5 Legitimate Ways to Make an Extra $1,000 Per Month

With countless ways out there to make extra money, it can be hard to know which ways are actually worth pursuing to help you with your particular financial goal.

Maybe you’re tired of being in debt, having little money left over each month, or struggling to make ends meet from paycheck to paycheck. Maybe you’re ready to save and invest more and take your finances to the next level, but you’re being held back by the limited income from your day job.

Whatever your motivation is for earning extra money, there are many different ways to earn extra money especially from home, but you need to watch out for the scams and misleading information.

In this post, I’m going to give it to you straight and provide proof because I know you can earn $1,000 extra each month by doing these 5 things. All these ideas are legitimate but I do want to clear up any misconceptions about side hustling and making money flexibly to make sure expectations are realistic.

Plus, I’m going to tell you exactly how to get started because talk is cheap. I’m so excited to share these realistic ideas with you so let’s get started.

Table of Contents

1. Freelance Writing

For those who read my blog, this should come as no surprise that freelance writing is #1 on this list. Freelance writing is one of the best ways to earn money online because you can set your own hours, choose your clients, and charge what you’re worth.

Freelance writers also tend to earn more than traditionally employed writers. As a freelance writer, you can work in whatever niche you please whether it’s finance, travel, higher education, parenting, fashion, etc.

Whatever you have an interest in, you can write about it and use your experience and research to enhance your articles.

I work full time as a freelance writer and mainly write about personal finance and small business topics. I write articles from 500-words to 1,500-words on average and earn anywhere from $60 – $400 per article.

As a freelance writer, I’d recommend you set your starting rate at no lower than $50 per post. At $50 per post, you’ll need to write 5 posts per week to earn $1,000 per month. You can also set your rate at $100 per post and only do 2-3 articles per week to earn $1,000 per month.

From Jan – March of 2017, I earned more than $14,000 from freelance writing alone so there is plenty of potential to earn more than $1,000 per month.

How to Become a Freelance Writer:

To start earning money as a freelance writer, you’ll need to find clients who can hire you as a regular staff writer meaning you’ll get ongoing assignments.

I’m a weekly staff writer for a few sites and it’s great because I get consistent work and can better estimate how much I’m going to earn each month.

To find clients if you’re just starting out and don’t have any connections, you’ll need to send a pitch which is a few sentences about yourself and how your services will help the client.

If you need help developing your freelance writing side hustle or career, I created a 6-week course that dives deep into how to become a successful freelance writer from scratch and get paying client work regularly,

Freedom With Freelance Writing is a course that can help you become a top writer in your niche and scale up your freelance writing business. I recommend this course if you’re serious about earning extra money or even turning freelance writing into a full-time job.

I share all of the things that helped me grow my freelance writing career to help you to do the same by avoiding pitfalls that commonly show up for new freelance writers.

If you’re ready to learn how to:

Make the mindset shift from employee to a successful business owner
Choose a profitable writing niche and become a self-proclaimed expert in it
Quickly build your portfolio and showcase your work to prospect
Find your dream writing clients
Network with other writers and clients to get more referrals
Solidify your brand
Structure your business legally as a home-based business
Price your services for profit
And more!

You can learn more about the course here.

Want to give it a try on your own?

I wrote quite a few blog posts about becoming a freelancer writer that you can start with to guide you.

You can also check out my website here and my YouTube channel for more tips.

2. Virtual Assistant Work

Virtual assistants have become a growing need as more and more businesses obtain websites and operate solely or partially online.

A virtual assistant (VA) is an online work-from-home personal assistant who helps businesses and individuals manage a number of various different tasks.

Some of those tasks include (but are not limited to things like):

Social Media Management
Blog Management
Editing/Creating Images for Pinterest
Organizing and Responding to Emails
Book Speaking Engagements
Sending Out Invoices
Responding to Comments on Articles
Negotiating with Advertisers
Scheduling Blog Posts
Updating Old Blog Posts
Scheduling Meetings
Data Entry Work
Managing Online Shopping Carts
Online Research
Scheduling Newsletters
Updating Websites
Live Chat Support

As a virtual assistant, you can also set your own rates and choose your clients or you could get hired by a company to work. There is no special training or certifications required to become a virtual assistant and according to PayScale, you can start out earning anywhere from $15 per hour to $30 per hour.

My friend Kayla Sloan earns thousands per month as a VA and you can check out one of her income reports here from when her business really started taking off.

How to Become a Virtual Assistant:

If you’re ready to become a virtual assistant, I wrote this blog post that will show you exactly how to get started.

How to Become a Virtual Assistant

Also, check out this interview with a real virtual assistant who’s earning around $1,500 per month. It’s a great over the shoulder look into what being a virtual assistant is about, types of work you can do, and hurdles to look out for. You’ll also learn from her advice for those wanting to start their virtual assistant journey and much more.

