The Unexpected Side Hustle

Shortly after getting hooked on the idea of financial independence and retiring early, I set my own goal, to reach FI in 10 years, with a fund of $700K. That was a year ago, meaning my deadline is now just 9 years away. In Mint, I even set up a goal, which visually reminds me every time I log in how behind I am at my current rate of saving (12 years and 10 months behind, to be exact). To make up the difference, I’ve been searching for side hustles I can pick up to speed up how much I put away. Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve found my unexpected side hustle!

My unexpected side hustle

When it rains, it pours, right? After getting a promotion last month, a unique opportunity fell into my lap: an organization’s webmaster had abruptly left and they needed an interim replacement, urgently. My advantage? This is an organization full of incredibly smart, older individuals who are not social-savvy, and those were the skills I could bring to the table. The approval process took a while, but I am now their interim webmaster for the next six months!

What are the job details?

Over the next six months, my duties are to:

  • Update their existing website (currently filled with outdated information)
  • Develop a new website design (all in WordPress, like this blog!)
  • Maintain social media accounts
  • Travel to the occasional conference (travel stipend provided)
  • Provide analytics reports on how the site is doing

That’s pretty much it. Ian and I are tackling this together, as he’s my backend guy. In terms of income, we estimated our quote at a rate of $100/hr. As a general guideline, side hustles should pay you more than what you make at your 9-5. Plus, when you’re a contractor, there are taxes to account for – a lot of taxes. Even so, since Ian and I are not generally strapped for cash, this unexpected side hustle is paying for my new computer, potentially some small renovation work in our new apartment, and a boost in savings/debt payoff!

To date, starting this project has siphoned off some valuable blogging time, but I’m not super concerned. Cash Fasting will still have semi-regular posts, and as always, I’m chatty on Twitter.

What happens after six months?

If we do a great job, then we can apply to be the official webmaster, which would be a 2-3 year contract. The great news is that all the hard work is upfront – if we can get through the rest of the year smoothly; then the next couple of years will be easy peasy. If I do get the extended contract, it could be worth up to $25K a year. People, I could live abroad off that kind of money! (Though the six-figure salary would be hard to give up.)

How does this help FIRE?

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, I’m currently 12 years and 10 months behind reaching my goal in 10 years. Sure, the market will help reduce that, but not significantly so. At the moment I’m putting $1,400 a month away into my FIRE fund; as a rough estimation, every $10K I add shortens total timeline of 23 years by a whopping 7 months. That is… really slow.

I don’t expect this to be a static situation, though. My earnings power will increase over the next few years, and hopefully, this hustle will open the door to other, more profitable ones; I’m just dipping my toe in the water here!

What makes this hustle so unexpected

I love writing and talking about personal finance, and of course, I harbor dreams of making money from this blog one day. This unexpected side hustle doesn’t require more than a couple hours of time a week after some initial set up. Although I got the opportunity through family connections, I learned the skills for it from, you guessed it, blogging! In that sense, blogging for over a year has really paid off. When I think about the type of work I enjoy, this isn’t exactly my ideal work situation, but I’m a huge fan of the organization and I do have the perfect skill set.

This is my very first time taking work as a contractor/freelancer; for those of you out there that do it, what are your tips for balancing workload/taxes/clients?

_______

Update: My contract has been extended another 6 months! It’s shorter than I would have liked, but I’m still celebrating. 🎉

Comments

    1. Author

      Thanks, FAF! I’m excited to get paid for something which is so different from my day job, and I’m looking forward to the additional opportunities that may open up as a result of this. Anything to get to FIRE ASAP!

  1. I love your writing style dear. It’s honest and clear. We harbor the same dream although I think you’re more interesting 🙂 I’m glad to hear about your new hustle!

    Those estimates are definitely rough, when money rolls and builds, it does so extremely unexpectedly. Anything net worth past $100k and that thing pretty much grows itself.

