Extra Income Archives - Page 58 of 60

Mystery Shopping – Make Extra Money

Last Updated: October 21, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 13 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.

Mystery shopping. Many of you have emailed me and asked me the question “what is mystery shopping” and have been wondering how I am making money through mystery shopping.

I usually make around $150 to $200 a month from mystery shopping.

Side note: If you are interested in the many other ways I earn extra money, check out my Extra Income page on my blog.

I use mainly Bestmark for my mystery secret shops. I’m not sure what other companies are good and reputable mystery shopping websites, but I know for a FACT that Bestmark is a legitimate mystery shopping website, so you can trust me when I say that.

Last month I didn’t make too much because not a lot of “good” shops were offered in my area. Lately, I’ve been a little more picky with the shops that I sign up for also.

What I consider a worthwhile shop for ME:

Either an online shop or phone call shop
If I have to drive, it’s close to somewhere I’ll be
Something I’ll use. I love doing Estee Lauder shops because I always love free makeup.
Restaurant shops, because I have to eat, of course.

Of course, what’s worthwhile to you and me might be different. When I first signed up for mystery shopping (sometime last summer I think), I literally signed up for everything. I made decent money, but it wore me out. The amount of surveys that you have to do is so repetitive that it makes you want to throw your computer at the wall.

Sometimes surveys take just a minute, but sometimes they literally take an hour. Restaurant shops usually take a little longer than others because usually you are grading every little detail.

Some examples of mystery shops I’ve done include:

Restaurants. This ranges from cheaper restaurants where I’m reimbursed for around $30 worth of food, all the way up to nice steakhouses where I get $100.
Dealerships. Bestmark has a ton of dealership shops available, but I only have done the phone call and scheduling services online secret shops.
- I usually do about 4-5 of these a week and these are the easiest shops. You don’t have to drive anywhere and the surveys literally take one minute. And you get paid around $5 for them. Although recently they’ve lowered the payment to only $3, and there’s a ton more work involved. I had to cancel around 3 or 4 shops because they didn’t make it clear enough about the amount of work that I signed up for. And for $3, I’m not really willing to do too much.
- They also have dealership secret shops where you go in and pretend you want a car. These usually pay around $20. This is something I’ve never done, and they have plenty of these available for everyone to do. I’ve never done this because car salesmen scare me. I’m not ready for thousands of annoying phone calls and I’m afraid that I’d be stuck in a dealership for an hour while trying to run away from the salesperson.
Retail. I mainly do [easyazon_link keywords=”Estee Lauder” locale=”US” tag=”maksenofcen0b-20″]Estee Lauder[/easyazon_link]. I’ve done a lot of these. I’ve gotten foundation, lotion, toner, face wash, concealer, lip gloss and so on, all for FREE! And these aren’t sample sizes, I’ve probably gotten over $200 in stuff, plus gotten paid around $10 on top for each shop as well.
- I’ve also done a couple of Best Buy shops. These are easy too. You just survey a certain department (takes like a minute), and then you can just buy something small like a candy bar so that they have your receipt for proof that you were actually there and performed it. Best Buy shops usually pay around $13. Not a ton, but the Best Buy is along the way home from my work so I just pop in.

Bestmark Mystery Shopping - Make Extra Money

This is a mystery shopping check from one week’s of mystery shopping.

The highest paid shops I do are usually for restaurants. I’ve done a couple of nice restaurants where I had to eat over $100 worth of food. Crazy! I’ve also seen Hotel mystery shops, but they’ve never been on a good day for me, so I’ve never been able to sign up.

Also, if you find that you cannot do a shop that you sign up for, all you do usually is contact your scheduler and say you need to reschedule or cancel. Try not to do this too often though. These schedulers will remember you, and if you’re good to them, they will give you good shops, so remember that!

Mystery shopping money will NOT make you rich. I want to make that clear. It’s just a nice form of side income, where I can get things I want for free! What I make from mystery shopping, I add to my vacation fund. So it’s a nice little addition every month.

