Any business venture, no matter how appealing it would be, always comes with its own disadvantages and when deciding to do it or not, it is always good to weigh the pros and cons.
Although home-based business may have its disadvantages, knowing what they are is critical in your venture in order to overcome them.
If you are aware of what they are, you should try to learn how to get around them to alleviate the issues and help you become successful with your home-based business venture.
The following are the most common disadvantages of a home-based business:
1. Easy to get distracted – with your family just a few steps away, it would be very easy for you to get distracted by any of your family members.
2. Maintaining Your Motivation Level – every entrepreneur requires a great level of motivation to be successful. If you are working with a boss, he or she would normally provide some sort of a motivation such as a promotion, a raise, bonus, time-off or just a little pat in the back. What happens if your business does not make the amount of money that you are expecting after all the hard work? How would you keep your motivation level where it’s supposed to be?
3. Lack of Self-Discipline – Everybody wants to be their own boss, but would you be able to discipline yourself the way a boss would discipline an employee? It would be very easy for you to put off things or watch the television knowing that nobody else is looking over your shoulder.
4. Lack of guaranteed fringe benefits – you won’t have the fringe benefits that you would normally get with a traditional job such as medical coverage, dental coverage, retirement, etc. If you want to have one, obviously, you have to pay for all those yourself but keep in mind that you would have to pay a higher premium for some of them since you won’t get the volume discount that traditional companies usually get because of the large number of employees they have.
5. No steady paycheck – many home based business owner struggle to have a regular paycheck especially during the early stages of the business. And even if your business has been around for a while, the monthly earnings would fluctuate so much depending on how your business performs.
6. Competing Time – even if you have a work schedule, the problem of competing business time with personal time still exists. When does your work stop and when does the personal time begin? Do you still work when its considered personal time or vice versa?
7. Being the Boss – Being your own boss comes with its problems as well. You are now responsible for making all the critical decisions of your business such as marketing, financial, or strategic planning. You might not have employees to delegate some of these responsibilities to.
8. Lost Family Space – the space that you use for some of your family activities will be gone since you will be designating one as your home office. If you have a guestroom or a library and you convert that into your office, then that’s less space for your family’s use.
9. No vacation or sick days – as self-employed individuals, sometimes you might not find the time to take a vacation. If your business will only work when you are there, then taking a vacation would really hurt your business. If you do not have any employees, who’s going to handle customer calls? How much money are you losing if you do not work? What happens if you are sick, who’s going to take over your place?
10. Zoning problems – If you do not know the zoning codes in your area, you may find this a problem if you conduct business that requires a lot of activity such as customer traffic, delivery truck traffic, etc. Your neighbors may file a complaint to the city officials, who may force you to pay fines if they find you violating the city zoning ordinance.
11. Technical Problems – if you are an information technology expert, great for you! But what if you lack the technical expertise and you are experiencing technical problems? You would have to make sure that you purchase technical support coverage. You would not have the luxury of having your own IT department!
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