankly it is a bad attitude and it will ruin your relationships, I understand you may not be as rich as your friends that notwithstanding give.    

This is the first in our Money and Relationship series, we will talk more about other forms of relationship soon.

I remain your friend and Personal Finance Coach Babatunde Ayorinde, follow me on twitter @pistis03,

And if you like to engage us to speak in your program or for adverts send us mail at babat09@gmail.com.

Thanks for reading, invite you Family, Friends and Foes to read the blog, as we move ahead to our financial freedom.