Sapphire Starr: moneymatters

20 Ultimate Side Hustles for 2020!

Want the freedom to work and travel?

Want to work from home and spend more time with your family?

Looking for a Side Hustle to create additional capital to invest and earn passive income?

Want to quit your job and travel the world but are concerned about finances?

Ok the later applies to me, but this blog post is for you!

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We all can use a little extra money on the side. Creating a side hustle is a great way to generate additional income, save money, and achieve financial freedom. There are several avenues through which you can make that happen. Maybe you want to make extra money to get out of debt sooner than later or save money for your next family vacation. Keep reading for ideas on how to make an extra $100-$500+/month.

1. Saving is Earning

Save more and spend less is a great way to grow your income. Saving as much as $500-1,000 per month will yield 6,000-12,000 for the year. By Joining Saving Money Challenge, you can save $500 in 30 days starting with just $1! The amount saved doesn't have to be large, but a little put in each month would pile up to an appreciable sum over the long run.

2. Housesitting

Housesitting is a great way to save money in exchange for free accommodations. This is especially useful for frequent travelers. Housesitters can travel the world, meet new friends, and save upwards of 30,000 a year in free housing. Remember saving is earning. Join TrustedHousesitters, the largest housesit network, and earn 20% off annual membership rate.

3. Freelance Work

Convert your passions into profit! Open an account on the following freelance work sites and market your talents for a fee:

Fiver

Upwork

People Per Hour

Freelancer

This is a great way to offer services to clients worldwide from the comfort of your home!

4. Airbnb

You can earn upwards of 1,000 per month renting your home/room on Airbnb.

Airbnb renting isn’t for everyone, but for those willing to invest the time, money, and energy to make it a worthwhile endeavor, it definitely pays off. If you don't have the time but still want to make extra cash for your room or entire home, Consider hiring a Airbnb CoHost such as Cohost Partners. They handle all the work, while you make money.

5. T-shirt business

Create awesome designs and print on T-shirts to sell. Companies such as, Teespring, offer print on demand and drop-shipping so there's no need to be bothered with inventory. In addition to T-shirts, you can also create designs for hoodies, mugs, bags, decors, stickers and more that can be sold on e-commerce sites such as Etsy.

6. Teach English online

Teaching English online is an awesome remote side hustle to generate additional income. You can teach the English language to non-native speakers or for individuals preparing for exams. In addition, there are opportunities to teach English online without a Bachelors degree!

A list of online English teaching companies that don’t require a degree are:

Though a degree is not required, it's a great idea to obtain a TEFl (Teach English as a Foreign Language) certification to guarantee placement. Earn free certification through the TEFL Professional Development Institute.

7. Start a Blog/Website

When I started Organize Kaos in 2010, there was very little information on how to start a blog. Today there's a plethora of information at the end of your fingertips! Get started today with services below:

Blue Host
-Free Domain Name
-Free SSL Certificate
-1-click WordPress Install
-24/7 Support

GoDaddy.com
-Domains
-WordPress
-Hosting
-E-commerce
-Easy Website Builder

Once started, A blog can be monetize by

Adding Cost Per Click ads in the from of banners. The most popular type of networking ads is through Google Adsense

Including Affiliate Program links in your content. Join Amazon Associates, one of the largest affiliate networks available.
Sell Private Ads.
Sell Memberships. With site like, Patreon Fans pay you a subscription amount of their choice in exchange for exclusive experiences and behind-the-scenes content.

Not a blogger? No worries! Hire a freelance writer on Fiverr to help create content for your site.

How to Make Money Blogging

8. Start a YouTube channel

Today, video content is viewed more than any other form of content. Create a YouTube channel, churn out good content, and generate passive income over the long term. Getting started is fairly simple! All you need is a cellphone and a YouTube account and you're ready to begin! Keep in mind you will need 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours before you can monetize your content. I started my YouTube channel, Organize Kaos, in 2010 with no knowledge of how to create a channel. I just hit start on my cellphone and the rest is history. There's a ton of YouTube Tutorials on how to start a channel if you’re intimidated by the process. Please subscribe to Organize Kaos to get travel and life hacks delivered straight to your timeline. Once monetize, you can earn up to 9,000 per year by creating 250 videos making $0.10 per day each.

