GrinaPay

THE LOAN YOU’RE AFRAID TO TAKE MIGHT BE THE BUSINESS YOU NEED TO START For many people, the word “loan” immediately creates fear. The moment someone says, “You can borrow money to start a business,” the first thought is usually, “What if I cannot pay it back?” And honestly, that fear is understandable. Nobody wants to borrow money and spend every month worrying about how to repay it. Nobody wants to start a business with excitement and end up with sleepless nights because the repayment deadline is approaching. But there is another side of borrowing that we do not talk about enough. A loan is not automatically bad. Sometimes, the real problem is not taking a loan; the problem is taking a loan without a plan for what the money will produce. There is a major difference between borrowing money to finance consumption and borrowing money to build something that can generate income. Instead of asking only, “How will I repay this loan?”, you should also ask, “What can this money he...

THE MAN WHO WAITED Before you read this, let me say this clearly: These stories are not real stories that anyone told me. They are fictional stories created to reflect the reality that many families may be facing today. Emmanuel Adekunle sat in his big living room, staring at the quotation on his phone. The numbers hadn't changed much since January, N3.5 million for a 5kW system, up from N3.2 million six months ago. He'd waited, convinced prices would fall. Everyone said solar panels were getting cheaper globally. That was the story. That was what the news said. He'd been wrong . "By June, it was almost N3.5 million," he told me, shaking his head. "The delay cost me an extra N300,000. I could have installed it in January and been saving money by now." I met Emmanuel on a Tuesday afternoon, the generator in his compound humming in the background, that familiar grating sound that defines so much of Nigerian life. He's a product designer, cr...