When you’re in dire straits … assuming all available funds and traditional sources of credit are tapped out, here are 25 ways to raise cash in a few days.
- 1) Start your Own Part-Time Business from Home – You might consider hiring yourself out as a dog walker, errand runner, driver or computer consultant.
- 2) Take a part-time job – Bartending and waiting tables are two tried-and-true examples.
- 3) Seek emergency assistance – Some charities provide services such as food banks, help or waiver of utility costs, and clothing and other household essentials.
- 4) Make stuff to sell – Etsy, an online shop is devoted to crafty vendors.
- 5) Rent out your spot – If you own some prime parking real estate, you could put cash in your pocket and get more exercise by renting out your spot and parking further away.
- 6) Sell on Craigslist – This a good alternative to the yard sale – a great internet site for buying and selling unwanted items. It’s free and localized.
- 7) Do odd jobs – Offer to babysit, wash cars, mow lawns, weed backyards or haul stuff out of the garage for your neighbors.
- 8) Find an on-line gig – Amazon Mechanical Turk -companies post tasks that machines cannot easily do, but that are relatively simple for humans. You choose an assignment, and, on completion, are credited with payment to your Amazon account. This money can be withdrawn once you accumulate $10.
- 9) Collect your change – Find hidden cash throughout your home – piggy banks, pennies, under sofa cushions, and in clothes pockets.
- 10) Return past purchases – Taking recently purchased items back for cash is one of the most efficient ways of making quick cash.
- 11) Hold a yard sale – Get rid of clutter. A yard sale may help you raise some money fast.
- 12) Recycle scrap metal – Sell your scrap metal to your local salvage yard or recycling center.
- 13) Become a temp – Temporary employment jobs pay well and can lead to permanent employment.
- 14) Sign up for medical tests – The National Institutes of Health has 300 studies that need volunteers. These studies pay well.
- 15) Take in a boarder – Sharing living expenses can put more cash in your pocket.
- 16) Tap your life insurance – Some life insurance have a "cash value" that you can withdraw at any time.
- 17) Get a Payday loan – If you’re responsible with your money and know that you’re facing less than two weeks of a cash shortfall, borrowing $300 today in return for repaying $345 in two weeks may be a good idea.
- 18) Raid your IRA – you’ll have to pay a 10% penalty plus taxes on the money at your current income tax rate.
- 19) Pawn your stuff – Pawnshops work like this: you offer up your prized possessions as collateral on a loan; in most cases, the loan will be about 10% of the actual value of your item. At this point, you have three choices: redeem the loan, pay interest to keep the loan alive, or let it lapse and forfeit your item.
- 20) Sell your plasma or hair – There are clinics that will pay you up to $35 or so for some of your plasma, which you can donate twice a week. Sales for generous lengths of tresses reportedly can net you several hundred to over a thousand dollars.
- 21) Bank on your sperm – Advertised sperm donation rates vary from $1 to $200 per week.
- 22) Sell stuff to motorists – Roadside sales can pull in some quick cash. Pick high-profit items that aren’t highly perishable and/or have a high cost/sale price ratio: cold soda, corn, baked goods, flowers.
- 23) Scalp tickets (legally) – If you have concert or theater tickets you can’t use – sell them.
- 24) Go scavenging – Collect cans … Go to the beach and use a metal detector to look for coins or other valuable items just below the sand’s surface.
- 25) Head to the Casino – This is the most desperate – MUST have more money within a very short time or your life will fall into ruin. Only then does a reasonable person consider the casino.
(AOL Money and Finance)