July 2018 Side Hustle Report – $1,759.07

Welcome to the July 2018 Side Hustle Report. As you can obviously tell, this post is coming out very late (my bad). What this does mean is that today’s post will be followed up pretty soon by the August side hustle report, so you’ll get a double dose of side hustle numbers in the next few days/weeks. 

For those of you that are new here, let me explain what this post is about. Each month, I document exactly what I earned side hustling using sharing economy and gig economy apps. I do this for two reasons: 

1. To show you exactly what someone can make doing these side hustles while also working a full-time job; and
2. To inspire you and give you ideas so that you can do the same thing if you want to.

I seem to be getting more interest in these reports and whenever I talk about this stuff, people always tell me they can see my enthusiasm. It’s because I really do believe that sharing economy and gig economy apps are something that most people can use to earn extra income without taking up a ton of their time (and it can be really fun). If you’re making a ton of money already, then yeah, you might not need to do this stuff. But if you’re a normal person, then making an extra $500 or $1,000 a month is a big deal. My post is just to show you that anyone can do this.

Anyway, here’s a breakdown of my July side hustle earnings:

 

Side Hustle Income for July 2018

• Airbnb:  $636.32
• Rover: $456.25
• Postmates/DoorDash/Uber Eats: $298.31
• Wag: $214.60
• Bird/Lime: $38.05
• Selling Trash Finds: $15
• Job Spotter: $20.16
• WeGoLook: $34
• Gigwalk/EasyShift/Field Agent/Observa/Merchandiser: $38.80
• Google Opinion Rewards/Dabbl/1Q: $7.58

Total Side Hustle Income for July 2018 = $1,759.07

I earned income from ten different sources in July, which is pretty crazy to think about. People are always talking about how your average millionaire has multiple income sources, so maybe I’m on the right track to becoming a millionaire?

Looking back at these numbers, what I found surprising is how evenly divided all of my side hustle income was for July. Usually, Airbnb dominates my income reports, but in July, I cut back a little on Airbnb. Even with that decrease, my other income sources more than made up for it, which led to a good side hustle month. 

Let’s break down each income source a little bit more:

 

Airbnb Income = $636.32

Airbnb income was down this month – one of my lowest earning Airbnb months since I started hosting on Airbnb over 2 years ago.  The main reason for the down month was because my wife and I blocked off a bunch of days for ourselves. When you’ve been hosting for a while, it’s nice to get a little break. And that’s exactly what makes Airbnb so good – when you want a break, you can just go ahead and give yourself one.

Breaking it down, we ended up with 11 nights booked, which comes out to an average nightly rate of about $57 for a spare room in our house. 
We didn’t have anything too noteworthy in the way of guests. One guest was a repeat guest that we’ve hosted before. The other guests were mainly folks just passing through on the way to other places. 

The one annoying thing this month was that we ended up getting a four-star review from a guest who said that our guest room looked bigger in the pictures. We don’t include room dimensions in our listing, but I think it’s pretty clear that it’s not a giant room or anything. I usually try to figure out how to address criticisms, but this criticism is probably one I’ll just ignore. It’s important to remember that you can’t please everyone.

If you’re thinking about hosting on Airbnb and want to support this site, feel free to sign up to be a host using my referral link. Airbnb is a perfect way to sort of ease into the whole house hacking experience. It’s obviously a little bit more work compared to getting a traditional roommate, but you also get to meet new people and, best of all, you get the house to yourself when you want it. And if you find out Airbnb isn’t for you, you can just stop hosting.

 

Rover Income = $456.25

July was one of our highest earning months ever on Rover, bringing in almost $500. Part of the reason for the high earnings in July was because we had one stretch in the middle of the month where we watched multiple dogs. Usually, we only watch one dog at a time since we like keeping things simple and easy, but we made an exception here for a repeat client who wanted us to watch his brother’s dog too. 

Unfortunately, it didn’t turn out great. The extra dog we watched was one that we hadn’t watched before, and anytime you accept a new dog, you always run the risk that things won’t work out. In this case, this dog barked a ton and generally made a mess all over the place. He’s a cute dog, but we won’t be watching him again. The owner did give us a $95 tip for our trouble though so that at least made things a little bit more worthwhile. 