If I want to eat at a nice restaurant that I would usually go to, then YES I would love to do a secret shop there. Those are always the greatest shops because you are paid to have fun.

Do you secret shop such as through Bestmark? Any tips?

Also, if you join Bestmark, please say I referred you! My ID is MO4999. You can join Bestmark by clicking here.

If you are new to my blog, I am all about finding ways to make and save more money. Here are some of my favorite sites and products that may help you out:

Cut your TV bill. Cut your cable, satellite, etc. Even go as far to go without Netflix or Hulu as well. Buy a digital antenna (this is the one we have) and enjoy free TV for life.
Start a blog. Blogging is how I make a living and just a few years ago I never thought it would be possible. I earn over $30,000 a month online through my blog and you can read more about this in my monthly online income reports. You can create your own blog here with my easy-to-use tutorial. You can start your blog for as low as $3.49 per month plus you get a free domain if you sign-up through my tutorial.
If you are still in college, I recommend you check out Campus Book Rentals. This website allows you to get your textbooks for cheap. I almost ALWAYS rented my textbooks and it saved me a ton of money!
Lower your cell phone bill. Instead of paying the $150 or more that you spend on your cell phone bill, there are companies out there like Republic Wireless that offer cell phone service starting at $5. YES, I SAID $5! If you use my Republic Wireless affiliate link, you can change your life and start saving thousands of dollars a year on your cell phone service. I created a full review on Republic Wireless as well if you are interested in hearing more. I’ve been using them for over a year and they are great.
Sign up for a website like Ebates where you can earn CASH BACK for just spending like how you normally would online. The service is free too! Plus, when you sign up through my link, you also receive a free $10 gift card bonus to Macys, Walmart, Target, or Kohls!
Save money on food. I recently joined $5 Meal Plan in order to help me eat at home more and cut my food spending. It’s only $5 a month (the first two weeks are free too) and you get meal plans sent straight to you along with the exact shopping list you need in order to create the meals. Each meal costs around $2 per person or less. This allows you to save time because you won’t have to meal plan anymore, and it will save you money as well!
Look for coupon codes. I search for coupon codes for everything. Today, I have two for you. I have a $20 Airbnb coupon code and a free taxi ride with Uber. Both are great services that I have personally used.
I highly recommend SoFi for student loan refinancing. You can lower the interest rate on your student loans significantly by using SoFi which may help you shave thousands off your student loan bill over time.
Answer surveys. Survey companies I recommend include American Consumer Opinion, ProOpinion, Pinecone Research, Opinion Outpost, Survey Spot, and Harris Poll Online. They’re free to join and free to use! You get paid to answer surveys and to test products. It’s best to sign up for as many as you can as that way you can receive the most surveys and make the most money.
Invest. There are no guarantees when it comes to investing, but you should always start sooner rather than later. If you are looking for a good investing platform, I recommend Motif. Motif Investing allows individuals to invest affordably. This approachable investing platform makes it easy to buy a portfolio of up to 30 stocks, bonds or ETFs for just $9.95 total commission. Plus, you will receive up to $150 for FREE when you use Motif Investing when you sign up under my link.
Use Swagbucks for your online searches. Swagbucks is something I don’t use as much, but I do occasionally earn Amazon gift cards with very little work. Swagbucks is just like using Google to do your online searches, except you get rewarded “points called SB” for the things you do through their website. Then, when you have enough Swagbucks, you can redeem them for cash, gift cards, and more. You’ll receive a free $5 bonus just for signing up today!
Try Digital Voice. Another one you may be interested in related to Swagbucks is Nielsen Digital Voice. Digital Voice is a part of Nielsen, which I’m sure you’ve heard of. All you have to do is surf the web and you may be able to start earning money.
Try InboxDollars. InboxDollars is an online rewards website I recommend. You can earn cash by taking surveys, playing games, shopping online, searching the web, redeeming grocery coupons, and more. Also, by signing up through my link, you will receive $5.00 for free just for signing up!
Find a part-time job. There are many part-time jobs that you may be able to find. You can find a job on sites such as Snagajob, Craigslist (yes, I’ve found a legitimate job through there before), Monster, and so on.

