These Weird Side Hustles Actually Make Bank
16:15 Share

You've heard of all the usual side hustles like driving for Uber or mowing lawns, and they're definitely a solid way to make some extra cash. But I can pretty much guarantee you've never heard of some of the side hustles we're talking about today because we're going to go through a list of not the best, not the worst, but the weirdest side hustles out there. So if you're looking to make more money to reach your financial goals, stay tuned. And at the end, I'll tell you the best way to find your next side hustle.

And be sure to hit the like and subscribe buttons and share this with your weird friend. And if this video was shared with you, well, now you know. - I'm not weird, you're weird. You guys are being so weird. - Okay, so this article has 27 side hustles, but I'm not gonna read all of them. I'm just gonna pick some of my faves. I host trivia. It's a few nights a week for two and a half hours a night, 50 bucks each night, plus you get food and drinks.

It's pretty chill and I make about $500 a month. Hey, that adds up. I guess you're doing this like a lot. That's fun. I think trivia night's a good time. And the people who go to trivia nights, you probably can make some friends who also want to go to other trivia nights. Big brain thinking.

Genius. Let's go to the next one. I bake fruitcakes from scratch using pecans instead of walnuts and cream sherry in lieu of harsher liquors. I use a half pound of loaf. Okay, why are you going into so much? How much money are you making? Business is pretty good. I can do a few hundred dollars or more easily and still have folks clamoring for more. First of all, no one's ever clamored for a fruitcake. Where do you live that they're clamoring for fruitcake?

Are these children? Are they elderly people? No adult I've ever met is like, "Better be fruitcake at this party, bro." What can I say?

I like cake. Here's another one. One thing I did was a mock jury I found on Craigslist. Went to a law firm where they catered food, drinks, and snacks. Got paid 200 bucks plus travel fees for about three and a half hours of work. All right, let's do the math. 200 divided by three and a half. Five, 57. $57 an hour? Sign me up. That's a killer side hustle. And maybe they found the mock killer.

Did you see Jury Duty? Such a good show. That man is a national treasure. Always something crazy that comes up. This literally feels like reality TV. Next one. I worked as a victim for a military training drill. $100 a day, paid in cash. Little sketchy? We'll continue. If you did all three days of the exercise, you got an extra $25. You're coming back to my area in two months. Now, I don't know how long this takes because, you know, you factor this in. $100 divided by eight. That's

That's $12.50 an hour. I mean, you can go work retail and make more than that, but this one is unique and strange, and I hope you weren't actually injured. If it's a military training drill and you're a victim, what are they doing to you, man? So I'm a little bit meh on this one, although I will say it's the only time I can respect a victim mentality if you're making some dough off of it. I met a dude once who sold feeder roaches to Petco, PetSmart, etc. He was making $200,000 off of his garage.

It's just filled with roaches? And they're just breeding constantly? Just more, more roaches. Disgusting. I don't think there's a number that is worth it for me to live in a roach-infested house on purpose for money. And Petco, you're sick freaks. I don't know what you're doing with those roaches. I don't like it. Whatever it is. Feeding them to other...

Creatures? What eats roaches? Snakes? Do woodland animals eat roaches? I don't know. Here's a good one. I have a flea market booth. Most lucrative part is freeze-dried candy I buy from a local business. Buy in bulk, 100% markup, so they're doubling the price, and I still sell a crap load of candy. All right, hey, I feel like people at a flea market are excited to get ripped off for the pleasure. You know, they're just like, ooh, thanks.

They have the freeze-dried candy here. You can just buy it at a normal store, but when you're at a flea market, you're like, I'll pay $17 for that even though I could buy it for $8. What a deal. You're doing it for the gram. Let's be honest. That's why you're going to the flea market. But wait, there's more. I watch for class action lawsuits and join when I qualify. I've made a few hundred the past couple of years, but my main motivation is how tickled my husband gets when a random check arrives.

I'm always looking for ways to impress him. LOL. Are you okay? You're always looking for ways to impress him? This marriage is just hanging on by a class action thread. I want you to know that. Boom. Roasted. But yeah, this one...

I don't think the juice is worth the squeeze on this one. It takes months and months and months and months for one of these claims to actually come through and for you to get a measly check because there's a million other bozos who also wanted their measly check. But hey, good for you. Glad you're okay. You survived whatever ailed you from this class action lawsuit. Next up, I teach English online, basically just chat with people. That feels like the opposite of just teaching. I feel like teaching, you should teach, not just talk.