9. Become a Social Media Manager

For this, you don't need a lot of skills; you just need to be social media savvy to start. You could manage social media accounts for celebrities, influencers, or even companies and get paid for it. Mentioned earlier, you can offer and market this service on freelance site such as Fiverr. Hootesuite offers the convenience of managing multiple social media accounts for personal and business in one place.

10. Create and Teach an Online Course

Everyone has skills and experiences that are unique and valuable! Share your knowledge and get compensated for it! Sign up with Teachable and join over 62,000+ instructors and create an online course using their powerful but simple all-in-one platform. This can be done remotely and virtually while making money in the process.

11. Start a podcast

Speak Up Sis:Episode 8- Unlimited Freedom

Chances are that you have something to say about any range of topics, and a podcast can be an excellent way of doing that. After a while you will gain enough traction to make money from it. Check out Podcasting For Beginners to help you get started! Anchor is the easiest way to create, distribute, host, and monetize your podcast-100% Free!

12. Become A Virtual Assistant

Virtual administration is one of the fastest-growing remote career fields, with job listings growing over 20% in 2019 according to FlexJobs data. Virtual assistants provide support to their employer or clients in the form of answering emails, transcribing documents, preparing statements and letters, organizing files, coordinating schedules and calendars, making travel arrangements, and generally taking charge of administrative tasks to help a client focus on the other aspects of their jobs. According to the current virtual assistant job listings on FlexJobs, some of the companies hiring for virtual assistants include:

13. Create/Sell Ebooks

Got an expertise or story you would like to share? Write about it! Google docs is a great FREE way to create an ebook from scratch and convert to pdf for publishing. Use Canva for free graphics to design your ebook then promote on social media platforms. If you create 10 ebooks at $10 each and sold 100 books per month, that’s 12,000 residual income in your bank account annually.

14.Domain flipping

Recently, I searched godaddy.com to purchase a domain name for my side hustle and it costed $2,500!!!! After further research I learned, you can purchase an available domain name on sites such as godaddy.com for $10-$15 (yr) and resell it for upwards of 2,000 or more. If you purchased 20 domains, you have the potential to earn 40,000!

15.Credit Card Rewards

Once you've mastered personal finance ( debt elimination and monthly cash flow plan) Credit card reward programs are a great way to earn cash back or points for free travel. In the past year, I've earned 1,000 cash back and free travel to Puerto Rico and Brazil. I would not advice to go into debt to earn cash back or points but paying bills with credit cards and paying credit card balance at the end of the month with cash you were already spending is a credit way to leverage credit and earn a little extra cash on the side. With Credit card such as Chase Freedom you can earn $200 dollars cash back and 1.5% cash back on all purchases with no annual fee.

16.Rent Your Car out on Turo

Welcome to the Airbnb for Cars! If you have a car you're not using, why not create extra cash flow by renting it out on Turo! Before you list your vehicle, know that Turo does have some criteria. This includes:

The car must be legally registered in any state but New York.
The car must be no more than 12 years old.
The car must meet Turo’s insurance requirements.
The car must have less than 130,000 miles on it.

17.Amazon FBA program

Fulfillment By Amazon (FBA) is a service provided by Amazon that provides storage, packaging, and shipping assistance to sellers. The program allows sellers to ship their merchandise to an Amazon fulfillment center, where items are stored in warehouses until they are sold.

On average, Amazon Sellers make upwards of 1,000+ a month. Selling on Amazon is pretty easy. You set up an Amazon Seller Account and download a amazon scanner app and you're ready to make some cash.

The process is really this simple:

Source products to sell through retail stores, thrift stores, or even from around your house.
List products on Amazon seller account and set the prices (typically the product details and pictures are already there fore you)
Ship all of the items to Amazon at one time.
Amazon finds the buyers, packages and ships each individual item, collects payment, deducts their fees, and then sends you money twice per month.

18.Real estate

WholeSaler
Real estate wholesaling is the process through which an individual, the ‘wholesaler,’ acquires a contract from the seller of the property and assigns that same contract to an end buyer. The Wholesaler makes an "assignment fee" which could be anywhere from $500-50k depending on the size of the deal. Wholesaling is considered one of the best short-term investment strategies and is a great way for individuals to break into the real estate investing industry. This is because wholesaling does not require significant capital to get started. Wholesaling can also help beginners learn quickly about the real estate market as well as gain invaluable negotiation skills.

