Quick! Can you come up with $100? Some of you have that in your couch cushions, but for those who don’t, here are 124 ways to make $100 fast.
I know most of you have $100 and a lot more. But maybe you need another $100 to bail someone out of jail or something. So here they are, 120 ways to get money fast (whether it’s in one week or one day). Some of them are shall we say, morally ambiguous, but when you need to make money quick…
Free Money
Get money with no effort.
Cash Back: Nearly 80% of Americans shop online and the majority site cost as a bigger reason than convenience. If it’s already cheaper to shop online, why not make it even cheaper? That’s what Ebates does, and You’ll get $10 just for signing up! You use their portal for your online shopping at more than 2,000 stores like Sephora, Macy’s, and Apple.
Ebates members also get special discounts, promo codes, and coupons. You earn cash back with each purchase and will receive it in the form of a check or through PayPal.
Unclaimed Money: You might have an old bank account that you opened as a kid, a check from a former employer from your high school job or a utility deposit on an account you closed. You can go to NAUPA and see if you’re owed any money.
Swagbucks: What’s better than getting paid to do things you’re already doing? Getting paid to drink I supposed but getting paid to do things like watch videos, shop, and do searches online is pretty nice too.
When you join Swagbucks you can get cash back when you buy online from more than 1,500 retailers including places you probably already shop like Amazon, Target, and Starbucks. You earn points for each dollar you spend and also get special coupons and deals exclusive to Swagbucks shoppers.
You can also earn points when you use the Swagbucks Yahoo search engine, and when you watch special videos Swagbucks has put together. You can redeem your points for gift cards or get cash back through PayPal.
Unused Subscriptions: We waste a lot of money on things like subscription services we no longer use. When is the last time you went to the gym? But life gets in the way, and we can’t keep track of everything. You might not even realize that you are paying for these things.
It would be nice to have an assistant who looked through your bank statements and credit card receipts and found this kind of stuff. But you need $100, so you are too broke to have an assistant. Getting ideas above your station.
That’s what Trim can do for you. It combs through your transaction history and looks for subscriptions to things like magazines, gym memberships, or food delivery services. They cancel anything you no longer want to pay for.
Missing Money: You may have money owed to you out there. It could be from un-cashed checks, old insurance policies, or utility deposits. You can search on Missing Money to see if you have any money floating around out there.
Reservations: Probably part of the reason you need $100 fast is that you spend so damn much money going out to eat. That’s why you need Seated. This is probably the best thing on this list. It sounds too good to be true but I know it works because Andrew and I both use it.
It’s an App that you use to book restaurant reservations. Every time you complete a reservation, you get a gift code for $15 for Amazon, Uber, or Starbucks. Amazing! The rewards are available within 24 hours of your completed reservation.
Adjust Your W4: Getting a big tax refund is exciting, but it’s not ideal. It means you are giving the government a tax-free loan every year. You can adjust the number of withholdings on your W4, so less tax is being deducted.
This will put some extra money in your pocket right away. You can use the IRS withholding calculator to figure out the correct number to enter on the form.
Banks: There is so much competition between banks that some offer cash bonuses when you open a new account as a way to attract new customers. There are usually some stipulations; you use direct deposit or pay a certain number of bills online, the account must be open for a minimum length of time or keep a minimum balance.
But most of the criteria are pretty easy to meet and signing up can make you a few hundred bucks.
Class Action Money: When a company settles a class action suit, you might be entitled to some of it if you ever purchased the product in question. Class Action Rebates will show you open claims.
Tax Refunds: The government might owe you money in the form of a tax refund that never made it to you. You can also use links on the site to find unclaimed state money, a mortgage refund and several other sources of unclaimed money.
Sitting
You need to be a little responsible to do these.
Pet Sitting: Especially if you know how to administer medication to an animal, you can make great money doing this. I had a diabetic kitty that required twice-daily insulin injections. It cost $35 per visit, so $70 a day.
Baby Sitting: Parents post jobs on Sittercity for everything from a full time nanny to the occasional date night sitter. You can apply to the postings, meet the family and get hired. The average pay for a sitter is a little over $12 an hour.
House Sitting: No one really pays for this anymore. At least not people who live in nice places. People will house sit for free in exchange for the free accommodations. If you’re willing to do a little more work, this site has some paid listings. You could house sit for free though and use that time to rent your own place out on Airbnb as we discussed earlier.
Freelance
Use your free time and your freedom to get your $100.
Uber: The hourly pay after expenses varies from city to city but you can expect to make around $10 an hour. In larger cities it will often be much more and in smaller cities, sometimes a little less.
