How To Make Extra Money

Making extra money may be easier than you think! New technologies, the internet, and today’s gig economy have created lots of new ways to make some extra cash. You do need to beware, however, of some folks who take advantage of the situation and trick you into putting up lots of initial cash. They lure you with really appealing promised but they may just take your money and run.

So first things first: be sure what you are signing on to is legit. And that’s where there is good news. There are now numerous opportunities that have been around for a while and have been proven to be for real. You can read lots of reviews of their operations and even blogs written by people make money on these side jobs, or ‘gigs”

Regardless of your age - in most cases - you too can be part of the “gig economy.” Many of these opportunities involve working from home, and they let you set your own hours. You can make some decent money as well. For example, people who listen to audio files or tapes and transcribe them on their computers can earn $25 - $50 per hour.

Don’t type? Don’t worry! Below we detail lots of services you can consider giving a try — and we let you know how much people typically earn each month doing that work.

News August 2019

Are you a pretty good writer but you don’t want to comeptet ti write for a living? How about trying your hand at proofreading? If you’re on top of basic grammar and good punctuation — and maybe even have a good writing style — you can actually earn some (very) decent money by proofreading! A young woman who wanted to earn some extra money while studying abroad actually made an additional $43,000 in one year — and that was in her spare time! Kinda makes grammar not so much of a drag, doesn’t it? Take a free workshop to see if this could be a winner for you. Just search Free Proofreading Workshop…

January 2019 Update: Did you know that you can earn some extra money by renting out a car that you don’t use all the time? There’s a service option in many cities in the U.S. and in some places in Canada that lets you do just that. You list your car with the service along with some photos, and let them know when it would be available and where its located. Also tell them what you want to charge for others’ use of the car and if you want to set limits on the number of miles that can be driven. The service (Turo) notifies you when someone wants to book your car and you can accept or decline. Then it’s up to you to meet with the person and check out their license and such. And Turo provides $1 million in liability insurance. Sounds interesting, doesn’t it? Check it out and maybe you can earn some extra cash!

Do you ever watch the tv show “Bull”? His business creates groups of jurors that mirror actual trial juries and uses lots of complex analysis tools to determine how a trial is going. Then lawyers can change their tactics to win over jurors. On a much simpler level you could help a lawyer out by acting as a “mock juror” — and you can do it online. Check out the website Online Verdict and see how you might get involved … and get paid to do so!

In a similar vein you can also help bloggers improve their sites and their posts. A service called User Testing helps connect you with bloggers who want such services. And if you sign up and help a blogger out with this testing, you get paid $10 — per test! It’s pretty simple once you are set up, and of course you can do it right from home.

If you enjoy writing and you're pretty good at — and you have some topic or skill you're passionate about, how about writing an ebook? You can use the Amazon Kindle program and/or the Apple iTunes Connect Program to promote and market your ebooks. through It's pretty easy to do and you'll reach the biggest part of the market by using them.

Have you heard of Amazon's Mechanical Turks? If you become one you can get super simple gigs to make extra money. They don't require high level skills and typically are something easy that you have to do hundreds of times (or more) to make some money but – if you've got time on your hands and not a lot of super skills, you should check it out.

Is your house or apartment cluttered with “stuff” that you don’t really need but can’t get yourself to get rid of? Consider setting up some sales on eBay or, if you’re crafty, on Easy. You can do it from home, it’s not difficult, and you could be surprised by how much money you can earn.

Have you checked your local area to see if people are hiring for the holiday season? It’s usually good to check first with Amazon because they typically hire thousands of people over the holiday season — for obvious reasons. The positions are in various places around the country and sometimes they can convert to permanent positions after the holidays. You might also find a job locally. Lots of stores need extra help over the holidays, of course …. and you might not only earn some extra cash but also get some special employee discounts. And who knows, that job could become permanent as well.

If you have some free time on your hands you might benefit from looking into Taskrabbit. This is an online market portal for folks looking to hire people to do specific tasks like running errands, doing some shopping, cleaning houses, helping folks move, doing handyman projects, etc. The study says that those who sign up and do tasks make about $110 each month. Of course you have a choice what tasks you do agree to do once you sign up, so you can make it fit your schedule and your abilities.

Did you know that some apps will pay you? There’s one called Achievement that lets you earn money by carefully logging your activity and progress meeting goals with Fitbit or MyFitnessPal. You earn cash $10 at a time and you can get it in cash or Amazon gift cards when you reach a specified number of points. And there’s no limit. So it’s a definite win — you help a company out, you earn cash, and you could lose weight and get more fit while you do it. Worth checking out!

If you can type and you’re good at it you can make money by taking audio files provided by someone and typing the words so that they can be transmitted as written files rather than audio. Very useful to people who record interviews and such and are not good at turning their recordings into written documents. Best news is that you can make between $25-$50 an hour doing it … that’s a lot more than minimum wage and more than lots of side gigs will earn you…

Do you have an outgoing personality and lots of energy? You could earn quite a bit doing direct sales for companies like NuSkin, Avon, Mary Kay and more. And you get discounts on the product yourself. It might take some time to build up a customer base that takes regular purchases — but when you get that point your income could replace your day job! Just be careful to read lots of reviews when/if you consider signing up, especially if there is a hefty initial investment required — you don’t want to end up stuck with lots of product that turns out to be difficult to sell.

How about other gigs you might be familiar with, like driving for Uber or for Lyft, or renting out a home or room on Airbnb? Or working for one of those services that have people deliver meals from restaurants or products from specific stores — how much do they actually make doing these things? Well a recent study by a firm that analyzed thousands of loan applications — which of course include income information — says that Airbnb comes in at the top. Those folks tend to make about $440 extra bucks each month. Of course you have to have the homes or rooms to rent but it’s good to know what it can earn you. People driving for Lyft, acording to the aforementioned study, make about $210 per month, and Uber drivers average around $155 monthly. You can also find some more inside scoop about driving for Uber or Left in our article Free Money 2016.Of course you have some control over how much you can make because you decide when you want to work and when you are off duty. It would be useful if studies would provide average income for specific numbers of hours worked. At any rate if you have a decent car these gigs can be good ways to earn some extra cash. DoorDash workers make about $100 each month picking up restaurant meals and delivering them to homes.

So give some of those a try and see if you can’t make life a little easier on yourself. It's not quite “free money” but it could make a big difference. If you’re still in need also check out the tips and resources we detail in Low Income Help.