Money is critical to our survival. Having enough of it allows us to have more control over our lives and achieve more freedom to pursue what we really want in life.
However, earning money isn’t that easy. Some people have to endure long hours at work just to earn enough. Others don’t need to spend the same amount of time working but they’re able to earn the same amount of money. And then, there are people who are lucky enough to earn money without doing anything.
If you’re finding that hard to believe, check out these 52 people who made a fortune out of nothing.
1. A possessed rubber duck
Most parents want to find an effective way to make their children behave. For one parent who’s running out of options, getting a hunted rubber duck seemed like the best idea. Considered as possess, it sold for over $100!
2. A mold-resistant grilled cheese sandwich with the Virgin Mary’s face on it
The person who auctioned off this sandwich probably didn’t ask themselves what would Jesus do? If he’d made a grilled cheese sandwich with his mother’s face on it, then he’d probably have cherished it forever. This is especially true when you consider that the sandwich apparently has the ability to completely resist mold. It finally sold for $28,000.
3. Wearing brands’ T-Shirts
For most of us, wearing clothes is normal. However, for one person, it’s a golden opportunity to earn lots of money. He started the company I Wear Your Shirt which does exactly that. He charges brands to wear their shirts and post those shirts on social media. It’s grown into a million-dollar, multi-employee business!
4. Create a site and earn from ads
For most people, creating a website that is worthy of getting serious ad revenues takes a lot of time and high-quality content. Well, not if you’re Alex Tew. Wanting to raise some cash so he could go study, he made a website and asked people to buy pixels on it for ads. In just 6 months, he was able to earn $1 million of ads.
5. Not an ordinary webpage
Someone tried to make a point about how anything could be art and reaped the rewards. Someone posted “Art used to be something to cherish Now literally anything could be art This post is art.” online. Then someone (who may or may not have been the person who wrote those words) printed that on some paper. Within one day, it had raised a whopping $600 on eBay.
6. Filming yourself while eating
Everyone needs to eat. It’s one of life’s basic necessities. But it turns out that every time you eat, you could be making a profit! Many people in South Korea have done just this. They post videos on YouTube of themselves eating large portions of food. And for this “work” they can earn up to $10,000 every month!
7. Making Potato Salad
One guy made a Kickstarter campaign for the sole purpose of making some potato salad. He was asking for $10 but got $55,422. And what makes it even crazier is that it was his first ever potato salad! The odds of this happening are incredibly remote, but if it pays out once, then it’s worth it!
8. Using foreheads to sell products
Andrew Fischer saw the guy that sold advertising space in the form of wearing branded shirts and went much further. He decided to sell the space on his forehead to a brand. To the highest bidder, he promised to have a logo or company name non permanently tattooed to his forehead. Companies went wild for this. In the end, SnoreStop won the bid, paying $37,375 for the honor.
9. Selling Unclaimed Baggage
If unclaimed baggage from an airport is not claimed within three months, then the airlines can legally sell it. There are companies that happily buy these bags for next to no cost and then sell the contents off for a huge profit. In America, the only company that does this is the adequately named Unclaimed Baggage Center in Alabama.
10. Dried Glue That Kinda Looks Like Homer Simpson
Superglue has a terrible habit of spilling everywhere. But it turns out that if you throw the dried glue away, then you’re throwing away your retirement money. Someone thought that a blob of dried glue looked a bit like Homer Simpson, put it on eBay and sold it for $239,000!
11. Watching Movie Trailers
Some movie fans are making money from their passion without going to film school or buying expensive cameras. They watch trailers and earn cash from that!
12. Selling Dollar Bills For Big Bucks
Next time you get change from a $20 bill in just $1s, don’t get annoyed. There’s a chance that some of those bills could be worth big money! The trick is to look at the serial numbers. If a dollar bill has seven repeating digits, like 09999999; seven digits with just one number broken up, like 99990999; repeating numbers, like 12121212; an even split of numbers, like 99990000; then that can be worth lots of money. Sell them on Cool Serial Numbers.
13. Cooking Your Dinner
Earning money from cooking your own dinner is now a money maker. If you buy more food than you need, you can invite people over to eat dinner with you, and get cash from that! It’s through another new app.
14. Taking Photos Of “Help Wanted” Signs
There’s an app that pays people for photographing “help wanted” signs! The only skills that people who do this need are a basic level of photography and an eye for the signs.
15. Reading Emails
Some sites, like Inbox Dollars, pay you to read a company’s emails. Sign up, and you can earn money doing what you’re already doing!
16. Staying In Someone Else’s Home
Since the rise of Airbnb, people have started to pay to stay at other people’s homes. But others think that that’s the stupid way around of doing it. Some people register themselves on websites such as Trusted House Sitters and make money by staying at someone’s home and watching their pet!
17. Air From A Musician’s Concert
Concerts are so popular because it’s basically impossible to experience anything like seeing a great musician live and in person. But one eBay user thinks that he’s found a way to capture the feeling of the concert. He’s bagging air from the performances and selling the bags online. One bag from a Kanye West concert sold for over $60,000 on eBay.
18. Selling A Cornflake Shaped Like Illinois
Yes, there really is a lot of money to be made from staring at cereal and recognizing what it looks like. It’s kind of like staring at clouds, but with some added capitalism. Anyway, one Illinois resident or fan of Illinois bought a piece of cereal shaped like the state for $1,350. On the plus side, shipping only cost 50 cents.
19. Selling Cereal That Looks Like Beloved Characters, And Then Selling The Story Of It!
One guy found a piece of cereal that looked just like ET. So he sold it on eBay for just over $1,000. But what’s even more impressive is that after he did this, he sold the story of his finding and selling the piece of cereal for $3,000.