Goals and Extra Monthly Income Update

Last Updated: December 7, 2014 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - Leave a Comment

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.

Already Tuesday, woo hoo! Today I’m doing a recap on my long list of goals. I have one problem with goals though. I tend to completely forget about them until I do my goal recap posts. Uh oh, what’s the point of goals if you never look? Hopefully I start checking in on my goals more often.

Also, I switched to Intense Debate for my comments. What does everyone think of them? I prefer it, but I will switch back if it’s not as user-friendly as I think it is. You don’t need an account or anything to comment. Let me know what you think!

March was a good month for us. We were good with our food budget and cooked a lot. We plan on cooking a lot in April as well. Our heat and electric bills went down due to super nice weather. But it’s going to be a hot April most likely. The past couple of days have been around 90 degrees, so we’ve had our air conditioning on.

You can find my February goals list here, and my 2012 goals update here (I will not be updating this as often).

March Goals Update

Finally pay off my car. PASS. I paid it off completely! Read about it here.
Save an extra $10 a day for a new camera. ??? Haven’t been keeping track. Not too worried about this anymore.
Reassess our budget and cut out $25. FAIL. I can’t think of anything off the top of my head.
Start and finish homework before it’s due. PASS. Doing pretty good with this!
Workout at least 3 times a week. FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL. How many more times can I say this? I’ve been running with my dog at least once a week, but not much more than that.
Sell my stuff to a consignment shop. FAIL. I didn’t do this. I think I did most of my selling in February, but none in March (I might have that backwards, not sure). I need to get rid of more. There are so many things that I do not wear.
Take a picture of my insane closet for you all. PASS! I made a post on my ridiculousness.
Make an extra $500 this month. PASS. I made just around $500. See below for more detail.
Move shoes to my new closet. FAIL. Nope. Haven’t really started my closet yet. I need to put bookshelves together and clear out all the trash in the extra bedroom.
Don’t spend any more money on clothes than what I sell. PASS. I believe I only spent around $50 on clothes this month. I have a horrible memory though, so if I’m wrong, yell at me.
Get my front windshield fixed. FAIL. I HAVE to do this month though, so I know it will be done.
Have loads of fun while on vacation! PASS PASS PASS. Had loads of fun! Need to do a recap.

April Goals

Reassess our budget and cut out $25. I’m sure there’s something we could cut out… Our cable contract is up soon, so I’m going to call soon and get them to lower our rate.
Workout at least 2 times a week. I keep failing at this. But I have so many reasons for why I need a good body for the summer. Memorial day, vacations, Vegas, pools, and so on. I want a nice stomach!
Run with my dog at least twice a week.
Sell 30 items to a consignment shop. I need to do this and get rid of a lot more, but I feel like with a number, I am more likely to think about it.
Make an extra $500 this month. I’ve been good with this so far. While it’ll be nice to someday make more, right now I seem to be stuck at $500.
Start moving stuff into my bigger closet. I’ve been horrible with this. I have bookshelves and everything ready, but I’ve been lazy. I will get this done this month.
Get my front windshield fixed. See above 🙂
Spend less than $500 on food and entertainment. This is a hard one for us. We like to go out but we should just invite people over more often.
Eat in at least 5 times a week. We’ve been pretty good with this, but need to keep it up.
Make 1 vegetarian meal a week. We eat meat everyday. We need to change this. I think this is a good start.

P.S. Check out other bloggers’ goals as well. Savvy Financial Latina posted hers as well. Let me know if you want me to add your goals link to this post!

