College Students Earning Extra Income
It is quite easy for you as a college student to earn extra money while you go to college full-time. Yes, even if you work full time or part-time. Earn extra by doing something you love. It’s very self-satisfying. In other words, it’s extremely easy for college students to earn extra money.
Earning Extra Income Potentials in Dallas, TX
Do I really need to earn extra money? Asked no one ever! Who doesn’t need extra mullah? While the task of taking on one more thing may sound terrifying, it doesn’t have to be. My biggest tip is to find your niche and go for it. You may have to try a few things out just to get the feel of them. Eventually, you will find your niche.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, 52.4% of college students work in the state of Texas. These working students are enrolled in a 2 to 4-year college and work on average 27 hours per week. They are earning on average only $14,000 per year. Roughly 39% of college students agreed that working while going to college helped them to take their education more seriously.
Edit, Proofread or Write Student Papers
Do you catch yourself wanting to correct every meme’s grammar mistakes? You have an eye for grammar errors? Sell your skills! Edit and proofread student papers. Put up flyers on campus, college student hangouts and on social media platforms to advertise your expertise.
Real Estate
Ever thought about buying a house? Renting out rooms? Or a couch for that matter?
Renting a room can be a done as a long term or short term. If you want to pick and choose when you have a guest, then set your room up to be rented out as an Airbnb. List your room on the website Airbnb.
Here you can select who your rent to, how much you are going to charge and when you want a guest. You can make, after fees, approximately $25 per night on average. Of course, location, location, location, the closer you are to the hubbub of downtown Dallas, the more you can charge per night. Hosting laws vary from town to town, or city to city; know your laws.
However, if you want someone long term then rent out your room to a roommate. It’s expensive living alone. Cut your cost of monthly bills by renting out your empty rooms. Whether you own your home or rent an apartment, a roommate or two can help make life a lot less financially stressful. The amount of rent you can charge should depend on how big the room is.
Let’s say you have a large room with an attached bathroom, you can charge from 1/3 to 1/2 of your monthly housing/apartment cost. If you have a smaller bedroom with no bathroom attached and they must travel down the hall to a shared bathroom, then you can charge 1/4 to 1/2 of your monthly housing/apartment cost. Keep in mind that most of the house is shared space.
Run Errands, Commute, Delivery Services
From the largest city to the smallest rural town, someone needs help. Whether you drive them somewhere, run their errands, go to the grocery store to pick up items needed or deliver food to them, people have things that need to be done that they may not be able to do themselves. There are multiple reasons why people need other people’s help especially the elderly and the disabled. Most of the time, these people are willing to pay a small fee in exchange for your services.
Uber offers commuting services. Compete 150 services in 90 days and earn $1,000. They offer 5 services in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for riders. As a driver, you can earn as little as $5.00 or up to $50 per hour. The hourly wage depends on how many people you are servicing, and the miles driven per hour.
Doordash offers delivery services in Dallas, TX. As a driver, you’ll receive $6 up to $17 per hour based on an average of 5 deliveries during that hour; add to that possible tips of 10-15% your clients purchase.
Postmates offers grocery deliveries. With Postmates you can average about 2 deliveries an hour depending on the number of items requested and driving time and distance. If you take the time to map it out and push two buggies in the grocery store at the same time, then you have the potential to earn about $13.00 per delivery; two deliveries for $26.00 for the hour.
Start up a Moving Company
Have you found that you are great at space saving and organization when it comes to moving? Fabulous! One thing that most people abhor when they are moving is packing, packing and more packing. Gather up a few strong peeps, advertise on everyone’s, that is involved, social media platforms and become movers.
An example company in Dallas, TX is Unpakt. The cost of moving is dependent upon the size of the client’s home, the distance from one home to the other, and is it a residential move or a commercial move. To move a one-bedroom studio would cost on average of $350 whereas a four-bedroom home would cost on average of $1,500.
You can add more to the cost if there are lots of large furniture pieces to be moved, who’s packing the boxes, how many boxes are you actually moving and how quickly does the move need to take place; just to name a few.