The appeal of Uber is that you can set your own schedule and there is no commitment. You can work your regular job and make your $100 in just a few hours on a weekend or some evenings.
Task Rabbit: TR lets you bid on jobs for things like picking up dry cleaning, food shopping, and babysitting. Lots of little, everyday tasks that others don’t want or don’t have time to do are up for grab for taskers.
Elance: It’s called Upwork now and is similar to Task Rabbit but for more professional kinds of work, writers, translators, customer service reps.
Move: You don’t have to get hired by a moving company to do this. If you live in a big apartment complex, lots of people move in and out. Moving tops the list of things that suck but people don’t realize just how much until they start doing it.
This is when they’re weak and wishing they had arranged movers. As you spot them carrying boxes to and fro, offer to help out for cash. I know this will work because it happened to me. Guy approached my boyfriend at the time and me as we were moving and offered to help. We took him up on it.
Your Home
Your home is a veritable gold mine if you know where to look.
Airbnb: If you live in a desirable place, a big city, a charming hamlet, the chances are that someone would like to stay in your place for a few days. And they’ll pay you! Right now, a small studio near the United Nations in NYC, so, far, far from the subway, is renting for $175 a night. If you can crash on a friend’s couch for just one night, there’s your $100 and then some.
Rental Property: You know how we feel about rental property. What could be better than having someone pay your mortgage and pay you? It’s intimidating to become a landlord though. You don’t know how to tell a good property from a bad one, you don’t know how to fix a sink, you don’t know how to screen tenants.
With Roofstock, you don’t have to. They are a turnkey real estate company. You just choose a house from their portfolio and the rest is done for you. The house is turnkey, there are already tenants in place, and those tenants have been screened. You just sit back and collect a check!
Rent like a champ: Do you live near a college campus, famous golf course, race track, or other venues where major sporting events are held? You can rent your home out to people attending those events through Rent Like a Champion.
You set the price and availability for your rental. Most rentals are from Friday evening to Sunday afternoon, and the site says the average host earns $1,100 per weekend. The company provides up to $1,000,000 in insurance coverage which acts as your primary insurance policy for the time your home is rented out. The policy covers liability, structural damage, and damage to items and property.
You are paid via direct deposit 5-6 business days after the guests check out. The site currently has listings in 25 cities in the US.
Stuff: Your house is full of it. And you’re too lazy to have a yard sale or even put it on Craigslist. That’s okay; there is a new service for the lazy, $100-less among us. Gone is an app that allows you to text a picture of what you want to sell and a customer service rep will make you an offer.
If you accept, they will send you a box and shipping label. If you live in Austin or San Francisco, they will send someone to your house to pick the items up! You can sell anything of value but some things, like electronics, do better than others.
E-Commerce: Selling stuff is a great way to make extra money whether you sell things you make or re-sell things you buy. If you want to build an on-line store, BigCommerce makes it easy. They have ready made templates so you don’t have to spend time designing your store.
They also have a lot of tools to help you do things like create coupons and promotions, process payments, handle returns, and share your store on sites like eBay, Google Shopping, Facebook, and several price comparison sites like Nextag, Bizrate, and PriceGrabber.
Parking: This won’t work everywhere but if you live near an event venue, a sports stadium, for instance, charge people to park in your driveway and even your yard.
Storage: Have space in your garage, attic or basement? Rent it out as temporary storage. Possibly get in touch with some contractors in your area who do home renovations. They can steer their clients to you for a place to store the things in the room being renovated.
Spare Change: You probably have more of it than you think. I always empty it out of my wallet before I travel and am surprised how much lighter my purse is without it. So that alone is probably $5-10 worth. Go through all of your purses, pockets, junk drawers, and couch cushions.
Re-Sell
People will buy anything! Take advantage of their acquisitive nature.
Yard Sales: You were too lazy to have one but maybe not too lazy to go to one. Do a few searches on e-Bay and Amazon to see what kind of stuff is selling. Then go find it and sell it yourself.
Old Gifts: All those crappy obligation gifts you get from relatives are in the back of your closet somewhere. Surely there are people in this world who relish and collect hideous holiday-themed sweatshirts and would pay good money for yours.
If you have old gift cards laying around, you can sell those for fast cash too. You can list new or partially used gift cards and store credits on sites like Raise. You set your own price, and you will receive payment through PayPal, direct deposit, or mailed check.
Clothes: You have some much stuff in your closet that you’re never going to wear again but one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Sign up for Poshmark and start making some cash selling your previously loved clothing.
Your Ex’s Crap: Still got some of that sob’s stuff hanging around? I don’t. I’m from the church of angrily burning it in a Santeria ritual, but you might not be religious. Sell those old hoodies and CDs and the bad ju-ju that comes with them.
