2018 Side Hustle Income Report Month 11

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Happy holidays! Things have been crazy over here, being pregnant and all. I went from doing nothing but watch Saturday Night Live reruns in the fall to embarking on an entire site redesign and rebrand right before Christmas!

As you all can see, Saving with Spunk is now Modern Frugality! The transformation is almost complete and I am so happy with it. There are still some kinks so if you see any feel free to leave a comment here and I’ll get on it. And thank you!

And even though I still have one more 2018 income report to do in January, this is the last one of the year! My accountant is going to be so happy to see everything he needs in one place. 🙂

Rest of the year’s reports:

Amazon Finally got back to me with a cryptic message (albeit from a seemingly real person) basically saying “suck it.” You can read more in my Merch category but if you don’t make it that far just know I am totally done with them.

As always, I only include income that’s deposited into my account so sometimes it’s from stuff I did a while ago but none of it is speculative. If you want more ideas on making money at home you can grab the list of work-from-home jobs I started with by entering your deets below.

Airbnb: $474.33

November was busier than October but we had a long stay that started in October so we got the payment in that month.

In November we were booked 22 nights over 6 stays. We charge $37 per night on weekdays, $40 per night Fri and Sat, and a $12 cleaning fee. I mark nights down to $35 per night if we’re unbooked short notice. The room is in the front of the house and we let the people use the spare bathroom privately.

I highly recommend Airbnb to monetize unused space. It’s fun to meet new people and easy because you’re never too far if something goes wrong. If you want to get started, sign up through this link and you’ll help us earn a little extra too!

T-Shirts: $2,543

I made $60.92 from Etsy and got my $2,482.84 backpay from Amazon.

Their response to me asking why my stuff is still processing a month after they “reinstated my account?”

“While ‘Processing’ is a normal part of the publishing process, we are aware that some designs may appear to be stuck in this status on the “Manage” page. There are several reasons this can happen and our team is continuously working to complete publishing of these products. While we are not able to provide updates on specific designs, please know that we will identify these products and work to resolve each one.”

Then they gave me a link to their definition of “processing.”

But apparently I’m not the only one this is happening to. So you know what I have to say Merch? thank u, next…

Books: $1,442.65

Amazon Kindle on the other hand has been increasingly great to work with and I cna’t say enough good things about it. These are my book earnings from September. I sold 759 copies of The No-Spend Challenge Guide and 74 copies of Meal Planning on a Budget.

NSCG was on sale through a special Great onKindle Promo all September and became #1 in its primary category so that’s where this spike is from. It’ll also be available for free to Prime members through Prime Reading January through March! So if you have Prime you should check it out!

My ads are still running and since July I’ve netted an extra $424.29 which is $162.59 over last month.

Mystery Shopping: $0

No mystery shopping recently. I just haven’t been up for it. It’s fun but you have to be available afterwards to write the report and first trimester had me like nah. We have done a few but those checks didn’t clear in November.

If you want to learn more about mystery shopping you can read my post about it.

Blog: $174.46

$25.06 from Amazon Associates
$94.95 from Other Affiliates
$54.45 from the Financial Freedom Planner

To put this in perspective, I get an average of 15,265 page views per month from 11,833 sessions (or 1.29 pages per session) and I have 1,997 active email subscribers. I don’t do anything to get traffic to the blog. I have a lot of pins on Pinterest and that along with some organic traffic is how I get this.

Travis’ Side Job: $382.33

Next year I won’t add this to the income report because taxes are already taken out of it and it’s not really my income to report. But this was a nice treat this month!

Total: $4,543.20

Total Passive Income: $4,160.87 (Not going to count this month as progress to passive income goal.)

Expenses:

Book Ads: $13.95
Etsy Seller Fees: $7.85

Total: $21.80

Set aside for taxes: $995

November Grand Total: $3548.20

2018 Running Total: $27,285.11

Current Goals:

We just passed 100,000 downloads of The Frugal Friends Podcast so I’d say we met our goal of growing the community! I can’t wait to see how much more it grows in 2019.

And I’m quickly getting new stuff up on the website and Modern Frugality store! So stay tuned next month for the full monty on that!

My only goal right now is to have a great Christmas and I hope you do the same. See you next year!

Jen Smith

Jen Smith is a personal finance expert, founder of Modern Frugality and co-host of the Frugal Friends Podcast. Her work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Lifehacker, Money Magazine, U.S. News and World Report, Business Insider, and more. She’s passionate about helping people gain control of their spending.