The W5 & How

So we need to start with the who, what, where, when , why and last but not least the HOW of fivehundredamonth.com.

Who

I’m just your everyday average North American guy. I’m like many of you reading this right now. I work a regular job (construction), I have a significant other (Alpine wife), drive an average truck (Nissan Frontier) and live in a small town of about 15,000 people. There’s nothing exceptionally unique or abnormal about me. In fact if I came out central casting to be an extra on a Hollywood set I would show up in the credits as Generic White Guy #3. Like I tell my wife “The only thing greater than my good looks, charm and intelligence is my humility” and I hear to humbly serve my readers. but all joking aside I am not a writer, poet or master communicator, just a guy writing as I’d speak to you across a table.

What

So what is this blog? It’s a monthly account of my adventures and mis-adventures to make an $500 per month in anyway that is legal, moral and feasible. The ground rules I have given myself are as follows:

1. I won’t knowingly break any laws, cheat people out of their hard earned money or try something that might suck up unknown amounts of time and energy.
2. Activities to make money will not be related to my regular job, like working overtime or pay increases.
3. I will be starting at with zero dollars. No going to my chequing account from my regular job to fund an opportunity.
4. I will be using my existing skills and non-monetary resources (vehicles, tools, network etc.).
5. Make it entertaining for myself and the reader.
6. Shill Alerts for anything that I make a cut. (Shill alert is anything that has a link where I get a small kick back when you click on it or sign up.)
7. 10% will go to charity.

It’s a couple other things as well. First it’s going to be an accountability tool for me to make an extra $500 dollars per month outside of and unrelated to my regular job. I often think that it would be nice to make a little extra scratch but then get distracted with the Honey Do list, Netflix, or changing everyone’s minds on social media. Now that I have an audience to report to I will need to deliver an update.

Secondly, I hope it will serve to be either an inspiration or a cautionary tale about certain endeavors, opportunities or ideas. We all have those “I should invent, sell, develop, write, perform…..xyz” thoughts. So maybe I’ll cover some those here in the blog or inspire you to take action on one.

Where

Where did this idea come from? Truthfully this is one of those ideas that’s been percolating in my mind since the fall of 2018 when the Alpine wife was in a Facebook commercial and yours truly got paid $150 to be an extra. It was a grueling 2 hours of standing around a camp fire drinking and playing my role as Generic white guy #3. Then the same month a neighbor needed help putting down new flooring in his house and paid me $350 for my help. I thought “Wow that was an easy $500, I need to do this more often”, so began the 2.5 year procrastination period.

When

Obviously most of what will be done will have to be done after work hours in the evenings and weekends. Currently I work a 9-5 but there will be times in the future when I will be away from home for work and then have extended time off. This will be the challenging part that I think everyone can relate to, finding the time. My hope is with some extra discipline and the commitment to entertain you I can cut the Netflix time down and make that extra $125 per week.

Why

Oh the questions. Why $500 a month? Why now? Why blog about doing it?

So why pick an arbitrary number like $500 per month? The motivational speakers tell us that we should set our goals high if we really want to achieve greatness. How does the saying go “Shoot for the moon and you may hit the stars but aim for a puddle an you’ll hit it every time.” Well truth is that to me $500 is a number big enough to make a difference in my life but not so big that I’ll develop and Aderall addiction. The way I see it is an extra $6000 in payments on the mortgage or in retirement savings is nothing to sneeze at. I’m looking to achieve betterness not greatness otherwise the blog would be called www.make50Kamonthwithatruckalaptopandaperscriptiondrugaddiction.com.

Why am I starting it now? If 2020 has taught me anything, it’s that you better start yesterday cause you never know what’s coming around the corner.

Why put it on the internet for everyone to see? I alluded to this earlier but I hope to inspire and maybe be a cautionary tale for others. I also need the accountability of reporting my progress to the world but most importantly it will give the Alpine wife a break from hearing me talk about it all the time.

How

This is the simultaneously fun and scary part. How will I start from zero and get to a consistent $500 every 30 days, $125 per week or $17.86 per day? The easiest and quickest way to start will be to use my existing skills to get off the ground and take advantage of some low hanging opportunities. Some of these may work for you some may not but we all have unique skills and resources to achieve “betterness”. Here are some of the ideas but this is not an all encompassing list.

• Services – handyman, software, etc.
• Delivery, Uber, Lyft driver
• Renting out my tools and vehicles
• Door to door sales
• Upcycling for profit on sites like Ebay, Mercari, Kijiji, Craigslist
• Affiliate marketing
• Surveys and secret shopper
• Investing – stocks, Bitcoin, real estate
• Contests – a penny won is better than a penny earned
• Becoming an Amazon seller
• Gambling on sports
• Credit Card churning
• Heck I’ll even spin a sign if it gets me $500

As you can tell pretty much anything is an option and I’ll be your guinea pig for things that you may have seen or heard others talking about.

Let the adventure begin!