Have you ever wished you could make passive income while you’re sleeping? Believe it or not, it’s actually possible to do just that.
Before we get into the passive income ideas I think it’s a good idea to first clear up a couple of misconceptions.
Although the word “passive” makes it sound like you have to do nothing to bring in the income this just isn’t true.
All passive income streams will require at least one of the following two elements:
1) An upfront monetary cost
2)Time
Passive incomeis a cash stream that requires little or no daily effort to maintain, unlike active income, such as cash earned from working at a job or as a contractor.
You can create passive income through investing in certain financial products or by starting businesses that, after an initial investment.
Passive income could be the key to reaching your financial goals, whether those include paying off debts, building savings or retirement accounts, or getting a nest egg for a rainy day or special occasion.
How do I generate passive income?
However, while passive income is money that you earn without actively working for it on a regular basis, getting to the point where you can bring in a significant amount of passive income does take some work up front.
Although it gets touted as easy money, most successful passive income ideas are the result of hard work: building an audience, optimizing paid ads, and delivering a great experience and a superior product.
In order to get one or more additional income streams going, you’ll need to invest some time, energy, knowledge, and even potentially some initial money.
For example: If you’re a full-time photographer or own a good camera, you can generate passive income from photography by selling photos online.
Stock photo sites like Pexels, Shutterstock, and other online media houses will pay for high-quality photos and videos. There’s no inventory to keep around the house besides your camera and laptop.
The good news, though, is that once you get these income streams up and running, they can increase your bank account with very little effort and maintenance – yes, even while you’re asleep!
How to Get Started with Passive Income
Typically, the lower the barriers to entry, the more crowded the field of competitors and the lower likelihood of success.
So you’ll need to weigh the opportunity against these factors and see which passive income strategy works best for you.
But it can be helpful to have natural ability and an interest in your target area, because these can help motivate you in the early days when things are likely to be tougher.
There are passive income opportunities for people who are starting out with some money.
In order to make passive income for you, you must make a few short-term investments or sacrifices; however, the benefit of doing this will pay off in the long-term, if you are very careful about which sources of passive income you choose.
Before you get going on your passive income journey, you’re going to want to do a little research to determine what types of passive income are the best for your available resources.
If you have specialized knowledge or skills, perhaps you might consider writing an ebook or creating a blog.
Everything You Need to Create a Website
If you’d prefer to invest some money and watch it grow, real estate or high yield savings accounts might be the way to go. Every person’s skills and interests are different, and there are a variety of different passive income methods that can help you build wealth.
In fact, to truly achieve your financial goals, it might be best to consider developing a few different passive income streams, based on the time and money you can invest up front.
Some income streams may be truly passive, where once you get them set up you can just sit back while the money rolls in; others may require a little ongoing effort to generate revenue.
But by building a variety of income streams, you can make a huge difference to your future financial welfare.
Now, let’s take a look at some of the most popular and profitable forms of passive income to help you achieve your financial goals. Here are eight ways to earn passive income.
- Real Estate
If you can make the initial financial investment, real estate can be one of the biggest earners for best passive income ideas.
Where the money really lies is in rental properties, which allow you to generate income while remaining completely hands-off.
To earn passive income from rental properties
You must determine three things:
- How much return you want on the investment?
- The property’s total costs and expenses.
- The financial risks of owning the property
- For example, if your goal is to earn $10,000 a year in rental cash flow and the property has a monthly mortgage of $2,000 and costs another $300 a month for taxes and other expenses, you’d have to charge $3,133 in monthly rent to reach your goal.
Risk: There are a few questions to consider: Is there a market for your property? What if you get a tenant who pays late?
A cash flowing rental property is a fantastic way to bring in a monthly income. To make this truly passive you can outsource the running of the properties to a management company.
The great news is, these days it’s easier than ever to get started with real estate, thanks to companies such as CrowdStreet, Fundrise, RealtyMogul, and Roofstock.
Let’s take a look at what each of these companies can offer a first-time or longtime real estate investor:
CrowdStreet is a crowdfunded company that allows you to be completely hands-off in the rental property investment process.
