[entrepreneur2008]

Try 40billion.com and entrepreneurs can raise money for small businesses through their networks of friends and family. Today, 40billion.com facilitates gift contributions (basically donations), but soon will offer loans and equity investments too.

[gowriter]

credit cards.

[BC SEO Guy]

Fund it yourself or from family or friends or leverage something you own and borrow it.

Even once you have success it is still damn near impossible to raise funds from investors because that requires a whole other skill set that the average entrepeneur does not have.

[Shania-CPA]

Certainly it's important to project your financial requirements and be able to answer for yourself when you will recover your capital (payback period) -- the same way you have to prepare the numbers if you're raising external funding.
Being your own boss is the primary motivator -- so I'm not too keen on heavily relying on outside capital just to start your business. Better to get it up and running yourself, funnel income from your day job to start with and then save enough to be able to quit and work full-time.
Having to report to outside investors is practically the same as being tied to an employer -- which is a major reason why you started your own business in the first place. I prefer organic growth.

[AOCenteno]

The best way to get money is to show that you can make money with what you have.

[MSwengel77]

Originally Posted by lpo_xy

In my opinion, i believe that for starters, you would have to raise your own capital before you can even ask some from friends and families. Its not easy but hey, one has to start from somewhere.

Agreed 100%