Suggestions for How to Make Money from Home

Many people want to know how to make money from home. Here are a few suggestions.

You might try several different things before you find the one that works best for you and your family. Remember that working from home requires motivation and family support. So, talk to your family first.

Telecommuting is becoming increasingly popular. Depending on what you do, you might be able to do all or most of your work from your own computer, rather than going into the office. Talk to your boss. Many executives realize the benefits of allowing their employees to telecommute.

Freelancing is another popular choice. What talents or skills do you have? Can you put them to work for you? If so, that's how to make money from home. For example, writers can work anywhere. Freelancers include computer programmers, software engineers, website designers and many others.

Nearly everyone has heard of eBay. Look around your house. Are there things that you might be able to sell? eBay now offers auctions and online stores for relatively low fees.
If you don't currently have anything to sell, consider attending estate auctions, flea markets or yard sales in your community. Learn about different collectibles. Sometimes you can buy them for next to nothing and sell them for a good profit.

With a little software and some practice, you can learn to build your own websites. You can either sell items or refer people to those that do. Many companies pay commissions for referrals. If a customer visits their site, using a personalized link that the company provides for their affiliates, and buys something, you earn a commission on that sale. That's how to make money from home, with little investment and without worrying about storing or shipping merchandise. It's called "affiliate marketing". There are hundreds of opportunities.

If you have a group of friends, you might consider doing home-shows for companies. Avon and Mary Kaye are well known for their home-shows, but there are many other companies to choose from selling a variety of different products. Organic foods, decorative accessories, jewelry and clothing are some examples.

If you use your imagination, you can probably come up with a number of things that are not included here. Just a word of caution; there are some scammers out there who target people that want to learn how to make money from home. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Read more »

Jobs Are Temporary - How To Use Them

Do you really want a job? What for? The paycheck? Maybe you enjoy the work itself (if you're one of the lucky few), but does that mean you need to have a boss? Fortunately no. There are many ways to both do things that you enjoy doing and make money from your work. And although they can help you get to your goals, jobs are temporary, so why not see them that way?

Don't start that job search until you consider what's actually important to you. You can then look at your employment options as the means to accomplish goals that have real meaning. As long as the process is approached in this way, jobs do have their advantages. The following are some ways to use a job in this way.

1. Jobs Buy Time

It's common to claim we don't have time - even for the people we care about, but this isn't true. No one else is deciding how you spend what time you have. If you really want to spend more time with loved ones or writing that novel, just stop using your job to buy nice clothes or new cars and use it to buy time instead. For starters (until you really learn how to use both time and money more creatively) set aside enough of that paycheck to take off a week and spend it how you want.

2. Jobs Create Money To Save For Goals

A job creates income, and some of that can be diverted into savings for future plans and goals. I personally used a good job to pay off my first home early. Then I quit the job. That bought me a lot of time to do the things I wanted to. Several of my past jobs were devoted to earning money for traveling. Your job can provide money to start a business or buy a cabin in the mountains.

3. Jobs Provide Business Training

It's common to think of a job as an end in itself, or a means to a better job sometime in the future. That's okay if you really love being an employee, but in many fields you can use a job as training for owning a business of your own. In businesses like carpet cleaning and restaurant management this is common. Learn the business from the inside, then start your own company with the training and education you got.

4. Jobs Let You Live In A Place

Suppose you want to be where the best skiing is, but can't afford more than a weekend there every year? What do you do? Why not get a job there? Ask a few bartenders and other employees in Aspen, Colorado how they moved there. You'll find that many came not for the job, but for the skiing opportunities - and the job was just the means to that end. Get a job in the Florida Keys if you want more time at the beach, or in another country if you want to learn a new language and culture.

5. Jobs Teach You Skills

Many jobs are good places to learn skills that will be useful to you later. Some join the military for this reason. You don't have to go to that extreme, but if, for example, you work as a tax preparer for one season, you could apply the knowledge and skills learned to all of your future business activities. Being a car salesman for a year might prepare you with the sales and negotiating skills to become a great real estate investor or business tycoon.

