Long story short, I quit my job of five years a couple of weeks ago due to bouncing paychecks and the owner already owing me about $700 from a previous bounced check. I was reluctant to draw unemployment / call the labor board since he was a relative (it’s complicated and I’m overly generous sometimes). Fast forward a week, I get a job at a temp agency (which incidentally was only a temp agency for the company it was contained in - what a sham…), work one night, then I am let go the next night because they "realized they weren’t supposed to be hiring anybody new since business is down. :dubious:
Anyways, in the interim, I’ve been trying to think of “non traditional” means of making side cash that don’t involve me standing on a street corner or selling internal organs. I’m sure there are others on this very board in similar situations.
I thought it would be a good idea to have a thread of suggestions on ways, other than employment, of making some money. For example, has anyone actually made an appreciable amount of money online via survey / turk sites?
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated by myself and others.
Mowing lawns and walking dogs will make you more money than online surveys. You can make good money on ebay if you do some research on what things will sell for and then find them online, or in the real world for less. I used to umpire little league games, fun way to make some extra cash if you know baseball. If you’re at all artistic, make a funny model out of clay of something crazy, unique, and interesting to a large group of people (Elvis bowling, Virgin Mary Golfing, or anything unusual involving a beagle- beagle people look for and buy anything beagle) Make a plaster mold of it, buy a big tub of latex, and crank out your rubber Elvis beagles at like 10 cents a pop. Then sell them for 5 bucks each on ebay.
if you’re good at games, or have a buddy who can power-level you, you could sell items/accounts in WoW.
Also I used to do Focus groups at around $50 a pop. Search your area. They can be anything from playing a game for 20 minutes and saying what you think about it, to answering basic family upbringing questions (did your parents read to you when you were a child? etc) and then taking a short math/english comprehension test, to tasting a new drink/food product and saying what you think about it. Good stuff.
Sperm/blood donation?
rob a 7-11?
sign up for taking some experimental drugs (medicinal, not recreational )
You can easily make several hundred dollars per month by going to yard sales, buying stuff, and putting it on ebay. You can’t do it with just anything, of course, but records, books, and video games all too fairly well.
If you did this “full-time,” you might be able to make more.
Even if you don’t type that fast, you can still do it if you don’t mind working longer hours for the same money.
PLUSES: It’s a true work from home job that isn’t a scam.
MINUSES: See above. It’s work from home as in WORK from home. You gotta be disciplined, the work is boring, and you can’t have the radio on in the background.
Lawn mowing is about over for the year now that it’s fall but there is good money to be made in leaf cleanup. If you can get your hands on a blower/vac (about $50 for a good electric one) and mower with a bagger you can easily make $50 or more for a couple of hours spent cleaning up leaves. Advertise by going door-to-door or leaving flyers on the door. If you’re a go-getter you could make $100 to $150 a day for the next couple of months or so.
Even if you filed for unemployment, it probably would be denied because you quit. Yet your reluctant to call the Dep. of Labor because of a “relative”?
Smelles like more bad cheese.
If both these stories are true, you should have no problem searching the classified adds, (online or a newspaper) for a job. But you want to make money by means “other than employment”. I do see a ray of hope though; you still want to work honestly for some cash. Just don’t get sick. Good luck.
I vote for dog walking as well. I use a dog walking service for my two dogs and it’s $35 for an hours’ off leash walk. She must really rake in the cash if she’s walking, say, 10 dogs a day.
Wow, thanks for all the good tips guys/gals! I’m looking into transcription and focus groups as we speak. Not a lot of dogs or leaves around here (rental property), but those suggestions as well as the other were great.
Melkor28, unfortunately, the story is all too true - I have no motive to lie. I know calling the labor board would be the sensible thing to do, but knowing the hardheadedness of my boss (he’s infallible and always right in his opinion), such an action would be sure to rip me away from an aunt and two younger cousins that I’m very close to. Not to mention, it would likely lead to the downfall of his already ailing business. I’m pissed at the guy, but the last thing I want to do is take him down - he’s done a lot of really nice/valuable things for me in the past in the form of gifts (used car, used computer, helping me move 40 miles). He also hired me at a point in my life where I needed a skilled occupation and a place where I couldn’t show up in the morning hungover on highly illegal substances.
