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Contributing Writer
Kimanzi Constable is an author of four books and a freelance writer whose articles have been published…
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A side hustle can increase your monthly income significantly with a time commitment of just a few hours a week. It can also support you with extra money when unexpected work circumstances arise.
“I started a YouTube channel in March of 2020 when COVID got real in the United States,” says David Dilworth, a Delta Airlines flight attendant. “I’m in the airline industry, so there was a lot of not knowing what would happen next.” Dilworth’s fitness-based YouTube channel now generates $3,000 a month and has a variety of revenue streams. It even makes him money while he’s in the air for his day job.
One in three Americans have a side hustle, according to a poll of 2,001 Americans commissioned by Zapier, a marketing automation company. If you’re curious about entrepreneurship, but want to take a financially sound approach, side hustles offer the best of both worlds and can put extra cash in your pocket.
Here are the side hustle ideas that are popular now, along with stories from people who are using them to make extra money every month.
Not only is it possible to make extra money with a side hustle, but doing so can be a way to stay ahead of inflation and add an additional 10%, 20%, or 30% to your monthly income outside of your full-time job. Here are 26 popular income streams to consider.
If you have a vehicle that doesn’t get used much, you could rent it out and make extra money.
Apps like Turo, HyreCar, and Hagerty DriveShare let you list your car for rent in select cities. Think of these services as being like an Airbnb, but with your car.
“Every time we would travel, we would pick a rental car category and not end up with the car we wanted,” says Daniel Veiga, a business growth strategist. “We switched to using Turo instead.”
Veiga enjoyed his experience as a customer. His family household juggles five cars in total, so he decided to list some of them on Turo. The extra money was so good that Daniel and his family bought five more cars and listed them. They made $4,339 in April 2022, an average of over $400 per car per month.
If you don’t need to use your car all the time, renting your vehicle could be one of your best side hustles for your situation.
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The online training and education industry will be valued at $243 billion in 2022, according to Statista, a data reporting company. If you are knowledgeable and/or experienced in a certain topic, your expertise could be used to make good money coaching or consulting people online as a side hustle.
“What’s exciting is that you can take skills you already have and coach others,” says Meredyth Mustafa-Julock, CEO at Coach Jennie, her wife’s coaching and consulting brand. Mustafa-Julock leveraged her expertise to build a new revenue stream in the business called “Borrow My CEO“; the offer generates $30,000 to $40,000 annually.
“You can get certified or share your skills and experiences,” she says. “Online coaching can be great if you enjoy solving problems and working with people.” The overhead to run an online coaching side hustle is minimal, and you can charge per hour or per month to create recurring revenue.
A shortage of inventory and rising material costs have resulted in a red-hot housing market. Even with mortgage rates being more volatile than usual, real estate investment is one of the best side hustles when you’re strapped for time.
“My husband and I have talked about investing in real estate since we got married twenty years ago, but [we] never did,” says Amanda Hammett, a leadership development strategist who started investing in real estate as a side hustle.
“We never had the mental space,” she says. “Suddenly, I was off the road as a public speaker. I spent 2020 researching [real estate], and narrowed down a location where we wanted to buy investment properties.” Hammett now has 32 properties that collectively generate $50,000 a year (plus all the tax write-offs) in extra cash.
Real estate investing can be done by buying individual properties or joining a group that invests in real estate. It can be a side hustle that pays good money while not eating up all your spare time, but it’s important to know your numbers before getting started.
In-person services are a tried-and-true side hustle. If you have time on your hands, consider leveraging it to make more money and increase your overall monthly income.
Take pet care, for example. Pet-sitting is a multi-billion dollar industry, according to reporting from Grand View Research, a data research company. Easy-to-use apps such as Rover and Wag! let you sign up as a pet care provider, offer dog walking service on demand, and start earning money.
“I started dog sitting six months ago via Rover,” says Djemilah Birnie, a creative consultant who signed up to walk dogs as a side hustle. “I generated a few hundred extra dollars the first month and quickly made it to $1,000 to $1,500 extra a month.” Birnie now projects that she’ll make $36,000 this year with this side hustle.
“I am booking out a month in advance, and it is something that easily fits into my current lifestyle.”
Remote work sometimes means more time flexibility at home. If you have extra spare time on your hands, consider animal sitting or other in-person services as a fun side hustle that helps you earn money.
A YouTube channel is a side hustle idea that has the potential to earn you additional monthly income on social media. You can record and publish videos that educate viewers on a certain topic, create reaction videos, or vlog your life.
