A 28-year-old woman has revealed the side hustles she does to earn £400 on top of her 9-5 job – and some are as simple as walking or sitting in front of the TV.
Matilda Littler, from Hertfordshire, made headlines earlier this year after saving nearly £50,000 thanks to a series of clever money-saving tips and tricks.
One key reason she was able to save so much throughout her twenties was a result of her ‘side hustles’ – small ways to increase your income that often don’t take a huge amount of time.
Many can even be done from the comfort of her sofa.Matilda, who shares advice on Instagram (@amillennialsaver), has made up to £600 per month this way, doing things like flogging her old clothes on Vinted, taking part in paid user testing, and even earning money by upping her daily steps through an app.
“I work a 9-5:30 pm job so all my side hustles happen after work or at weekends,” she told NeedToKnow.co.uk.
“Hopefully, this will show that you can do side hustles from a few minutes to a few hours a day and can be really flexible to a person’s lifestyle.
“I can make between £300-£600 a month and these side hustles can really vary depending on how much time I have.
“As I have a full-time job, these are done in the evenings or on weekends which is why it can vary month on month.
“I put a set amount aside each month into savings from my salary, and then side hustle money usually goes towards savings or ‘sinking funds’ – these are saving pots that I put money in for a specific event.
“Currently, this money is going towards a ‘Christmas’ fund and a ‘Holiday’ fund as I’m going on holiday shortly.”
As for how much time she spends on the side hustles, Matilda said it doesn’t need to be overly time-consuming.
She explained: “It can really vary on how much time I have, [but] on average, it’s usually a couple of hours a week – in weekday evenings or sometimes weekends.
“I try not to use my weekends but things like Vinted require more time so I did this on a Sunday morning.”
Using last month as an example, Matilda took home £400.56 from her various secondary income streams.
She said: “I made £220 this month on Vinted – I focused a lot on this as I’ve recently moved to a new place and was selling any old winter clothes I won’t be wearing again this year.
“I also made £32 doing surveys this month.
“I usually just do these in evenings when I’m chilling and watching the television as they’re really easy to do.
“There are a lot of survey sites out there but my personal favourite is Prolific – I find there are more survey choices and higher pay-outs.
“I also use cashback, which is where you can sync your cards and get cashback on your spending from the retailers on the cashback sites.
“I made £21 in cashback this month – which is more than usual months as some places were offering a higher reward percentage, and I booked a hotel, so higher expenses – but considering this cashback requires no effort from me and is collected automatically, it’s a great easy way to earn money back.”
Matilda also took part in user testing to earn £45.56 last month, as well as user interviews, where she earned £61.
She said: “User testing is where you test a company’s new app or features and give feedback.
“You don’t need to schedule any interview time to do this so you can pick up a test when you have free time and the browser will record you.
“The tests work out around £7.62 and can take between 10-15 minutes.
“For user interviews, you do need to schedule an interview and the company will show you a new website or feature and ask you questions about it – it’s like a one-to-one focus group.
“If you’re successful in getting a user interview, you can then schedule a time that suits you.
“I opted for 6 pm after work – it was 45 minutes long and I earned $75 from it (around £61).”
Her final two side hustles may be particularly appealing to anyone looking to earn a few extra pounds.
Matilda said: “You might be thinking, I can get paid for walking? But yes, sites like Cashwalk, Weward, and Sweatcoin will give you points for the number of steps you do and in return, you can make money.
“I made £5 from this, this month – it may not seem like a lot but it’s an easy way to earn some money.
“I also made £16 this month by playing Skedadle, an app where you can play games and in return, it will pay you money.
“They have adverts on the boards such as on the snakes and ladders board which is how they make their money to give to you.”
While last month she earned just over £400, in July, she made a whopping £613.98 from Vinted, completing surveys, getting cashback from shopping, user testing, the walking app, playing games for money, and £344.50 in interest on her savings accounts and premium bonds.
