The holiday season is right around the corner and we are excited. While it’s going to be all about giving, sharing, enjoying and merry making, many may be stressed over the additional expenses that come along.
According to the Census Bureau’s Monthly Retail Trade Report in December 2022, Americans spent around $1,600 per person. In 2023, this was expected to be 40% more. And this year as well, there are more chances that this spend may increase.
But you don’t have to worry because along with the many expenses, this season opens up numerous opportunities. There are plenty of ways to make extra money for the holidays.
Financial stress should be the last thing on anyone’s holiday list and we will make the best effort to help you with some extra holiday money through this blog.
Let’s not waste time and explore the best ways to earn extra for the holidays and fill your wallets a little more this year.
30 Ways To Make Extra Money For The Holidays This Year
If you’re willing enough, there are many side hustles, seasonal opportunities, and smart shopping options that let you earn extra amid the chaotic holiday expenses.
1. Seasonal Retail Jobs
Earning Potential: $17/hour
If you have a knack for sales, marketing, and convincing customers, this is a good way to get paid well enough. Holiday season generally brings along numerous sales. Brands and retailers are on a constant lookout for temporary sales representatives during this time.
While they want to make maximum sales, your skills to get this done for them could offer you the opportunity to stash some extra cash into your wallets for the holidays.
You can easily find one of such jobs online or at a local mall. These temporary roles are mostly available in the beginning of October through November when stores and brands are gearing up for special sales like Black Friday.
Not only you can make more money for the holidays but also save on your favorite products with employee discounts.
2. Work From Home Jobs
Earning Potential: Variable
Platforms like ZipRecruiter, FlexJobs, etc always offer numerous work from home jobs. You can find some seasonal options as well. Based on your expertise or skills, look for a work-from-home side hustle that lets you earn extra money and save for the holidays.
From large companies to small businesses everyone needs various tasks to be done well while their sales are likely to shoot up. You can find a lot of opportunities from data entry to online customer executive jobs that pay you well.
3. Make and Sell Craft
Earning Potential: Variable
Artists out there can literally make a fortune out of their skills. They just need to know how to monetize them. If you are into craft and handmade decor, the holiday season is a golden time.
You can make and sell craft and decor for specific festivals. We hope you already know, this is the time to make the best use of social media and online stores like Etsy.
People are a lot into handmade crafts, apparels, and decor. Make sure to use this opportunity to its best.
4. Rent Out Your Car
Earning Potential: $200 to $2,000/month
If you only use your car occasionally, you can turn it into an easy passive income generator. Rent it out. You can set your own prices after a bit of research, make some ground rules and enjoy an extra passive income.
You can look up to apps like Turo and ZipCar to make it easier. There are different ways to do it – you can either meet the customers and handover the keys to them, or you can make a toolbox that’s accessible by renters. Obviously, there are various other apps for this that you can use.
5. Become A Rideshare Driver
Earning Potential: $210/month
Becoming a rideshare driver in your spare time is a great way to earn extra money for the holidays. You can turn to apps like Uber and Lyft to get regular ride bookings easily.
During the holiday season there’s greater demand for ridesharing since people may want pick and drop from airports, train stations, etc to their destinations. If you’re good at socializing, this is one of the best holiday jobs for you.
6. Deliver Food
Earning Potential: $3,198/month
As the demand for food delivery continues to soar every year. Platforms like DoorDash, Uber Eats, etc offer lucrative opportunities to individuals who wish to make a living or earn extra.
Food delivery is one of the most popular side hustles and the easiest to get started with. Delivery drivers enjoy the flexibility of choosing their work hours. You can choose peak hours to deliver more and make more money.
With a little bit of strategic planning, you can target lunch and dinner rushes, weekends, and special occasions to maximize your earnings.
7. Rent Out A Room In Your House
Earning Potential: Variable
Renting out that extra room in your house will help you make the best of its earring potential. You can always get creative and stand out from the crowd. Let a warmth reflect in your listing and offer. And yes, if you’re comfortable, you can rent out a fully furnished room with some basic stuff.
Using apps like Airbnb, HotPads, SpareRoom, etc, you can easily find a good tenant. Make sure to do a basic background check to ensure safety. Whether it’s for the holiday season or not, this is a reliable way to earn some extra cash.
8. Take Up Freelancing Projects
Earning Potential: $6,010/month
For experienced professionals, freelancing is one of the best ways to make extra money for the holidays. You can take up suitable projects post your regular working hours. The best thing about freelancing is the flexibility it offers.
You can take up writing, graphic designing, or data entry projects according to your availability and earning goals. Not to mention, platforms like Upwork and Fiverr make it easier to find suitable projects and earn.