Bird-Dog

A "bird-dog" is nothing more than a lead that YOU pass along to someone who may or may not be able to do something with that property. Most people pay a standard fee for referrals. For example I pay anywhere from $500-1000 for leads that I end up buying and selling.

19.Get paid to Advertise on your car

Companies like Wraptify will pay drivers to put advertisements on their cars. Depending on your commute, location, and the campaign, you can earn between $100-$1000 a month for each car wrap.

20.Petsitting/dogwalk

As a dog walker, sitter or boarder, you offer up your services to dog owners looking to get someone to care for their pooch. Sign up with Rover, and get connected with pet owners looking for your services. According to Rover, dog walkers who use the site to promote their business can expect to make up to 1,000 per month.

Bonus Hustles

21. Drive for Uber or Lyft

Consider using your vehicle to bring in an extra stream of income. Driving for Uber and/or Lyft gives you the freedom and flexibility to make money on commutes your taking anyway. Don't feel comfortable driving strangers in your vehicle? UberEats, Postmates, DoorDash are equally equitable alternatives.

22. Sell Digital Printables on Etsy

Printables are digital files that a purchaser can buy, download, and print from their home printer. Examples of printables you can make include:

Calendar Planners
Meal Planners
Financial Planners
Diet and/or fitness planners
Trackers (i.e. weight loss, debt repayment, etc)
Coloring sheets (for kids and adults)
Stickers
Journals

Create, Design, and Sell printable on Etsy for profitable passive income.

How to Sell Digital Downloads on Etsy.

Have you made money using above mentioned hustles? What's been your side hustle experience? Please share in comments below.

“You must gain control over your money or the lack of it will forever control you.”
― Dave Ramsey

Debt elimination is paramount to creating the freedom you need to live a fulfilled life! In July 2009, my colleague introduced me to Dave Ramsey's The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness . I was skeptical of this Debt-free "thing" and was convinced as a child I would "always" have debt. I actually refused to buy the book because I was sure it was a scam! I was living check to check and struggling to stay afloat. With Nothing to lose (literally), I checked-out The Total Money Makeover (TMM) from my local library. After reading the TMM, I became a Dave Ramsey follower and was "gazelle" intense.

Want to work and travel?

Want to work from home and spend more time with your family?
Looking for a Side Hustle?

Want to quit your job and travel the world but are concerned about finances?

Ok the later applies to me, but this blog is for you!

Need a vacation, but don't think you can afford it? Is your bucket-list waiting to be checked off? Do you need some extra coins for a family staycation?

Whatever your travel desires are, below you will find four easy ways to save money for your next adventure.

Join The Money Challenge

Spring is around the corner and we all can use some extra cash.

Savings is an essential part of Financial Freedom along with debt reduction.

You can save $500 in one month starting with $1!

So you can’t save money? It’s easy as pie! Brown bag your lunch instead of going out. 6 dollars saved times five days a week times ten years is 21,000 bucks!

I just found a really neat website, Feed The Pig that I want to share with you. The site helps people like you and me feed our piggy banks and save money, by understanding where and why we spend it.

Over the past several decades, Americans 25–34 years old experienced significant declines in net worth while increasing their debt. For every dollar worth of assets owned, this group carries 70 cents worth of debt.

The Feed The Pig campaign aims to reverse this trend by empowering younger Americans to take charge of their personal finances by living within their means and saving for long-term financial security.

Statistics demonstrate that this group’s financial behaviors, while less established, tend toward debt accumulation, and this is happening during a period of milestone events such as getting married, having children and caring for aging parents. But there is hope: more working time before retirement means that their current financial decisions have a greater impact (positive or negative) on their long-term financial security. With this campaign, AICPA and Ad Council hope to get younger Americans to establish better spending and saving habits.
The campaign draws upon a traditional savings symbol, the piggy bank, to encourage 25-34 year olds to find the benefits of saving for every stage of life.

Feed The Pig has lots of cool features—you can set up your own personality profile and make a savings plan customized to your day-to-day reality. You can project what you will save over time if you sock away up to 5% of your salary. You can get tons of tips, reminders, or even swap ideas with other savers to make Feeding the Pig easier.

Check it out!

