2018 Side Hustle Income Report Month 7

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure for more information.

Guess who’s back? Back again!

Sorry not sorry for getting that song stuck in your head.

Here we are again with another installment of “what I made outside of my full-time job!”

Here’s the rest of the year for reference:

• January’s Side Hustle Income Report
• February’s Side Hustle Income Report
• March’s Side Hustle Income Report
• April’s Side Hustle Income Report
• May’s Side Hustle Income Report
• June’s Side Hustle Income Report

Previously I haven’t had a goal with these reports. I just wanted to share what you could realistically expect to make doing a few of these things and track my own income to help my accountant come tax time.

But this RV renovation’s got me dreaming. Dreaming of being done with the reno and of taking off in our own RV and seeing the country.

But in order for us to do that we have to be bringing in a certain amount of passive income. For me, that goal is $3,000 per month. And that’s without our Airbnb income. So that’s what I’m working toward now.

I’ll be adding a percentage after the total to denote how close I am to my goal for just passive income.

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: $933.59

Summer is definitely the slow season. We were unbooked for almost a week in July! But we’ve still done enough to cover our mortgage so it’s still a win.

We charge $37-$40 per night and a $12 cleaning fee. The room is in the front of the house and we let the people use the spare bathroom privately.

I highly recommend it as a way to monetize unused space. If you want to get started, sign up through this link and you’ll help us earn a little extra too!

T-Shirts: $850.94

June’s earnings from Merch by Amazon were $850.94 and ZILCH from Etsy.

Oof, Etsy, you’re killin me. I know summer is slow but c’mon!

And to my surprise, all the frustration I’ve been feeling might be going away. I’m not saying it is, but I’m optimistic. Merch has entered the UK and Germany and Amazon put 100 of my designs into their marketplaces and tiered me up to Tier 1000.

I paused my designer in July but I’m on an upswing so I think I’m gonna bring her back on in September.

Hopefully, the next few months will get me back into that $2K range and I’ll be super stoked.

Books: $980.02

These are my book earnings from May. I sold 323 copies of The No-Spend Challenge Guide and 104 copies of Meal Planning on a Budget (63 of those were giveaways.)

In August I ran countdown deals on both books and did some publicity on them so I’m excited to see those results.

I’ve been running ads for both books and have netted $23.96!

Mystery Shopping: $2

We did three shops in June. Two were reimbursement only and one was supposed to pay $12. But I didn’t read the guidelines all the way through and bought a sangria for me and my friend when no alcohol was supposed to be purchased.

I’d done dinner shops at the location and alcohol was fine but I didn’t realize it wasn’t allowed at a lunch shop. So always read the guidelines!

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

Blog: $56.88

#GetRichBlogging. Slow month. August will be much higher. The blog income broke down like this for July:

• $11.94 from Amazon Associates
• $44.94 from ads

Other: $105.01

When we signed up for a Schwab brokerage checking account for our trip to Bali we got a $100.01 credit! And I filled out an invite-only survey through Appen and got $5.

I obviously won’t count these toward my passive income goal 😉

Travis’ Side Job: $172.47

Travis does some paperwork for a private jet owner and gets paid pretty well for a few hours of work.

Total: $3,100.91

Total Passive Income: $1,887.84 (62% to Goal of $3K)

Expenses: I’m a frugalprenuer so I keep my expenses low but there are some that are unavoidable.

• Designer: $40
• Book Ads: $1.01
• Etsy Seller Fees: $3.72

Total: $44.73

Set aside for taxes: $760

July Grand Total: $2,296.18

2018 Running Total: $18,413.77

Goals for Q3 of 2018:

1. Grow the Frugal Friends Community. August is the last month of Q3. I’m taking it easy and focusing on growing our podcast audience. I’m going to be emailing other podcasters to appear on their shows to talk about frugality and we’re starting a book club to increase reviews! We’re giving away a copy of our Book of the Month for every 5 reviews we get.

If you want to participate, leave us a review and send a screenshot to frugalfriendspodcast@gmail.com!

2. Build my presence on Merch & Etsy. With Merch, the early bird gets the worm. I’m gonna try to capitalize on this Europe thing and see how things shake out. After a dismal few months on Etsy I still haven’t given up but I need a lot more motivation.