10 Legitimate Ways to Make Money at Home

Not every mom has the luxury of being able to stay at home with the children and not have to earn money as well.

Luckily there are some great things that you can be doing from home that can bring in some real cash while you are at home with your babies, and that can become genuine careers in the long run.

Some of these jobs you can do with no prior training, others you will need to invest a little time and money in learning the skill properly, then you can start earning with them.

All of the jobs below are legitimate ways of making money on the side while you stay at home. Some will earn big money, others will just give you pocket money, but it all adds up right?!

Another thing you can do of course, when money is tight is to get in to coupon-ing. Coupons can save you hundreds of dollars a month on your groceries and other items! I like using Coupon Surfer cos they are free!

10 Legitimate Ways to Make Money at Home

1. Surveys

Ok, so they will probably never pull in the big money, but when you are stuck on the couch for hours on end feeding a newborn, why not do a few paid surveys to help pass the time?

Survey junkie pays you for any survey that you complete – you can check them out here.

2. Scoping

Now this is a role that you may never have heard of! Scoping is what the court reporting industry calls editing. If a court reporter is the writer, a scopist is the editor.

If you are a talented individual with excellent word skills, you can receive a transcript and audio from a court reporter, download it into your software, and edit the transcript to be correct according to the audio.

Excellent punctuation, word use, and vocabulary skills are essential but there is training available through the Internet Scoping School so you don’t have to start this all on your own!

On average, a scopist earns between $30,000 and $50,000 per year but sometimes more. They are also in high demand.

3. Blogging

If you are interested in starting a blog, make sure you do your research first!  Many moms start a mom blog with the hopes of making thousands per month. AND it is possible. BUT it takes a lot of hours and a lot of work for the first few years until you build a following.

I have a great post on how to start a blog and actually make money here. Blogging for money means you need to start out right on a self hosted site.

I prefer to use wordpress.org (not .com) on a site hosted on your own hosting. Personally I use Black Chicken Hosting because their plans are super affordable and their customer service is actually amazing, but they aren’t the cheapest option for beginners.

Bluehost is the PERFECT place for beginners to start, their helpdesk will get you set up and their plans start form less than $4 a month, and you get a free domain name!

Then choose a good theme, I like DIVI as it has options for building pages and posts that are very easy to use. And their customer service is amazing. 

On this site I actually run Generatepress which is SUPER fast and very customizable. 

Also I have found that you have a lot better success if you use paid stock photography, this doesn’t have to be expensive! I love to use Deposit Photos as their packages are SUPER affordable.

The upside – you are in charge of your own hours, content and how you spend your time.

The downside – many bloggers work 40 hours a week for a year before they start seeing a good income. Some manage it in a matter of months, but this might not be you!

If you REALLY want to learn about blogging I really recommend the courses at Dare to Conquer – he has lots of free videos that are well worth watching! I am a lifetime member and the information there is AMAZING.

RELATED: How to start a blog and actually make money

4. Become a Virtual Assistant

Being a VA is a fantastic way of making money from home as a mom. You can start a Virtual assistant business as a side hustle, and develop it in to a full business when they children are older.

A VA is someone that provides office support off site. It can range from doing graphics, content creation, scheduling, booking flights, answering emails, organizing online files, social media management and so much more.

You are in total control over what services you provide and what hours you do, as well as how much you charge. VA’s typically earn $35-100USD per hour depending on your skill set.

However, as with any work from home business ideas, you have to build your company from the ground up – work out what services you will provide and then find the clients that are willing to pay you for this.

If you are considering this path, I suggest you invest in a little training and support from someone that knows what they are doing! 

Setting up a business and learning new skills is SO much easier when someone is there holding your hand and telling you exactly what to do next! Learn how to become a VA here in 30 days or less

5. Selling on Ebay or Etsy

Some stay at home moms are absolutely killing it with online sales.

You can sell your own creations on Etsy, or if time is more of a factor, you can buy things from a wholesaler like AliExpress, and they sell them on to others via Ebay.

If you are super interested in this, there are ways to set up drop shipping from AliExpress direct to your customers, so you don’t even have to touch the products!

The trick here is to 1) find a product that sells well and 2) find a good seller on AliExpress. 

6. Book keeping

If you are good with numbers, you can offer to do some book keeping for other small businesses.

Once you have learned the basics of a few types of accounting software, they are all much of a muchness. 

Many small business owners are happy to pay someone else to keep track of their income and expenses.  Try your local plumbers, electricians, builders and other trades people, as well as fellow work-from-home moms and dads.

7. Proof reading

If you have a passion for words (and can spell better than me, which to be fair isn’t hard) then you might want to look at proof reading as a valid work from home option.

Proof readers can help edit books, blogs, magazines and pretty much anything that you read is proof read by someone!

Here is a free webinar about why proof reading is a great choice and how you can set up your own proofreading business.

8. Web design

If you are more of a creative bunny, then you might like to look in to web design. The joys of webdesign these days is once you have a good knowledge of wordpress (.org not .com) and get a couple of good themes that you like to use under your belt, you can become a professional web designer!

Personally, I like to use DIVI for web pages and Generatepress for blogs.

9. Transcribing

Transcribing is when you type what someone has recorded. Doctors, lawyers and all sorts of other professionals use transcribing services – here are some more places you can look for transcribing work.

Being an excellent transcriptionist — one that actually gets hired — involves much more than the ability to listen and type, and there are some free courses here that will show you what you need to know.

10. Coaching or consulting

Chances are there is something that you are super good at, that someone else would pay you to coach them for.  Have a think about your current skill set, what could you teach, consult or coach?

• An instrument
• Business development
• Social media management
• Child development
• Fermenting foods
• Growing a garden
• Sewing
• Cooking
• Advertising
• Diet or Keto coaching

A good place is to start – looking at your previous professional career and your favorite hobbies are two great places to start looking.