Find a mover’s contract online, edit it to fit your needs and have your new client sign it. You can include that they pay you however you’d like to be paid such as half up front and the remainder at the end once you’ve fulfilled the contract. You probably may even want them to take complete responsibility for renting their own moving U-Haul and boxes (or tubs).
Babysitting, Pet Sitting, and House Sitting
People love to take weekend get-a-ways, the problem is they have little children, pets and a home filled with valuables. The average pay for house sitting, babysitting and pet sitting in Texas is $12 per hour. The average yearly salary is $35,000.
Nowadays, people do not want to leave their homes unoccupied. Offer to stay in their home while they are away. If you’re feeling adventurous or a need to travel, you may even venture into the international realm of housesitting. Good and reliable babysitters, pet sitters and house sitters are in dire need and in high demand.
Babysitting isn’t always easy, depending on the child or number of children, but people are looking for good solid babysitters. They don’t want to leave little Susie alone with just anyone, and that’s totally understandable. For a local Dallas company, check out BabySitters of Dallas. They have served this area since 1955 and have built a strong reputation.
With this company, you may also be babysitting for the elderly and disabled as well as children of all ages. You may also want to check out Nannies On The Go; they have been in business since 2006.
Care.com is one of the largest and most trusted babysitting websites out there. More than 20 countries and over 25 million people use this website. You may pay for their service or signup for the free basic package. Overall, it’s a win-win for both sides.
For a local pet sitting company, Society Pet Sitter, On Call Pet Sitters and VIP Pet Sitters are all located in the heart of Dallas. Society Pet Sitters has been in business for over 25 years and are in high demand. With VIP Pet Sitters, you can pet sit and dog walk.
Of course, you can always go with an online company. On Rover.com you can kill two birds with one stone and housesit while your pet sitting. People love their pets just as much as they love their children. The little pet can even come stay with you as if you were a hotel.
You will need to consider your living arrangements and if it’s allowed to have pets. You may not want to pay a hefty pet deposit, so check your contract terms for pet care. You can earn an average salary of $35,000.
TrustedHousesitters is another website that lets you connect with people who are looking for a pet sitter as well as a house sitter, mainly in the Dallas, TX area. Click the Join Now icon and get started. This website is also the largest website of its niche. Their average pay is $20 – $40 per day.
HouseCarers is one of the top leading international house-sitting websites. They are known to have their i’s dotted and their t’s crossed.
Better yet! Advertise on your own personal social media platforms that you offer these services. That way you can keep 100% of your hard-earned money.
Sell Unwanted Items
How stuffed is your closet? Can’t shove anymore items in it. Sell your old, unwanted or ill-fitting clothes. Decide what needs to go, snap a picture of it, and post it on social media. It’s time to profit!
Stuffed closets, we all have that problem and you can’t fit any of your new clothes in it. Sell your unwanted items on your social media pages. You can search garage sell and clothing for sale pages in your local area and list them. If you don’t want the hassle of having to deliver or holding on to these items, then take them to a local consignment store. Clotheshorse Anonymous, Revente Resale and Clothes Circuit are all located in the Dallas area.
Are you crafty? Fortunately, there are lots of Pinterest projects that people want but aren’t crafty enough to create the project themselves. Therefore, they are willing to purchase the project.
Opportunities here are endless. Consider the project, the cost of materials, and your time spent making it, then put a price tag on it. Again, snap a picture along with the price and upload them onto your personal social media pages. You’ll be selling your crafty projects in no time at all.
Consider selling on Etsy, 28.6 million active buyers are looking for the next new fad. The amount of money that you can make on this platform is endless. The average one may make on here is $20 – $30 per day. Setup a store on Etsy with your name and logo. Snap a picture, make it clear and easy to see, upload your images and start selling.
It can be this easy if you don’t over complicate things. You’ll need to research the least cost-effective way to ship your product, neither you nor your buyer will want to pay a high shipping fee. FYI, you will need to figure in Etsy’s small 15 cents listing fee per item and their 5% fee on each sale. Use PayPal to get paid because it’s cheaper than using Etsy.
Has anyone ever told you that you have gorgeous handwriting? Try the art of calligraphy. We all know people who are getting married or about to graduate. Offer to write out their invites for a small sum of money. The price tags on invitations and announcements are expensive. People will be thanking you.
