I say it time and time again, my favorite thing about working from home and for myself is that I get to decide how much money I’m going to make. When the new Freebird by Steven seasonal line comes out, I don’t have to beg for overtime, apply for a part-time job, or pray that the Boot Fairy will stop by my house. I turn to one of the many ways to make extra money without an extra long-term commitment.
In today’s post, we are focusing on those opportunities that take only an hour or two to complete one job and allow for the utmost flexibility in scheduling. Pick up work when, if and where you want. Oh. And most of these don’t require any special skills or education.
1. Become a Reseller
One of the easiest ways to make extra money is to sell stuff. While you are eventually going to run through unwanted items of your own, there are thousands of people make great money on the side buying and selling stuff from others, aka flipping.
We have talked extensively about flipping recently. While many of our resellers are working their businesses full-time, you can certainly do it on a small scale as well.
- Selling on eBay
- Selling on Amazon
- Selling on Craigslist
- Flea Market Flipping
2. Rent Your Stuff
So maybe you aren’t quite ready to part with your stuff quite yet. There is a big market for renting everything from tools to bikes to baby strollers.Check out our listof places to buy, sell and rent for more ideas.
3. Mystery Shopping
Even if you work from home, you have to leave the house eventually. While you are out and about, why not make a few extra bucks? Apps likeFieldAgentorGigWalkwill pay you for checking the price of a certain item in a local store or snapping a picture of a product display. This is so much easier than mystery shopping of years past.
- Money-Making Smartphone Apps
4. Take a Few Surveys
While there are tons of scams in this industry, there are also plenty of legit survey companies. Save up those rewards to finance your holiday shopping or buy yourself something special.
- Pinecone Research – pays $3 per survey
- Swagbucks – so many ways to make money with this one; watch videos, take surveys, shop online, and more
- Inbox Dollars – get a $5 signup bonus
5. Sign Up for Rewards
If you regularly use a credit card to make purchases, make sure it’s a card offering rewards. While Discover is always a popular option,Credit Karmarecently informed me the Capital One No Hassle Rewards card would get me the biggest return according to my spending habits.
6. Lose Weight
HealthyWageallows you to earn up to $10,000 by placing “bets” on your weight loss. This is a great way to stay motivated and accountable.
7. Shop Online
I do a lot of my shopping online these days. I love getting cash back through programs likeEbates. These programs pay you cold hard cash. You may also be able to make a little more by referring your friends.
8. Tutor
Not only istutoringa great local gig, there are so many places that contract online tutors. Skype and online conference software make it easy to teach remotely. Sites such as Cambly have become increasingly popular with my readers over the past year. And, you can always market to parents and students directly if you would prefer to cut out the middleman.
This is one freelance gig that offers a lot of flexibility. Your students will likely be available nights and weekends. If you are going it on your own as opposed toworking with a companylike Kaplan, you can decide how many hours you want to put in each week.Studypoolis another great option – simply answer student’s question and get paid.
9. Write an eBook or Online Course
I love passive income opportunities that keep earning you money hands-off indefinitely. Write an eBook for Kindle or sell your educational goods onTeachers Pay Teachers. If you have extensive knowledge in a certain field, you can venture into offering online courses through platforms like Udemy.
10. Pet Sitting
Make yourself available for a few fun-filled afternoons on sites like Wag!
11. Run Errands
There is no shortage of places to pick up local tasks in theon-demand economy. Sign up with sites like Instacart, TaskRabbit and more.
12. Make Deliveries
Sites likeDoorDashoffer a lot of flexibility in scheduling and many provide a guaranteed hourly minimum.
13. Micro-Tasker
Crowd-sourcing sites are always popular among those looking to make money in one hour or less per week. Big projects are broken down into small tasks that can often be done in less than 15 minutes. A few of our favorite sites:
- mTurk
- Fancy Hands
14. Focus Groups
These opportunities are typically one-off gatherings lasting just a few hours. Even though the availability is sporadic, you can make good money for providing your feedback.See this postby Real Ways to Earn for a list of companies to sign up with.