Invest
Do you know the best way to make money? You don’t? Have you never listened to a single episode or read a single article we’ve done?! It’s investing. Here’s how.
Betterment: We have loved Betterment since Day One and we love it still. It’s such a good gateway for people who are afraid to invest because you don’t have to know anything about money or personal finance or investing to get started. There is also no minimum and the fees are low.
There is no excuse to not open a Betterment account and start investing now. If you have two minutes and five bucks, you can do it. If you want more information, we did an exhaustive review.
Wealthfront: Betterment not your cup of tea? You might prefer Wealthfront. It’s a great alternative to Betterment, the same kind of hands-off investing, low fees, and lots of great features like tax loss harvesting and direct indexing. We did a review of them too.
Medical
Burke and Hare made a pretty good living selling stuff (well, bodies) to the medical field.
Bodily Fluids: People will pay for them! Well, not just any people, medical people (mostly). You can sell plasma for about $35 per donation and platelets for about $50.
Your Genes: This one is more intensive than selling blood products. If you want to sell your sperm, you’ll receive between $50-$200 but must donate two or three times a week for as long as six months. And you can’t “donate” outside the clinic. If I were a guy, that would be a deal breaker no matter how much they were paying.
If a woman wants to donate eggs, she can make bank! Between $5,000-$15,000. But it’s no picnic. You’ll be subjected to a lot of medical and psychological testing before beginning, you’ll need to shoot yourself up with fertility drugs while undergoing more testing during the process, and the procedure to remove the eggs is a surgical one.
Your Womb: If you want to carry a pregnancy for someone, again bank. Between $40,000-52,000. But you’ll go through lots of testing and medical appointments and have to be pregnant for nine months, so not exactly easy money.
Clinical Trials: You can get paid to have drugs and things like MRI’s tested on you. You can make between $50-$300 per day. CenterWatch is a good place to search for trials near you. Hopefully, you get lucky and are in the placebo group.
Kidneys: Not legal in the states but don’t let that stop you! You can make between $5,000-$25,000 for your extraneous kidney. (Please don’t do this.)
Poo! Fecal transplants are a thing. I worked in functional medical offices for years and have been interested in this as a medical treatment for a while. Your gut biome is extremely important and having a healthy one may have implications medicine is only beginning to understand.
So poo is big business. You can make about $40 per sample. The catch is, you have to be super healthy yourself. OpenBiome pays for poo if any of you are local to Massachusetts.
You’re Bored
You don’t even have $100, so it’s not like you’re out of the town.
Mechanical Turk: This is an Amazon site that pays small amounts of money for completing simple tasks like looking at an image and describing it in fewer than ten words.
Gigwalk: This is an app. You do things like go to a store and verify that items are correctly priced or displayed, take a photo and send it to the manufacturer.
Skills
I know you have mad ones.
Cook: I know someone who was a home chef/magician. Frankly, I can’t think of anything worse than some guy making me dinner while he pulls a rabbit out of his hat, but he made a living at it, so there’s a market.
There is probably a better market for non-magical cooks. Do you have a friend who wants to make dinner for a potential SO but can’t cook? Here’s your $100. Some chicks have claimed to get a ring after making some kind of roast chicken, so I think $100 would be a cheap price to pay.
Fix Stuff: Not everyone has DIY skills. I would gladly pay someone to do things like assemble bookshelves or fix my broken lamp. Do you have technologically challenged friends? Gold mine! Yea, turning it off and back on will probably fix it, but you can surely push a few extra buttons to make them think you earned that $100.
Clean: Cleaning isn’t so much a skill as a pain in the ass. And some people will pay good money to avoid pains in their asses. Even if you don’t love to clean, it’s a quick way to make some good money.
The average independent cleaner (not working for Merry Maids or a similar service) make between $25-35 per hour. A few hours and you have your $100 and then some.
Organize: Some people love to organize. You can tell who they are because when you visit their house, you see all sorts of weird stuff like alphabetized can goods and books that have been arranged by color. If you’re such a person, others will pay for these magical abilities.
Insurance: Dealing with insurance companies is a nightmare. Just because you get a bill from an insurance company doesn’t mean it’s legitimate. If you can navigate through this, you can save people thousands of dollars. PolicyGenius has been my solution to this, it’s cheap and automated.
Talents
Fewer of us have talent than have skill so you can charge a little more for these.
Etsy: Are you a crafty person? Can you make things like fancy soaps, jewelry, clothes? You can set up an on-line store and sell your creations on Esty.
