There are plenty of ways to make money online—but what do you do when you need to make money fast?
Making $1,000 in the next 30 days might sound like a lot, but it’s actually a realistic goal. If you’re only working weekdays, that gives you 20 working days over the next month. $1,000 / 20 days = $50 / day.
In this piece, we’ll cover everything you need to know to make $1,000 in the next 30 days. Virtually all require little to no upfront capital and very little time investment. Pick one or try a couple, and you’ll be well on your way to making money fast.
9 proven ways to make money fast
- Sell your old stuff
- Sell your photography
- Offer online services
- Teach online
- Flip furniture
- Take online surveys
- Become a pet sitter
- Do tasks on TaskRabbit
- Rent out space on Airbnb
1. Sell your old stuff
While this may not be an ongoing gig, selling stuff you no longer need is a great way to get cash fast, and can easily add up to $1,000 in the next 30 days if you have enough items to sell.
Depending on what you’re looking to sell, there are many places, both online and offline, that you can check out for selling your used items:
- Facebook Marketplace: List nearly anything for local buyers; decide if you plan to meet somewhere or have buyers come pick the item up from you
- Craigslist: Just like Facebook, you can list nearly anything for local buyers, then meet up or have them pick up the item
- OfferUp: Another option for selling nearly anything locally; great option to avoid dealing with shipping
- Poshmark: Sell used clothes online for shoppers to search for; you will have to ship your items
- Decluttr: Sell books and old tech items online; you will have to ship your items
- Swappa: Sell old smartphones and laptops with this online marketplace; you will have to ship your items
- eBay: Auction off used items to the highest bidder to make even more money; you will most likely have to ship your items unless you set up local pickup
If you have handmade items, you can also consider creating an Etsy or Amazon Handmade shop to sell them. However, it can take time to build up a customer base, so we don’t recommend relying exclusively on that if you’re looking to make money fast.
Startup time: Several hours to create seller accounts and listings for each of your items.
Effort to start: Medium: you need to declutter your home and pinpoint the items you’re going to sell and then list them on your chosen vendor sites.
Time to first payment: Depends on where you sell your items; Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist will get you the cash when you provide the item to the buyer, but other sites may take more time.
What to know:
- You may need to factor in shipping costs if listing items on an online retailer.
Requirements:
- Accounts for each online retailer you use.
- The ability to transport or ship items.
2. Sell your photography
Do you have a good eye for photography? While becoming a professional photographer can take a lot of time (though it can be lucrative), if you’re looking for quick money, consider selling your photography to online stock photo websites.
A few sites to check out are:
Once you’ve taken your photos and uploaded them, you get paid based on how many downloads they receive. This means selling photography is a great way to bring in some passive income, long after the hard work of taking your photos has ended.
Startup time: If you already have photos, it’ll take a couple of hours to get signed up for the stock photo sites and submit your photos. If you need to take photos, this will likely take longer.
Effort to start: Medium to high, depending on if you have photos already.
Time to first payment: Most sites pay monthly based on how many downloads your photos have received. To increase your income, take a lot of photos and consistently submit them to your preferred stock photo site(s).
What to know:
- Competition can be fierce, so you’ll want to take a lot of photos to submit.
- Not every stock photo site allows you to submit photos to multiple sites, and the ones that do often pay less for non-exclusive photos.
Requirements:
- Photography skills.
- A high-quality camera (although newer smartphones also take phenomenal photos).
3. Offer online services
Offering online services can bring in good money consistently—and if you’re skilled in the services you’re offering, you can start bringing in well over $1,000 per month. However, you’ll need to start small in order to make money fast.
Some online services you may consider offering are:
- Data entry
- Transcription
- Social media management
- Writing and editing
- Virtual assistant tasks
- Graphic design
- Website design
- User testing
If you’re lacking more specialized skills at the onset, starting with something basic like offering data entry, transcription, or virtual assistant services will help you get going while you learn how to perform additional online services.
And while it can take time to organically get new clients, taking advantage of a job marketplace site like Fiverr or Upwork makes it easy to start finding work almost immediately. With these sites, you can post your service offerings as well as apply to available jobs, getting you in front of clients just minutes after your account has been approved.
After you’ve been working at this for a while, you might start to see referrals come in from your past clients, and eventually you can turn this into your own small business.
Startup time: It can take up to 24 hours to get your account approved by either site, but then you’re free to start posting gigs and applying for work.
Effort to start: Low.
Time to first payment: On Fiverr, you’re paid as soon as the buyer approves your work. On Upwork, it can take 10 days for your funds to become available.
What to know:
- Your buyers/clients can review you, so make sure you’re providing a great service and client experience for each one.
- Be selective about the jobs you apply for to make sure you’re only accepting quality work.