15. Provide Website Feedback
There are several “usertesting” opportunities today that connect remote workers with website owners looking for feedback on their site. These gigs generally only take about 15-20 minutes and can pay $10 to $20 per “test.” You are often recording yourself via webcam as you visit and navigate a website and sharing your experience and what you like or don’t like about the site.
- Get paid to test websites
16. Refer Your Friends
While this gig doesn’t always equate to cash, it can get you some free stuff you need anyway. Earn free credit when referring your friends to sites like Zulily or Groupon. You can also earn some cold hard cash for sending your friends toEbates or Ibotta.
17. Become a Chauffeur
We recentlytalked to the Ride Share Guyabout how he is making up to $30 per hour driving people around. You can also make money picking up and dropping off other people’s kids at their activities with a program like HopSkipDrive.
18. Clean
The awesome thing about the gig economy is that you don’t have to make something into a full-time business to profit from it. There are likely a few businesses in your area that could use someone on the weekends to clean their office space. Or, get one or two housecleaning clients through a site like those below. Five hours per week = $50 to $100
19. Flip Blogs
Flipping domains used to be a hot ticket. Today it’s selling done-for-you, income-generating websites and blogs. This works perfectly for me. Every year or two I spot a trendy topic I’d love to delve into and I start a blog. After a year or two, I lose interest. Rather than letting the site die a slow death, you can sell it for a profit if it’s making money. This has netted me anywhere from $200 to $15,000 in the past depending on how much the site is earning at the time of sale. Made for AdSense and Made for Amazon sites tend to bring the best return.Flippa’s okay for selling, but if you are making five figures per year go with a broker like Latona’s or Empire Flippers.
- Start a blog and make money in 7 steps
20. Watch your spending.
This awesome challengefrom Brightpeak Financial will show you how to stash away $500 in just 7 days.
21. Get Part-Time Remote Work with a Startup
Angel List is a website where startups can find investors and gain interest. It’s also a site where they can connect with employees and independent contractors.
Angel List has a special section just forremote job listings. You can find both full-time andpart-time opportunitieshere seeking everything from bloggers to CFOs. You will be able to see the pay being offered, a thorough company description and how many people have applied for the listed job.
22.Become a Social Media Manager
This gig offers a lot of flexibility. You may be able to schedule social media updates in advance and check for comments or replies periodically throughout the day. You need to have a working knowledge of popular platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Pinterest. You should also have good customer service and organization skills.FlexJobsis a great place to find legitimate remote job listings in this industry.
23. Evaluate Search Engines
This is a popular remote position. Though some find the work isn’t steady enough to provide a full-time income, that could make it perfect for you to make more money while growing your home business. Lionbridge, Leapforce, and iSoftStone are three big names in this industry. You can find a few more places listedhereas well.
24. Become a Direct Sales Consultant
Direct sales is a perfect fit for many budding entrepreneurs because the business really starts booming on nights and weekends when ladies are off work and ready to host home parties. That leaves you all day to work on your business while earning a nice side income holding a couple of parties per week.Find a business you love and a product you can stand behind.
25.Work On-Demand
Maybe your free time is sporadic. In that case, check out sites like TaskRabbit or NearJobs where you can pick up gigs like doing the laundry or picking up the groceries. These are often one-off jobs that require no ongoing commitment.
26. Monetize Your Free Time and Activity
There are a lot of legit places to pick up a few bucks here and there.Swagbucks, for example, will pay you for watching videos and completing surveys (they will also give you a $5 bonus when you sign up and earn 2500 SB in your first three months).Ebateswill give you cash back for shopping online, coincidentally they offer a $10 gift card for creating a free account. And, everyone needs to grocery shop.Ibottapays me for doing that. It’s not much, but every little bit helps when growing a business.
Regardless of the side gig, you decide to incorporate, make sure the hourly commitments are in-line with your own business growth goals. Trying to juggle too many things and too many hours can lead to a conflict in which no one wins.