YouTube: Make an on-line tutorial for something you’re good at, car repair, building a bookcase, cooking your signature dish. Upload it to Youtube and enable monetization. This allows them to put ads on your videos.
Cater: This doesn’t have to be a whole, starting a business, big to do. Ask friends, relatives, and co-workers if they have any special events coming up they would like you to cook for. As we get closer to the holiday season, there will be a lot of opportunities for various kinds of get togethers.
Event Plan: If you’re not much of a cook, you can still take advantage of all the holiday parties. Plan the event, which can mean anything from planning the menu to arranging for flowers, sending out invitations, and renting things like extra chairs and glasses. People are busy around the holidays and may be willing to outsource some things.
Bar Tend: You don’t have to get a regular job doing this, you can do this at parties. You could even do it at a party you’ve been invited to. Stay behind the drinks area, serve people and put a glass with a few dollars in it on the table. I bet you get some tips.
Hair And Makeup: Another good one to take advantage of around the holidays. Everyone wants to look their best, but not everyone knows how to do the fancier hair and makeup that some holiday soirees require. Help us!
Tutor: Those ultra-competitive tiger parents want to make sure their special cornflakes get into the best schools, whether that means pre-school for three-year-olds or the Ivy League for eighteen-year-olds.
You can tutor in person, but you have to round up clients for that which can be time-consuming. It’s worth putting yourself out there because once you get started, you’ll often find new clients via word of mouth.
But in the meantime, an easy online job is tutoring on-line. Wyzant is a site where parents and students shop for tutors for a variety of subjects from algebra to science to test prep. There is a wide range of ages in need of tutors as well, from elementary age through college.
You can set your schedule and fees, and Wyzant takes a cut.
Street Performer: Can you play an instrument, break dance, do magic tricks? Go to a tourist area, set out a hat and show your moves.Busker
Translate: If you are fluent, and I mean very fluent, in a language, you can get paid to translate. Translatorscafe.com is a free online directory of translators and translation jobs. Just upload your resumé and list your rates and services.
New jobs are posted every day and include things like translating a tourism brochure or subtitling a movie. You apply directly to the hiring company. Or you can try an online agency like gengo.com and verbalizeit.com. You select projects that fit your schedule and abilities.
Public Speaker: Speaking in front of a group regularly features on lists of people’s biggest fears. It’s up there with death. And clowns! More than a quarter of Americans fear it. This leaves plenty of room for opportunity. If there is a professional topic you’re knowledgeable on, there are groups who will pay you to speak about it.
Book Yourself Solid and Public Speaking with Michael Port
On a list of biggest fears, public speaking is #2, death is #6. So we'd rather be dead than give the eulogy. Michael Port will help us overcome our fear.
On-Line Daters
They have enough money for A List on Ok Cupid and to go on lots of drinks/coffee dates so you might as well get some of that too.
Crappy Photos: Why do some people have such awful photos on their dating profile? It’s not that they’re ugly, $100 won’t fix that, it’s just the pictures are so poorly taken. Well, because they aren’t a professional photographer or even an amateur one, so there’s your answer. But if you are, you can help. Offer to take some panty dropping photos for cash.
Here are some tips to take good dating profile photos. The left side of the face is somehow more pleasant to look at according to one of those weird studies that are pretty useless, but hey, it’s useful for this one thing, so not a total waste of grant money and scientist’s time!
Take the photos during “the golden hour.” This is the hour just before or after sunset when the light is redder and softer, therefore more flattering. There is even a calculator that tells you what time that is based on your location.
Women should show a little cleavage and men should go shirtless if they have a good body. If you Shallow but true. Hot is hot, and looks are about all we have to go on when we’re perusing on-line dating sites.
Crappy Profiles: Some people try, bless them. But it’s hard to objectively write about yourself. If you have a poor self-image, you sound like a sad sack, and if you have too high a self-image, you sound like a douche. Offer to revamp their zero message getting profile.
A profile should read like a compelling short story, not a bullet list of attributes, or worse, an entitled list of “deal breakers.” When potential dates read it, they should understand what to expect when dating this person.
Texts: We want the new person we’re dating to think we are a hot commodity, much in demand! Or we want our nosy parents or co-workers to think we have a life in which boys or girls are interested in us. But our phones sit there, wan and silent.
Offer a service to send texts at pre-arranged times to boost value. You can also arrange to send “escape” texts to people on first dates. You text with some terrible emergency thirty minutes into the date. If it’s going well, they ignore it. If it’s an SOS situation, they have an out.
Around Your Hood
Become the entrepreneur of your block!
Mow Lawns: Even if everyone in your street is hale and hearty, head over to the local old folk’s side of town and offer to mow their grass.