6. Jobs Pay The Bills

Although not an exciting use for a job, this is sometimes necessary. But unless you really love the job you get, make this temporary. Here's how: Keep in mind that whatever job you get, if you got one that paid a little less you still would have survived. that means you're making more than enough to save a bit and plan something else. Pay those bills then, but also put a little bit of every paycheck aside and start looking for ways to pursue more interesting goals. You can at least continue your job search after you are hired, until you take one more step up in income, and then save even more for what matters to you.

Use that job as the tool or temporary stepping stone that it is!

Read more »

The Best Jobs for the Future?

It may be that the best jobs for the future are not jobs in the traditional sense, but we’ll return to that idea in a moment. First, lets look at the idea that a job is the important thing. Is it? In what way. We might like to imagine that a good job can pay the bills forever, but job security is a thing of the past - if it ever really existed. Where you find your employment security now is not is a specific position, but in skills that will enable you to quickly replace any job lost or quit.

For example, if you are an actor, you might lose a job every few months - every time a movie or program you’re working on is finished. That’s okay if you are a good actor and know how to promote yourself. Another opportunity is always just around the corner. This has always been the way it works in Hollywood, but more and more it is true in other fields.

Consider how many computer programmers lost their jobs in the "dot com" crash of 2000. Of course, many of these same employees went on to bigger and better things, because they had the skills necessary, and made the contacts that opened up possibilities. Clearly, having the right skills and experience is more important than having a specific position in a specific company.

The best jobs for the future will be those that you will actually enjoy and are prepared for. Get to work on your resume and your skills and your self-marketing know-how.

Naturally, you’ll also want to aim for fields that are growing (avoid horse-shoeing and VCR repair). With a decent set of appropriate skills - including those of self-promotion, you will always find work.

But do you really want a job? I certainly don’t, and I haven’t had one in many years now. What I call my job is exactly what I am doing right now: writing off the top of my head as I sit here in my pajamas. My only boss is myself. My days and hours are of my choosing, and I can do my work from a beach in Mexico when I wish. The best jobs for the future, in other words, may be the ones that you create for yourself.

Read more »

A Few Creative Ways To Make Money

We were always looking for creative ways to make money when we were children. My brother collected golf balls from the bottom of a pond at the edge of a golf course, and sold them. I sold candy from a hollow book to classmates, and ran casino and carnival-style games for my brothers and friends. We collected driftwood, sea shells and other natural items, gluing them together to make artistic items that we sold for a few dollars.

But what creative ways to make money can we use as adults, to generate more than a few dollars? The following are some ideas that I have found in my research and from my own experience.

Carving Walking Sticks

This is one I have tried. Using trees cut near where I lived I made hundreds of walking sticks, some with gems inset on top, others with designs wood-burned into them. Most had handgrips made from strips of leather cut from used leather jackets I bought for a few dollars each. I spent a summer selling a couple hundred of these for prices ranging from four (wholesale) to twenty dollars.

Some artisans target the high-end of this market, with walking sticks that start at $40 or more. Those ones typically have more detailed carvings, and they sell best at art and craft shows (we sold mine mostly at flea markets - not the best place).

Selling The Moon

One company sells plots of land on the moon, and they get about $29 for a small lot, or more for larger parcels. Will the titles hold up legally in the future? Who knows, but customers get a deed they can display on their wall, and a map showing the precise location of their lunar property. This company has reportedly sold millions of dollars worth of these lots. Now that's a creative way to make money.

Old Clothes Made New

A few entrepreneurs out there are making old clothes into new ones. How? Start with used shirts and pants that are in good condition, then add ribbons, beads and other decorations to make them into something new. Dye them or splatter them with bleach to create patterns as well. The resulting artistic creations are sold at craft shows and online.

More Creative Ways To Make Money

( A few quick ideas)

- Have "foreclosure tours" for real estate investors, taking them on a tour of the latest foreclosed homes in town. (Since first writing this in 2007 I have seen this concept used in California.)