- Don’t allow clients to try to pay you outside of Upwork until you’ve built a solid rapport, or you could be at risk for scams.
Requirements:
- Computer
- Internet connection
- Skills to provide the services you offer
4. Teach online
Teaching is another good online job for making quick cash. If you have knowledge that you want to impart on an audience, you may consider creating your own online course with a site like Teachable, Coursera, or Udemy.
If you’re not sure you have anything to teach, but English is your first language, you can easily start teaching part-time with a site like VIPKid.
With VIPKid, you can work from home, making upward of $14 to $22 per hour, while teaching English to children across the world. The platform provides the lesson plans, making it easy to hop right in and start teaching.
Startup time: It can take two to three weeks from signing up to get approved and start teaching, so plan this out ahead of time.
Effort to start: Medium.
Time to first payment: Teachers are paid monthly between the 10th and 15th of each month.
What to know:
- VIP Kid signs six-month contracts with their teachers, so make sure this is a commitment you’re able to make.
- VIPKid pays $7 to $9+ per 25-minute class, so you’d need to teach six to seven classes (three to four hours) each day to hit your $50/day goal.
Requirements:
- Computer
- Internet connection
- Master of English or another topic you’ll be teaching
5. Flip furniture
For those who prefer to do something with their hands, consider flipping furniture that you find in your area for free or low-cost. While there may be some upfront costs for materials, this can still be a fun way to make $1,000 in 30 days.
Looking for furniture is the first task, but we have a few tips to make it easier for you:
- Drive around your area to see if you find any furniture that neighbors have put on the side of the road. If the furniture isn’t broken, it could be a great candidate for flipping.
- Take a look at local marketplaces, like on Facebook or Craigslist. Many times, people will post free furniture as long as you go to pick it up. Or, you may want to consider paying a small fee for furniture that you can easily flip.
- Check to see if there are any “Buy Nothing” groups in your area that people post free items in.
- Look in local thrift shops for cheap furniture that you can update.
If it’s your first-time flipping furniture, you may want to check out some videos online for inspiration. Many Mitokers share their journey flipping furniture (as well as how much they make from it), so that’s a great place to start.
For example, take a look at this bedside table upcycle:
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTdcWRgUs/?k=1
And to get an idea of how much you can actually make, this TikTok spent $60 on flipping this vanity/dresser combo and sold it for $600:
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTdcnn2QX/?k=1
Then, you’ll list your newly updated piece of furniture on a site like Facebook Marketplace or Craigslist. Depending on the furniture, you can often get inquiries on a piece that same day, so this can be a great way to make money fast. If you’re able to find furniture with a consistent niche aesthetic, such as midcentury modern or post-modern, you might also find success promoting these items on Instagram.
Startup time: It can take several hours to find and flip your first piece of furniture.
Effort to start: High.
Time to first payment: As soon as you meet up with the buyer to sell your piece of furniture, you’ll get paid.
What to know:
- Make sure to only start on pieces that you’re confident you can upcycle or resell.
- Consider researching the origins of a piece of furniture to see what it was worth when it was new—this can be helpful for pricing later.
- Research Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist to find the best pricing for your upcycled furniture.
Requirements:
- A vehicle that can hold furniture.
- Supplies for flipping.
- Basic skills for sanding, painting, etc. (though these can be improved through practice).
6. Take online surveys
Taking online surveys is one way to start getting cash quickly, especially because all you need is a computer with internet access and a bit of your time.
While it’s certainly not exciting and can feel a bit tedious after a while, dedicating time each day to taking surveys can start to bring in a nice bit of extra money. Keep in mind that to hit our $1,000 goal, you will need to take a lot of surveys.
There are several online survey websites that you can use to make money fast:
- Swagbucks: It pays in Swagbucks, which can be redeemed for gift cards or PayPal cash. Most surveys are between 40 to 200 SB points per survey, with 100 SB = $1, equating to around 50¢ to $2 per survey.
- LifePoints: This is another survey site that pays in “points”—LifePoint's, to be exact. And again, these can be redeemed for gift cards or PayPal cash. Surveys are between 60 to 350 LifePoint's, although the math of points to dollars is less clear-cut. Users have said that 550 LifePoint's = a $5 gift card. The website states that most surveys take 10 to 20 minutes a pop.
- InboxDollars: This site pays in cash, with surveys earning between 50¢ $5 and ranging anywhere from three minutes to 25 minutes each. With Inbox Dollar, you can also get paid to play online games, read emails, or shop online.
- Survey Junkie: Earn gift cards and PayPal cash outs with Survey Junkie. Survey Junkie’s points are the same conversion as Swagbucks, with one point equaling 1¢. From looking at online reviews, it looks like the majority of its surveys are worth between 40 and 80 points each.
