👇Odd Ways to Earn $$$ in November

Mall Santa?

Nov 19, 2024

Hi Oddies,

Jen Glantz here.

November is the kind of month where the pressure to open up our wallets begin. I browse my inbox every morning and see brands telling me that they already started their Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales.

Already? Yes.

Everyone is hunting for your disposable income this month.

I’m not.

I’m here to help you try and make more cash before the year is up.

My goal in 2024 is to not overspend this holiday season.

So to do that, I’m keeping a close eye on my finances, pre-planning my gift list, and focusing my free time on new business ideas.

I’m also blocking certain websites (so I don’t give into temptation), putting brand emails in my spam folder, and removing my credit card information from places like Amazon and other sites so it’s not easy to press the buy now button.

Let’s talk making money.

Ready?

Ps. I’m taking a few weeks off of writing this newsletter to celebrate the end of the year. I’ll be back once more in December and then every week starting in January! Have ideas for the newsletter? Hit reply. Let’s chat!

Personal Shopper

‘Tis the season that everyone has a list of people in their life that they want to buy gifts for….but not just any gifts…meaningful gifts that say “I love you” or “I adore you” or “I spent a long time thinking about what to get you”.

The problem? Not everyone has time to source these gifts or isn’t good at picking out what people actually want or need.

I’m guilty of that. I love the people in my life but I’m crummy at figuring out what to get them.

That’s where you come in - a personal gift shopper.

You can charge $300-$400 a client and source gifts for them. You spend 90-minutes understanding each person on their gift list, then present them a list of potential options, and help them decide on the right item.

Work with 25 people and there’s your $10,000.

Plus, you can make affiliate cash on the backend (using Amazon or RewardStyle).

Holiday Store Decorator

Offices, restaurants, bars, event spaces, house parties, etc. people need help with holiday decor. If you’re awesome at looking at a space and being able to transform it into a winter wonderland, you could make this your seasonal odd high-paying job.

You could charge $500-$5,000 per client and source the decor and decorate.

This company does it so you could work through them or start your own local business.

Mall Santa

While you can still become a last-minute local Santa, there are so many opportunities to cash in with this seasonal gig. I’ll write about it soon - BUT a Santa can pull in over $49,000 a year with this 2-month job.

Line Holder

People will pay you to wait in line for them - whether at the DMV or at Best Buy for Black Friday shopping. You can make around $25/hour. Perfect for someone who likes to chill…just not on their couch.

Find gigs here.

Mystery Shopper

Spending the weekend shopping at stores already? Get paid to do that as a mystery shopper. You can get paid to shop and give feedback after you’re done. Typically, you’ll be asked to make a purchase, and then you’ll be reimbursed. Market Force and IntelliShop are two free platforms you can use to get started.

Gift Wrapping

Some people are so good at this and if that’s you, you can pick up some extra gigs as an in-store gift wrapper. Here’s where you can search for these jobs.

Ski Resort Gigs

If you want to get out of your comfort zone and local area, here is a list of ski resort jobs available. They even sometimes provide housing or share low-cost options.

Seasonal Recruiter

Seasonal recruiters can get paid anywhere from $15 to $33 per hour. They are in charge of sourcing, screening, interviewing, and evaluating candidates. Exel, Sears, and Robert Half hire seasonal recruiters.

House or Pet or Plant Sitter

People are planning end-of-year trips and need someone to watch their pet, house, or plants. I wrote a lot about how you can make cash doing this right here.

Create a profile on a house sitting or pet sitting website.

If you work 10 gigs a month, that each pay $500, you’ll hit that $10,000 goal by the end of the year.

Rent Your Space or Your Stuff

There’s a lot of money to be made by simply renting out your stuff to people who need that exact *thing*.

Check this post out for more details.

But you can put your home, backyard, or office up for rent this holiday season using an app like Peerspace and you can rent your “stuff” using apps like these:

Loanables: you can rent out anything, to anyone.
Friend With A: another spot to rent out anything and make (as they say) $1,000 a month
Style Lend: sort of like my coat idea…a spot you can rent out things from your closet.
Baby Quip: rent out all your baby stuff to people coming into town
Turo - to rent out your car
Neighbor - to rent out your space to someone who wants to store things

Freelance Help

A lot of businesses need extra help during these final months of the year. So pick a skill that you’re good at and offer it to other people’s companies as a seasonal freelancer. Let’s say you’re good at customer service, writing, social media, delivery, accounting, or just strategy - create a profile for yourself on a freelance website like Fiverr or Upwork.

Personal Chef

With all the holiday parties coming up, a lot of people will want to hire a personal chef to caterer those events. If this is something you’re skilled at, you can offer up your services for a lot of cash.

Think about it like this…

You could charge $250 for an awesome charcuterie board for an office party.

You could charge $5,000 for a catered event for an office of 50 people.

You could even charge $300 for a 4-person, in-home, cooked dinner for a person who wants a diner party.

If cooking is your thing, make the cash this holiday season.

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