When my wife and I were in our 20s we took the path to get formally educated, medicine for my wife and engineering for myself. During this time we got married and then had our first child the next year. We found that we were struggling to save and were living paycheck to paycheck. We could feel ourselves getting deeper and deeper into a hole. How were we going to get ourselves out?

I had a run a few business in the past, so I continued to drum up some business which helped us get by but we needed more. We started a few new business that were more valuable to our time and could work around our schooling, I over did it and ended up not being able to go to school making my debt come due. Just like that we were hit with a $750 bill every month, and I was working so much just to be broke again. Sound familiar?

As like many people I listened and read Dave Ramsey’s “Total Money Makeover” book and fell in love with the concept. My wife and I attacked our debt, balanced our budget (more on this in another article) and killed over $40,000 in school debt in two years on a $55k salary and paid for college at the same time in cash. How did we do it? Budgeting is first, but side hustles are second.

According to urban dictionary a side hustle is:

“Sideline that brings in cash; something other than your main job. Maybe playing weekend gigs or life coaching. SELLING AMWAY IS NOT A SIDE HUSTLE — it’s just a stupid way to alienate your friends.

When start up your own business you probably want to get some side hustle going. Maybe a small low stress consulting job on how to get a side hustle going.”

So the key here is that it isn’t your main source of income and isn’t part of any master plan for any long term consistent money. This isn’t as much as a diversification strategy as it is a fun way to make some extra dough on the side and play with some ideas. Many of these can be very profitable, but side hustles in general are good money for a while and then the market matures and makes it less profitable.

What are some easy side hustles (gigs) I can do on the side?

Mobile App related Side Hustles:

Drive Sharing

Uber – Everyone and their mother has heard of Uber, they are like a taxi service for private car owners. A person uses the Uber app and creates a pickup and drop off location and an Uber driver in the area comes and provides the transit.
Cash potential : $18-60/hr.

Lyft – There is another company that is just like that called Lyft. I have driven Lyft and made some decent side hustle money on this! I’ll post a detailed cost benefit analysis in the next few posts.
Cash potential : $18-60/hr, $35/hr guaranteed some weeks. GET A $220 sign-on bonus here!

 Delivery and Moving:

BuddyTruk – Have a truck? Help someone out by helping them move or haul something in your truck.
Cash potential : Up to $40/hr.

GoShare – Have a truck or van? Help someone by moving or delivering their stuff. Just like BuddyTruk but a bit more money.
Cash potential : $47.52 – $61.92/hr

 Amazon Flex – Amazon delivers everything and they need help! Sign up for Amazon Flex and you can help deliver their packages. Flexible and easy. You don’t even need a nice car!
Cash potential : $18-25/hr

Car Sharing:

Turo – Everyone needs a car at some point, do you have more than one that you want to loan out? Check out Turo. You sign up and setup a schedule for when your car is available, the rate, and if you are willing to deliver it and you are ready for some cash. This one was new to me, even

with my little Nissan Leaf, they quoted me $8,435/yr if I rented it with them! I just signed up!
Cash potential : $7,000-$47,000 per year if fully available.

Advertising:

Wrapify – Drive a lot where there are a lot of “eyes” on you, great! Wrapify will wrap your car in a paint safe advertising wrap, they do panels all the way up to the full car. They manage everything through the GPS located app, giving you some extra bucks! I checked with Lyft and you CAN wrap your car while drive sharing! Uber hasn’t replied yet. Sorry guys Turo said no.
Cash potential : Up to $500/month on top of your Lyft money!

 Carvertise – Same gig as Wrapify, but less money.
Cash potential : $100/month

House Renting:

Airbnb – This service has been around since 2008 and has short term to long term renting down to a science. There are hundreds thousands of people getting their home paid for with Airbnb, did you know that

most people get 3x-5x more for their home renting with Airbnb than by traditional renting? I have used this service as a customer and literally have stayed in the nicest places in the world for as little as $20/night for a whole house compared to $300/night!

Cash potential : Generally your mortgage multiplied by 2x-5x. Get a discount on your first night with Airbnb here!

 Sell Stuff:

Amazon, Ebay, Craigslist – If you didn’t know you could sell on either of these you are really living offline. But you may not have known you can sell USED items on Amazon and have them store, pack, ship and handle all the customer service issues. I have done this and made several thousand dollars in a few months!
Cash potential : Could literally be millions. Google it.

 OfferUp, LetGo, Facebook Marketplace – These little babies have made a few thousand dollars for me also, super simple. Snap a picture, list a title and description, $ you want and bam you can have it sold in a few minutes.
Cash potential : Could literally be millions. Google it.

Retail Arbitrage – So this isn’t an app per say – it is a technique. You go to a retail store (or their dumpster) and buy items on clearance. Scan it with one of the above apps such as Amazon and see how much money you can make off of it. I literally did this at Fred Meyer and Target and made $400 off $20. It is dirt simple. Do it.
Cash potential : Could literally be millions. Google it.

Offline Side Hustles:

Everyone wants an app or a company to help them make money. Honestly it reduces options and makes it a safer place emotionally (safer feeling in the pack, “Well Abe made money”), but this is where opportunity is too! Do something no one can do or wants to do and you can make money.

What are some of these? Well for starters babysitting, dog walking, childcare, dog sitting, cleaning animals, woodworking, painting, starting a consultant biz, you get the idea.

I literally had a student of mine pay for his entire college degree by WASHING TIRES for people while they worked. Hey everyone wants good looking wheels right?

Keys to success: Be open to an opportunity, test it quickly, think about the result in $/time, double up on successful ideas. Let go of unproductive ideas.

Be consistent. Be honest and serve with integrity. Be consistent.