You’ll need to invest at least $10,000 to get started, but that investment gives you access to any available commercial real estate, and you won’t have to deal with fees down the road.
Fundrise is a great option for beginner investors, or those without much to invest up front. For as little as $10, you can invest in a real estate investment trust and start generating passive income, A REIT manages income properties and allocates the profits to investors.
Real Estate Investment Trusts.
These are investment vehicles that hold property within them – and you as the owner get to benefit from the gains, refinances, sale, income (or loss) on the property.
Similar to mutual funds, REITs are companies that own commercial real estate, such as office buildings, retail spaces, apartments and hotels.
You can purchase REITs on the stock market just like any other company or dividend stock.
Our favorite platform to invest in a REIT is Fundrise. They only have a $500 minimum to get started.
That means it’s purely passive income – be aware that the more you can invest up front, the more profit you’ll generate.
DiversyFund : DiversyFund is our top-ranked crowdfunding company because they only invest in multifamily cash flow positive properties in high growth areas, which is one of the least risky types of real estate.
RealtyMogul is also a crowdfunding site, but on this one, you’ll pool your investment with that of others and purchase properties like retail space and office buildings.
This one does require a minimum investment of $5,000.
Roofstock is a great option if you want to outright buy rental properties.
This marketplace features single-family rental homes that are already up for sale – perhaps with renovations already made and even tenants living in the home – that you can purchase with your own money and keep all the rental income from it.
The one caveat here is that you must be able to afford to purchase a home on your own.
2. Dividend Stocks
This form of passive income is one way to build an income stream that will require a little up-front research, but can really be worth your while if you’re willing to put the time into it.
Dividend stocks are great for investors who don’t want to wait for a long time to see their investments pay off, as the companies distribute a portion of their earnings to stockholders on a regular basis, generally each quarter.
The trick is to invest in high-yield stocks, so do your research and look for ones that yield 6-8% instead of the standard 1.5-3.5%.
It’s also a good idea to invest in companies that have a strong history of growth, so you can feel pretty confident that you will continue to see your passive income increase, and won’t have to worry about the company going out of business.
It’s also very important to watch out for actively managed funds, which can charge high management fees; you’ll fare better with passively managed, low-cost index funds.
Because you have to own the stock to receive dividends , you likely will have to tie up thousands, if not tens or hundreds of thousands, of dollars to earn significant income from dividend stocks.
And be sure to use an online brokerage that offers good rewards to help manage your portfolio.
Most Notable: Webull, Schwab, Fidelity, Stash,TD Ameritrade, M1 Finance
M1 Finance is a popular and highly-rated option that allows you to build your portfolio, invest, and auto-allocate your investments for free.
3. High-Yield Savings Accounts
A high-yield savings account is basically a way you can invest in yourself rather than something else.
You should be building savings through your budgeting efforts anyway, and if you’re doing that, it’s a good idea to make your own money work for you.
The average bank only offers 0.15% interest on savings, which means you won’t see much growth until you hit $250,000 or more in your account.
CIT Bankis a great option for online savings, especially if you’re looking to save money for an emergency fund or vacation.
They offer a wide range of savings accounts that can be tailored to your needs and they have no monthly maintenance fees.
But with a little research, you can find banks that offer interest rates of 3% or more, which can help you start to see your savings grow pretty quickly.
Investing in a high-yield savings account at an online bank can allow you to generate a passive income and also get one of the highest interest rates in the country.
4. Certificates of Deposit
Certificates of deposit, also known as CDs, are similar to savings accounts in that you’re basically investing in yourself in a truly passive way.
The biggest catch with CDs is that you will not have access to your funds until they fully mature, which could take months or even years depending on the terms of the CD.
The good news is that CDs are completely safe as they are protected by FDIC-insured institutions.
They’re the best option for people who don’t plan to touch their savings for many years – perhaps if your biggest financial goal is to save for retirement, a CD would be a good investment.
5. Rent Your Own Possessions
In this day and age of the “gig economy,” one of the easiest ways to make some extra money without a lot of time or effort, is to share things you already have.