- Create a mobile recording studio in a van or panel truck. Take it from town to town and charge people to produce a CD of their singing, which they can buy for a novelty or to send out to agents and record labels.

- Make a mobile "pet photo" business that you run from the back of a van and charge people for photos of their pets taken in their home or yard - or against the backdrops in your mobile studio.

- Sell outdoor enclosures for indoor cats (we built our own 8-by-8-by-8 foot one for $110 in materials). These are sometimes called catteries or catiaries, and allow cats access through a cat door from inside.

- Create an article on creative ways to make money, then use it to promote a website where you make money off the advertising, as I first did with this article.

- Reuse the article as a page to generate more traffic (and revenue) for the site.

Read more »

Making Money Using What You Have

Sometimes you don't have to look very far to find new ways to make money. You can start making money using what you have. Consider carefully what you can do to profitably use the things you own, the situations you are in, and the skills you have. How can you make some money from these?

Some Money Making Possibilities

Renting Rooms

We've made tens of thousands of dollars over the years renting out bedrooms, even when we were living in a mobile home at the time. We charged a weekly rate that included all utilities, making it very convenient for students and single people. I've also known of people renting a spot in the yard to somebody to park their R.V. and live in it. I once converted a shed into a bedroom and rented that out too.

Rummage Sales

Find everything you don't need (maybe half of your possessions) and have a sale. We find it better to simply take it to a flea market. The fee for a spot is usually cheaper than an ad in the paper and you are guaranteed some customers if it's a good flea market. If you enjoy the process, you can start accumulating more stuff to do it all over again.

Closet Grocery Store

I used to make a little money running a "grocery store" out of two shelves in a living room closet. My room renters paid regular retail for cereal, soup, etc., which I would buy during half-price sales. Also, selling cold pop out of the refrigerator for 50 cents was a regular source of income for years.

Neighborhood Taxi Service

I used to pick up three or four fellow employees on the way to work at a charge of one dollar each way. Recently a neighbor paid us $30 to take her 12 miles because the cabbies here don't speak Spanish (I speak a little and my wife is from Ecuador). It may not be legal without a taxi license, but go ahead - I won't tell. There are regular newspaper ads in some areas of Ohio and Pennsylvania offering rides to the Amish residents, because most Amish will ride in cars but will not own or drive them.

Read more »

Make Money Finding Things

Treasure Hunting Begins At Home

Yes, you can make money finding things - if you know where to look and what to look for. There are many things you can find that can be sold. Gold and precious stones come to mind, but it doesn't end there. Get up into that attic to see what treasures you find, and then check out some of the more unusual ways to go treasure hunting below.

Hunting Diamonds In Parking Lots

The temperature changes your jewelry experiences getting in and out of cars and buildings cause diamonds to come loose from their settings. This makes parking lots one of the most common places that diamonds are lost. One older couple I read about become so good at telling the difference (from a distance!) between the sparkle of a diamond and bits of glass that they regularly take early morning walks in mall parking lots for a second income.

Treasure Hunting in The Desert

An older Native American we met at a hot spring in Arizona showed us how to find arrowheads and metates (using for grinding corn or mesquite beans) laying out in the desert. They are hundreds of years old. He has sold at least one of his metates for $200 during a yard sale. For non-Native Americans this may be illegal, so check with authorities on this one.

Hunting For Natural Treasures

We have sold sea shells that we collected from beaches in Florida, and giant pine cones from California. We've also sold a lot of rocks that we collected all over the country. We sell them at flea markets and craft shows, as is, or made into something crafty.

Treasure Hunting In The Garbage

In our town the city collects all large junk for free during a week in April or May. You'll see perfectly good bicycles, furniture, games, toys, chairs, etc., in piles in front of almost every house. At least several people come by with trucks and trailers to pick out good things to sell at flea markets or auctions. It is a regular source of income each spring for some of them. I'm sure this happens in other cities.

Treasure In Vacuum Cleaner Dust

A man in California offered to take the shag carpet when a large old theater was being remodeled, saving the new owners the cost of disposal. The theater had been closed for years, but during the thirties it was a place where the wealthy went for entertainment. The wealthy, like all of us, lose things, but more valuable things perhaps.