Shovel Snow: Even if your neighbors are able bodied, shoveling snow sucks and lots of people will gladly pay someone else to do it.
Clean Gutters/Rake Leaves: A twofer. When leaves fall in the yard, they fall into the gutters too and are wet, sticky and gross to remove.
Walk Dogs: Everyone likes puppies! Look around for the fat ones in your neighborhood. Those are the ones who have parents too lazy to walk them. But all puppies need and deserve exercise, and you need and deserve $100. Join forces with the fat puppies and profit!
Raid The Recycling Bins: Does your town have mandatory recycling? Free money just sitting on the curb! Maybe do this one in the dark of night, so your neighbors don’t see you pawing through their cans and bottles.
House Numbers: If you live in or near a subdivision, buy number stencils and offer to paint house numbers on the curbs in front of houses. Otherwise, the pizza delivery guy may never arrive.
Haul Trash: This only works if you are in an area that does not have trash pick up but requires residents to haul the trash to the dump. If you do and have a truck, you can make the pick ups and drop offs.
College Kids
They have rich parents or fat loan checks, so they have it to spare.
Condom Delivery: College kid Kyle McCabe started a condom delivery service on his campus. He arrives at your door, condom in hand, wearing a flashing blue light on his helmet to denote the emergency nature of the situation. He also provides a more discreet delivery sans lighted helmet, but hey, then your floor mates won’t know you’re getting some so what on earth would be the point?
Dumpster Dive: You have to do it on move out day. College kids throw away the most amazing stuff! College kids are notorious for throwing great stuff in the trash because they can’t be bothered with it when they move out at the end of the semester.
Clothes, furniture, books. Just anything they don’t want to bother lugging back home. You might get some great stuff for yourself and some stuff you can re-sell.
See what perfectly good stuff your peers have chucked out and sell it on e-Bay or Craig’s List or your school’s local FB page. Textbooks may be especially lucrative. Check out other college’s dumpsters nearby.
Fill Out Forms: This one is for pre-college kids. If you’ve been to college, you know the Hell that is filling out student loan forms. I’m sure there are a few parents who would gladly hand over this chore for money.
Write Papers: Morally ambiguous territory again, but hey, it’s not your ass on the line. If you can knock out a term paper while some college kid gets drunk tailgating, good for you.
Drunk People
You’ve probably been drunk before. Would you have fallen for any of these? Exactly.
Read Palms:. You don’t actually have to know how to do it. Go here and pick up the basics. It won’t even matter if you mess up cause the other person is drunk! Palm reading is also a really great flirting technique since it immediately involves touch. But you don’t get paid for that (or maybe you do).
Sell Food: Drunk people are hungry! And not picky about what they eat. Drunk people don’t order salads; they order Taco Bell. So go to Taco Bell and get a few of those twelve packs of tacos. Stand outside the bar at closing time and triple the price.
Drive Sober: This probably works better in smaller places that don’t have things like Uber or hail-able cabs. It also probably works better if you make friends with the bartenders who can steer clients to you rather than be some creepy stranger trying to get people into your car outside a bar.
Bet Them At Pool: Drunk people don’t have great hand-eye coordination. What they do have is bravado. So challenge some to a game of pool and bet some money on it. Even if you aren’t a great pool player, you’re probably better than a drunk person. Unless their first name is a city. NEVER play pool for money with someone whose first name is a city. Cards either.
Work
You already have a job but are you getting the most out of it?
Overtime: If you’re paid hourly, see if you can get some overtime. If you have lazy co-workers, see if you can pick up some of their hours when they’re home with a hangover.
Change Shifts: If your job has shift work, find out if working a less desirable shift pays a little more. Many people prefer 9-5, so working a late shift might net you a slightly bigger paycheck.
Outsource: There is a legendary story of a developer who outsourced his own job. He figured out a workaround that let him outsource his work to China while he watched cat videos on Reddit all day. He was paying less than a fifth of his six-figure salary to the worker in China. Genius!
You can’t sit around all day on watching cat videos as he did, though. You’ll have to be doing something with that free time to make some extra money.
Ask For A Raise: If you don’t ask you don’t receive so it can’t hurt. Ask three times. It’s hard to muster up the courage to ask for a raise once, never mind three times. A boss knows this and may dismiss your first attempt hoping that will be the end of it.
By asking more than once, it shows the company that a raise is an expectation that needs to be met. It also serves as a reminder. Everyone is busy; everyone has distractions. If you ask once and forget it, your boss may too.
Don’t just walk in and ask. You have to be prepared to argue your case. This is almost like another job interview. You need to sell yourself again. Know your value within your team and the company.