The rest of the dogs we watched were pups that we’ve watched in the past. One of our favorite pups is this one – a pup we’d literally watch for free (but don’t tell her owner that):

For the year, I’ve made well over $2,000 from dogsitting – a fact that I find pretty remarkable. While some of my side hustles might fade away as I get older or when I have kids, dogsitting is something that I’ll probably keep doing forever, especially if I already have a dog. 

If you feel like supporting this site and you want to try your hand at dog sitting, you can sign up to be a Rover sitter here.

 

Postmates/DoorDash/Uber Eats Income = $298.31

I had a big delivery month in July with almost $300 in delivery earnings. Not too shabby at all! Here’s a breakdown of my July delivery earnings by platform: 

• Postmates: $60.73
• DoorDash: $176.20
• Uber Eats: $61.38

I’m finding DoorDash to be one of the better delivery apps in my city mainly because they’re always offering bonuses during the dinner hour. Depending on the day, these bonuses can go up to as much as $5 extra per delivery, which means that a 10 or 15-minute delivery can bring in $15 sometimes. That’s obviously not normal, but even without the huge bonus, I get around $8 to $10 for a delivery that can take me between 15 and 30 minutes to complete.

I have been cheating a little bit this month though – instead of doing my deliveries on a bike as I usually do, in July, I spent a bunch of time using electric scooters to do my deliveries. Since I signed up to be a Bird Charger and Lime Juicer (more on that below), I can often ride these scooters around all day for free, which is pretty sweet. The downside, of course, is that if I’m flying around on those electric scooters, I’m not getting any exercise, which sort of defeats the purpose of doing these deliveries in the first place. Still, those scooters are just way too much fun! 

These delivery apps usually have some sort of signup bonus, although they change regularly. Still, it’s worth checking to see if there’s a good one for you since you can make some really legit money just doing deliveries to get the bonus.  You can read my post here about how my wife and I made $50 an hour doing deliveries by using our referral bonuses. 

 

Wag Income: $214.60

July was a good Wag month. As usual, I’ve been walking my regular dog client during the lunch hour. This dog owner orders a walk for her dog almost every day, which means that most days, instead of sitting at my desk, I get to go outside, get a little exercise, and walk a friendly, cute dog! It’s not a ton of money (with the tip I get a little over $11 for each walk), but the walk only takes me 20 minutes plus 3-4 minutes of travel time to bike over to the apartment building.

I also get the occasional walk from another dog that I like who lives in an apartment building literally 100 feet from my office. With tip, that walk earns me $16 for a 30-minute walk (plus the 30 seconds it takes me to walk over to that apartment building). I’d love if I could get more walks for this dog! 

In addition to my regular weekday walks, I’ve also been doing more walks on weekends. I had one 60-minute walk I did on a Sunday morning that earned me $31 after tip. That’s really good to just walk someone’s dog! 

If you’re looking for more info about Wag, be sure to read my in-depth post about my experience as a Wag dog walker. 

 

Bird/Lime Income: $38.05

As I wrote about in a previous post, I’m obsessed with these electric scooters (you can read more about my experience charging scooters in that post).

To quickly recap, in July, I signed up to be an electric scooter charger for Bird and Lime, the two big electric scooter companies that launched here in Minneapolis over the summer. These scooters have to be charged every day, so every once in a while, I’ll grab a scooter that needs charging, charge it up overnight, and return it the next day. As a side benefit, while I’m charging the scooter, I can basically ride it around as much as I want for free. 

The main issue for me is that, to get paid, you have to drop the scooter off at a designated spot (called a Bird Nest or LimeHub). All of these spots are concentrated downtown, which hasn’t really worked out for me since I don’t live or work downtown anymore. I did set up a few scooters though just to make sure I understood how it worked. This picture below was the first Bird Nest I ever set up – good for $15 or so.

The rest of my scooter charging money in July came about because I had to be downtown for work for a few days. This worked out very well for me – I basically got a free ride to work on my scooter (remember, when I’m charging the scooters, I get to ride them around for free), and got paid on my way into work. 

This scooter thing is something that can really work out well for anyone that lives in a cool neighborhood and works in a dense area (think, your typical young professional, millennial). You can basically scooter to work for free and get paid while doing it. Again, make sure to check out my post about my experience as a Bird Charger and Lime Juicer if you’re looking for more info about what it’s like to charge these scooters. 