I also want to start hitting more blog goals, so I’m going to start listing them out so that I can keep track easier. These are amounts that I would looove to reach by the end of April:

Twitter followers: Goal is for 350, I’m currently at 233. I don’t know why I waited so long to make a Twitter account!
Alexa rank: Goal is to be under 90,000. I’m currently at 112,000.
RSS readers: Goal is for 650, I’m currently at 564.

Extra Monthly Income in March

Ad links on my blog -$426
Sponsored posts -$0
Surveys -$6
Mystery Shopping -$53

So I actually made $485 extra last month!

How did you do in March? Any extra income?

Money in my 20s

Last Updated: December 7, 2014 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 35 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 Friday everyone! This week went by pretty quick for me thankfully. I have a pretty packed weekend (but it’s mostly fun stuff) so it should be a good one! I hope everyone has a great weekend also.

I believe that how you behave in your 20s with your money can definitely change everything. If you start investing, saving, paying off debt now, then you are preparing yourself for retirement at a great time. Compounding definitely plays a huge factor in starting young also. If you save $1,000 a month for the next 40 years, then at 6% interest you will have

$1,968,572

But if you wait to save until 20 years later and save $2,000 a month in order to catch up, then after 20 years at 6% interest, you are only at $935,825. BIG difference right? The time value of money definitely plays a big part in this, so the younger you can start, the better!

There are many things that I’m doing now to prepare myself for my future. This involves, my spending habits, budgets, schooling, my career and so on.

What I’m doing:

Went to college and graduated with two undergraduate degrees. This helped me a lot when I was applying for jobs and I also feel more rounded (even though both degrees were business related). I wouldn’t be able to be in my field without my degrees.
Working on my MBA. This will help me with my career and also a higher salary with more opportunities.
Secured a good career. My job is very stable and will if anything grow by an exponential amount. There aren’t too many people who do what I do.
Advancing in my career. I’m working on my credentials and I should have them this summer as well. I just have to take one more test and turn in sample reports (these are extremely long). I need to start working on my sample reports soon.
Live within my means. This one is different from the others that I just listed. Living within my means is something I do, but also something I could work on.
Paying off my debt. This is a big one! I hope to have my student loans completely gone by next year and then my house to be paid off in less than 5 years from now. WHOO HOO for goals.

I also have a fully funded emergency fund. My job is pretty secure, but you never know if something might come up. With an emergency fund I don’t have to worry as much and worry about living paycheck to paycheck.

One thing I DO need to start concentrating on more is investing. I know a decent amount about investing and finance (I am a Finance MBA major and I work in the financial services industry), but I’m still unsure of how exactly I want to allocate all of my investments. And until I’m positive that I understand everything (hey I have an investment mind just like Buffet, maybe one day I’ll be a billionaire, ok probably not), this is kind of hindering how deep into investing I’m getting.

Another area I would like to work on is getting a more stable side income. Maybe blogging? I’m still not sure. I have so many ideas floating around in my head though.

Of course there are many things I want to do in my 20’s also. I don’t want to look back on my life and feel like I missed out on anything. As I’ve said this whole week, I budget and watch my spending so that I can do the things I love in life.

In my 30s, I’d like to do a lot of things. It just seems so crazy to think of myself 10 years from now! I’d hope to have a family, no debt, great investments and lots of world travels. In my 40s? Not really sure. I haven’t thought about my life that far ahead honestly. I would hope to be able to retire early though.

What are you doing to prepare yourself for your future? What do you wish you would’ve done?

Why I Budget

Last Updated: July 18, 2020 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 34 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.

This week is going by fast! I’m so happy that it’s Thursday. Today my post is about budgets and it also happens to match up with Women’s Money Week’s Budget Thursday!

Lately I’ve been getting a lot of e-mails and comments about how I budget and what software I use. First, I’m surprised that so many of you e-mail me about this (this makes me happy because I know that I’m getting everyone to think about their finances more!) but this also surprises me because you guys e-mail me about this! I never honestly thought I’d be the one for people to ask.