Sell your used and unwanted books and textbooks. Yes, that’s right! Sell your old books and old textbooks. One place to do so is on Amazon but here your pay will be in the form of a gift card, which is not a bad thing considering that you can now buy pantry items and food through Amazon. It’s an easy and time-consuming way to buy a stock of toilet paper or paper towels.
Photography Freelancing
Ever thought about freelancing by selling your photographs? Are you notorious for walking around snapping pictures? Do people comment about your eye-catching abilities? Here’s an idea. Sell you photos!
Set up a local photography studio in your home. You don’t need a large space, but if you happen to have an empty room then definitely use it. Think about your models: babies, children, sports teams, etc.
Use your personality and lifestyle to decide who and what you’d like to photograph. If you don’t have any space to have a home studio, then go to your clients. Scout out local places such as downtown, museums, botanical gardens, local parks and playgrounds.
There are online opportunities to sell your photos as well. There are about 40 websites where the commission varies from $.025 per photo up to $5.00 per photo. You can sell to websites like 123RF, Shutterstock, DepositPhoto, and Foap. Get to snapping!
Temp Job Agency
A temp job agency will place you in a temporary job. These temporary jobs are for a short-term basis only. Companies will use a temp agency because of its benefits and convenience of not having to hire and fire short-term employees. Working through a temp agency helps you gain exposure to a variety of jobs, networking opportunities, flexible employment, and gain new skills.
It can also help you decide what you’d like to do in the future if you are a college freshman and still undecided on a major. Why should you consider a temp agency? Well, if you’re a college student that will be going home at the end of a semester it keeps you from having to quit a job; just let the agency know that you’ll be unavailable for a set amount of time.
Dallas has several temp agencies to choose from. The top five are High Profile Staffing Services, Burnett’s Staffing, Choice Specialists, Frontline Source Group and Workbridge Associates.
Resident Adviser
Every college has a need for a resident advisor. This is a great way to save on college costs. As a resident advisor you can live on-campus for free and earn some extra money. At Texas A&M University, a RA can earn of $9 – $10 dollars an hour.
Rounding Up
It’s exactly what it sounds like. In your checking account logbook, round up your cents to the next dollar amount. When you make a transaction, such as $14.35 you will write it down in your logbook for $15.00. It’s just a few cents but eventually it will accumulate to a small chunk of change. Take care of your pennies and your dollars will take care of themselves.
Online Potentials:
Working from home and making an extra income has never been easier. The world wide web has stepped up to every occasion to aid people in making money along with the ease of being paid for such transactions. I’ve compiled a list of online potential extra income earners.
There are even some that you could do as a full-time position that would allow you to work from home. This may sound very appealing and ideal for those that have children or if you are a stay-at-home person.
Online Tutoring and Teaching
Tutoring can be very self-satisfying. There’re very few things that are as powerful as watching and helping a child master a subject area. The rewards here benefit both the tutor and the tutoree.
Check out:
- Education First – must have experience in teaching, a TEFL and a bachelor’s degree. Earn up to $20 per hour.
- Course Hero – no previous experience needed but knowing about the subject is a plus. Earn up to $500 a week.
- QKids – must have a bachelor’s degree or be studying for one. Earn up to $16-20 per hour.
- Brainfuse – must have a bachelor’s degree. Earn up to $10 per hour.
- Nicetalk – must be fluent in English and teach Chinese students to speak. Earn $10 an hour.
If you are not sure about tutoring online then tutor in person. Setup a small group for struggling students and help them out. You can meet once or twice a week which ever you choose.
You don’t have to tutor; you can actually teach online. Here are some great companies to check into.
- VIPKid
- GoGo Kid
- Udemy
Online Niches
Have you ever wondered what it’d be like to be a juror? eJury.com pays $5-10 per verdict; it doesn’t pay much but could be quite interesting. This site allows attorneys to prep for trial, which means that you will receive the point of view from each side of the case along with a list of personal questions designed for feedback. You will then view the case and submit a verdict. There’s high need for eJurors in the Dallas, Texas area.