Okay, one of them's a kid where we do a 50-50 reading and watch Pokemon and Godzilla? So I get paid minimum wage to watch Pokemon and old Godzilla? No. No. This isn't worth it. This is a weird th- You're just hanging out with kids on the internet watching Pokemon? I don't understand how this is even a real job. There's no way you keep this job after they find out you've just been watching Godzilla movies. They can do that on their own, without you there. The point is you're actually-

helping to teach, not just being a buddy. It's not a pen pal where you watch movies, although that I would sign up for. Movie pal. I'm telling you, it's a million dollar idea. My partner and I did valet for college football games. We got paid hourly, about 11 bucks an hour at the time, but the tips at the end made it worth it. Okay, valet for college football. That feels a little bit chaotic, but I do love, I gotta respect the hustle.

of a valet. Those folks are not fooling around. All right, they are aware. They got like the moisture wicking shirts. They are ready to go. And if you can drive a car safely, don't enter my vehicle. I think this is a great one. And you can make good money with tips if people are doing it right. Be generous. Tip your valet folks. This one I immediately regret.

I crochet and sell dolls. And if that's a photo of the actual dolls, I can't imagine anyone's buying. The blue hair one's really throwing me off, but I guess if, hey, if that's what you're into, you got bigger problems. You know what I mean? If you're out there buying crochet dolls as an adult, issues. As a kid, adorable. But how do you have an Etsy account, child?

Is mom doing this for you? Here we go. I pet sit for people in my building, mostly doctors. Three doctors and some elderly couples. It's great for my dogs to play and have dogs over, take them to the park, on walks. Some people charge 80 a night. That's what my pet sitter charges me, but they give me 40. Plus they bring me a little knick-knack from wherever they travel to. That's the perk you're excited about is the knick-knack?

It's the thing I immediately throw away. If anyone gives me a knick-knack from anywhere they went, I don't want it. Get it out of here. How'd you get that through customs? I'm going to give you your gift anyway. You don't deserve it. My bigger question is, you know some people charge $80, and you're charging half of that? And these are doctors. I would up your prices, but...

I will say this is one of my favorite side hustles of all time if you like animals. Pet sitting, pet walking, you can do this in your own neighborhood and you can do it on your own schedule a lot of the time. So definitely want to check out Charge More. Not that weird, but I model for art classes. I have a full-time job, but I usually do classes a month and get paid in cash, which is nice. How many classes? You do classes a month? Is it one or seven? More detail would have been helpful here.

But you get paid in cash, which is nice. I'm going to say this one is, it actually is a little weird to model for an art class. It would be uncomfortable for me personally because I'm self-conscious. But hey, if you're clothed, I think that helps. Fair point.

Moving on from that visual, you know what else is weird? That you're fine with leaving money on the table by keeping your savings in a normal, pathetic, low-interest savings account with some brick-and-mortar bank. Because instead, you could be earning top-tier rates with a high-yield savings account from Laurel Road, one of the sponsors of today's episode. With Laurel Road, you could be earning top-tier rates with a high-yield savings account from Laurel Road, one of the sponsors of today's episode.

With Laurel Road, there's no minimum deposit, there's no fees, and your savings are FDIC-insured. And if you're ever craving human connection, which I often do, they have real-life people on their premium care team that are ready to help. Although I sometimes just call just to say hello. Get started today by going to laurelroad.com slash george or click the link in the description below. And while you're out there hustling and juggling all these odd jobs to make some extra cash, you probably don't have time to deal with scammers and spammers.

And that's where DeleteMe comes in, another sponsor of today's episode. They do the hard work for you to clean up your digital footprint and give you peace of mind. They'll send you a report showing you where they found and removed your info and how much time they've saved you. So far, I'm at 77 hours of time saved, beat my record. And they've cleaned my info from 250 data broker sites. So if you're tired of your phone blowing up with texts and robocalls and spam emails, you can get 20% off by going to joindeleteme.com slash george or click the link in the description.

Back to the list. I sell items I find in the alley. Yeah, that would definitely fall into the category of weird. Really nice stuff. I have a Poshmark inventory. Over 450 items have sold well over a thousand. No one would ever guess where this stuff came from. I'm going to guess now. I'm going to make sure I never shop from you, man. What? You just found it in an alley? There's 14,000 questions I have before I buy something.

That's fair.

Here we go. I had an Etsy shop reselling vintage and antique cast iron cookware that I would find in rusty condition and restore to be collected or used again. Great little side gig at the time. I enjoyed it. I like this one because you're taking something that you already enjoy doing, you're finding a way to do something that other people are maybe too lazy to do, and you're also restoring something back to its former glory. And for that...

I commend you. Great job. Here we go. I knew there was going to be a DJ in here somewhere. I DJ weddings and provide light shows for bands coming through town. That's a good one. It started off just as a hobby and a spread through word of mouth. People pay so much money for DJs and bands for weddings that it makes my charge of $100 an hour look really cheap. That's a good deal for a DJ. I mean, you know, five hours at the party is $500. I'll hire you. Although, I don't know if this is you in the photo. You look like a good time. Does that guy work with you or is he a...

Is it the one attendee of the wedding? I don't know what's going on here, but rock on, my friend. And I like what he's doing here. He not only DJs weddings, which might be a more seasonal gig, harder to find clients. He also provides light shows because he has the right equipment and the know-how. And he does this for music gigs coming through town. So get creative and find other ways you can use that skill set to do even more.