I only use Excel and my head. I store a lot in my brain and that’s probably not a good idea. I have a horrible memory but I recently signed up for Mint and that’s been helpful to see where my money is going. Mint does lag a little for me and I hate getting the constant e-mail reminders for bills that I need to pay (even though I paid them 2 weeks before I get all these annoying reminders UGH). [Read more…]

Relationships and Money

Last Updated: December 21, 2014 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 33 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.

Most people look at me like I’m INSANE when I tell them that I bought a house with my boyfriend, let alone that we have joint finances. It works for us, and we’ve actually never had a single problem. We’ve been together almost 6 years and have lived together for almost 5, so we’ve been doing this for some time.

However, I do get nervous when my friends talk about doing the same thing with their significant other. This is because even though it worked for us (and my friends always like to use us as an example, which I hate because it makes me nervous), I know it doesn’t work for everyone.

Every relationship is different (just like people!) and more people need to realize this. Just because one thing works for one couple, doesn’t mean it’s going to work for everyone.

I do most of the financial related things in our relationship: I make sure bills are paid on time and I keep track of everything. I think it’s easier this way so that no one is cross-doing things that the other has already done. And I’m better with financial related tasks (I’m in the financial services industry) than he is.

I hope I don’t offend anyone with the things I list below, but these are just things that wouldn’t work in our relationship. However, I do understand that different things work for different people. Have any of these worked for you in the end anyways? I also realize that some of these situations might work if the finances aren’t joint as well.

We don’t keep secret money

In some relationships, one of the spouses might be taking money and hiding it from the other. They might be doing this as a backup just in case the relationship doesn’t work out or because the other person in the relationship might not be good with money. Or someone might be lying about their salary and saying it’s smaller, so that they can funnel the different to their own personal account.

I do know of people who do this because their significant other is horrible with money, and by telling the other person that they have less money every month, he/she then spends less. So this is actually benefiting their relationship – and this is how this might work for different couples. I don’t know how sustainable that is though because eventually the other person should be more aware of the financial situation. My bf is definitely guilty of lifestyle inflation and I try to talk to him about our finances as much as possible so that he understands. I try to make everything with our finances extremely open. He knows everything (I like to pretend that he listens to everything at least).

Talk about financial goals

This is something that we didn’t talk about a whole ton, but in the end we both have similar financial goals. We have talked extensively about it now though. We know where the other is heading and what we want to do a year from now, 5 years from now and so on. I think this is healthy because it clues you in more about the other in the relationship.

Knowing the other’s financials

I think that in every relationship, all financials should be known. No one should be hiding $100,000 worth of credit card debt and so on. This isn’t healthy especially if you plan on getting married, buying a house, having kids and so on.

Different ways for different people

I’m at that age where a lot of my friends are starting to move out. They all have different financial situations. All of my friends are pretty good with their finances and all only have a little bit of student loans.

Obviously just with these three different financial situations just among some of my good friends, you can tell that different relationships handle finances differently. I’m not judging any of them, we made our fair share of mistakes when we started out and I think that’s the best way to learn. And as you can tell, I’m definitely one for openness in a relationship – I think everything should be known.

What is your financial situation in your relationship?

What are some tips or things you wouldn’t do in your relationship?

Goals and Extra Monthly Income Update

Last Updated: December 7, 2014 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 40 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.

I hope everyone’s having a great week so far. Seems to be going by relatively fast. Before we know it, I’ll be on vacation! Whooo hooo! Technically, my February goals update is a day early, but I doubt anything will happen today which will absolutely terribly wreck it.

Overall February was a good month, but we spent A LOT of money on food. We definitely need to watch our food spending. March probably won’t be any better since we’re going on vacation, but we have all of that budgeted.

You can find my February goals list here, and my 2012 goals update here.

