Well, it sounds as if you are living within your means.
People always have TWO options when it comes to getting ahead.
One option is to cut expenses. If you are already living modestly there might not be much fat to trim.
The second option, the BEST option, IMO is to increase your income. If you read any of Kiyosaki's stuff he talks about not denying yourself of the things that you desire.....you just have to figure out a way to pay for them. And this is really the best way to look at it because it motivates you. It is based on the idea of EXPANDING your world instead of contracting it. You can contract things only so much, but you can expand them infinitely.
The problem most people have with money is that they see it in only one, two, or three dimensions.
Those who see it in one dimension are only concerned about getting by day to day. Nothing saved, no assets, just paycheck to paycheck living.
People who see it in two dimensions are the kind who realize that there is another side of the coin- how much you spend. They control what they spend in order to save for a rainy day.
The third dimension is where most of the middle class comfortably (in theory anyway) resides. They understand that the more you make and the more you save, the more you have left to INVEST, and they manage to acquire some assets such as a 401k,etc.
The people who will probably never have to worry about being homeless are the ones who think of money as having MANY dimensions. They understand that it goes beyond earning, saving, and investing, it's also about CREATING.
You say "I don't know how to go about starting a business with no capital", and that shows me that you haven't realized that there are more than three dimensions. It sounds to me like you aren't earning enough at your current job to allow you to live a decent lifestyle and be able to invest, let alone think about CREATING.
The great thing about this is that part of the word CREATING is CREATE. And you can CREATE by getting CREATIVE.
There are thousands of ways to start a business with little money....you just haven't taken the time to go to the bookstore or the library to do some research.
How much is "a lot" of money to you? Is $500 unobtainable?
The reason I ask is because i am in the process of starting a couple of businesses on a shoestring budget. One is producing a series of informational videos. I already had the camera, lights, editing software, etc., but if I didn't already have these items it would have cost me about $500 to set it up. When they are finished I plan to sell them for $30-$50 each. That means that with this business alone, if I manage to sell 4 videos a day at an average of $40 each, well, do the math. That's a nice little side income, wouldn't you say?
I am also starting a business that involves "personal care" products. I will be spending about $10,000 to launch three different products, but if I were to put a little more of my own labor into it I would have been able to get in for less than $3000 total. The $3000 is mainly for product which has a retail value of close to $20,000. Worst case I sell it to a distributor for $4-$5k and wash my hands.
Granted, the only reason I am able to do a lot of this stuff is because I have TRIED AND FAILED at many things in the past, but I have taken with me valuable lessons that I am using. I started out trying a whole bunch of stuff, now I have skills in marketing, sales, graphic design and other media, etc. that allows me to do a lot of stuff others can't do or that would cost them an arm and a leg.
What's my point? Well, if a farm boy from the midwest who grew up lower middle class with nothing more than a high school diploma can make things happen, almost anyone can. You can sit around and make excuses all day long (not you personally), but at the end of the day, the people who get out there and try stuff and aren't afraid to fail are the ones who eventually get the payoff. And the ones who sit around and complain about being the victim of their circumstances just might find themselves without options and maybe even HOMELESS, because they didn't bother to try.