Have a number in mind but don’t toss it out. Do some research to determine what others in your industry and your geographic area are making. Someone working in New York City can expect to make more than someone doing the same job in Nashville.
There are websites dedicated to this, glassdoor.com or payscale.com are two good examples. Discuss salary with your co-workers. It is not legal to fire employees for discussing salary. Many employers use the taboo of discussing salary to underpay everyone.
Make Cuts
Sometimes the first cut is the deepest. Dig down until you hit $100.73.
Cable: It doesn’t have to be forever. I myself need cable during cycling and college football season, but those months when there isn’t either happening, I could get rid of it and save more than $100. You might even get a better deal than you had when you re-up.
But lots of people have become ditched cable for good. With streaming services like Amazon Prime, Hulu, and Netflix you don’t even have to give up much of what you are probably watching on cable. The average cable bill is now $103 per month. For about $30 a month you could subscribe to all three of the above services.
The Little Things: You know this one, coffee, snacks when you get gas, lunches out because you didn’t bring from home. Those little things add up more than you think. If you don’t think you’re spending much on those little things, set up a Mint account and weep when you see the number.
Dating: costs money, probably more if you’re a guy. Stop the fruitless search for your soul mate for a few weeks and watch that $100 accumulate.
If you simply must date, you can do it on the cheap. This article has a ton of cheap date ideas that won’t cost a fortune and is probably more fun than the boring dinner and a movie you were planning anyway.
Go-Part Veggie: I’m Paleo so I would never tell you to cut out meat but it is expensive, and you could probably stand to eat more veg. So make a couple of meals a week vegetarian meals.
Budget Bytes is a great site that has tons of healthy, low-cost recipes, many of them vegetarian. There are step-by-step instructions, photos, and a breakdown of the cost of each ingredient.
Walk/Bike: I know not everyone can do this to commute to work but take a look at a week’s worth of your car trips. Is there at least one that you could have walked or biked for? This will save you gas, save wear and tear on your car and get you some much-needed exercise.
bike
Friends
Hopefully, you have some. And hopefully, they have more money than you.
Call In Your Markers: It’s not nice to quibble over things like who owes exactly what between friends. Stuff like dinner checks split 50/50 even though one of you had an extra drink or buying both coffees, so the other person snags you seats, all comes out even eventually. But you don’t need $100 eventually, you need that money now. Time to call in those extra glasses of wine and mocha lattes.
Make A Bet: But it’s going to have to be an embarrassing one to make it worth their $100. Like agreeing to streak in public or do ten minutes of stand-up at an open mic night.
Blackmail: Have some dirt on a friend? Ask them how much it’s worth not to reveal it at their wedding reception. You won’t have the friend, but you’ll have the $100!
Family
They probably won’t let you starve or live on the street, but they might not be willing just to cough up $100. Takes some persuasion.
Guilt: In the 2005 Christmas tsunami, a mother was holding both her small children in the raging waters. One was five, and the other was two. She knew that if she tried to hold them both, they all would die. So she made Sophie’s Choice. She let go of the older kid reasoning he stood a better chance than the smaller one.
And against every odd, both kids lived. But think of the opportunities to mine that vein of parental guilt. Kid probably got a pony for every birthday after that and a car when he turned 16. Surely you can get a lousy $100 if you remind your mother of the time she left you in the car while she shopped at Target.
Forego Inheritance: Do your folks have some cash they plan on leaving to you? Maybe they would be willing to give you some now when you really need it, and you forego that amount once they pass.
Crime
Who says it doesn’t pay?
Drop A Dime: Are there any unsolved crimes in your area? Do you think someone you know is the culprit? Turn them in for the reward!
Snitch: Become a supergrass which is a super cool British word for informant. Know some shady ass people? Would the local filth like to know what they are up to? You can get paid for that information. You might even get off for your own shady ass antics.
Mock Jury: Many lawyers will try their case before a mock jury to find out what needs to be improved before taking a case before a real jury. According to this site, you can make as much as $100 a day!
Ask
You never know unless you do.
Panhandle: Well, it’s not exactly dignified, but you might be surprised by how much you can make sitting around with a sign looking sad. Bring a pet. I’m as cold hearted towards humans as it is possible to be but a sad animal gets me every time.
Panhandle Electronically: If you read a sad tale of woe in your local paper, you can bet the woe haver also has a Go Fund Me. These people have less shame than traditional panhandlers. I’ve seen people asking for money on there for boob jobs. And they get it! I guess having shame isn’t very lucrative.
Single People
More than half of Americans over the age of 16 are single, so you have a big demographic to work with.