Lastly, a really fun and profitable niche within the VA world is Pinterest virtual assisting and it’s well worth looking into if you want to become a VA. Learn more about that niche here.

3. Making Dog Treats

If you’re looking for a way to earn extra money that is fun and can be both online and offline, starting a dog treat business is a great option to help you earn $500-$1,000+ per month.

My friend Kristin Larsen started her own boutique dog treat when she was in college. When she was laid off from her 9-5 during the Great Recession she quickly scaled her bakery to a full-time business.

She was soon bringing in hundreds of dollars from in person events on Saturdays and she was consistently selling her treats every day through her Etsy shop. Soon news spread about her bakery and she was featured in print magazines and online press, and she was even invited by the Emmy Awards to gift her dog treats in the swag bags.

A common misconception about making dog treats is that you have to have baking experience however there are many simple recipes and easy to follow directions to remove that barrier.

How to Become a Dog Treats Bakery Owner:

Becoming a dog treats bakery owner is easy with Kristin’s step-by-step course, Diva Dog Bakery, which is designed to teach you everything you need to know to launch a profitable dog treat business.

If you want to learn more before diving in, check out her free workshop that shares:

Why the homemade dog treat business is HOT and getting hotter every year
How to turn a dog treat bakery business into a side hustle pulling $500-$1,000 per month, or how to scale it into a 5-figure/year business
The best places to start a dog treat business, online or offline
How to price and sell your treats
And more

You can sign up for the free workshop here.

4. Babysitting/ Pet Sitting

I’m sure you’ve heard of these classic and popular ways to earn extra money. They’re classic because they really work.You can easily earn $1,000 per month by babysitting, pet sitting and walking dogs, or by doing a combination of all three.

As a parent, I know how expensive childcare can be so don’t underestimate the need for this quality and important service. If you like kids, you can start out by charging at least $10 per hour to babysit and you could probably demand more if you’re available during peak hours like evenings and weekends when daycares aren’t open.

You can also offer special services for ‘date nights’ for parents who wish to get a night away. For $45 you can include babysitting, a healthy snack, storytime, and a fun activity with the kids. After school and before school care is also a major need.

My sister who’s in college picked up a nanny gig before school hours to earn extra money. She gets up early and heads over to the family’s house, then she helps get the kids off to school safely. If kids aren’t your thing or if you’re simply interested in diversifying your income sources, consider pet sitting and dog walking.

You can earn an average of $10 per dog that you walk and around $30 per night for pet sitting. Pet sitting could be very lucrative if you’re able to attract clients who travel a lot for work or are taking a vacation during the summer which is the busiest travel season.

If you babysit 15-20 hours per week and pet sit or walk dogs for a few hours, you could easily earn $1,000 per month.

How to become a babysitter/pet sitter/ dog walker for hire:

You can always start by asking around your neighborhood and advertising but most people are searching for these services online so you’ll need to create a detailed online profile to get more clients.

5. Blogging

The final extra income idea in this guide is blogging. Blogging is not for everyone, but if you have a topic you’d like to blog about and are willing to lay the correct foundation, you’ll have plenty of options when it comes to monetizing your blog so you can earn money.

If you’re skeptical about blogging as a legitimate income stream, I definitely understand. Before I became a blogger myself, I would have been skeptical if someone told me I could earn $1,000 per month or more from a measly old blog.

The main misconception is that blogging for a hobby is not the same as blogging as a business.

If you start a blog, you can’t expect to write about your pets and your kids and automatically start making money. You have to take certain steps to monetize your blog like place ads on your site, work with sponsors, sell products etc.

It can be really fun, but it’s a lot of work and takes time to build things from the ground up so please don’t get under the impression that blogging will provide you with an instant income.

Yet and still, for the right person, it’s worth it to start a blog in my opinion because you can work on it on the side of your main job and earn a flexible extra income that could potentially be passive.

Blogging is a legitimate job that requires lots of work, writing and communication skills. However, the payoff can be HUGE. It’s rewarding and can become a consistent source of income.

Here are a few more posts that can share a bit more before dipping your feet in the blogging pool:

How to become a professional blogger:

If you’re interested in starting a blog that makes money on the side or just want to learn more about the possibilities or making money from a blog to see if it’s right for you, I’d highly recommend signing up for my free blogging course which is called How to Start a Successful Money-Making Blog in 10 Days.

This free course will teach you everything you need to know about how to choose a topic for your blog and set everything up, how to get people to start reading your blog, along with the best monetization strategies to help you start earning money sooner.

You can learn more about it here.

Summary

There you have it. 5 real and proven ways to earn an extra $1,000 per month. Now that you know how to give yourself at least a $12,000 annual raise, it’s time to take action and get started with one of these side hustles.

Think about what you could do with an extra $1,000 each month and let that motivate you. If you have any questions about earning extra money, you can always email me or check out this post for additional ideas.

How are you earning extra money?

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5 Legitimate Ways to Make an Extra $1,000 Per Month