Many of us have experienced what it feels like to be drowning in student loan debt, with no financial resources for paying the loan off in a reasonable amount of time. Meanwhile, interest racks up, and your $30,000 college loan is now $100,000. If this sounds like you, welcome to the club – I’m glad you’re trying to take control of your financial situation by visiting my post that will cover the top side hustles that help pay off student loan debt. With that said, let’s jump right into it to find out how you can make the extra money you need.
What are the Best Side Hustles for Paying Off Student Loans?s
When you owe thousands of dollars in student loans, it can feel hopeless and overwhelming. But I’m here to tell you that if you create a plan to tackle your loans, which includes finding a side hustle that’s perfect for you, and that will allow you to earn extra cash to apply towards your college debt, then you will start to feel a sense of accomplishment and control over your financial affairs. With that said, let’s begin by going over the top side hustles for paying off college loans so you can get on the right path sooner rather than later.
1. Create a YouTube Channel and Monetize it
If you love making videos, or think you would like to share your thoughts with the world on a weekly basis, then consider starting a YouTube channel for profit. There is so much potential in paying off your student loans with this side hustle, and it’s something that you may just love doing.
Think about what type of videos you might want to post on YouTube – comedy, product reviews, current event updates, or maybe stock market informational videos. As you can see, the options as to what type of videos you can create are really limitless.
Ways Your YouTube Side Hustle Can Create Extra Money
- Advertising: I’m sure you have all seen ads appear in the middle of watching a YouTube video. Well, the YouTube channel owners can generate ad revenue when a viewer takes certain actions in response to the ad.
- Memberships: When your viewers sign up to become a member of your channel, they make monthly payments to you. In return, you provide them with bonuses such as special emojis, badges, members-only live chat privileges, as well as other perks. There can be different membership tier levels with varying prices. The more traffic you have, and the more channel members, the more money you can pay towards your student loans.
- Merchandise: YouTube provides a section where eligible channels can display custom merchandise, accessed through a Store tab. Viewers can buy items such as branded T-shirts, hoodies, mugs, and more. Here is a great example of a YouTube store.
- Super Chat & Stickers: Viewers pay money to have their chat message spotlighted.
This idea is on the best side hustles to pay off your student loan list because YouTube is extremely popular with millions of viewers at your disposal. Plus, it’s a fun way to reel in additional funds to pay off college debt.
2. Sell Items on eBay to Bring in Extra Cash
The popular selling platform, eBay, has been around for years, and people are making a ton of money on it. I’ve tested the waters on eBay by selling 2nd hand items, vintage and collectibles, books, and more. I once found an old marine atlas with maps at a yard sale and purchased it for $5. It came complete with pink and green mold marks on many pages, two dead silverfish bugs stuck within the pages – the book was a mess.
However, because it was a very old book, with maps, it was worth money to collectors. I don’t remember the exact price I sold it for; I think it was around $85 – not a bad profit for a fun day out garage sailing. You can find all sorts of valuable items at yard sales and estate sales – old baseball cards, 1st edition classic books, and so on. You can also find items at your local thrift store.
This is a great side hustle that will allow you to pay extra money towards your student loan each month. If that sounds promising to you, you’re probably wondering how you can begin selling.
How to Get Started Generating Money on eBay:
- Set up an eBay account.
- Start treasure hunting at yard sales, estate sales, and thrift stores.
- Take photos of your items – using your phone camera is fine.
- Create pages within eBay for each item, write compelling descriptions, and upload corresponding photos.
- Your items sell, the buyers pay, and you ship the items out.
3. Make Being an Uber or Lyft Driver Your Side Job
Drive your way to less student loan debt by working with the biggest rideshare companies – Uber or Lyft. All you have to do is meet their requirements to start driving for them. You can check out Uber’s driver requirements as an example. They make money by earning a base fare, plus additional money for driving in high-demand areas, extra cash for picking up more than one rider, and of course tips. You can drive others around in your free time, and create extra income in the process to pay off your student loans quickly.
4. Take a Bite Out of Your College Loan by Becoming a Dog Walker
Any dog lovers out there? What could be better than a side hustle that allows you to pay off your student loan debt faster just by walking a few furry friends? It will not only bring you the joy of being around adorable dogs that are super excited to see you, but also brings in cash that can be used to pay towards your college debt.
Dog walking may not seem like a real side job, but it is. There are official dog walking companies, professional independent dog walkers where that is their main source of income, and then there are those who consider it a side hustle and do it to earn additional money.
How Much Extra Money Can You Make Walking Dogs?
The amount of money you can make would depend upon how many dogs you walk per week, how much you decide to charge, as well as the neighborhoods the dogs reside in – if you target high-income earning neighborhoods, you can certainly charge much more. Depending on certain factors, dog walkers can charge anywhere from $20 to $40 per hour.
Think about the income potential here! You can utilize your time by walking multiple dogs at once; it’s done all the time – I’m sure you have seen that person walking down the street with five dogs on leashes; I know I have. If they are getting at least $20 per dog, then that would be $100 for just that one hour. Ok, now that’s a lot of extra money you can use for paying off your student loan.
A Dog Walking Website Can Boost Your Income Potential
To raise your income potential with this creative side hustle, it’s recommended, but certainly not required, that you get a website, and business cards that directs clients to your site.
Once on your site, they can see your bio that describes your experience level, pictures of you with happy dogs, and maybe a video of you interacting with a few. You can also add testimonials of past clients – the sky is the limit as to what you can add to your dog walking site.