    1. Author

      That’s what I’m hoping for! It’s going to take me a lot of time though before I get there, though. I think the piece I’m really missing at this point is real estate investments, but NYC is just so freaking expensive idk how I can afford it 😭
      The hustle is great, but it’s small earning opportunities compared to actually building wealth. Sigh~

  2. Wow! That’s a great side hustle. I dream of making about £1,200 extra from side-hustling so this seems like an amazing opportunity. I hope that you excel at it.

    Last year I was lucky to get a side-hustle that required about 10-15 hours of my time every fortnight. I managed my time by taking (paid) time off my regular job when I had to and cutting back on social time. It worked out pretty well mostly although I did get physically overwhelmed (flu-ish) by the end. Thank goodness for sick pay!

    1. Author

      That sounds like the perfect management system! I’ll prob use something similar. There’s going to be a conference in Wyoming in June that my attendance will be expected at, so for sure I’ll have to take time off from my regular job to go.

  3. This is so awesome, Jane! I think this is a good lesson that everybody has some marketable skills that people pay for. I remember I got paid $40/hour to upload stuff to WordPress and was amazed that someone would pay me for that.

    1. Author

      I know, right!! The webmaster that I took over for had been in the role for years… that means he made over $80K doing what I would consider to be the bare minimum for the site (since it’s in poor shape now). This is wayyyy better than my teenage years, where I would charge $10/hr for neighborhood babysitting and thought I was raking in the dough, haha.

  4. Very cool! Love that you are so in tune with the numbers that you know the impact of every $10k on the timeline. I’m not really doing any freelancing at the mo but most recently I did some copywriting at $50 an hour which was pretty huge for me!

    1. Author

      $50/hr is a great rate! Full-time, that comes out to a six-figure salary, which is nothing to laugh at. Depending on how much time this hustle takes me vs what I estimated, my $100/hr rate may drop quite a bit.
      I can’t but help to measure the impact of each $10K, which has its pros and cons. I love knowing the time value of each contribution, but for really large goals, it just ends up highlighting how much further I still have to go. >.<

  5. Jane, this is so awesome (and so is your shiny new laptop haha 😉 ). Huge congratulations!

    I thought I had a good thing going with my second job, where I’m averaging $21/hour, but this blows it out of the water. I can’t wait to see how this will eventually speed up your FIRE timeline!

    1. Author

      Thanks, Erin! Hey, a gig is a gig. Mine’s only temporary at the moment, so we’ll see if I can manage to get a longer contract. Otherwise, it’s not going to make any sort of dent towards FIRE. Fingers crossed!

  6. This is awesome! Congrats!!! As far as taxes go, I set aside 30% of each fulfilled invoice. This helps me cover not only federal, but also state and local (where I don’t receive as many credits/deductions.) I usually have a tiny bit leftover, and one year I owed a bit, but it’s a method that’s worked for me. I guess the percentage would depend on your own state and local tax rates, and if this income takes you into a higher taxed bracket.

    1. Author

      Yeah, the taxes are going to be the most complicated part. Because Ian and I are splitting the work, we’re billing everything through his LLC and trying to figure out what tax filing methods are most beneficial to us. Until that’s decided, I just need to pretend that I’m not making any money yet. 😆

  7. Very cool Jane, and when you think about it, it is less efforts, more fun and a better investment than for example a rental property 🙂

    1. Author

      It is most definitely less effort for now, but it’s also a pure money in exchange for time situation, which I would prefer to move away from. That’s why getting a rental property still appeals to me so!

  8. OMG Jane, congratulations on the side hustle! lol, it sounds chill, and you’re right. You can live abroad on that kind of money, web mastering on the beach or something lol. Imagine if you transition toward being a freelancing webmaster instead of working in finance? Might potentially give you your 6 figure salary but you can live abroad for cheaper than NYC right? 😉

    1. Author

      Thanks, Jack! I could absolutely live abroad with this side income, but it’s too temporary for me to make that jump. For now, this is great practice for me to get used to being my own boss and setting my own hours – something I’ve never properly experienced before. As I get used to this, my hope is that I’ll be able to create additional income streams that will eventually allow me to work anywhere I want. 🙂

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