Source: www.adcoucil.org & www.feedthepig.org

Six Tips to Put Your Financial House in Order

Six Tips to Put Your Financial House in Order
By Kim Lankford, Monster Contributing Writer

If you want to spend less time worrying about your money, then it’s time to get your financial act together. These six strategies can help improve your financial situation and simplify your life at the same time.

1. Put Your Savings on Autopilot

If you haven’t maxed out your 401k or other retirement plan at work, add an extra $50 or $100 every month. Increasing your contributions just a little can make a huge difference over time. By adding $100 per month when you’re 25, you’ll have an extra $330,000 in your 401k by the time you’re 65 if your investments return 8 percent annually, which is below the average long-term return for stocks. Since the investments are pretax, your $100 monthly investment will lower your paycheck by $75 if you’re in the 25 percent bracket. If your employer matches your contribution, you’ll get free money to help you save even more. And it’s the easiest way to save, since the money is automatically invested before you can touch it. If you’ve maxed out your 401k, invest $333 automatically every month in an IRA. Ask your IRA administrator to set up automatic payments.

2. Stop Worrying About Your Investments

Instead of poring over your investment options and wondering when -- and what -- you should buy and sell, have the experts do it for you. Most mutual fund companies, and quite a few 401k plans, now offer target funds that match your investments to your savings time frame. If you’re in your mid-30s, for example, you can invest your retirement money in a 2040 target date fund. This fund invests aggressively when you have more than a decade to go before retirement, then gradually gets more conservative as you approach retirement. These funds are diversified, so you don’t need to invest your retirement money anywhere else.

3. Pay Bills Automatically

Signing up to have your bills paid automatically from your bank account saves you monthly check-writing hassles and mail-delivery worries; it also protects you from costly missed deadlines. After one late payment, some credit-card companies boost interest rates beyond 31 percent and charge late fees of nearly $40. And some card companies raise your rate if you miss a deadline on another card, even if you have a spotless record with them.

4. Streamline Your Files

Go through your financial files and toss what you don’t need. In general, you should keep your tax returns forever, but you can get rid of supporting documents after three years (six years if you have self-employment income). You can also get rid of monthly investment statements after everything matches with your year-end summaries and ATM receipts as soon as the transactions appear on your monthly bank statement.

5. Protect Your Identity the Simple Way

Instead of signing up for expensive services that monitor your credit records for identity theft, do it yourself for free. You can now get a free copy of your credit reports from each of the three bureaus (Equifax, Experian and TransUnion) every 12 months (www.annualcreditreport.com). Stagger your requests so you get one report every four months. Review each one carefully for errors or unauthorized charges.

6. Get Out of Debt

The best thing you can do to improve your financial health is eliminate high-interest debt. Try to use any bonus, raise or tax refund to pay off credit cards in full. Even adding a few hundred dollars to your payments can make a huge difference, especially if you can get your credit card company to lower your rate. If your minimum payment is 4 percent of your debt, a $5,000 balance with an 18 percent interest rate would start with a $200 monthly payment, which would take 32 months to pay off and cost $1,314 in interest. If you pay $500 per month on a 5 percent card, you’ll cut your interest charges to $118 and pay off the balance in just 11 months.

How does this simplify your life? Once you’re out of debt, you won’t have to juggle minimum payments, and you’ll save a ton in interest, which frees up extra cash to reach the rest of your financial goals.

An Emergency Fund is money set aside in times of crisis-job loss, unexpected illness, major home or car repair, etc. Due to the instability of current market its imperative that you have money set aside in case of an emergency. There is no way to predict when an emergency will occur but you can be prepared if something happens. Emergency funds give you the financial freedom and time needed until your condition improves. Over 80,000 jobs were lost this year, and in January, over 250,000 homes were lost due to foreclosures. So the real question isn't whether, or even when, they will happen, but how it will be resolved.

How Much?
A general rule of thumb is to save at least 3-6 months of living expenses. Determine how much you need to save by tracking your monthly expenses both fixed and variable? Examples of fixed would be your rent/mortgage, car payment, insurance premiums. Examples of variables food, gas, clothing, utilities. Check out sites like Mint, My Spending Plan , or Duck Software, that offer free online tools to help create, track, and understand your monthly expenses. Start saving something today. It doesn't have to be a large amount; start small and gradual increase until goal amount is reached.