This will push the average neighborhood dog walking competitor out because your website makes you look like the best candidate for the job. It will also bring in a much higher rate because dog owners are dog lovers, and they want only the best and most trustworthy people caring for their beloved family members. So, anything you can do to convince them of that will boost your hire-ability and rate per hour.
5. Pay Your Student Loan Off Faster by Starting a Blog
This side hustle for paying off student loans is one of my favorites because it has the potential to make a lot of money. How much money and how fast can you pay down your loans? It all depends on how much time you want to put into your blog – you can make $20, $500, $2,000, $10,000 a month, or more. Now your interest is sparked, right? This is the type of side job that will not only bring in money for your debt, but also has the potential to allow you to leave your day job, if that’s a goal of yours.
How Do You Make Money Blogging?
There are many ways to reel in extra cash with your blog, but the most popular way is through affiliate marketing. This is where you sign up with a company as an affiliate partner, they provide you with a link that’s specific to your website, and then when you create a blog post, you work that link into the article, promoting what the company is offering.
If someone clicks on that link within your post, and they purchase something, signup, or take certain other actions, then you make a commission. If you start to get a lot of traffic to your blog, more people will click on your affiliate links, and then you are automatically making extra money to pay off your student loan debt – even as you vacation, sleep, or while you watch TV.
Tips for Starting Your Own Cash Flowing Blog:
- You will need to sign up with a hosting company so you have a place to park your website files. I suggest using Bluehost. I use them and so do many others. You can sign up through my Bluehost link so you receive a discounted price.
- To be able to build your site and have a place to create posts, you will need a platform to work in, and this would be WordPress. It’s the best one out there, and I wouldn’t even consider using anything else.
- Choose a theme that you love – there are tons of free WordPress themes to use. From the WordPress dashboard, hover over Appearance, and then click on Themes to view what’s available.
- Build your site within WordPress, or hire someone to do this for you. There are plenty of affordable freelancers who can easily build your site.
- Really important – place email sign up forms on your site to capture your reader’s email addresses. Give them an incentive to do so, like a weekly newsletter, or something related to your website’s area of interest. I use ActiveCampaign and it’s really increased my revenue.
- Start applying to affiliate marketing programs that fit well with your site’s overall subject matter.
- Create blog posts that will rank well and drive traffic to your website, and add the affiliate links where it’s appropriate.
- Once you have everything set up, you can start reaching out to a wide audience and drive quality traffic to your blog through Facebook. You can learn more on how to do this by checking out this page that has info on an online class called FB Ad Course for Bloggers.
If blogging sounds like something you would be interested in, make it your new side hustle to pay off your student loans. If you’re not sure, then read our other post on the topic for more inspiration – the title says it all: How I Earned Over $1,800,000 with My Blog and You Can Too.
6. Use Freelance Writing Gigs to Repay Your School Debt
This idea for bringing in extra money is similar to the previous one, “becoming a blogger”, meaning that you may end up writing blog posts, but the difference is that it won’t be for your personal blog. Other freelance writing projects could include press releases, marketing materials, brochures, email newsletters, and more.
This is on the top side hustles for paying off student loans list for the following reasons:
- It allows you to work from the comfort of your home.
- There are outstanding platforms you can use to find clients; my favorite is Upwork.com.
- You decide what project you want to work on and who you want to work with – you’re in the driver’s seat.
- It allows you to determine your own rate – you can charge what you feel you’re worth. If you’re a great writer, clients will pay the rate you’re asking for.
If this sounds like a side hustle you would consider to make extra money to pay off your student loans, then give it a go. As mentioned, you can try Upwork, it’s one of the best freelancer sites out there. Also, if you’re not into writing, there’s just about every imaginable type of freelance project you can think of on the site. This includes clients looking for virtual assistants, graphic designers, data entry, and more. While we’re on the topic of freelancing, read over this article titled – Reasons Your Income Potential Can Skyrocket if You Switch from Employee to Freelancer.
Additional Side Hustles for Paying Off Your Student Loans
| Social Media Management | Deliver Food with DoorDash |
| Teach English with VIPKid | House Sit |
| Online Courses with Udemy | Sell Items on CafePress |
| Deliver with Instacart | Clean Houses |
| Sell Crafts on Etsy | Shoot for Stock Photography |
| Rent a Room Out with AirBnB | Become a Tutor |
| Become a Personal Chef | Detail Cars |
| Sell an Ebook on Amazon | Resell Clothes on ThredUp |
| Neighborhood Yard Work | Become a Virtual Assistant |
| Give Music Lessons | Answer Questions on JustAnswer |
| Take Surveys with Survey Junkie | Run Errands with TaskRabbit |
| Weekend Sign Spinner | Babysit |
| Become a Mystery Shopper | Be a Movie Extra with Central Casting |
Additional Articles of Interest
- Learn more about how to start blogging with WordPress and Bluehost.
- Check out our article that details how you can make good money so you can quit your day job.
- Read this post to find out what the top financial reasons to start a blog are.
- Turn a side hustle into a career with these 20 home-based business ideas.
- Be informed on how student loan debt is rising and has become a national crisis.
- Crypto is on the rise so it may be worth your time to look into the topic. Start with diving into this guide to investing in crypto, as well as this other helpful post that discusses how much to invest as a beginner.
Get Started Using Any of These Side Hustles to Pay Down College Loan Debt!
The sooner you start applying extra money to your student loan each month, the faster you will pay off your debt, as well as stop the interest accumulation in its tracks. No matter which side hustle you decide is best for you, the important thing is to just get started, and keep the end goal in mind for motivation, which is earning money on the side to pay off your student loan debt! For even more outstanding ideas on paying your loan, dive into our article that covers paying off $20,000 in student loans in less than two years.