Whether you have a second home you can rent out on Airbnb or for longer-term rentals, or you just have some extra storage space or a car you don’t mind sharing, renting your own possessions won’t make you rich, but it could bring in a nice little extra cushion of money to help you pay your own expenses or build savings.
One company called Neighbor focuses on letting people rent out their extra space to people who need storage.
Whether you’ve got a basement, garage, or spare room, if you’ve got some extra space you don’t really need, you could earn a few hundred dollars a month. Turo is a similar concept, but for cars.
Whether you have an extra vehicle that doesn’t get much use, or you don’t use your primary car that often, Turo allows you to rent out your vehicle to short-term users.
You’ll of course want to do your research to make sure you understand all the risks – Turo does provide state-minimum insurance for all bookings, and additional coverage is optional, so you’ll have to weigh the pros and cons.
Maybe you don’t have an available vehicle, but you do have a parking space in a coveted area. Consider renting that out to generate as much as several thousand dollars per year.
6. Share Your Knowledge
Do you have a skillset or knowledge that could help other people? One good way to earn passive income is to share your skills through writing.
Related Article:More Income Ideas
You could start a blog, or write and sell an ebook.
Either of these options does require some up front time commitment, but once you have them up and running, blogs and ebooks can generate a lot of passive income.
If you opt for a blog, keep in mind that you won’t generate income right away. You’ll need to take some time to build it.
We recommend purchasing a domain name and making use of SEO tools to help get your blog posts to the top of search engine results. You’ll also want to post regularly to start building traffic.
With a content management system and hosting service like Shopify, you can get a blog up and running in no time.
You’ll need to invest time into creating an SEO marketing strategy and producing and promoting the content, but know that your efforts will be rewarded.
The return on these passive income investments can be upward of $30,000 per month , depending on how you monetize your blog.
But if you create quality content and promote it through your platforms, you’ll build an audience big enough to generate a significant income stream.
But once you’ve got some regular readers, you can monetize your blog in a few ways: you can share links to affiliate products or services, publish ads, or sell your own products and services.
One of those products may be your ebook.
For example, some people who sell digital products will use various marketing strategies to enable more people to discover their products, which leads to more sales in a shorter period.
Others may scale the scope of their passive income business with new products that further their initial offerings to recapture an established client base.
If you have enough knowledge to share about a particular topic, you can write a short ebook and sell it either directly on your website or through Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing.
Ebooks are often appealing to consumers because they are less than $10 and easy to access from anywhere, and with enough buyers, you can generate a lot of income.
If you’ve really got a lot of knowledge about your chosen topic, consider creating an online course and selling it through Udemy or Teachable.
It’s easy to build a video or written course, and once it’s created, you can sell it to a wide variety of people.
7. Become an Influencer
Similar to blogging but with less of a commitment, social media influencing may be a way to go.
If you have a knack for sharing content on Instagram, Twitter, or Pinterest that gets a lot of likes, shares, and follows, you may be able to monetize this.
You can sign up as an affiliate for companies whose products and services you already use, and earn payments for every sponsored post you make promoting that product or service.
If you prefer longer-format content production, you might consider creating and posting YouTube videos.
You can make money through product endorsements on these videos, and if you start getting enough views, you can also earn built-in ad revenue.
8. Drive for Extra Cash
This isn’t quite a truly passive option, but it can be a good way to earn some secondary income.
It’s very easy to get set up with a ride-sharing or delivery service, such as Lyft, Uber, Instacart, or GrubHub.
If you have a reliable vehicle and some spare time, you can easily make a few hundred extra dollars a week either giving people rides around town or delivering groceries or takeout to them.
Many of these services allow you to set your own hours, so you can work your side hustle around your regular responsibilities.
As you can see from this guide, there are lots of options for earning passive or near-passive income no matter what monetary, skill, and time resources you can commit to doing so.
This is certainly not an exhaustive list either; in today’s technological world there are many options for earning extra money both online and offline.
If you’re willing to commit your resources to the steps and ideas above, you could earn residual income effortlessly for years to come.
Many people flip items they find at thrift stores, or earn money by writing online content or taking surveys.
Whatever you do, there is sure to be a great side hustle or passive income stream out there that is perfect for you and your financial goals.
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