Extra Income Archives - Page 46 of 56

Financial Goals and Increased Income – Many Changes

April 16, 2013 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 84 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Recently, I have been receiving many questions about how our financial goals have changed since we now are making more income than we used to make. Even Jordann made a post last week titled How to Spend Your Extra Income. We definitely need to adjust our financial goals. This is mainly because of all of the side hustles that I am doing, especially since how last month I made nearly $8,000 in extra income.

The extra income that I have been making from my numerous side hustles is amazing. It allows us to do many things, while also paying down my student loans. Yes, I am busy most of the time, but I am much more comfortable and happy with life. And yes, I could be dedicating all of our leftover money and all of our extra income towards my student loans, but I am a believer of enjoying your money as well. I have a well-thought out plan that will enable us to pay off my student loans extremely early in life, so I should be able to have fun as well!

Below are all things that I want to start working on or finishing completely (in large part due to my extra income) within the next 12 to 13 months. Wish us luck!

[Read more…]

A Tornado and $888 in Extra Income

April 15, 2013 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 103 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Hey everyone! Happy Monday. This past week was okay, and that is because of the wild weather that we have been having in Missouri lately. There was a tornado in my city on Wednesday and it actually landed in our neighborhood. There are also reports that there was a SECOND tornado that landed on the opposite end of my neighborhood at the same time.

Me and W were out eating at a restaurant when the tornado sirens went off. In Missouri, the tornado sirens seem to go off weekly, so it’s hard to take them seriously. That was a big mistake! I know, I know, a lot of you will think we are very stupid. We were at a restaurant (and this restaurant was PACKED, so it just shows that no one else takes them seriously) and once the sirens stopped, the rain seems to slow down as well. We thought we would take the chance and drive home. Keep in mind that this restaurant is at the beginning of our subdivision, and only about .25 miles from our house.

We got in the car and everything seemed to go downhill. We made the turn to enter our subdivision and couldn’t even see out the car window because it was so windy and the rain was coming down so hard. We stopped the car for a second, but we felt like the car was picking up from the wind and had no where to go. Then a power line started to spark and catch on fire right next to us, so we decided that stopping was not a good idea and that we should just try and make it home. So we are driving and are ALMOST home (we could see our house) and a huge tree falls down right before us and blocks the whole road and we can’t even drive into anyone’s yards because of the tree blocking everything. Also, trees were falling down everywhere, with at least 20 or 30 gigantic trees down in our neighborhood. So we pulled the Camaro into someone’s driveway and noticed that their garage door was open and ran inside their garage. We of course didn’t feel comfortable in someone’s random garage that could easily blow over, so we started banging on their front door.

However, it was extremely loud because of the tornado, and we couldn’t even hear ourselves knocking on their door. No one came. So we cowered on their front porch (it was a pretty deep porch) and hid their for about 5 minutes. The wind then seemed to die down, so we decided it was our chance to gun it home. We couldn’t see anywhere in front of us and didn’t even know where we were in our own neighborhood because of all of the trees that were laying in the streets. We saw our neighbors’ roofs on the street, trampolines and sheds in front yards and on top of houses and so on. We had to jump out of the car very quickly and move trees and branches multiple times so that we could drive.

Definitely the most terrifying thing ever. Everything at our house is fine, and we most likely need a new roof and a couple of other things. We’re just happy that we were safe! Oh yeah, and then our power was out until Friday at around 3pm. That was a joy. We have definitely learned our lesson and whenever the sirens come on (which is every single time it rains here), we will be searching for a basement. I’ve never been or seen a tornado before this past week, so it changed my life.

Anyways, I’m still winning when it comes to my student loans. My student loan plan is still on track and I will be paying them completely within the next couple of weeks. I know I’m going to have a hard time parting with so much money, but in the end it will be best. No longer having student loan payments will feel like heaven, and it’ll be so nice to know that I have paid them off so quickly.

Spending

We did some major shopping this weekend, but it was all free because of a large amount of money that W has on a gift card that he received from his work. We have been trying to spend money on ourselves this whole weekend and it was hard! The gift card is also good at Lowes, and we plan on buying a new grill, some nice patio furniture, lights to light a pathway in the front yard, and tons of plants. Can’t wait until we go shopping for that, especially since it is all free.

I also contacted a landscaper, as many of you suggested. We just don’t have the time, and we have so many things that we need done. We found a flyer at our front door, and it turns out this guy just lives 3 doors down. I called him and he came over on Friday. We need a front and backyard cleanup (there is tons of trash because of the tornado), gutters cleaned, trash hauled (we have tons of branches and leaves in bags, and also carpet that needs to be gone), and vines killed in the backyard. He said he would do all of this for $175, which I think is great. Is this a normal price? We’ve never had this done before and don’t know. We’re also going to have him mow the lawn for at least a couple of months as well, which he quoted us a price of $28 per week. I’m guessing that’s normal also. I plan on calling him today, so give me your input!

Anyways, I’m fine with paying money in order to get things done. Would you pay to get things like this done if it meant that you have more time for yourself? Or are we crazy?