9. Test Websites and Products
Earning Potential: $43.50/hour
More and more companies are launching new websites or upgrading them. While their success is significantly dependent on user experience, website and software product testing is a crucial aspect of their development lifecycle.
You can use your spare time to help companies do away user testing for their website and get paid for it. Companies also need product reviews which you can provide them. Usertesting is one of such platforms to get paid for testing a software product or website.
All you need is a laptop, microphone, camera, and WiFi. You can easily earn up to $10-$35 per session. This is perfect for individuals who need something short-spanned.
10. Gift Wrapping
Earning Potential: $17.73/hour
The gift giving season indicates a lot of gift wrapping and not to forget, givers and receivers all like it fancy. However, not everyone is good at this craft. Even if they are, people have limited time amidst the endless holiday chores.
For ones who are creative enough, gift wrapping can bring in some extra cash to support your holiday expenses. You can easily find opportunities to do it within local communities or your neighborhood.
11. Offer Costumes On Rent
Earning Potential: Variable
Especially on Halloween, almost everyone is on the lookout for unique and spooky costumes. If you’re into designing outfits, the Holiday season could offer many well paying opportunities for you.
Prepare the best of outfits and rent them. If you cannot design outfits, there may be ones you no longer wish to wear at events. You can rent them out too.
12. Provide Childcare/Babysitting Services
Earning Potential: $17.62/hour
This isn’t just one of the ways to make extra money for the holidays but can actually turn into a great source of income for the entire year. With all the holiday chores, events, and traveling, parents want their babies to be taken care of.
Doing it well for them could be one of the easiest ways to earn some extra holiday cash. You can find many of these opportunities online via websites like Care.com.
13. Become A Pet Sitter
Earning Potential: $18/hour
People traveling this holiday season might be seeking someone to take care of their pets in their absence. Pet lovers, this is a great time to get paid for taking care of a furry friend.
You can also provide dog walking service to one of your neighbors if you can only be available at a specific time during the day. Or look for better pet sitting jobs on Rover.
14. Party Decorator
Earning Potential: $15.61/hour
Love hosting and decorating for parties? The Holiday season offers you plenty of chances to live in the world of your creativity and let it brighten up others’ days. There may be numerous events and parties throughout the holiday season.
Create or upgrade your portfolio, spread the word and let people know that you are open to decorating for their events. This is a great way to earn more money during the holidays. Make sure you do your best to win over your potential clients’ trust.
15. Sell Items On Amazon
Earning Potential: $1,000/month
Our favorite, one of the greatest marketplaces, Amazon is known for letting people sell things and make money from home. If you’re really able to pick up in time, establishing an Amazon business could earn you huge profits.
If you are already selling something offline, consider setting up a business account on Amazon. This could be your long-term side hustle that pays you well.
Amazon sellers based in the United States of America sell around 7,400 products every minute.
16. Collect Rewards and Cashbacks
Earning Potential: $1,000/month
Your routine offers you a lot of opportunities to make extra money. Holiday season is the synonym of shopping. Make sure you don’t miss any chance to collect rewards and cashbacks.
Remember, a penny saved is a penny earned. There are various offers that you need to catch up with for a happy shopping experience that actually lets you save more money.
DollarSprout Rewards lets you earn cashbacks from 15000+ stores. All you want to do is download its extension, shop as you wish, activate your cashbacks and get them credited to your PayPal account.
17. Try Dropshipping
Earning Potential: $1,000 – $2,000/month (for beginners)
Don’t want to create or sell something of your own? Starting a dropshipping business could be a great way to earn extra money for the holidays and become a part of the booming e-commerce sector.
All you need to do is choose the most trending products, tie-up with suppliers, create compelling product descriptions, market the products well enough, and sell without having to maintain an inventory.
18. Prepare A Holiday Gift Guide
Earning Potential: Variable
Gift giving is an essential aspect of the holiday season. However, it also brings along a lot of confusion. Want to make some extra money? Prepare a holiday gift guide to help people find the best gifts for their loved ones.
Where’s the money? Become an affiliate for the products and gift ideas you mention in your guide. Every time someone checks out or buys a product via your guide, you get paid!
Statista says, around 80% of millennials in the United States, consider product reviews before buying them.
19. Participate In Online Surveys To Earn Extra
Earning Potential: $50/hour
Opinions have an important place in this world and many companies pay for it. Through platforms like Swagbucks, Survey Junkie, etc you can get paid for participating in surveys.
You can dedicatedly spend some time daily or weekly to make sure you don’t miss any opportunities and earn enough at least for the holiday gifts.
Swagbucks claims that its members can earn up to $5 per day. On some days these earnings can be $50 to $250. You must try this!
For more clarity, read our Swagbucks review.
Best Survey Websites To Make Extra Money
Survey Junkie
Your survey points are redeemable for cash at the $5 mark with Survey Junkie.