Related: How to Make Money on YouTube
Dilworth, the previously mentioned flight attendant whose YouTube channel makes around $3,000 per month, says that 60% of this revenue comes from affiliate links on his videos. The remaining 40% comes from a combination of paid partnerships, personal training inquiries, and AdSense, YouTube’s program for paying creators a cut of the ads that run on their channels. Dilworth says YouTube has helped him find clients and get his online business off the ground.
If having a creative outlet appeals to you, consider creating content and publishing it on a platform like YouTube, TikTok, or Instagram to grow an audience and eventually pursue additional income streams. Online platforms can be a great way to make extra cash and relieve financial stress.
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If you like the idea of real estate investing, but don’t want your property to be leased out for years on end, consider listing your property or spare room on Airbnb. Millions of consumers book Airbnbs as an alternative to hotels; as someone who travels full-time, I’ve booked over 150 Airbnbs in 40 countries.
You also don’t need to list an entire property for your side hustle to fly on Airbnb. Many people choose to list a portion of their home or even a single spare room, says Michael Marcial, a business consultant. Marcial makes about $10,000 a month in extra money listing property on Airbnb as a side hustle.
“A house, part of a house, or even a room can be listed on Airbnb,” he says. “You may have a side hustle opportunity in the space you already have.”
Airbnb can also be a great option if you want to stay connected to a part of the world that has special meaning to you.
“After going through a divorce, I was invited to speak at an event in Jamaica,” says Alicia Lyttle, CEO of Monetized Marketing, a company that coaches entrepreneurs. “I was in the process of restarting my life. That event was so successful that my sister and I went back to Jamaica for two years. Since I was spending so much time in Jamaica, I looked at purchasing a home there.”
“One of the houses I looked at was in rough condition, but the family of Bob Marley owned it. I bought the home, remodeled it, and listed it on Airbnb when I was not staying in it.”
In the first three months, Lyttle’s property generated $9,011.33 on Airbnb. It has since brought in $152,000 of extra cash since first being listed in 2017.
“I have an Airbnb manager who maintains the property in Jamaica, so it’s generating passive income for me,” she says. Some of the best side hustles are ones in which you treat the work like your own business, step into the role of CEO, and start generating extra money passively.
Millions of people buy things every day from an online store like Amazon, their favorite retailer, or a small business on social media. According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau, e-commerce sales for 2021 were estimated at $870.8 billion. If you’re passionate about a certain industry or want to solve a specific problem, consider producing and selling the product you wish you had. Set up an online store so you can start selling online and bring in extra money each month.
Your products don’t have to be new. Listing gently-used items on social media, eBay, or Facebook marketplace groups can be a side hustle that not only brings in more money, but also declutters your home.
Freelance work is a great side hustle, and companies are almost always looking for skilled labor to help them get things done. A few examples of freelance work include:
If you plan to pitch business owners or companies, you might want to consider creating a business formation. This will allow you to operate as a company, even if it’s just you, and doing so will give you tax perks and keep more of your extra income in your pocket at the end of the year.
Why only be paid once for your efforts? Subscriptions, memberships, and paid newsletters let you get paid over and over again for the work that you do in your spare time.
Tools like Patreon and Ko-fi are designed to help people develop recurring revenue streams. Creator culture is one of the hottest side hustles at the moment, and the thought of offering direct-to-consumer memberships or subscriptions as a way to generate extra income is compelling to many.
If you’re strapped for both time and brain power, but are still curious about having a side hustle, one of the best side hustle ideas to consider is affiliate marketing.
Affiliates use special links or discount codes to promote their favorite products and services. If you’ve ever listened to a podcast episode and heard the host mention a discount code during a commercial, that’s affiliate marketing in a nutshell. Depending on the terms and conditions of the agreement, affiliate marketing can be either a one-time payout or a recurring monthly payout, and commissions vary widely.
If you need a side hustle idea that doesn’t require you delivering a product or service, affiliate links might be one of the best side hustles for bringing in extra income each month.
If your property has unused space, you might be able to use it to make more money. Neighbor is a unique marketplace that connects people with unused space in their garages, attics, basements, and driveways to renters looking for affordable storage.
“I saw a local news station segment on Neighbor and thought about the unused space on my lot,” says Carol Ann Wood, a full-time teacher. “Getting started was simple. I downloaded the app, then took a few pictures of my property. Once I uploaded the photos to the app, I set the price.” Wood uses Neighbor to offer her large yard as RV storage space. She’s made $12,718 over the last twelve months by using the service, an average of over $1,000 a month, which helps to offset the cost of her mortgage.