How to save on tight budget?
Once you create a budget you will be able to have a graphical view of how you spend your money. You will be surprised to find out that your spending $100 a month on take out, or $85 bucks on lattes and morning Joe! Evaluate your budget and find create ways to shift money to more constructive spending, ie emergency fund. Treat the fund like a bill and even consider having set amount automatically transferred from your checking account or pay check.

Where to Keep it?
I often considered putting my money in a coffee can and bury it in the back yard (probably safer than the current stock market), but that is a bit archaic! The market will eventually improve and confidence will be restored. According to A Women's Guide to Investing, you want to keep your money in an account that are fairly liquid and will not risk losing your money-such as high yielding Savings Account , or Money Market Account (not your checking account), or short-term investments like Certificate of Deposit (CD) or US Treasury Bonds. Wherever you decide to keep your money, the key is accessibility in times of emergency.

When to Save?
NOW

Talk Money Tuesday- Setting Goals

Be careful what you wish for and how you plan to get it, or you won't. You can succeed in reaching your goals for building wealth for your lifetime use and passing it along to your heirs. But, in order to do it, you'll need to do things a bit differently from most people. Don't sit and wait for opportunity to come knocking, go look for Mr.Opportunity or create your own. If you ask wealthy people how they got that way, "They were determined to meet their financial goals". In order to direct your determination where it will help you the most, you must first identify what you have now. Assuming you've done that, the next step is to set your goals for the future.

Visualizing the Goal
What's the best way to set goals that will help motivate you to achieve your personal financial wants and needs? A purely monetary goal may not be a very powerful motivator: Most of us need to focus on tangible items or tangible benefits. One of thee first steps in goal setting is finding a concrete goal or goals that motivate us emotionally. How about that classic black Mercedes Benz, a brand new home, Cruise around the world. Spend a day or two making up a list of the things you've always wanted, and prioritize them. You'll probably find that you have some short-terms goals and some long-term goals. An example of a short-term goal might be creating a vacation fund to support your vacation plans for the next year. Example of long-term goals would include retirement planning objectives. Whatever it is, make sure these are your goals, not someone else. Once you have come up with the goals, do enough research on your goal so that you know it "inside and out". Imagine at least once a day how it would be to have your goal, and how your life would be improved by having it. If the goal can be represented by a picture, keep one or more pictures where you're bound to notice them.

Measuring the Goal
How to make your goal measurable, you need resources. How close you are to having the money to pay this price is a convenient way to measure your progress toward reaching your actual goal. In order to make your goals measurable, we suggest two steps: reducing your goals to a monetary amount and setting a deadline to reach the goal. Put it in writing. Be sure to keep your written goal somewhere where your are sure to see it. What will it take to reach your savings goal? Clink the link below and use the Savings Goal Calculator to help you find out. Enter in your savings plan and view graphically your financial results.

http://www.finance.cch.com/sohoApplets/Savings.asp

Talk Money Tuesday-"Your Starting Point"

In order to be successful, you must have resources. To buy that dream home, purchase that new car, save for retirement, start a new business, college fund, requires money. Before I start talking about, 401K, mortgage loans, IRA, Stocks and Bonds, 529 college plans, lets first deal with the basis of financial freedom-saving! Here's 4 tips for your journey toward Financial Freedom:

1.Be honest! "A Journey of a thousand miles begins with one step, but you must know what direction your going in." You may not want to think about the money you've spent and the money you did not save, but acknowledging where you are can help in making wise decision in the future. Know the facts about your credit, spending habits, & debt. Go to www.annualcreditreport.com to get your free credit report. Take inventory of your assets and liability. You can print a downloadable personal financial statement to help inventory your finances at http://www.finance.cch.com/tools/downloads/perfinanstatement.rtf

2. Commit to saving! I live by the 80/10/10 rule; 80% income goes to basic living expenses, 10%tithe, 10% saving. I have money automatically withdrawn from my bank account so I don't even miss it. Online banks like, ING offers free savings account with no fees, no minimum balance, 4% return-www.ingdirect.com. You may not be able to save 10%, but commit today to save at least $30.00 month, $1.00 a day and then gradually increase as you see fit.

3.Build a budget. Sit down and record your income and expenses and manage money accordingly. I recommend www.mint.com which offers a free money management tools to build budget.

4. Cut Frivolous Spending. Make a list of needs vs. wants. Cut back on entertainment, eating out and other extras. Give yourself a weekly allowance.

Sapphire Starr