Increasing our household income is always at the forefront of my mind. Whilst Steve works full time at his job, often taking on overtime and with me working freelance, we find that we don’t have much after bills are paid. This leaves little money for saving.
We want to be completely debt free as soon as possible and want to have a deposit for a house as soon as we possibly can. This means we need to dramatically increase our household income.
So how am I planning on doing this?
- Take on more freelance work. This is pretty obvious and now that Jack is at nursery 5 days a week for half days, much more achievable. My parents & Steve’s parents would happily pick him up on a couple of afternoons to enable me to get more done. If I am awake, my mind is on pitching for work. Each morning I will go through my emails and check social media before checking a number of different sites I use.
- Take on a part time job. This one is a little harder to do as with Jack’s nursery hours and the area I live, it is going to be tough to find something with hours I can work. I do keep an eye on jobs going round the village and am applying for a few. I will still do my freelance work around a part time job too.
- Do surveys/mystery shopping. I already use a few different survey sites and mystery shopping. I’ve cut back the sites I use as some just weren’t worth my time but a cheque every few months from a site like Populus Live can be very helpful.
- Get cashback where possible. If I am buying something online, I am always going to see if I can go through Top Cashback and get some cashback for it. Yes, sometimes the waiting time for your cashback is crazy but every little helps, right?
- Declutter and sell, sell, sell. I really need to do another declutter and sell anything that we no longer need or use that is in good enough condition.
- Do odd jobs. I wouldn’t charge but my Nan wants me to do a few odd jobs round her house every now and again and is insisting on paying me. I’m thinking of putting a sign in my local shops offering my services.
I’m really hoping that if I put the effort in and really try my hardest every single day, I will be able to see a dramatic increase from my end. Hopefully Steve will be able to take on some more overtime in the run up to Christmas as well and we can actually start to see our savings accounts grow. We are also hoping to save money on our household bills too.
How would you suggest increasing household income? My friend Emma at EmmaDrew.Info has started a series on how to make an extra £x amount of money each month – why not take a look? I’m definitely taking some of her ideas on board!