Do you love searching the web, grazing about on websites? Check out UserTesting.com. You will enter your email address, verify it and download their software. They will have you perform a test where you think out loud while using a website then submit that test to them.
After they evaluate you, you will be earning money from testing out websites. They pay can range between $40 – $60 per website. Sounds almost too easy and definitely worth looking into.
Virtual Assistant
You don’t have to be a genius to be a virtual assistant, mainly just organized. Examples of what you might do include phone support and live chat for tv remotes, calling facilities for information, advertising, organizing photos on a MacBook, audit client files, light bookkeeping/accounting or managing a client’s calendar. These are just the first few jobs that showed up on one platform’s first page.
Take a look at these 5 platforms:
- Upwork Global Inc. – here the pay will vary depending on your experience level.
- Zirtual.com – pays between $13 – $18 dollars an hour.
- Contemporaryva – pays about $10 per hour.
- Clara – here pay will vary depending on a client’s need.
- Fancy Hands – here the pay is per task and not by the hour.
Blogging
Start your own blog! You’re a cool person and have lots of things to talk about. You may even want to build your own website just to strut your own stuff. It’s never been easier. You’ll need a blogging platform such as Blue host or WordPress.
Bluehost will let you secure your domain and host your blog for only $2.95 per month. Talk about quality topics, quality versus quantity is the key and know your stuff. Double check your stuff, know that the information you are putting out there is true and valid, give facts and statistics.
Website
Discover your own brand! Upload your professional pictures, have a resume page, share your accomplishments, connect to your social media pages and have a contact form. Show off your side hustles. Do you volunteer, through a church or internationally? Develop a timeline and post about your volunteering experiences.
People spend about 24 hours a week online. They spend approximately 22 minutes to 2 hours a day scanning their social media pages. These average times have increased about 11 minutes per day since 2017. Grab someone’s attention!
Writing
So, you’ve started blogging and your own website! Now turn that into an eBook, self-publish and sell it on Amazon. You may just be the next #1 best seller! You are basically already sharing your passion on your blog, website and social media platforms. Take a chance!
Once you’ve gotten the hang of it and have a social media following, monetize your blog and/or your website with Google AdSense and other affiliate programs. You can build a nice passive, residual income.
80% of employers are now googling potential employees’ names. They are checking out social media pages. Brag time!
Online Real Estate Investing
Fundrise Starter Portfolio allows you to invest $500. This money will be split in half and invested in real estate properties here in the US. You can see your properties in your portfolio. Quarterly dividends are paid out on the investment property.
Online Surveys
While I’m not fond of taking surveys, I know a lot of you, college students, love taking them. And better yet, you love getting paid to take them. Bread, Mypoints and Inbox are three of the largest and legitimate websites to go through for this type of extra income. Inbox even lets you earn money while you watch their tv clips. Enjoy!
Online Shopping
Want to shop? Want to receive cash back after you shop? Then I have good news for you. There are several websites and apps that you can use. Rakuten, Paribus, Ibotta, and Fetch Rewards.
Rakuten, used to be EBates, let’s you shop through their website at your favorite retailers and then you receive a 40% cash back discount.
Fetch Rewards is an app where you send them picture of your receipts. Then accumulate points to exchange for gift cards to places like Amazon. How easy does that sound?
Virtual Wallets
Not sure how to go about getting paid for your services? Not to worry, there are companies out there that have your back. Paypal, Square, Payoneer, Skrill and Google Wallet are great platforms to consider.
- Paypal – available internationally; no charges to deposit your money directly to your bank account but charges a 1% fee for instant transfer to a credit/debit card or bank account.
- Square – available for US residents and Canada only; with square you will use a magstripe card reader that works with your type of phone or you can enter your clients credit/debit card information manually; charges a 2.75% transaction fee.
- Payoneer – available internationally; charges 3% to deposit your money to your credit/debit card or a 2% fee for withdrawing money via an ATM machine.
- Skrill – available internationally; charges a 1.9% fee for transactions which is less than PayPal.
- Google Wallet – only available in the United States and you are charged a 2.9% fee for each transaction.