I Used My Life Savings to Invest in a Boda Boda Business, It Ended in Premium Tears

When I got my first well-paying job as a video editor at a production company in Nairobi, I promised myself I wouldn't spend my entire salary on city life.

I was earning about Ksh120,000 a month at the age of 26, and while many of my friends were upgrading their lifestyles, I had the goal of building an investment that could generate income even when I wasn't working.

Ironically, the idea came from a casual conversation during Christmas.

In 2021, I had travelled home to Luanda in Vihiga County for the holidays. Like many people returning from Nairobi, I spent a lot of time chatting with locals, including boda boda riders at one of the stages.

One rider caught my attention. He told me that after deducting fuel and other daily expenses, he usually made between Ksh500 and Ksh800 in profit every day.

What surprised me even more was what he said next.

He told me that most of the motorcycles at the stage didn't belong to the riders operating them. Instead, they were owned by teachers and nurses in the area, while the riders simply operated the bikes and shared the earnings with the owners.

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To me, it sounded like the perfect investment.

I went back to Nairobi convinced I had found my side hustle. Over the next two years, I became extremely disciplined with money.

I skipped unnecessary nights out and channelled almost every bonus and extra income into savings.

Eventually, I had accumulated about Ksh450,000 at the end of December 2023.

I used Ksh435,000 to buy three motorcycles. I topped up for the necessary registrations with the remainder of the money.

Since I couldn't manage them from Nairobi, my parents agreed to supervise the business from home. The arrangement was simple.

Each rider would remit Ksh400 every day to my parents without fail.

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Three motorcycles meant Ksh1,200 a day. I had opted that the plan would work for 6 days and gave the remaining day off. This was also the day they were free to take all they had made for the day. I thought this would be a motivation for them.

That meant that in a month I was expecting about Ksh28,000.

I was already dreaming bigger.

For the first four months, everything looked perfect. The riders brought in money consistently, my parents sent me regular updates, and I congratulated myself for making what I believed was one of the smartest financial decisions of my life.

Then the phone calls started.

One morning, my father informed me that one of the motorcycles had been impounded by the police after the rider knocked someone's goat, which died.

Recovering the bike meant paying fines, spending several days at the police station and losing income while the motorcycle sat idle.

I brushed it off as an isolated incident.

A few weeks later, another rider was involved in another accident.

Although nobody was seriously injured, I found myself paying for repairs and travelling home to help resolve the dispute.

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Then came another surprise. One rider failed to report to work for four days. When my parents called him, he claimed he was seriously ill.

Out of concern, my mother decided to visit him. Instead, she found him operating another motorcycle at a different stage.

He hadn't been sick. He had simply abandoned my bike while earning money elsewhere.

Replacing him took weeks. The problems didn't stop there.

One rider also regularly returned home smelling of alcohol and would have excuses for bringing less than the agreed Ksh400.

There was always a story. Fuel prices had gone up. The police had conducted an operation. The motorcycle had developed mechanical problems. Business had been slow because of the rain.

Every week brought a new explanation.

The business I had imagined would generate passive income slowly became my second full-time job.

Instead of spending weekends resting, I was making calls to mechanics, riders, police officers and my parents.

I realised something that had never crossed my mind when I first heard that conversation at the boda boda stage.

I wasn't just investing in motorcycles. I was investing in people. And people are much harder to manage than machines.

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Looking back, I understand why the business looked so easy from the outside.

When I visited the stage during Christmas, all I saw were motorcycles carrying passengers and money changing hands.

I never saw the police impounding bikes. I never saw the accidents. I never saw riders disappearing without notice.

I never saw the constant repairs, the excuses or the emotional exhaustion of supervising people from hundreds of kilometres away.

Eventually, by June 2025, I sold two of the motorcycles and retained one under a rider my family had known for years.

The income is smaller, but so are the headaches.