Side hustles April 2019

The great thing about doing side hustles to generate extra income is that you can hustle on your own terms.  The more hard work, time, and creative effort you put in, the more extra money you can make.  You can hustle as little or as much as you want, whenever you want.  It’s your extra money, and you can choose how you want to spend it.  Instead of focusing on what ideas don’t apply to you, try focusing on different side hustle ideas that you can implement to work for your situation.

Once a month (usually on the 1^st), I like to post a short summary of our personal and financial situation for the previous month.  While I don’t often post articles, I am committed to documenting all of my side hustle income.  Here I’ll share some of what’s been going on with our lives and our side hustles. 

Welcome to May!  Did you have a good April?  This last month has been our most entertaining month of the year. 

We started the month off with a 4 day visit to San Diego.  On the way to our Airbnb, we visited Legoland.  We have definitely gotten the full value out of our Legoland passes.  It’s awesome to be able to visit the amusement park on Thursday since it is quite empty, with no wait for any rides.

In San Diego, we went to Sea World two days in a row.  One of the days, our son wanted to spend most of the day just playing with the toys in the gift shops.  Since we have season passes to Sea World, we did not feel any rush in getting through as many rides, shows and exhibits as possible.  We patiently waited as our son spent much of his time just playing with sea creature toys.

I’m glad we found a nice Airbnb for our stay.  It was nice having so much space, free parking, and it felt like a home away from home.  On our last day in San Diego, we went to visit a beach for the first time.  Our kids got a chance to run around on the wet sand and splash in the water.  We had a blast!

We recently purchased annual membership to the La Habra Children’s Museum for $80 for our family.  We’ve already gone 3 times this month!  There are fun little kid activities spread throughout the museum including: carousel rides every hour, full sized dinosaurs, an area to dig up dinosaur bones, an interactive garden, a play kitchen, a play supermarket, a costume dress up section, train village, and taxidermy room with fish and insects.  The museum is a 15 minute drive from our home and has free parking.

The rest of the month was filled with other fun activities like dinner at friends’ homes, Easter egg hunt for the kids, going for walks around our neighborhood and playing in the playground.  This entire month has been an adventure for our kids.  Since our children are growing so fast, we want to spend as much quality time as we can with them. 

Here’s our monthly summary of side income that we have generated in the previous month of April.

Award Travel

On 4.29, I redeemed 91,600 Chase Ultimate Rewards points with my Chase Sapphire Reserve account towards free round trip flights for my family to Portland, Oregon worth $1,374.  We are going to visit the in-laws and have them see their grandkids.  I’m really glad we have a large stash of credit card points that we can spend towards free travel.   

Cash Back

On 4.1, I received $10.23 deposit in my Discover Cashback Checking account.  This is 1% cashback from paying our rental property with my Discover debit card.

On 4.1, I received a $10 PayPal deposit from Mr. Rebates shopping portal.

On 4.4, I received a $4 statement credit on my Freedom Unlimited credit card from Chase Offers.  This was 5% off dog food purchases.

On 4.5, I received a $50 statement credit on my AMEX SimplyCash Business card from AMEX Offers.  This was 10% cash back for purchases made at Staples.

On 4.11, I received a $1.02 statement credit on my Chase Sapphire Reserve card from Chase Offers.  This was 10% off a pie at Coco’s Restaurant.

On 4.15, my wife received a $10 statement credit on her AMEX Gold card.  This was the $10 AMEX Gold dining credit for spending money at Shake Shack.

On 4.27, I received a $10 Amazon gift card by redeeming some old points from my Lexus credit card.  It cost 1,350 points but I’m glad I could drain the point balance from my account as this is not a credit card I use much. 

Rental Income

On 4.5, we received a net profit of $450 from our rental property. 

Survey Income
On 4.8, I received a $15 check from E-Rewards Medical for completing a medical survey.
On 4.8, I received a $10 check from E-Rewards Medical for completing a medical survey.

On 4.8, I received a $25 check from E-Rewards Medical for completing a medical survey.  Yup, 3 checks from E-Rewards Medical on the same day!

On 4.17, I received a $40 direct deposit into my checking account from GLG Survey for completing a medical survey.

On 4.30, my wife received a $35 Amazon gift card from Amazon Preview, a company that pays for surveys.

Miscellaneous Income
On 4.18, I sold an old Apple watch strap on Macrumors for $27. 

On 4.19, I sold an unloved watch on Reddit Watch Exchange subreddit for $450.  This was a watch I purchased on a whim but then decided I really didn’t need.

On 4.23, my wife sold an older unused clothing steamer online for $30.  We haven’t used this in over a year as we no longer steam our clothing.

On 4.23, I sold another unloved watch on Reddit Watch Exchange subreddit for $785.  While I love watches, I don’t need a large collection of them.

On 4.30, my wife sold an unused bluetooth speaker online for $10.It’s great to be able to reduce clutter around our home and increase side income at the same time.  Selling all this stuff makes us hesitant to purchase random items in the future.

Monthly Totals:

We saved $1,374 on award travel

We earned $95.25 from cash back

We earned $450 from rental income
We earned $125 for completing online surveys

We earned $1,302 from selling unused items in our home.

All of this totals $3,346.25 from our side hustles for the month of April!  It’s been a great month of side hustle income for us.  More importantly, it's been such a fun month with the family.