This is a partnered post in association with Moneycontrol.

If you’re looking to save your monthly income and allocate budgets for separate needs, homemakers are the best ambassadors to look up to.

Traditionally, homemakers’ responsibilities are assumed to be limited to cooking, cleaning, and providing as caregivers for the family. This unpaid ‘profession’ is demanding, and unlike salaried professionals, it yields no breaks and offers no promotions. Yet, the community defines the true meaning of providing unconditional services; and amidst this COVID-19 pandemic, they decided to step-up even more. These unsung homemakers, who have been said to keep away from financial matters, emerged as the smartest ‘money managers’.

How did homemakers manage their finances?

If you’re looking to save your monthly income and allocate budgets for separate needs, homemakers are the best ambassadors to look up to. In the last six months, India has witnessed a dearth in regular supplies, mounting job losses, and sky-rocketing living costs. In such times, homemakers turned to some key financial instruments to rise above the setback.

Access to cash via fixed deposits

With a long-term vision in mind, many of them trusted Freecharge‘s brand promise to invest their lifelong savings in fixed deposits. One of the compelling reasons for this product’s attractiveness is the guaranteed returns that it offers. Additionally, the flexibility to withdraw money before its maturity is also a major benefit. When households experience tightening liquidity, this allows easy access to cash requirements. And those who invested before also benefitted from the accumulated interests.

Thinking ahead with options for all risk appetites

To augment the size of their wealth bundles, many homemakers tapped the lucrative offerings of mutual funds before the lockdown. While the markets experienced sluggish growth in the first 6 months, the economy unlocking has reinforced market sentiments, resulting in profitable portfolios. Apart from mutual funds, however, Freecharge also gave people access to various investment options depending on their appetite for risk. These include large cap, mid cap, and small cap equity funds and even debt and hybrid funds. Each of these varies in terms of risk and, as a result, the returns they offer.

Playing it safe with gold

The success saga of these new-age wealth wizards doesn’t end here. Women are the smartest gold-investors. They used their personal fascination over the product to generate increasing returns via Freecharge’s E-Gold avenue. This low-risk, high-return investment is a hassle to store physically. Offering a faster and safer way to make investments, women have trusted gold to give them higher returns this year, especially given the decline in the stock market.

As market statistics reveal, the rising volume of investments has led to a dramatic increase in gold prices. This online option bestowed convenience to homemakers when they juggled with the rising volume of household duties.

How did homemakers make investment decisions? 

It’s remarkable to record these successful data points. The offerings are undoubtedly living up to their expectations. But, how did homemakers, who are ideally cut off from the financial know-how, manage to make it so big? The secret solution is Freecharge’s extensive blog that guides people through their greys of making investments.

Every investment is a risk undertaken. An interplay between the ratio of pros to cons and personal intuition influences such decisions. Freecharge, through their blog, helped homemakers understand the market and be able to make these decisions for themselves. To facilitate extended support, they also have a 24/7 customer support toll-free number that intends to solve all kinds of queries – no matter how trivial they are.

What other steps did homemakers take to expand their financial cushions?

Investing in financially viable products was a smart strategy, but not exhaustive in itself. It was equally important to earn more money during the lockdown. This is where homemakers put their ‘homely’ skillset to commercial use.

For example, Pooja Carippa, a yoga instructor and mother of two, left her corporate career to pursue her dream project. In the lockdown, she utilised Zoom to keep her livelihood floating. Offering a week of free sessions, she eventually charged for her 4-hour-per-day-classes. This got her 50 sign-ups from students across the globe.

In Pune, when the virus struck, a married woman entrepreneur with a steady T-shirt business found herself out of work. To feed her 6 family members, she repurposed the raw materials to create masks. Capitalising upon the pressing opportunity helped her earn the support of Mann Deshi. She is now running her new venture with a team of thirty women.

Research from Warwick Business School boasts about women’s portfolio, which has outperformed men’s by 1.8 percentage points. The terrific combination of women’s intellectual and skills applied to investment opportunities such as FD, MF, and Gold via digitally suitable apps like Freecharge has a promising path of development.

Be smart like homemakers: Capitalise upon Freecharge!