20. A Dorito That’s Shaped Like The Pope’s Hat
This is an appealing item for fans of Catholicism and chips alike! Even if you’re not that into either, you can still admire the resemblance of this Dorito to that of arguably the most famous hat in the world. It sold for $1,209 in 2005, the same year that Pope Benedict XVI became the head of the Catholic Church.
21. Being The Friend Of A Canadian Senator
One Canadian senator, Mike Duffy, decided to pay his friend $65,000 of government money for nothing at all. The friend didn’t even need to get on Rent A Friend. He just knew someone in a high place who gave him money.
22. Wearing Makeup
Makeup brands need people to wear their prototype products. That means that some people get free makeup and paid to try it out! Why would anyone buy makeup when you can get money for wearing it!?
23. Using Microsoft’s Search Engine
Most people use Google to search for stuff online. But Microsoft actually pays people to use Bing, their search engine. All that people need to do is sign up for Microsoft Rewards
24. Asking Other People For Their Unwanted Stuff And Selling It
Most people have stuff that they don’t want anymore. You can offer to take it off their hands and then post it online. That’s literally money for something you’ve paid nothing for!
25. Watching Movies
Millions of people signed up to Moviepass, because it meant that going to the movies was suddenly so cheap. But some people get to go to movies on an opening day and get cash back from it. It’s the same as being a mystery shopper, only you give info about the most popular screenings and the trailers before the film. People can make up to $20 an hour by watching a movie in the theater.
26. Pretending To Be Ill
When you’re training up a doctor, nurse or any other medical professional, you can’t just set them loose on a patient. But they also need practical experience. What’s the solution? Pay someone to be a fake patient! Sometimes, all that a fake patient needs to do is lie there and groan. Then the cash comes pouring in!
27. Lying In Bed
It turns out that there’s a really lazy way to forward science. NASA is paying people to lie around in bed for 60 days. People that participate in this experiment get $19,000 for the two months of “work.”
28. Being Someone’s Friend
Some people need friends so bad that they’re charging up to $50 per hour for the right people. Rent A Friend is where people are selling their friendship skills to people who need someone to hang out with. And by the way, the site is strictly for platonic friendships. According to the site, some people make up to $96,000 a year by being someone’s friend.
29. Downloading Apps And Never Using Them
It takes literally seconds to download an app. But doing that simple action could really pay out! MobileXpression just sits on your phone and monitors your phone activity. You can get gift cards or items for doing this!
30. Playing The Lottery For Free
It’s no surprise that a few people win lots of cash from the lottery. But the downside is that most people spend money without getting anything back. But on the app Lucktastic, people get lottery cards for free! That means that there’s literally nothing to lose from playing a range of lotteries!
31. Become a bed tester
“Is your dream job sleeping and getting paid for it? Well, today’s your lucky day because your dream can become a reality as a professional sleeper. Don’t get too excited, though: competition is fierce and vacancies are rare, so be sure to check job boards for mattress companies or hotels regularly,” says Career Addict. One man made $76,000 for sleeping in all of Travelodge’s 17,000 rooms.
32. Collect and recycle cans
If you have some extra time on your hands or just collected cans casually, over time, it could really pay off. In some states, like Oregon and Michigan, each can recycled can earn you $0.10. One man named Curt Degerman made $1.36 million from collecting and recycling cans. Of course, some of those earnings were made from playing the stock market from his can business.
33. Buy and sell URLs
There are probably only a few URLs left out there that are worth any money, but if you were lucky enough to swoop up a few domains around the start of Google, you could be rich. A man named Chris Clark owned Pizza.com and sold it for $2.6 million in 2008. He bought it for $20 in 1994.
34. Create a meme
Remember that “I can has cheezburger” meme that went viral? The one with the open-mouthed cat asking for a cheeseburger? Yeah, the creator Erik Nakagawa made approximately $10 million from millions and millions of people sharing that meme. Yep. Just think about that for a minute.
35. Become a professional mourner
“Professional mourners, also called moirologists, are actors hired by family members to grieve at funerals and wakes. The intention is to increase the number of funeral participants, provide new faces, show support for the deceased, and help people deal with a tragedy through other’s expressions of grief. While many people are uncomfortable with the idea of professional mourners, it’s a job that is growing in popularity,” says Job Monkey. They can earn around $30 to $120 per funeral.
36. Walk some dogs
If you have a little bit of extra time on your hands and happen to love four-legged friends, why not walk some dogs? Services like Rover and Wag Walking are always looking for people to help walk people’s dogs when they don’t have time. In general, expect to earn about $15 to $20 per 20-minute walk and $20 to $30 per 30-minute walk. For two walks a day, expect to pay between $30 and $45.
37. Become a hangover helper
This job does require some work, but at least it’s easy money! One couple has decided to become “hangover helpers” by coming to help clean up after a big party. They’ll also cook breakfast and bring you Powerade.
38. Sell your hair
Although it’s better to donate your hair if you have long locks, there are some websites that will take undyed, untreated, long hair to use for extensions. Do some research to find out which sites are looking for the type of hair you have. One woman made $82 by selling her hair on eBay.
39. Selling plasma
Another bodily fluid you can sell is your plasma. Plasma can be donated if you’re at least 18-years-old and weigh at least 110 pounds. Each plasma donation can warrant $20 to $50. The more you weigh, the more you’ll get paid.
40. Selling sperm
“A lot of people sell their body fluids, believe it or not. And donating sperm can be a great way to make some extra money. But there is a bit of a catch with this one. The donor needs to qualify. The qualifications include height, build, attractiveness, blood type and sexual preferences,” explains Self Made.
41. Provide doggy daycare
For just $100, you can become certified in doggy daycare. If you love hanging out with dogs all day, you can charge people to drop them off at your home if you have the room or you can spend your free time at PetSmart while earning extra cash.