Love it. This one says, Rev, you can transcribe the audio that you hear and it can be anything from police body cam to talks about blueberry fields. All right? You can make decent money if you grind it, you get graded, you don't want to get too many bad marks, et cetera, et cetera. I don't know how much money they're making. I have heard that Rev...

While an okay side hustle doesn't make a lot of money. So I think to their point, you've got to really be grinding and have a high grade and make no mistakes. So if you're like Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, like you really are going for it, I think you can make some decent... doing this. This one already started weird. Oh, okay. Okay.

Okay, thought he was like watching people. Different. Not a creep. Digital creep. People are always looking for random help. Last weekend, I made 25 bucks by going to a lady's house and clipping her cat's toenails. Hey, someone's got to do it. Did you even know how to do this? Did you have cat toenail clippers already? More questions than answers on this one. But this one is true. In my neighborhood Facebook group, I often see people saying, hey, can you come...

Pull the weeds out for 50 bucks or clean the dog poop out of the backyard for 25 bucks. And a lot of people will jump in there, especially teenagers, kids that are home from college and

and anyone who wants to make some extra money. So I like the resourcefulness here. Don't love cat toenails. Not a fan. Back in college, I put together furniture 80% of the time for older folks who ordered flat pack furniture and couldn't put it together themselves. I enjoyed the puzzle of putting together IKEA furniture. Usually had an interesting conversation or two with the older generation. This one's twofold. What they're really paying for is human connection. Okay, elderly people can be lonely.

And so I love that, number one, you're helping them do something they couldn't do on their own. And number two, you're having some great conversation with them. So big fan of this one. I don't know what you get paid for this. I imagine it's not crazy, but I feel like you should get paid $50 to $100 for putting a piece of IKEA furniture together. That feels worth it.

Here's another one. Not super odd, but I sharpen knives and tools to supplement my income. Startup costs are pretty low. Making anywhere from a couple hundred to about a thousand a month, depending on how much I'm working at it. That's a good one. I mean, there's a lot of things people want sharpened. Lawnmower blades, shears, chisels. So I feel like this is a good one because a lot of people may not have the tools to do this.

Don't want to do it themselves, me included. So yeah, I'll support this small business. Love it. This person lives in Kansas City. Soccer's kind of big here, all right? And they referee on weekends, making about 30 bucks an hour. So good. If you're a sports lover, go ahead and do some ref work. I'd love to. Put me in one of those. Let me get the whistle. I would be fouling everybody. I'm a snitch, man. I'm a narc.

I will catch you double dribbling, my man. Yeah, no matter the sport, I'm not a fan of double dribbling. You get a single dribble, single dip into the guac. Don't be double anything. It's gross. As I said, I cool it like I see it. Had a plumbing backup. Needed someone with a snake to clear the line. Is that a euphemism? You should see a gastroenterologist for that. That's just sick.

But assuming it's actually plumbing related. Looked on Craigslist, everyone was charging 99 bucks for the snaking. One guy advertised for 69 bucks, called him, he came, had my line clear in 20 minutes, got to talking, yada, yada, yada, write a novel about it, all right? He bought a used electrical plumbing snake for 400 bucks. He was instantly busy with snake jobs, his price was the lowest. So he undercut the competition, making 400 bucks a day, and he was working seven days a week.

Now that is impressive. There is some big money in the trades. So if you're willing to get your hands dirty, literally, this is a great field to jump into. And last but not least, there's a huge group fitness instructor shortage and some studios or gyms will train you in spinner Pilates in hopes that you'll bring in money. I paid for my yoga teacher training, made the money back fivefold in a year, and I'm going to skip the expletives.

There was no need for that. No need for that. Teach 10 hours a week, not including desk time, and clean up on top of my full-time job. Good chunk of change to basically get paid to exercise. That's the part I never think about. These instructors never have to work out because they're always working out and getting paid for it. And I'm the idiot over here paying to get a workout in. Maybe I should be a yoga instructor. Breathe out the target return you forgot to do. See, it's not that hard. It's not that hard, Amber. I'm going to forgive you.

because I'm a very zen person. - So there you go. There are so many ways to make extra cash and this list probably gave you a good idea or a bad idea for how you can make a buck. But here's the deal. If you're willing to get creative and put in the effort, the possibilities are endless. And if you still don't know where to start, I've got a super helpful side hustle quiz to help you figure it out. It's completely free and I'll drop a link below in the description. And while making more money is great, it's only half the equation when it comes to creating some margin with your money. The other half is finding ways

to spend less. And trust me, you can get weird with that too. So if you want some creative ideas on how to cut back, keep watching this next video on the 17 things frugal people refuse to buy. And I'm telling you, number 16 will preach. I'll also drop a link in the description below. Thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.