Anyways, of course I’m filling out applications and looking at Monster.com for job opportunities. But I’m in a small town, with no college education and a lack of construction skills common for a man my age. Add to that, our local job market is falling apart even faster than the scare tacticians in the media would have you believe. I realize that when I find a job, I will not be making $11/hour again and I’ll be starting over at $7-8. Thus, the need for supplemental income.
I hate to be a speakerbox for paranoia, and am the first annoyed by constant blathering in the mainstream media of market, unemployment, recession/depression woes. But with each passing day, I’m seeing the signs on the wall, and realizing that they may not be exaggerating as badly as usual this time. We could use some real tips on this board about staying afloat in tough times - It’s relevant now to a larger portion of the population than the norm.
Sorry for being so long winded. I feel the need to defend myself even in front of strangers…even more in front of strangers, actually. I’m stubborn like that :-). Thanks again!
A vote for focus groups and that kind of crap. That got me some beer money in college. Getting paid for trying yogurt drinks and stale french fries is not as bad as it sounds. Great dating opportunities too!
I also did the “mystery shopper” thing. It is a ton of fun. It can be a bit of a drag if they are the kind that needs to be done at a certain time, but you are free to choose what jobs you get. Plus, they work in a form of auction deal, which means that if you live in an unpopular area (I did), the pay for the jobs increases (greatly) as the deadline approaches.
I have a friend (in England, but I don’t think it matters) making some decent money redacting marketing blurbs for all kinds of companies. I am not sure how to go about hooking up with that, but I think he has a single contact that provides all the jobs, he doesn’t have to hunt each one.
I also used (as a customer, not as a worker) a site where people posted small graphic design projects. I have no idea what your skills are, but I am sure there are similar sites for all different kinds of skills.
David Pogue (technology columnist for the NYT) was raving a while ago about http://www.domystuff.com/
It can be done. Good luck and let us know how it is going.
How athletic are you? It may not matter. There is an enormous shortage of sports officials for youth and high school sports. The high profile sports are doing (i.e. football), but I have a ton of friends that referee basketball, and officiate softball, volleyball, etc. It’s easy if you’re thick skinned. You’ll get trained for free, and depending upon where you work, a lot of places pay at the game.
I remember hearing about a prositute who went to the hospital for appendix surgery. They sewed up the wrong hole and now she’s making a little money on the side.
Regarding the various means of making side cash (focus groups, mystery shopping, etc.), I wonder how much they pay on an hourly basis. My guess is not a lot, given the amount of work necessary. Wouldn’t the best way to get side cash be to get a second job?
Well, a second job is a good idea if you want a sure thing, but it also puts a big hindrance on flexibility at the first job and scheduling. Also, this will not apply to all people, but I will admit to having slightly lazy motives in this endeavor. I know the saying “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is” is probably accurate when it comes to 99% of the Make Money Online / At Home schemes, but I’d love to be able to find something I could do at my leisure. I’d “have” to go to my to my second job when scheduled, but I can offer to rake leaves anytime I please.
I’m in love with the Ebay and work at home transcription suggestions, though, since I’m a bit of a hermit.
Also, Sapo, do you happen to remember what site you used for your graphic design needs? Was it guru.com? The job I left was at a printshop, and while I didn’t do anything extremely elaborate, I did more than my fair share of stationery, greeting cards, fliers, logos, etc over my five years there.
Thanks again everybody! If none of your ideas were to pan out for me, it would not be for naught, since they have both motivated me and reassured me that if nothing else, I can find a way to make it.
There’s always Labor Ready. Well, not literally always - you have to be there early in the morning. But they pay you that evening.
Some of their jobs can be difficult or dirty, but you can turn down any particular assignment that sounds too bad. Pretty soon they’ll be hiring for snow shoveling, and, around here at least, for standing next to a Salvation Army pot and ringing the bell.
And its not at all unusual for the company you’re working at to offer to hire you as a regular full time employee.
)
But they pay you that evening.