20. Bake and Sell Delicacies
Earning Potential: Variable
People want to fully enjoy the holidays and yet the families cannot spend the festive gatherings without delicious bakes. Many families prefer outsourcing their tasks and one of them is food, candies, cakes, and more.
If you love cooking and baking, we suggest you grab this opportunity of making an extra living out of your hobby. Do not forget to get reviews and feedback to get more clients.
21. Sell Things You No Longer Use
Earning Potential: Variable
You can declutter for the holiday season and earn at the same time. Sell out the things you no longer use but can be reused. This could include books, furniture, gadgets, and even your clothes. This is one of the best ways to earn a few extra dollars without having to work for hours.
22. Give Music Lessons
Earning Potential: $34.60/hour
The ones who play an instrument, can easily make a few thousand dollars giving music lessons. It can be any musical instrument. If you’re proficient enough, you can easily teach beginners. Online lessons will increase your reach and help you earn more.
All you need to do is prepare a structured lesson plan. You can make efforts to garner trust from potential students. Also, consider giving a few discounted lessons to capture your students’ interest.
23. Tutor For A Language
Earning Potential: $62/hour
The demand for online teaching continues to grow. If you are a language aficionado, it’s time to make money out of it. You can start giving online language lessons for English, German, or any other foreign language you’re proficient at. It’s not only one of the best ways to earn money for the holidays but a great side hustle for the entire year.
24. Become A Travel Planner/Guide
Earning Potential: $16.48/hour
Many people are not the stay-at-home types and want the best travel experiences during the holiday. If you are well traveled and like to plan itineraries, consider becoming a travel planner this season.
For the ones who know their local places very well and have great speaking skills, becoming a travel guide could be a good job. You can travel around, guide other travelers, and make money out of it.
According to a source, 115.2 million Americans are likely to travel during the winter holiday season in 2024.
25. Do One-Gig Jobs
Earning Potential: Variable
When looking for something temporary, writers, artists, and performers can take up gigs to earn extra. These one gig-jobs offer you a lot more flexibility considering you can’t dedicate regular time to a side hustle.
Platforms like Airtasker, TaskRabbit, etc offer opportunities for nearly every skill. This could be an easy and reliable way to earn extra money for the holidays.
26. Offer Homestays
Earning Potential: Variable
Have a beautiful home at a beautiful location? Offering homestays during the holidays can earn you a fortune for your holiday expenses. Get the space well furnished and maintained. You can list the space on apps like Airbnb. Make sure to enrich your listing with some good pictures of the space.
27. Become A Mystery Shopper
Earning Potential: $714/week
Brands are now more conscious about customer experience and take help from mystery shoppers to make sure they’re doing well. If you’re someone who loves to browse through malls with no intentions of actually buying things, becoming a mystery shopper could be a great way to earn extra money for the holiday season.
You can sign up with BestMark, Market Force, etc to get reliable opportunities. Brands either pay you for trying new products, or compensate with meals and products.
28. Be A Photographer
Earning Potential: Variable
Love capturing beautiful moments to freeze time forever? Taking photography gigs for weddings, parties, and holiday season celebrations could be one of the best ways to earn money. Make sure to update your portfolio with some of your best projects. Spread the word on social media, post reviews, entice more clients with seasonal discounts!
29. Part-Time Car Washing
Earning Potential: $14.43/hour
You can spend weekends washing cars for an extra income. Everyone wants a sparkling clean car but not everyone has the time and willingness to do it. This is something that requires minimal upfront investment. You can expand the scope of services with car detailing. This way you can earn extra money for the holidays without having to hamper your routine and primary job.
30. Offer Lawn Maintenance Services
Earning Potential: $16.85/hour
Lawn maintenance isn’t a seasonal thing, people need to get it done regularly. If you were looking for a side hustle that helps you earn extra and have an interest in gardening and maintenance, you may go for it. You can start with a few projects within your neighborhood.
Start Now To Stash Extra Cash For The Holidays
There are numerous opportunities out there for those who want to earn extra money. However, you should know yourself when choosing a side hustle. If you start now with discipline and dedication, you can certainly fund your holiday expenses better than you expect. We hope this list of options is helpful.
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FAQs
How to earn extra money around the holidays?
There are numerous opportunities that let you make extra money for the holidays. You may take up a side hustle, a freelancing project to increase your income significantly. Further, there are other ways to make small savings through cashbacks, selling your unnecessary stuff, pursuing your hobbies for money, etc.
Do I need experience to get a holiday job?
Not necessarily. Most holiday jobs require basic things or creative stuff. You can get one even without experience.
How much can I earn in a short time?
Your actual earnings may depend on the type of jobs/side hustles you choose. The earning potential varies for all of them.