 

Trash Income: $15

I’ve been getting real weak in the trash game lately just because I haven’t found it as fun as I used to. These days, I really only grab stuff that I can just carry home with me – things like Ikea end tables, coffee tables, and other similar things. 

In July, I sold three Ikea end tables I found over the course of the month while I was out scootering or walking my dog.

They don’t sell for much – they’re only $10 or less new, so I sell it for $5. Still, they always sell really fast and since they’re so light and easy to carry, whenever I see these around, it’s basically like finding $5 on the ground. 

Trash income is going to pick up in August since the college students are all moving out now. I’ll update in the next post. 

 

Job Spotter Income: $20.16

Job Spotter continues to be so easy and is the one app I tell everyone to download, even if they don’t want to do any of these stupid side hustles.  Yeah, it’s not a ton of money in the grand scheme of things, but I think almost anyone can consistently make between $10 and $20 every month without really doing anything beyond what they do in a normal day. Over the course of a year, that adds up.

I get comments and emails every once in a while about people who are making several hundred a month doing Job Spotter. That’s really crazy to me but it’s a good example that there’s money to be made out there if you’re willing to think outside the box. 

Make sure to check out my Job Spotter post if you want more info about how this app works. 

 

WeGoLook Income: $34 

I earned money on two WeGoLook gigs in July – a $20 car photograph gig and a $12 “door hanger” gig. I also had one $20 gig get rejected because my pictures were too dark. At the time, my camera was broken and wasn’t taking the pictures very well, so I kind of expected that to happen. 

One of the car photograph gigs was at a car dealership within a 10-minute bike ride from my house. I went over there, took some pictures of this huge truck, and was out of there in 15 minutes or so. For 20 bucks, that’s worth my time. 

The door hanger gig involved printing out a letter and taping it up on the door of someone’s house. When I got there, it turned out to be an apartment building, so I couldn’t tape the letter anywhere. I noted that in the app and still got paid my $12. 

I haven’t written a specific post about WeGoLook yet, but Peerless Money Mentor has written about his experience doing WeGoLook. Check it out if you want more info about how WeGoLook works. 

 

Gigwalk/EasyShift/Field Agent/Observa/Merchandiser Income: $38.80 

I still do these picture taking apps whenever there are easy gigs that I can do. This month, my earnings came from an EasyShift gig, a few Field Agent gigs, and a few Merchandiser gigs. 

EasyShift involved taking pictures at a CVS that’s a few blocks from my house. The CVS closed a while ago, so I just went over there, took a picture of the outside, and marked that it was closed. I made a quick $3 for that. 

My Field Agent gigs were all secret shop gigs where I was reimbursed for my purchase and got paid a small amount to answer some questions in the app. I stopped by a Popeyes for one gig and got myself some red beans and rice (which I was reimbursed for) and a few bucks to boot. I did another gig at an Ikea, where I got myself a free lunch and a few bucks for my troubles.

Merchandiser involved taking pictures of some products at a Target. I got paid $8 for each gig and it only took me a few minutes to complete each task. 

 

Google Opinion Rewards/Dabble/1Q Income: $7.58 

I’m not a fan of survey sites since I find those to be way too time-consuming, but these three apps work on your phone and each survey only takes a few seconds to complete. You obviously won’t get rich doing them, but they take so little time that I think they’re worth doing. Google Surveys is the best one, in my opinion – I seem to make a consistent $2 every month for what amounts to probably a minute of my time each month. 

 

And that concludes the July 2018 Side Hustle Report! 

July continued the good side hustle month streak and August is going to be even better. It’s pretty crazy how much all of this little stuff adds up. And remember, I work full-time and do this blog on the side, which means that I’m fitting in a lot of stuff into my day. In other words, if I can do it, you can probably do it too.

If you’re interested in learning more about how I earn money on the side, be sure to check out my side hustle report page, where I have links to every side hustle report I’ve written since 2016. 

I’ve also recently put together a nice list of all of the sharing economy and gig economy apps that I’ve used over the years. If you want a central place to see all of the different apps out there that you can use to make extra money, then just enter in your email and you’ll get access to the list. I’m updating this list on a regular basis, so I think it’s worth it for anyone who’s interested in figuring out ways to make extra money. You can check them out here.

See you all in the next Side Hustle Report!