This week, I'm sharing an article on over 200 ways to make extra money. You can find it by clicking here. The article features side hustles based on your skills and interests, ie Animal-Related hustles, computer-related hustles, hustles involved in taking care of Senior citizens, caring for pets, music, food & drink, and even seasonal side hustles you can try. There are so many more categories and I highly encourage you to check out the article. There are even side hustles for teenagers!
Sometimes the first step is having that idea, but then you'll probably ask, "well, what next? What do I do?" I can only go off of things that I have personally tried, but here are some general tips:
Network: Let your friends and family know of your services/products. Maybe they'll be interested
Advertise: Social media, especially Tiktok, is great for free advertising. While you can spend money on ads for these sites, you will still need to use the right hashtags, posting regularly, and providing quality videos and/or images of your products or services
None of these side hustles will make you instantly rich or give you quick results. I can tell you from experience: there's no way to earn money instantly. It will take time, the right approach, and even a bit of luck and choosing the right time.
Provide value. What problem does your product or service solve? How are you different from any of your competitors? These are questions you should think about when advertising your side hustle. However, don't think too hard about it! The answer might be simpler than you think!
I hope all these tips help and the article helps you start your side hustle. Thank you for reading and have a good weekend! :)
Note: This post contains Amazon affiliate links, and I make a small commission if you buy through them.
As we creep up on the end of the month, I wanted to think about different savings tricks and methods. One that I've noticed has become pretty popular over the last couple years is cash stuffing.
For those who don't know, the idea behind this is that you withdraw an amount of funds as cash and bring it home, then divide that cash into different envelopes or folders for different things you might be saving/budgeting for.
This might also be called envelope budgeting or "the envelope system".
For cash stuffing, all you need is cash and some envelopes. On each envelope, you write down a specific goal or category. Common ones are:
Clothes Shopping
Vacation
Take Out
Hobby Supplies
Fun
Keep in mind that you can use cash stuffing just for savings goals, OR you can use it for your entire budget system, including rent, bills, groceries, etc. Just remember that this is meant to help you, so if it's easier for you to pay your bills through debit/credit, make sure to leave enough money in your account for those things.
This is an example of a commercial budget binder than uses labels and envelopes (although the "envelopes" in this case are plastic sleeves rather than actual envelopes).
And here is an envelope set from Clever Fox, a planning brand that I'm very fond of. The envelopes in this listing have spots for you to not only name the category, but also track your budgeted (planned) and actual funds used for that category each month.
While the cash stuffing method is trendy right now, it's not new, and there's actually a fair bit of psychology behind it.
Neurodivergence
Some people struggle with budgeting for different reasons, but a common issue, especially for those of us with neurodivergent minds, is that the money in our bank accounts is too abstract. We see the number in the account and we know what it means, but for some people there's still a disconnect in the mind about how much money is actually available to spend.
Using a cash method when feasible allows people who struggle with digital money to hold their funds in their hands, and completes that connection of "this is what I have" to "this is what I can spend". Dividing that physical cash into clear categories, labeled and separated, also helps with that connection.
Age
A cash method for spending/budgeting is also a great way to teach your children about money. Many people might mock parents who give their kids "allowances" and "charge them rent", but in many cases these parents have just set up a system that works for them and their kids to teach the children how spending works.
Personally, I think it's a really good idea. Starting your kids early with something low stakes like a $20 monthly allowance and, say, $3-5 "rent" shows them how to budget long before they have to face that concept in the real world.
Plus, kids love to do things that they see their parents doing - that's why children love kitchen sets and toy grocery stores so much!
Family
My last major reason for suggesting the cash stuffing method is that it's a good way to get the whole family on the same page if you share funds. How you determine "whose money is whose" is your business, of course, but if you have a family fund, using the envelope method can help identify clear boundaries and limitations on spending. You can also use this as a family activity - every week, two weeks, or month, the family all sits down together to work out the budget.
Whatever reason you might have to try this budgeting method, if it works for you, let us know! And if it doesn't, let us know that too, and why!
Hi there everyone! It's Finance Friday again and today I've come to talk about the homemade vs store bought debate.
Am I afraid? NO!
Well. Yes, a little bit.
Homemade vs. Store Bought has been an ongoing debate online for years at this point. It's not new content, and I know that people are probably tired of it. Bear with me, however, because I like to think that I have a shiny new outlook on things.
What do I mean by Homemade?
Before we get into the meat of the post, I want to define a couple things. "Homemade" in the context of this post means any food or home goods that you make at home using whole (or as close to whole as possible in your area) ingredients or basic supplies (such as fabric, wood, yarn, etc).
For this post I won't be going into the really raw homemade area, where you grow/raise your own food or harvest your own wood/fibers or other supplies. I may address that level of homemade later on, but not today.