“My side-hustle allowed me to free up my finances, and the best part is I’m renting out space that would have otherwise gone unused,” she says. “I love how this is something I can do in addition to my full-time job.”
Nana Academy is a free online appliance repair training school and jobs platform. Anyone can sign up to train, and once you’ve completed your training you can book repair jobs with top employers like Samsung, GE and Miele. Since launching in 2017, NANA technicians have completed over 78,000 jobs at an average rate of $90 per job, according to internal metrics supplied by the company.
“Learning a trade [skill] can be a more lucrative and rewarding side hustle than the ones most people typically think about, like driving for a ride share or being an on-demand shopper,” says founder David Zamir. “The pandemic increased the demand for appliance repair since so many people were at home and using their appliances more regularly. Because of this, there continues to be a growing need for people to repair them.” Zamir says that for many technicians, trade skill development has been impactful.
“Taking jobs on Nana has made my quality of life better by allowing me to have more time to be home with my family,” says Sandro Fernandes, a Nana graduate and technician based in San Francisco. Since 2020, Fernandes has made over $190,000 by taking jobs on Nana. “I worry less about money now.”
For Zamir, using a side hustle or skill to dig yourself out of debt is a personal experience he knows well.
“I went through a period in my life where I felt hopeless, I had no savings, and faced large debt,” says the founder. “Learning a trade skill helped me to not only provide for myself and my family on a day-to-day basis, but to actually build a long-term, successful business that changed my entire life trajectory.”
If you want a more flexible side hustle and know a lot about a certain subject, high school or college tutoring,
“I tutor in my off time because it is the most flexible way for me to make money without making my daily schedule too demanding,”’ says Aidan Seidman, a senior at the University of North Carolina studying mathematics. Seidman says he uses a combination of strategies to bring in both short-term and long-term clients.
“I find long-term clients that will usually work with me regularly through the semester through online mediums like NextDoor, Facebook pages for the school, and advertising on Instagram,” he says. “However, I make sure to find out when the exams are for each calculus class so that I can tape an advertisement outside of the classroom door around that time. So many of my clients only work with me once or twice in order to prepare for an exam.” Seidman charges $50/hour and works anywhere from one to ten hours a week, depending on whether or not an exam is coming up.
“The best part of it is the pay rate,” he says. “I can charge up to $50 per hour because there is such high demand for quality tutors. I am able to make as much money in a week as my friends with normal jobs only working a quarter of the hours.”
Have a swimming pool or other big investment that doesn’t get used often? Or perhaps you have an extra parking spot available in an area where parking is in high demand? The sublet economy continues to boom, and it no longer only applies to houses or apartments.
Swimply is a service that lets you rent out your backyard pool. RVnGO is an option for subletting your RV, and Spacer functions as a marketplace for garages and parking spaces.
And just in case you have a yacht that’s sitting around and collecting dust, don’t worry, there are sublet services like Jettly and Boatsetter specifically for boats. The physical assets you have can make you money when not in use.
The clothing in your closet that you never wear might be able to make you money.
Poshmark is an online marketplace with over 80 million users where people can buy, sell, or trade secondhand fashion or home goods. Some users use the platform to sell their existing items, while others source goods at low cost and then “flip” them, selling the goods on the marketplace at a markup, a technique known as retail arbitrage.
“Reselling on Poshmark is the perfect side hustle for me as a student because it gives me the flexibility to pursue my education and other interests while making an income,” says Ali Dieguez, a 23-year-old kinesiology major at San Diego State University who made $13,740 in sales on Poshmark last year. Dieguez says she started selling activewear in 2020 as the demand for casual clothes was on the rise.
“When I first decided to start reselling, I didn’t necessarily think I’d do it long-term,” she says. “But now I can definitely see myself reselling for the foreseeable future because of the opportunities that have come with it.”
Think about whether you have clothes you don’t use anymore, such as baby clothes that your children have outgrown, that would be a bargain for others.
“I’m a full-time medical student and mom of six with a long-time dream to become a doctor,” says Ashley Waters Gordon, an Atlanta-based part-time reseller on Poshmark. Gordon has made $3,000 on Poshmark so far.
“I picked up selling part-time while applying to medical schools to help pay off the application costs and chip away at tuition,” she says. “My goal is to ramp up my resale business so I can eventually pay off my medical school tuition.
If you’re good with a camera, you can use your keen eye to make money, and side hustles such as wedding photographer and brand photographer are fairly common.
One other approach to consider is volume photography, in which you show up on site and take photos of many different people in one setting, such as taking yearbook photos or event photos for a school district. Volume photography can help you make money with minimal setup, but organizing all the photos on the backend can quickly start to feel overwhelming.
