Side Hustle Income Report, March 2017 – $515.52

Putting your income on blast for the whole world to see? Seems crazy, but I love reading other bloggers’ income reports. It feels like a permissible form of snooping. To pay it back to the universe for my nosiness, I thought I’d throw my own hat into the ring. My focus for these income reports, however, is not my actual income but just side hustle income – that is, money I make outside of my day job.

I rather think I’d be all right with the title Queen of Side Hustles. I’ve got eggs in every basket, and I attribute that methodology to some of my success.

Click here to read through all of my side hustle income reports.

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Face Painting Income: $320

This is on the low end for me, but I had a slew of gigs at the end of February and a few scheduled for April that I’m not factoring in. Also, I charged less than my normal rate for one of my gigs, as it was a favor for a friend and my former employers.

Dog Walking & Sitting Income: $113

$83 of it was through Rover.com, and $30 was from a local agency.

This was the first month I’ve had any activity from Rover.com. I’m also on DogVacay.com and have had no hits – I wrote this draft before March 29th, when Rover and DogVacay merged! Exciting. Maybe that will mean more business for me?

(UPDATE: I don’t know if it has to do with the merge or just the natural progression of things, but I’ve definitely seen an uptick in requests and income via Rover.com. Check out some of my other income reports.)

House sitting is amazing. Hanging out in someone else’s clean house by myself with their puppies, food, and internet? Hell yes. So far, my new best friends are a goldendoodle, a French bulldog, and two Australian cattle dogs.

Want to make some side hustle cash of your own as a dog sitter? Sign up here with Rover.com to be a sitter/dog-walker in your city and get hustling.

Bartending Income: $50

I was trawling through Craiglist one day and saw a job listing for part-time bartending with a local catering company. I thought, “Hm. Why not?” I’d sometimes played the role of bar server on the cruise ship, if that counts toward ‘having experience’. Fast forward three weeks, and I’ve got the gig, got my TIPS certification, and have finished their onsite training sessions! I haven’t picked up any shifts yet, but I’ve made $50 compensation for the training sessions.

Content Mill Income: $16

I didn’t even know what a content mill was before this month – for those of you who dont know, it’s a marketplace where clients will place open orders for content they’d like written, and you as the author can pick it up and fulfill that order for them.

I dabble with freelance writing here and there, but clients can be few and far between if you don’t treat ‘marketing and advertising your services’ as a full-time job (which I certainly don’t). The idea of selecting from a pool of writing assignments, taking what you want, and be assured that you’ll actually get paid is enticing.

I’ve made $16 from content mill writing this month. To be honest, it was kind of a grind – the price per word that you start off with for most of these mills is abysmal, but there’s the promise of, “Increase your author rating with enough positive feedback and get paid a higher price per word!” That’s reason enough for me to knock out a few assignments here and there. Plus, it’s something to do when I’m not working, face-painting, dog-sitting, or bartending.

Investment Income: $16.49

I’ve made about $1 in interest from my LendingClub.com investments. I’ve made $15.49 from Vanguard investments.

Blog Income: $0.03

 

Last but not and least, I’ve made a tidy $0.03 from the blog this month. The idea that I’ve made money off of something I created is a rather amazing feeling; I will take those three pennies straight to the bank and proudly!

Mystery Shopping Income: food

No extra income, but this month I did a mystery shop at a casual-dining restaurant chain that you’ve heard of (if you’re American). I took a friend, we ate enough food for five people, had some beers, and I was reimbursed for the $36 I spent.

Grand Total: $515.52* and a free dinner.

*Not too shabby, except this doesn’t take into account taxes and other money I’ve invested into these side-hustles (face-painting, mainly). But, still, it’s nice to have the extra income for a few extra hours of doing things I enjoy.

Upcoming Side Hustles

A few face-painting gigs, two separate five-night house-sits, a mystery shop to a retail store and one to a new movie theater, and bartending shifts & writing assignments as available. I’m definitely keeping busy!

April Goals:

• I’ve been a little lazy with my face-painting business this month. Time to take my own advice from a previous post and get hustling!
• Raise my rates for dog-walking and house-sitting; my rates are currently low because I have fewer reviews than the average dog-walker on Rover.com, and I also live in a small town–there’s really not much demand. But, I now have a few five-star reviews under my belt, and I’m moving to ‘the big city’ at the end of April, so I think that will help. Also, once I move, I’ll be able to start offering overnight dog stays at my home! That’s a ‘May’ goal, however, and we’ll put a pin in that.
• I’ll try and hustle a little harder with the content mills to get a little more pocket change.

What do you think? Any suggestions for other streams of side hustle income? How did you earn some pocket change this month?

 

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