Extra Money

I have noticed that the number of comments left on this blog has dropped off recently.  This is probably because I have not been very active lately in the Today.com community. To try to rectify this situation I am instituting a new policy.  The policy is that if you leave a comment on this post I will visit your blog and leave a comment on one of your posts.  I will try to continue this policy as long as it does not take up an inordinate amount of time.   This should work well for both of us.  I’ll receive more feedback and be exposed to more blogs and you will have more activity on your site as well.

Also I am planning on putting together a bookmark list of Today.com blogs that have the Entrecard on them.  If you have a Today.com blog with an Entrecard on it please leave a comment so I can add it to my bookmark list.  I will not be able to drop on this list every day but I hope to do so at least a couple times a week.   Thanks.

There are many ways to make extra money by selling stuff.  In this part of the series on selling stuff we will concentrate on making extra money by selling stuff on eBay.

There is a good chance you have already sold stuff on eBay before because it is the largest online marketplace of its kind.  It has made it possible to sell all kinds of stuff that would have been difficult to find a market for before.  In this post I’ll give you a brief overview of how to get started selling on eBay.  Perhaps later I will write a separate series on making extra money by selling on eBay.  There is a lot to be written on this subject.

To get started you should open an eBay and PayPal account if you haven’t already.  This is very easy to do.  Then you need to make an inventory of what you have around the house you can sell.  Then research what those items sell for on eBay.  It is helpful to look at the completed auctions listing to get a good idea of what your items are worth.

Then create a listing for your product and put it up for auction.  Make sure you give a detailed listing and include a picture.  During your research you should have noted what similar products that sold for a higher than average price included in their description and how it was listed.  Now you can use that information in your listing.  Don’t copy from another listing but just use it as a guide.

If you’ve done your research you shouldn’t have any problems selling your items.  Receiving payment and shipping items is simple and you shouldn’t have any difficulty with doing that.  Now all you have to do is keep listing your items until they are sold.

Of course there are some drawbacks to listing on eBay such as the high fees.  In the next part of this series we will look at some alternatives to eBay for selling stuff.

One of the most common ways to make extra money is to sell stuff.  There are many different ways to make money by selling stuff. You probably have already made money by selling stuff at some point in your lifetime whether you looked at it as a potential source of extra money or not.  This will always be alternative income but if whatever you are selling is recurring- such as a monthly subscription - then there could be a passive income component as well.  To keep things simple we will only focus on the alternative income element for now.  I might do a post on the passive income element in the future.

As I said there are many different ways to make money by selling things and there are also a variety of places to sell your stuff.  Over the next few days I will go into more detail on the ways to sell stuff and the places available to sell your stuff.  Odds are that one or more of these will be a good way for you to make extra money.  If there are any specific ways that you would like me to post about leave a comment and I will try to do a post on it. Thanks.

This is a continuation of my series on how you can make extra money working at home.  Yesterday, I detailed how you can make money working at home if you can find companies that offer legitimate jobs.  Today, I will tell you some companies that offer legitimate work at home jobs.

The work at home jobs I will let you know about today involve answering calls in your home.  You will basically be working at a home based call center for companies that have outsourced their order taking, customer service and/or sales calls.  This allows the companies to save money over what it would cost to have an in-house call center and allows you to make money working at home.

The benefits to working at home are obvious but there are some drawbacks to working for these companies as well.  The pay is fairly low, about $8 an hour is common, you often need to have  a dedicated phone line for answering calls, and you only get paid for the time you are actually talking on the phone.  Still the appeal of working at home might be enough for you to overlook these drawbacks.  Some companies that hire for work at home are Alpine Access, Arise, LiveOps, and WestatHome.  I don’t have any personal experience with any of them.  I’d be interested in feedback from anyone who has worked for one of these companies.

Working from your own home is a good way to make extra money.  I do exclude most jobs from my ways to make extra money but a job working at home is an exception.  This is because it provides you with much more flexibility than a typical nine to five type job.

There did not used to be many legitimate work at home jobs available.  That has changed though with the spread of computers and high-speed internet access. Now there are many different companies that will pay you to work for them in your own home.

This is alternative income rather than passive income because you have to work for the money you earn.  Once you stop working the income will stop as well.

The main problem with work at home jobs is finding a legitimate one.  There are lots of scam companies out there but there are legitimate work at home companies also.  Tomorrow I will tell you about some of the good work at home companies that you might be able to work for at home.

I hope everyone is having a Merry Christmas.  Or did have if you’re reading this after Christmas.  I am going to enjoy taking the day off.  You can’t be focused on making extra money every day.  Although if I receive more in Christmas presents than I give I guess that would be like making extra money.  I am just kidding about that.  Don’t take me too seriously.  I will be back tomorrow with more ideas on making extra money.  I am sure many people will be needing extra money after spending too much over the holidays.  I hope I can help.

Another way to make extra money is to get paid for putting ads on your car.  There are several companies that will pay you to do this but it isn’t easy to be chosen to have ads on your car.  Being chosen depends on where you live, what kind of car you drive, and your driving habits among other factors.  If you are chosen you could be paid up to $900 a month for having your car wrapped with an ad.

You do have to deal with several restrictions also if you are chosen to have ads on your car.  You have to refrain from behavior that would reflect badly on the  advertising company.  For example, you would need to refrain from swearing or littering in your car and not park in front of certain types of businesses.

Even with these restrictions this is an easy way to make some passive income if you’re lucky enough to be chosen.  Check out FreeCarMedia for more details.

A unique way to make extra money is by being a guide for ChaCha .  ChaCha is a company that allows people to call or text them with questions and they provide the answer.  Your job as a guide would be to provide the answers.

Working as a guide for ChaCha would be a form of alternative income because it is actual work.  It is different from a normal job though because you have flexibility on when or even if you are going to work.  You work at home from your own computer using software downloaded from the ChaCha site.  Since you are not an employee you can work when you like.

The main drawback to working as a guide is that you don’t make very much money.  I tried it for a while and it was clear that I wasn’t going to even make minimum wage.  If you are more skilled and efficient you could make about $9 an hour or more.  Check out the FAQ’s at the ChaCha website if you would like to learn more.

This is not a way to make extra money because it is actually just getting your own money returned to you.  I think it is worth posting about though because it is possible readers of this blog have a tidy sum coming to them they don’t even know about.

Most states have a website where you can search and find if you have any unclaimed money that is due you.  These are typically forgotten bank accounts, utility deposits, insurance policies, etc.  A great, free site that lets you search for money from many states is MissingMoney.com.

I used the site last year and found $13 that was due me from a canceled credit card account.  How they couldn’t find me to return the money when they always had my address I don’t know.  After filling out a simple form I received a check from the State for my money.  It wasn’t much but for about 10 minutes of time it was worth it.  Go ahead and do a search, you might find some money.

As I stated yesterday I will now tell you how to make passive income with GPT sites.  This can be a great way to make a little extra money and it takes very little effort.

Most of these sites have referral programs that will pay you a percentage of your referral’s income.  Some of these will even pay you on the referrals of your referrals.  This gives you a potential to make significant passive income.  If you have a blog you can use it to promote your referral links and generate passive income. (You can’t promote on your Today.com blog though because that is against the terms and conditions.)

There are a lot of different GPT sites out there.  I have not used any lately so I can’t vouch for the dependability of any certain sites.  I used to use CashDuck and it worked well for me but I haven’t used it lately.  A couple of sites that seem to be popular are Cash Crate and Treasure Trooper.  I haven’t used either one of them though so I can’t vouch for them.  If you have any GPT sites that you’d like to recommend, please leave a comment.