Extra Income (does not include income from our main jobs)

Extra income was lower in the past week, mainly because the power went out at our house from Wednesday through Friday because of the tornado. Most of my extra income efforts are from things that I do online, so of course it’s hard to do any of my side hustles if I have no power! It’s hard to make any extra money online when you don’t have internet for half of the week! I could have done things this weekend, but I prefer to have weekends to myself. Oh well, I will catch up with everything next week.

Posts from my blog:

Link Love

What are you sacrificing for Money? Monster Piggy Bank
Is living in a small town better? Eyes on the Dollar
Will I ever need to work again? One Frugal Girl
I freak out when my inbox is empty – Freelancing The Happy Homeowner
Is your blog really a business? Nuts and Bolts Media
I’m buying a condo in Portland Frugal Portland

Food

We’re doing good with our food spending, but not the greatest. We had to throw away almost all of our food in our fridge since the power was out and most of the food spoiled. The food in the freezer was fine though and still COMPLETELY frozen (which we were very surprised by), and we kept all of that.

Being healthy

I’m still doing good with this. Since a lot of our food spoiled, I replaced everything with more healtheir options and was able to get rid of a ton of junk food. Because of this, I consider this the only good thing that happened when the power was out haha. Also, I have been addicted to eating kiwis, and got a great deal at Aldi the other day. 24 kiwis for only $4! Yes, I said $4! The grocery store that I normally shops at would price that at $12, and the quality of fruit at Aldi always seems to be better.

Have you been doing well with your extra income, spending and being healthy?

How to Spend Your Extra Income

April 11, 2013 BY Jordann - 48 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Michelle has been doing an amazing job with extra income lately. Her blog has been taking off and that’s helping her make a ton of side income every month. Due to this, she’s been getting a boat load of emails about blogging for side income and has even written a few great posts about how to make money blogging. Hopefully her readers have benefitted from her tips and are starting to make money at their own blogs.

One thing she hasn’t covered is what to do with all of that extra income. One of my favorite things about extra income is that it’s not included in the budget, so you can really do anything you want with it. That said, it might not be the best idea to blow it on shopping. So what should you do with your extra income?

Use Your Side Hustle Income to Pay Off Debt

This is probably my number one suggestion for extra income. I make a bit of cash every month through staff writing and my own blog, My Alternate Life. Up until a few days ago, I’ve thrown everything I’ve earned at my debt. This has been a huge boon to me because it’s shortened my debt pay off window. When I first started trying to pay off the $38,000 of debt I’d accumulated through school, my best calculations had me debt free in five years.

Now it looks like I’ll be debt free before my the two year anniversary of Operation Pay Off Debt. This is partly due to me putting all of my extra income towards my debt. Michelle is employing the same strategy to pay off her $38,000 in student loans, and she’s managing to get rid of them amazingly quickly. [Read more…]

How To Make Money Blogging

April 9, 2013 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 169 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Updated: January 5, 2016.

Today’s post is the one that many of you have been waiting for. I don’t think a single day goes by without me receiving an e-mail regarding how a person can make money blogging online and/or how to make money online.

If you are interested in starting a blog of your own, I created a tutorial that will help you start a blog of your own for cheap, starting at only $3.49 per month (this low price is only through my link) for blog hosting. In addition to the low pricing, you will receive a free blog domain (a $15 value) through my Bluehost link if you purchase at least 12 months of blog hosting. FYI, you want to be self-hosted. This is essential if you want to monetize your blog as you will appear more professional and this will help you monetize your blog tremendously.

Sometimes it’s bloggers who e-mail me, but half the time the e-mails are from readers who do not have a blog but are interested in starting a money making blog.

As most of you have seen, a big bulk of my income every month comes from my blog in some form (I made over $320,000 online in 2015): advertising, affiliate income, consulting and so on. This How To Make Money Blogging post will be all about various ways that you can make money blogging.

When I started my blog in August of 2011, I never thought I’d be where I am at today. Now, I blog full-time, earn a great income, and I travel full-time, as you can see from my monthly online income report updates.

My extra income from my blog started slow, but within the past couple of months it has jumped significantly. I spend all of my extra time on finding extra income methods, and it definitely seems to be working.

[Read more…]

We Set a Wedding Date and $2,336 in Extra Income

April 8, 2013 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 4 Comments

Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning I get a commission if you decide to make a purchase through my links, at no cost to you. Please read my disclosure for more info.

Happy Monday everyone! The weekend was fun even though I wish the weekend was a lot longer. The weather here was awesome this weekend and spring has definitely started here. I think it’s supposed to be in the high 70s all week which will be nice. Having the windows open and the nice weather just feels great! The picture above was taken after a long walk with our two dogs 🙂

We finally set a wedding date too. When is it?! June 7, 2014 WOOHOOO! Both the ceremony and reception will take place on W’s family property which is really nice. It looks way better than all of the estates and outdoor venues that we looked at, and it has meaning to us. Also, there are 2 weddings scheduled for there this summer, so I’ll be able to look at those and get great ideas from them. I’m so excited to finally have a date because now I can start actually planning it – and I am super excited to start.

My student loan plan is still on track and I will be paying them completely off my the end of this month. I know I’m going to have a hard time parting with so much money, but in the end it will be best. No longer having student loan payments will feel like heaven, and it’ll be so nice to know that I have paid them off so quickly.