PhotoDay is a platform that helps photographers with sales, marketing, and overall workflow, and they have an app as well. The tool’s interface helps photographers get their post-production turnaround time down from weeks to days, says Robin Janson, professional photographer and PhotoDay user.
“I was a naysayer for the first year,” he says. “I thought, ‘Our order forms are just fine. They’re not broken.’ And then COVID came along, and we had no choice but to adapt by going digital.” Janson and his wife Jennifer got into photography themselves after feeling dissatisfied with the quality of photos they were receiving on school picture day. “Through PhotoDay, our sales have gone up, our buy rate is higher, and our workflow is streamlined,” he says. “No one ever expects their side hustle to become a career. It’s pretty awesome.”
Have a washer and dryer at home? That can be a side hustle, too.
Hampr, a company that refers to itself as the “Uber of laundry”, lets you sign up as a contractor, drive to people’s homes, pick up their laundry, and take it home to launder and fold. The contractors, referred to as washrs [sic], deliver clean laundry in 24 hours.
Hampr is another example of technology enabling the gig economy; if you’re at home for a lot of the day, you could be making money in the background while working remotely or running other errands.
If you’re able-bodied and have weekends free, helping families move could be a great side hustle. Moving services require minimal licensing in most states, and independently-owned moving companies earn anywhere from $75-$128 per hour, according to a data report from HireAHelper, a moving services platform for both movers and consumers preparing for their next move.
“It’s surprisingly simple to start a labor-only moving company,” says Ryan Charles, GM of Managed Moving Services at HireAHelper. “Demand for moving services surges over the weekend, making this a viable side hustle for those who work during the week. Starting a moving company is a good side hustle for a strong person who doesn’t mind lifting and moving heavy objects. You could partner with a friend, acquire basic equipment, like a moving dolly, name your company, and list your services online.” Charles suggests starting with a competitive rate to build up your reputation with customer reviews, then increasing your prices over time.
“With moving companies earning upwards of $352 per move, you can split the cost with your friend 50-50, and still make pretty decent money per move,” he adds.
Taskrabbit is a gig economy platform that was founded in 2008. When you sign up for Taskrabbit as a Tasker, locals can hire you to help with odd jobs around the house. Taskers in the U.S. make an average of $48 per hour, according to a fact sheet provided by the company.
Related: Tips for Winning in the Gig Economy From Taskrabbit’s CEO
According to their website’s support section, the most frequently booked jobs on Taskrabbit are:
A gig economy platform like Taskrabbit can be a great option if you don’t want to deal with the sales and marketing parts of a side hustle.
If you want to offer a very specific skill set with exact requirements, such as graphic design, Fiverr can be an excellent way to get your side hustle efforts off the ground.
On Fiverr, the freelancers dictate the conditions of the service, and you offer your skills entirely online. For many, the ability to work remotely and on their own timetable is a compelling one-two punch.
Related: Fiverr Lets You Test-Drive Your Side Hustle Idea. Here Are 11 Ways to Get Paid Now
If you have a lot of space or land, you can rent it out by the hour for dogs to run around.
Sniffspot is an online platform that connects dog owners to local properties and backyards. You’re not dog-sitting, you’re renting your space, and you don’t need to interact with your clients who are coming in and out if you don’t want to.
Denise Powers of Chesapeake, Virginia began renting out her backyard in summer 2022. She says she made just over $2,800 over the summer hosting dogs in a private play park setting.
Related: The Perfect Side Hustle for Dog Lovers? Making Your Backyard an On-Demand Dog Park
Do you have a way with words? If the answer is yes, you might be able to help people with their social media presence.
Dakota Robertson is a 24-year-old full-time Twitter ghostwriter, a role he says he stumbled into. Formerly an electrician, the entrepreneur was able to leverage his college coursework in English to start and scale his presence on Twitter, attracting the
Robertson has made nearly $200,000 in 2022 ghostwriting for others, according to documents reviewed by NextAdvisor. Social media ghostwriting is a side hustle that you can scale up or down as much as you want, based on the time you have available.
Related: Social Media Ghostwriters Are a Thing Now. How This 24-Year-Old has Made $193,581 this Year
If you love baking or cooking, and want to make a little extra money on the side, consider doing it for others in a niche offering.
Michelle Heston is a PR and Marketing executive who bakes hyper-realistic cakes on the side. Since she has a demanding day job, she caps her output at one cake a week. Heston says she makes between $500 and $1,000 a month baking custom cakes for local businesses and families. She operates an Instagram account for the business and no website, and takes clients either through direct message conversations or referrals.