What do I mean by Store Bought?
In the context of this post, Store Bought strictly refers to a complete/finished product. Think of buying fast food, frozen meals, ready to eat foods from the local deli, or finished products like pillows, blankets, towels, books, journals, decorations, and so on.
For the purposes of this post, things that are considered ingredients, but aren't necessarily whole ingredients, such as store bought spices, oils, flours, sugars, etc will be counted toward the homemade section.
The Argument for Homemade Products
Homemade products are great for a lot of reasons. When it comes to food, you know what ingredients are going into the food, there are fewer preservatives and artificial dyes, and when you cook homemade you can be aware of and eliminate allergens more easily.
For handmade goods like furniture, decor, clothing, etc, you have the ability to choose where you get your materials, and sustainably source them if that's something you value.
No matter what you're making at home, there is often a sense of pride and accomplishment that accompanies completing a product that you've made from start to finish, and this accomplishment can be a big boost to our mental and emotional wellness.
The Argument for Store Bought Products
If store bought products didn't have their benefits, we wouldn't have as many supermarkets as we do. Buying ready to use products, or products that are quick and easy to assemble, is convenient and saves time. The store may also have products or foods that you can't make at home, either because the process requires expensive equipment that you don't have, or the ingredients may be out of season or completely unavailable in your area.
Buying from the store also means that people don't have to learn how to do things that may not interest them.
Cost Comparison
Alright, it's finally time to get to the point of this post: comparing the cost of homemade vs store bought. This is the argument that circles social media almost daily. So, which is more cost efficient?
The truth is, whether you like it or not, that answer is dependent on an individual's situation. I say this because when we're talking about cost efficiency of homemade or store bought products, it's a conversation that needs to address not only the financial/monetary cost. You must consider monetary, time, energy, and social costs.
Homemade goods are often cheaper by the dollar unit. By this I mean that the volume of ingredients or supplies that goes into something you make at home is going to cost less than buying the finished product from a store. For example, in my area, let's look at how much it would cost for me to buy a Whopper from Burger King vs making it myself:
Whopper from Burger King: $7.19
Whopper at home: $2.88
Ground beef: $5.93/lb ($1.48 per serving)
Slicing tomatoes: $1.98/lb ($0.12 per serving)
Green Leaf Lettuce: $2.14/ea. ($0.24 per serving)
Mayonnaise: $5.98/30oz ($0.20 per serving)
Ketchup: $3.98/32oz ($0.13 per serving)
Pickle Chips: $2.47/32oz ($0.15 per serving)
White Onions: $1.27/ea. ($0.15 per serving)
Sesame Seed Buns: $3.28/8ct. ($0.41 per serving)
As you can see, one Whopper made at home would be about 60% cheaper. However, most of these ingredients can't be bought by the serving. The first price listed for each ingredient is what I would spend if I had none of these ingredients at home, and in that case my grocery total would be $27.03.
One could argue that in the long run, the homemade is still cheaper because you can use those ingredients for more than one Whopper, or for other things, and that's 100% true. In a situation where you have $30 and you need to buy food, I absolutely recommend buying the groceries and stretching them out.
What if, however, you only have $10? What if you're homeless, living on the street or out of your car or hotels? How will you store and prepare those groceries? What if you have the $30 but you have absolutely no time in your schedule to set for cooking?
These are, of course, symptoms of a larger problem, but they still have to be considered in this argument. Too often I see people living paycheck to paycheck being scolded or mocked for grabbing a fast food meal or eating frozen meals when that's all they have time for before running off to their next job, or all they have energy for.
I've said it before on this blog and I'll say it again: Fed is Best. Your first priority in any situation is to have your basic needs (food, water, clothing, sleep, and shelter) met. In a society where it's a struggle for so many people to have all those needs met on a daily basis, there is no room for judgment on how they meet those needs.
On the other side of things, fast and cheap does come with it's own cost. When you save on time and money you're sacrificing things like nutrition, control, sustainability, and sometimes overall health. For some people, those things are too high of a cost themselves, and that's perfectly okay. No matter what, you have the power to make those decisions for yourself.
Conclusion
In the end, it's up to you to weigh the costs and benefits of homemade vs store bought and make that decision for yourself and your family. This is a long-running argument that often dips into the political aspect of things, and it will likely continue for a lot longer.
For your household, to make sound and informed decisions one way or the other, remember to keep these costs in mind:
Financial - the dollar amount that you spend or save
Time - how much time it takes you to complete the task
Energy - how much effort, both physical and mental, that you have to put into the task
As long as you remember that all of these things count toward the final cost of your decision, I know that you'll be able to make the choices that work best for your situation.