February Goals Update

Save an extra $10 a day for my DSLR fund. PASS. But I haven’t been keeping too well of track of this amount.
Reassess our budget and cut out $25. PASS. We didn’t cut out too much, but with the mild weather and the fact that I was able to elminate the $6 satellite insurance, I’m sure we greatly surpassed the $25 goal.
Start and finish homework before it’s due. PASS. I’ve been doing pretty well with this.
Post about my side income. PASS. See here. I received a lot of feedback on this from all of you. Lots of emails, if you have any more questions, just let me know!
Workout at least 2 times a week. FAIL. I think I’ve only worked out ONCE this whole new year so far.
Sell my stuff on eBay. FAIL. I think I’m just going to bring the rest of my stuff to a local consignment shop. I’m honestly just too lazy to list everything on eBay.
Make an extra $500 this month. FAIL, but I’m still happy. I didn’t make a ton this month. I made around $400. I would’ve surpassed this $500, but I accidentally forgot to do 2 sponsored posts which would’ve made me an extra $120. I thought the expiration was longer, but it wasn’t. My survey income would’ve been bigger, but I was feeling lazy as well. See below for my income breakout.
Watch our spending this month. EHHH. We’ve been watching our spending very closely, but with the costs of the new (old) Jeep, our spending definitely increased.
FINISH MY CLOSET. FAIL. Haven’t worked on it at all. I think we built one bookshelf for my shoes, and that’s it.

March Goals

Finally pay off my car. I’ve had this cash just sitting in my checking account. Not sure why. I’ve just been lazy, but laziness is costing me money. I need to do this immediately.
Save an extra $10 a day. I want to keep saving for this. I’m not sure if I’ll be buying a camera anytime soon though.
Reassess our budget and cut out $25. This is on my goals pretty much every month. There’s always something that we can cut. I’m going to try and bundle some of our bills to see if we can get a discount.
Start and finish homework before it’s due. Midterms are this month and before you know it, it’ll be finals in the first week of May. Need to start studying!
Workout at least 3 times a week. I upped this, yes I know that’s probably not good. My working out has been a mega fail obviously.
Sell my stuff to a consignment shop. My closet is still super packed and I can get rid of a lot. I’m too lazy to sell it online.
Take a picture of my insane closet for you all. Once you see the picture, you will want to come over and help me clean it.
Make an extra $500 this month. I didn’t pass my goal in February, but I’m hoping to this month. My Alexa score is gradually going down and sometimes I wish I wouldn’t have bought my own domain recently (so that my score wouldn’t have reset), but it’s going down pretty fast. This should help me get more advertising offers.
Move shoes to my new closet. Obviously I need to start making smaller goals.
Don’t spend any more money on clothes than what I sell. So if I sell $200, then I would like to buy less than that. Very attainable.
Get my front windshield fixed. I’ve been putting this off for over a year. But, now my inspection so that I can renew my plates is in April, so I need to get this done.
Have loads of fun while on vacation!

Extra Monthly Income

Ad link on my blog -$103

Sponsored posts -$60

Surveys -$18

Mystery Shopping -$200

So I actually made around $381 extra last month!

How’d you do in February? Any extra income?

I’ve paid off over $25,000 in credit card debt

Last Updated: September 11, 2017 BY Michelle Schroeder-Gardner - 58 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.

Find out how I've paid off $25,000 in credit card debt.

The title is true, well kind of…

While, I’ve never had a balance on any of my credit cards, I still make charges on them and incur “debt” even though it’s paid off completely every month. So technically I have had that large amount in “credit card debt” in the past few years. I got my first credit card at 18, and I was purely using it to gain credit for a long time. It definitely helped my score, and I was able to learn how to control my spending at a young age.

Yes, I’ve paid that much in credit card debt. Probably over that amount. Just recently, after our December credit card bill came, the balance for all 3 of our cards was around $1,500. Yes that’s a lot for one month, but of course other months will be smaller.

Also, I’ve seen a couple of other bloggers do this (not recently, so I can’t remember who did it, so let me know if you remember!) and I thought it was interesting to see where others come in on the credit card debate. I’d love to link-up.

Some prefer to be mostly cash based, whereas I would be lucky if I was caught with $1. [Read more…]