“Baking is a productive therapy for me,” she says.
Related: Is It Cake? Even Better, It’s a Side Hustle. How She Makes $1,000 a Month Baking One Cake a Week
If you have a hobby or passion that has a niche community, you could create a website that serves this community, making extra money on the side.
Sam Laird is a rock climber who started ClimbingShoeReview.com to connect with other climbers online regarding shoes and gear. He began publishing shoe reviews, which include affiliate links to purchase the shoes off of Amazon. Laird receives a commission whenever someone buys shoes with his links. The climber $1,183.69 for September 2022, based on documents reviewed by NextAdvisor.
Niche review websites can be a great source of passive income, but you’ll want to know the ropes of how to start a blog before getting started.
Related: This Rock Climber Turned His Hobby Into a $1,000+ Per Month Side Hustle. How He Did It
Do you have great taste in music? If the answer is yes, it could be making you money on the side.
Robin Young has a popular rock music playlist on Spotify. He uses websites like SubmitHub and Playlist Push to review songs from new artists and consider them for his playlist.
The catch? Your playlist needs to have at least 1,000 followers, which Young says is the hardest part. The musician ran approximately $400 in Facebook and Instagram ads promoting his playlist to get it over the initial 1,000-follower benchmark.
Young now averages $6.25 per song review, and a review takes just a few minutes.
Related: Dream Side Hustle Alert: How This Musician Earns $1,000 a Month Curating Playlists on Spotify
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The next time you grab a bottle of water or a snack from a nearby vending machine, know that it’s someone else’s side hustle.
Marcus Gram wanted to get into investment real estate, but he couldn’t afford a down payment. So he purchased a refurbished vending machine instead for a few thousand dollars, placed it with a local business, and restocked it a couple times a week with inventory he purchased from CostCo. After some initial missteps, he found his groove, and the machines netted an average of $1,500 a month in their first three months of operation.
If you’re short on time, but have some cash that you can invest upfront, purchasing a vending machine can be a low-fuss side hustle. Gram now owns 25 vending machines across four states.
Related: Is The Hot New Side Hustle… Owning a Vending Machine? Yes, Says This 31-Year-Old Who Made $340,000 Last Year
The prospect of starting a side hustle in order to make more money can be exciting, but also daunting. You only have so much time outside of your full-time job, and you want to optimize how you spend it.
You only have so much time; one thing you should consider before starting a side hustle is its potential profitability.
As you discover your groove and find clients, make it easier for people to pay you. If your side hustle doesn’t use a marketplace or an app like some of the examples listed above, it might be worth your time to set up a sales funnel. Sales funnels are digital marketing assets that prevent your ideal clients from getting lost in the noise of the internet, says Brianca Johnson, a marketing strategist and educator.
“Side hustles can make more money with sales funnels because it takes the pressure off of you to constantly have to find new clients — the funnel converts them for you,” she says. “All businesses need a sales funnel.”
Johnson also recommends sales funnels because they don’t require any knowledge of coding to set up and implement.
“I think anyone can learn how to set up a sales funnel — even those [who are] not techy.”
The beauty of a side hustle is that you’re building it in your spare time. Blocking off time each week to work on your side hustle can help you make progress and earn extra money. Remember, the goal is not to have your side hustle turn into another dreaded task on your to-do list in addition to your day job.
“I managed social media in my corporate life and saw an opportunity to manage social media freelance on the side,” says Rahkim Sabree, CFEI, an author, speaker, and financial coach. Sabree slowly built up a side hustle outside of his day job as a financially stable way to move toward self-employment.
“Monetizing my skillset seemed to make the most sense as I built out my financial coaching business after leaving corporate America.” Sabree’s side hustle, still intact, generates about $37,000 per year in revenue and requires less than ten hours a week of his time.
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When your side hustle starts to make money, there are reporting requirements. You have to report your earnings if they are $600 or more, per the Internal Revenue Service. The laws on earnings reporting are clear.
If you anticipate generating thousands or tens of thousands a dollar a year from your side hustle, take the time to learn about business formation. When you set up a business, you enable additional tax write-off opportunities that will allow you to keep more money in your pocket.
Side hustles are exciting and a great way to bring extra money into your bank account every month. Take some time to examine each potential side hustle, and do your research. Then choose the side hustle that best fits your life and goals.
A side hustle can both complement your primary source of income and eventually grow into something bigger. Leverage the power of side hustles as you work your way toward financial independence.
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