When the old carpet was cut up and carefully shook out, it was found to contain over $2,000 worth of precious stones, rings, and coins. Wondering what may be caught by vacuum cleaners, the man then arranged to take the full cleaner bags from several cleaning companies each week. It saves them disposal costs, and he regularly finds coins and small jewelry when he digs through the dirt.

Hunting Treasure With A Metal Detector

For less than $200 you can buy a metal detector and begin looking for buried treasure. I've only found about 200 coins myself (mostly at the beach), and none of them have been valuable ones. A woman in our town, however, used her detector to find coins when the city tore up the old sidewalks. She sold one of them to a local coin shop for $700. A woman I worked with tells me that her husband and her have found many pieces of gold jewelry at the beach with their detector. It is also common now to use metal detectors to find gold nuggets in the southwest.

Panning For Gold

For less than $10 you can buy a gold pan, and become a prospector. I like the dark-green plastic ones best, as it is easier to see the gold. Most federal lands are open to prospecting without a permit. The only place I've seen gold in my pan is in Canada (there isn't much gold in Michigan), but people have better luck panning for gold in the mountain streams of the southeast and southwest, and it is always a nice way to spend an afternoon in any case.

Treasure Hunting In The Streets

Maybe you've seen homeless people collecting cans to sell as aluminum scrap - tough way to make a living. In Michigan (and other states), however, there is a 10 cent deposit on every beverage can. During festivals I have seen people with bags full of hundreds of cans and bottles they collected in the parks and garbage containers. Some of them travel here every year during the Cherry Festival, just to collect returnable bottles and cans that week.

I also once spoke to a man who went to the big concerts in the area to collect all the beer and pop cans in the parking areas. He told me he can make over $100 in a few hours (plus the time to take them to the store). Collecting "returnables" can be a dirty, even embarrassing way to make money, but an old guy in town here tells me he pays the rent doing this.

Read more »

Unusual Jobs

Although unusual jobs can be a way to get out of a rut and make some money, they can also be fun. In the past I've worked as a repo-man (very fun) a investigative process-server (fun), and even handed out free samples in grocery stores (not so fun), among many other jobs I've had. Some examples of other odd jobs follow.

Wrinkle Chaser

A wrinkle chaser is the person that irons wrinkles from shoes as they are being made to ensure they are perfectly smooth when you buy them. he or she also inspects shoes or parts for inside or outside for wrinkles and other flaws.

Chicken Sexer

This is a real job title. A chicken sexer sorts through baby chicks to determine if they are male or female, and then segregate them. You may have seen Mike Rowe doing this on his "Dirty Jobs" television program (and it really is a dirty, stinky and disgusting job).

Citrus Fruit Colorer

A citrus fruit colorer, with the help of steam and chemicals, gives citrus fruit a more natural-looking coloring, because fruit is usually picked before it is fully ripe.

Celluloid Trimmer

A celluloid trimmer shaves down a golf club and then adds celluloid bands onto the golf clubs to make the leather grip stay in place.

Odor Judgers

Odor judgers get to smell armpits all day to help make deodorants that will work well. I'm not sure why somebody other than some strange fetishist would want this job, but we all have to pay the bills somehow.

Furniture Tester

Now here's a good one. The La-z-Boy Company (and probably others) employs furniture testers to check out their recliners. Want to relax for a living? Good luck getting one of these jobs though - I suspect there are less than a dozen such positions.
Cowpuncher

Cowpunchers herd, castrate and brand cattle. When you get bored castrating cattle, you get to repair fences, watering troughs and do other maintenance work on the ranch.

Alligator Wrangler

This is one of the more dangerous jobs, and probably not worth the pay, unless you get a T.V. show like the The Crocodile Hunter. There are two ways to get into the field. One is to wrestle and otherwise annoy alligators as entertainment at a tourist-based alligator farm. The other is to remove alligators from people's property when they become a nuisance.

Read more »