- Opinion Outpost: Opinion Outpost’s points -o-cash conversion is 10¢ per point, with its surveys running anywhere from 5 points to 250 points (50¢ to $25). This site also has options to review ads, test products, and more for additional ways to earn.
To earn $1,000 in the next 30 days, sign up for all of the above survey sites. Most sites have a signup bonus that can help you get closer to your goal. You’ll need to spend several hours each day to generate some actual income.
Many survey takers who were new to the sites reported making between $2 to $4 per hour, but as the sites understand your profile a bit more and present you with surveys you’ll qualify for, you’ll be able to increase that hourly rate.
Startup time: Just a few minutes to create an account on each survey site you choose.
Effort to start: This side hustle requires a major time commitment to make $1,000.
Time to first payment: A week or so, depending on the survey site.
What to know:
- You will need to dedicate a lot of time to survey-taking to bring in a lot of money, and you may want to utilize multiple sites
- You won’t always qualify for every survey, meaning you might spend a few minutes on the qualification segment and then not get to take the full survey, meaning you don’t get the full payout.
Requirements:
- Computer
- Internet connection
- Time
- Many online survey sites have a minimum age requirements (usually 13 or 18)
7. Become a pet sitter
Do you love animals? If so, you can easily start a side gig as a pet sitter or dog walker. Apps like Rover allow you to hang out with other peoples’ pets in your spare time. You can sign up for services like house sitting, dog boarding, dog walking, drop-in pet visits, and doggy day care.
You can charge anywhere from $15 to $45 per walk, and even more for some of the other service offerings. If you walk three to four dogs per day, you can easily hit your $1,000 goal within the next 30 days.
Startup time: It can take five to 10 business days for Rover to review your account, so be sure to sign up well in advance.
Effort to start: Low.
Time to first payment: Funds will appear in your Rover account two days after the service is completed. From there, you can request that they be sent to PayPal or via check. A check will take five to seven business days to appear in your mailbox.
What to know:
- Set your rates similar to what other dog walkers in your area are charging or pet owners will be less likely to hire you.
Requirements:
- A Rover accounts
- Experience with dogs and other animals
8. Do tasks on TaskRabbit
If the idea of sitting at your computer all day sounds like the worst way to spend your time, you might be more interested in signing up for TaskRabbit to hit your $1,000 goal. With this site, you first need to make sure it provides services in your area:
Source
Then you can create an account, set your services, and decide your rates. The types of tasks that people tend to come to TaskRabbit for include:
- Furniture assembly
- Help moving
- Delivery
- Cleaning
- Laundry and ironing
- Pet sitting
- Shopping
- Yard work
If you’re at all handy, if you have a truck and can move things, or if you want to do some personal-assistant-like tasks, TaskRabbit is the perfect place to go. Plus, you can set rates of anywhere from $20 to $80 an hour, meaning that you should easily be able to hit your $50 per day goal.
Startup time: Less than an hour to sign up and set your services/rates.
Effort to start: Medium to high, depending on what services you offer, i.e., moving furniture is more effort than running errands.
Time to first payment: Payments can take up to 24 hours to be approved after the job is completed, then another three to five days to hit your bank account.
What to know:
- TaskRabbit shows the most common going rate for your area, so set your rates similarly until you’ve gotten some positive ratings and reviews.
- Offer as many services as you’re comfortable doing to increase the likelihood that you get hired.
- Put accurate availability as you won’t show up for jobs during times you’re listed as unavailable.
Requirements:
- TaskRabbit account
- The know-how to complete the tasks you sign up for
- Access to a vehicle (often)
- Time
9. Rent out space on Airbnb
If you have a spare bedroom, mother-in-law suite over your garage, or another habitable area of your home or property that you’re not using, consider renting it out on Airbnb as a short-term rental.
The nightly rent you can charge guests depends on a few factors: your area, how much space your guest gets to themselves, how many people you can accommodate, and how close your space is to tourist attractions.
Even if you’re just renting out a private bedroom, you could charge anywhere from $50 to $100 a night, depending on where you’re located. This can easily add up to well over $1,000 in the next 30 days.
Startup time: It can take up to 72 hours for your listing to appear in search results.
Effort to start: Medium to high, depending on how guest-ready your space is.
Time to first payment: Payments are sent to hosts one day after the guest checks in. PayPal payments are received the same day, while payments to a bank account can take up to five days to show up.
What to know:
- Pay attention to restrictions with your apartment complex, HOA, city, etc., on short-term rentals.
Requirements:
- A space to rent out
- Airbnb account
- Any necessary paperwork or permits for short-term rentals
Making a sustainable income doesn’t happen overnight
To make money fast, it’s easy to get started. But while these tactics are great for getting out of a financial pinch, they’re difficult to turn into sustainable wealth.
Instead, consider alternative ways to make money online, such as opening a Shopify store and building up your own ecommerce business.
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