SO For Hire: It’s not what it sounds like. The holidays are coming soon and for single people that means nosy ass relatives asking how come they don’t have a girl/boyfriend yet. They both know, it’s because the single person is ugly.
But that’s rude to say. Man, the ugly single person would really like to show Aunt Martha by turning up with a real looker this Thanksgiving. This is where you come in. Works for weddings too where the atmosphere is really fraught.
Fake Engagement: Grab an accommodating friend and announce that you’re getting married. Think about it. How much in cash and gifts have you given people getting married or having a kid? Thousands possibly. About time you got some of that back. Some people will give you money, other’s gifts, so ask for the receipt.
Marry
Tourists
Look at them, walking around with cameras around their necks and wallets full of local currency in their back pockets. Don’t take that route, though.
Walking Tours: I do these in every city I visit. There are all kinds, history, ghosts, architecture, food! Craft one and advertise it in hotels and those kiosks that have information for tourists. Even if you don’t charge, a lot of people will tip.
You can connect with these visitors and become their local tour guide through Vayable. You can set your own availability. You can create themes for your tours that align with your interests and knowledge of the local area; museum tours, hiking tours, history tours, food tours.
You set your prices, and Vayable takes a reasonable 15%. You make a profile and record a short audition video. If you’re approved, you will be given access to the site to list your tour. The payments are handled via credit card through the site. You are paid within 24 hours of conducting the tour.
Vayable is available in more than 600 cities worldwide.
Cooking Class: This is another thing I do on vacation. Food is so intrinsic to a place. There’s no more appealing way to get a feel and a bit of history for a place as to eat and learn about its food. Again, devise a menu showcasing local dishes and advertise in tourist areas.
Bar Crawl: They’re tourists, so they don’t know all the great hole in the wall places you know and the guide books don’t list them. So take a group on a bar crawl, so they don’t visit your city and commit the unpardonable sin of drinking at the bar at Applebee’s.
Activity Tours: Are you an experienced scuba driver? You know all the best places, where to take lessons, where to rent the gear? Not everyone does, and it takes a lot of research to figure it out. If you can arrange all the particulars of this type of trip, or similar ones, rock climbing, white water rafting, people will pay for it.
X-Rated
Puritans, please turn back now.
Your Underwear: You all better appreciate this one, and at least one of you better do it and send me some of the money you made. I googled this and forgot to use Tor. I suggest Reddit for this. The subreddits Used panties and FetishItems are the most active. I’m not going into any detail, but there are ways to make your panties more desirable to buyers. That’s enough now; my parents will read this.
FinDom: I might be down for this one even though I didn’t have the stomach (but I do have the ass) for the panty selling one. FinDom is a subset of the BDSM community. The dominate demands cash and gifts from the submissive. That’s all I’m going to say, but I assure you, it is a real thing. You can google the details. Use Tor.
Squashing: If you’re a BBW, there are men out there who will pay you to sit/lay on top of them and squash them. Learning all sorts of things in the X-Rated section!
Sex Tape: Do you have a tenuous connection with someone famous? Can you find another Z-lister who wants to have sex with you? Do either of you have a pimp for a mother and are absolutely devoid of shame? The path to riches is clear.
Shop Around
Being lazy costs you money. A little legwork can save you some.
When you shop for an airline ticket what do you do? Go to a site like Travelocity or Expedia and compare prices or just go straight to an airline site and purchase a ticket? Of course, you use a comparison site because you want to find the best deal.
Shopping for things like insurance and utilities is the same. You don’t go straight to Geico’s website because then you only see Geico’s prices.
Electricity: There are fewer choices for things like cable and electricity, but some lucky places do have more than one provider. Power 2 Switch is a comparison site for electricity providers. Currently, you can compare prices in some areas of New Jersey, Texas, Ohio, and New York.
Cable: Allconnect does the same with cable and internet providers. Enter your address and zip code, and it will give you a list of providers and their prices in your area.
Insurance: Check and see if you can find a lower price for your various types of insurance, renter’s, home owner’s, car. You can compare rates here.
Student Loan Interest Rates: There is $1.4 trillion in student loan debt outstanding. When you have debt it makes it hard to get ahead, to invest, or to buy a home. If this sounds familiar, refinancing the debt can not only help you pay it off more quickly, but it can save you money on interest too.
We have often recommended SoFi and we still do but they have certain criteria that you must meet before you can refinance with them. LendKey has less stringent standards. LendKey is a platform that matches borrowers with community lenders and credit unions instead of banks.
It compares offers from more than 300 partners so you can shop for the best rates. Lendkey doesn’t charge an origination fee, another way they help save you money and they service the loan for you.
Groceries: Do you have an Aldi near to you? They have great prices. Check ethnic markets too. Often you can get things like meat, produce, and spices for less than your local big box place.
