Here is my someway working recipe. Not long ago I started to use Upwork freelancer portal, because I know how to make e-books and other e-documents. But so can any damn Pakistani. So the prices here are as low as 10$ per project (usually takes me an hour).
But then something weird happened. A niche business found me. Obviously I wrote something right in my resume.
My mothers tongue is language with about 3M speakers around the world. Some app makers from all around the world tend to pack as many languages in their app as they could. Including mine. There are millions and millions of apps on the market, but only a couple guys on the Upwork, that can do that.
Of course in this case demand is still low and sporadic, so I’m not going to be rich any time soon. But here you have classic sample of utilizing your special knowledge, if you have one.
You people talk like the government isn’t gong to be aware of your business, and your low level low paid people are going to accept cash payments and give them to you.
It’s not zero investment. The land costs something.
Why haven’t you started a parking lot if the business is so sweet? Write up a business plan that shows it’s as good a deal as you think and I’ll invest. Make sure to include a quote from the arm-thing-fixing contractor.
There was a machine that counted the vehicles running over sensors in order to count how many cars entered the lot. The attendants unplugged the machine and then pocketed the fees. :smack:
35 times 75 (100% full) x 12 months = 31,500 a year gross
Minus, taxes, electricity for lighting (and believe me, parking lot lights are not cheap to run), light fixtures, maintenance, someone has to collect the money and enforce who can park there. Property taxes, payroll taxes, unless you’re the one doing the collecting, billing and enforcement. If that’s printing money, you need a bigger printing press.
No, in this case I’m talking about Amazon and similar discounting sites like Sierra Trading Post etc. They are always moving prices all over the place with sales and discounting to adjust and move inventory. If you think you can sell something they are discounting and you can make some money flipping it after taxes, shipping and Paypal + Ebay transaction costs go for it. But if you guess wrong you now have slow or non-moving inventory that’s costing you to carry it. You are effectively a minor league retailer and you had better guess right.
Also you need to constantly checking these sites for deals as opportunities come and go like the wind. .
If you own taxi medallions in Toronto you can make millions and do essentially no work. You rent the medallions to the drivers at exorbitant rates and make all the money while they work for peanuts.
If you want easy money at low cost almost all the ideas put forth so far are terrible for the reason Little Nemo explained; if it’s easy too many people do it and profits are driven to zero. Where the easy money is is in a business where you can engage in rent seeking and/or arbitrage.
That is, you need a business that
Is heavily regulated and restricted by government, in a way that creates an artificial shortage, and
Has unusual barriers to entry.
Find something the government restricts in number. Get into that and use your profits to protect the restriction.
The problem with that idea is that in some cities (New York for one) Uber is cutting into the value of taxi medallions. They’re no longer the safe investment they once seemed to be.
Well, it depends on the city. Some have embraced Uber; others have banned it. It’s just an example.
I knew a business once that trucked raw milk from the dairy farmers to the factories. The thing was that in Ontario, owning dairy cows is a regulated oligopoly - like taxi medallions - as is trucking the milk. It was a license to print money. Big, risk-free bux are to be found in fleecing the market in a regulated industry.
The other problem with that is, Uber or no, they are valued at millions of dollars and you would need millions to acquire them.
If you have a huge amount of investment money for acquisitions, there are any number of already built and operating business you could buy, and if you hire good managers you can certainly live off the income.
Start a blog or YouTube video channel. If you can put out material that attracts a big audience, the ad revenue can be Large. Consider for example The Slo Mo Guys, whose videos collectively have nearly 1 billion views. At this point, they’re pulling in $2K per day, not including their T-shirt sales (which reportedly earn more than that).
Depending on the nature of the videos you create, you’ll need to invest in some equipment, and you’ll need video editing skills and some measure of creativity/style. The Slo Mo Guys have averaged one video every 17 days. Their revenue isn’t exactly labor-free, but a good portion of the work they do looks like fun.
Agree, but there are some notable exceptions - the woman who opens the kinder eggs on you tube seems to have carved out a weirdly successful niche, for example. Get your nails done, buy some kinder eggs, and kick back as millions of kids worldwide are hypnotised as you open them on camera (?!)
As a parent of young kids I’m familiar with most of the minecraft youtubers - the best of them are indeed putting a serious shift in to generate that content, and have a lot of talent as entertainers. Like anything, though, there’s a few along for the ride who are average and probably doing alright out of the medium’s current popularity.