Best Passive Income Ideas For Financial Freedom

Executing the best passive income ideas has long been a favorite hobby for side hustlers and entrepreneurs. While the thought of earning money in your sleep might appeal to everybody, not many are brave enough (or have the knowledge) to hop aboard the passive-income-bandwagon.

Truth be told, generating a steady cash flow may take a while. But if you’re clever enough to invest your time in the right avenues, you’ll be surprised by how much revenue you can generate each month.

In this post, we’ll be discussing some of the best passive income ideas that’ll help you attain financial freedom.

Most ideas on this list will require significant time and effort. Not to mention, you’ll need to keep a close eye on your earning methods. Now if that comes as a surprise to you, it’s important we brush up on what passive income is all about.

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What is Passive Income?

Passive income is a model of earning that often requires little or no maintenance for steady cash flow. However, contrary to popular belief, this doesn’t mean you can forget or ignore your choice of passive income stream anytime soon. In most cases, we advise you monitor and closely keep track of your income sources.

List of Best Passive Income Ideas 2018

To help you get started, we’ve compiled a list of some of our best passive income ideas that you can start off with:

1. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is likely one of the most powerful ways to generate passive income but it’s not the best method for everybody. For starters, you’ll need a blog with a decent audience or fan-following. Once you’ve built your own tribe, you can use a number of affiliate networks to generate passive income. We recommend:

If you don’t have a blog of your own, learn how to make one today. It may take you some time to learn the ropes but you’ll definitely thank us for helping you start off.

2. Publish an eBook

Channel your inner writer and publish an eBook. You’re likely to generate more revenue if you stick to the non-fiction route. The trick here is to research on trending industry topics that people would like to read up on. The following subjects have been creating a lot of buzz lately:

Online Marketing
E-Commerce
Entrepreneurship
Self-Development

And yes, while fiction certainly dominates the market, it’s an incredibly competitive area to break ground in. But if you’re a well-established author and think you’ve what it takes, by all means, go ahead and write fiction. (We’re encouraging you to follow your instincts here!)

Thanks to Amazon’s Direct publishing platform, practically anybody can publish their own book. Rest assured, the process is fairly straightforward and won’t require a lot of effort. What you need to focus on is crafting an insanely good read for your potential readers so put all your efforts into that.

3. Try Your Luck With Crowdfunded Real Estate

Looking for the best passive income ideas that require minimal effort? Consider real estate.

While real estate is perhaps the most fool-proof way to generate passive income, it’s not one of our most economical suggestions. And that’s precisely why we recommend using a crowdfunding platform.

Thanks to crowdfunding platforms, practically anybody can enter the real estate market without having to invest large sums of money.

Some cool fundraising platforms include Reality Shares which is amongst the biggest crowdfunding platforms out there. While it mostly consists of deals that require a minimum of $5,000, you may be able to occasionally score decent properties for $1,000. Another notable advantage of using Reality Shares is that you can handpick the property you’d like to invest in.

4. Develop an App

Okay so, don’t roll your eyes just yet. We know exactly how difficult it is to develop a smartphone app and that’s probably why we’re including it in our list of best passive income ideas.

There’s no denying it. Developing an app requires sound technical knowledge and a little bit of investment too. But just imagine creating the next Instagram or Uber – yeah, you’d be hitting jackpot.

Experiment with underrated niches and try to solve a problem. While it’s not possible to hit gold mine overnight, developing an app can be a great way to generate passive income.

However, for that, you’d need to understand the dynamics of smartphone application and wrap your head around the technical aspects of business.

5. Swipe Cash Back Credit Cards

Using cash back credit cards may not be the greatest way to generate passive income but it’ll definitely help you save up on items you were going to buy anyway. You’re likely to find numerous options hence search online for the best cash back credit cards and narrow down your options.

6. Buy and Rent Expensive Equipment

This is practically the laziest idea on this list. Consider investing in expensive equipment that you can rent to people online. While this is definitely a fuss-free way to earn extra money, you’d have to figure out stuff in terms of logistics and maintenance. After all, you can’t risk somebody ruining your expensive camera or PS3, though you can narrow the chances by asking for advance payment.

As far as finding potential customers is concerned, you may benefit from free online directories that target your local area. Using a website isn’t such a bad idea either if you have all the resources available. Another cool marketing tool includes rental sites such as Craigslist.

Here is a list of things you can rent:

Treadmill
Camera
Photo Booths
Tiller and other gardening equipment

Bonus points if you already have some of this stuff at home!

7. Earn Rental Income via Real Estate

There’s no arguing that real estate is one of the best sources of passive income. For centuries, investors have generated sound revenue simply by renting out houses, condos and now most popularly, office spaces. Though real estate requires a sizable investment, it’s definitely something worth experimenting with. So if you’ve managed to save some cash, consider investing in real estate.

You can either begin your hunt for long-term tenants or use vacation rental websites such as AirBnB.

8. Earn Royalties from Audio Tracks

Do we have a musical genius here? If you classify yourself as one then you can easily generate some passive income by creating audio tracks and jingles. Once you’ve created your masterpiece, get it licensed using popular websites such as Sound Cloud, Song Freedom, and Audio Socket. This might not be the best solution for everybody but it’s definitely worth the effort if you’re passionate about music and don’t mind spending some time on practice.

Conduct due diligence to come up with audio tracks that’ll be a hit. For inspiration, check out tunes that are heavily licensed and work on something along the same lines. Remember, copying someone’s work isn’t an option, it’s important you create something that reflects your personal taste and style.

9. Use Passive Income Apps

This may sound too good to be true but there are a number of passive income apps that you can use to fuel your bank account (while spending time on the couch). Some of our top contenders include apps like Ibotta and Screen Stash.

For more information, check out our detailed guide on passive income apps.

10. Sell Stunning Photos Online

Do you have a knack for photography? It’s time you put your talent to good use and start selling pictures. There are a number of photo-selling websites that you can use for this purpose including Shutter Stock and iStockPhoto. However, in order to do well, you’ll need to gain command over photo-editing software including Adobe Photoshop to breathe life in your photographs and do some extra touch-up work.

We’ll be honest, you’ll find tons of competition in this field. But if you genuinely enjoy taking pictures, selling images could turn out to be a fun way to make passive income.

11. Purchase Dividend Stocks

Investing in dividend stocks is another great way to generate passive income. However, when it comes to stocks, you’ll need to hit the books and perform adequate research especially since you’ll need to invest in a large number of stocks to make big bucks.

Rest assured, you don’t have to be a pro to start but you’ll definitely require the desire to learn. Start by keeping an eye out for high-income dividend stocks and keep working your way up.