Farmer
If you have farm stands near you, you can buy directly from the source which often means lower prices since there is no middleman involved. If you have a bakery outlet, you can get reduced prices for things like bread, rolls, and sometimes baked items like pies and cakes.
Making a Difference
Not in the hippy way. Price difference.
Credit Card Perks: A lot of people don’t know about all the perks that come with having a credit card. Most cards come with price protection. If you charge a purchase to your card and see the same item at a lower price within a certain time frame, your credit card will refund you the difference.
Price Difference: There is an app that helps you get money back on items you’ve already purchased. It scans your inbox for recipts. If you made an on-line purchase from a store that has a price guarantee, Paribus, unlike your credit card protection, does the leg work to get the refund for you.
DIY
Don’t always throw money at your problems.
Cleaning Products: You can clean a lot with nothing more than vinegar and baking soda, both of which are dirt cheap. You don’t need a cabinet full of single purpose products to clean your house.
DIY cleaners
All-Purpose Cleaner: Mix one-quarter cup of white vinegar, two cups of water and 30 drops of essential oil into a spray bottle. Shake before each use.
Glass And Mirror Cleaner: Mix two cups of water, half a cup of vinegar, one-quarter cup of rubbing alcohol, and one to two drops of essential oil in a spray bottle. Shake before each use.
Carpet Deodorizer: Mix one cup of baking soda and fifteen drops of essential oil in a container with holes in the top. Sprinkle over the carpet, wait one hour and vacuum.
Scouring Powder: Mix two parts baking soda, one part salt, and one part Borax in a container with holes in the top. Sprinkle in the sink, tub, or toilet and scrub.
Small Repairs: If it’s broken, there is a video on Youtube that will show you step by step how to fix it. Your car, appliances, electronics. You don’t have to run out and buy something new or pay someone else to fix something for you.
Dry Cleaning: Clothes don’t need to be dry cleaned after every wearing. If it’s delicate enough to require dry cleaning, it’s unlikely that your doing manual labor in it or something. You can’t wear something to the point of smelliness, but you can “dry clean” things at home with something like Dryel. If something is stained, google how to remove that stain on that fabric.
Misc
Because I couldn’t fit these anywhere else!
Digital Currency: If you want a piece of the digital currency action, Coinbase is a platform where you can buy and sell bitcoin, ethereum, and litecoin through your bank account, credit cards, or PayPal account. It’s risky but if you buy low and sell high, you can make money trading digital currency.
Bet Against The Lions: I’m a self-flagellating Lions fan so it doesn’t really pain me anymore to say this than it does to root for the Lions. It’s almost always a safe bet. If you really want to clean up, double down on the bet when the Lions are ahead, and there are only two minutes left in the game. You won’t lose because they will.
Sell Cold Water: Stand outside some event that will have overpriced water and sell bulk purchased bottles for half the price.
Return Something: I know we agreed that some of these would be morally ambiguous and I’m okay with that. What I’m not okay with is being a dick. So if you do this, don’t be a dick. Return something because you should not have bought it and have not yet used it. Don’t take advantage of places like Costco that have extremely generous return policies to get fast money. Because that makes you a dick.
Sell Door To Door: Remember when you were a kid, and your school made you sell stuff like candy bars and gift wrap door to door? No reason you can’t do that as an adult. I would let people know you’re doing this as a fundraiser and then actually donate part of the money to a local charity. Otherwise, it just looks kind of weird.
Deliver Furniture: Not everyone has a pickup truck. But no truck people buy stuff off Craigslist too and need to get it home. If you do have a truck, you could provide this service. Maybe even better, contact sellers of large items and offer it to them. They can pay you and add the delivery price to the purchase price. It’s a win for them because advertising something with free delivery is sure to increase interest.
Sell Your Hair: Why give it away to Locks of Love when you can sell it for cold, hard cash? That’s where hair extensions come from. You can make anywhere from $100 to $4,000 for your hair! I wouldn’t expect to make $4,000 though. That was probably unicorn hair or something to make Elton John a wig.
Sell Your Breast Milk: And not just to babies. If a baby needs it, you probably should donate it. But believe it or not, adults are buying the stuff too. And they’re paying a fair penny, about $2.50 an ounce. Athletes are buying it for the energy it provides, and some people buy it believing that it increases immune function.
Sell Ad Space On Your Car: You can make up to $400 a month to let companies advertise on your car. There are fewer of these opportunities than there once were but they do still exist.
So there you have it. Not all of them are fun, and not all of them will make you $100 in one go, but if you really need some money, there are plenty of ways to get it.
