There’s nothing better than having a variety of side hustles that generate enough passive income to cover your living expenses every month.
As you may be aware, passive income refers to revenue from activities and investments that don’t require as much effort or time as a full-time job.
In this article, we shall be looking at 23 profitable side hustles and business ideas for accountants. Each idea has the potential to make enough passive income to cover your living expenses.
Although most of them are not directly in the accounting field, they’re all relatively easy to start and manage, even if you have no prior experience. Let’s get started!
23 Profitable Side Hustle Ideas for Accountants
1. Sell spreadsheets online
As an accountant, you are probably an Excel guru. You can make a decent amount of money by selling complex spreadsheets on Etsy.
Many people struggle with Excel, which makes this a fantastic idea because you can be sure that there will be demand.
2. Sell digital files
Some examples of digital files include templates, PDFs, how-to guides, plugins, etc. If you’re familiar with creating any one of them, you could also make passive income by selling them on Etsy.
For example, you could sell business plan templates, purchase agreement templates (for houses, cars, etc), employee contract templates, etc.
3. Invest in stocks
This is right within your wheelhouse. Stocks are riskier than many other investment options but they can provide steady passive income for years and years.
4. Invest in CDs and bonds
Certificates of Deposits (CD), and Bonds, offer moderate returns and have a much lower risk than stocks. Bonds can be seen as a loan to a company or government. CDs can be purchased from banks or a credit union in Florida. They are similar to high-interest savings accounts.
5. Invest in crowdfunded real estate projects
This is a great way to get into real estate on a budget. Crowdfunding platforms like Fundrise and RealtyMogul allow investors to pool their money to fund a real estate project.
In exchange for your investment, you’ll get a share of the project and the income it generates. Many crowdfunding platforms will allow you to invest at little as $100.
6. Invest in REITs
Real Estate Investment Trusts, or REITs, are companies that own and operate a variety of real estate properties.
By investing in REITs, you’ll get a share of the income they generate. REITs can be traded in the stock market and are very easy to buy and sell at any time.
7. Invest in a small business
You can use platforms such as Mainvest to invest in small businesses that are raising capital. In exchange for your money, you get a small share in the business and a percentage of the income it generates.
8. P2P lending
Another great way to put your money to work is through lending. P2P lending sites like Prosper will connect you to loan seekers who have been thoroughly screened and meet certain criteria. That helps reduce the risks on your part.
The interest rate on Prosper ranges from 7-35%, which is pretty good. P2P lending is one of the best side hustles for accounts.
9. Write an e-book
If you love writing, then you should definitely consider self-publishing an e-book. It’s one of the best passive income ideas.
The e-book can literally be on any topic you’re passionate about. It doesn’t necessarily have to be in the accounting niche. If you love cooking then you can write a cookbook.
Once you publish it on Kindle Direct Publishing, you instantly get access to millions of Amazon customers. That means will not have to worry about marketing. Amazon takes a small cut of the sales and then pays you the rest.
10. Start a blog
If the idea of writing an entire e-book just isn’t appealing to you, however you have a passion for writing, then you should consider starting a blog.
The blog can also be on any topics you’re knowledgeable on. Once you start to get traffic, you’ll make passive income through ads and affiliate marketing. You can use Wix to build your blog from scratch in just a few hours.
11. Create an online course
This is another great way to monetize your skills and knowledge. The e-learning industry is rapidly growing as online courses become increasingly accessible and affordable to the average person.
You can create a course on any topic through Teachable. Most of the work will go into creating and recording the content, however once it’s uploaded online, you won’t have to spend any time actively teaching.
Students will be able to enroll from anywhere in the world and pay your fees directly on Teachable.
12. Record audiobooks
If you have a great voice and you love reading, becoming an audiobook narrator can be a great passive income idea. Companies like voices.com, ACX, and BunnyStudio will pay you a decent amount of money to simply read aloud books.
13. Rent out a room in your home
Do you happen to have an extra room in your house? Perhaps your family traveled out for a few weeks or your roommate is out of town for the weekend.
If you are in such a situation, then you can easily make money by leasing out the room on Airbnb.
14. Airbnb arbitrage
This is similar to the previous idea, however, rather than renting out rooms in your home, you instead lease an entire house, furnish it, and then sublease the rooms on Airbnb.
With this model, you can potentially make thousands of dollars each month. It’s a fantastic side hustle for accountants.
15. Rent out your parking space
If you live near a popular attraction or in a place with terrible parking, you can make hundreds of dollars passively by renting out your parking space through Neighbor.
16. Rent out unused space in your house
You can also make passive income by renting out your garage, attic, basement, or any other unused space in your home through Neighbor.
17. Rent out your car
If you don’t plan on using your car for a while, or you have several cars, you can make passive income by renting them out through Turo.
18. Advertise on your car
This is another fantastic way to make money using your car (if you don’t mind driving around in a mobile billboard).
You can sign up on platforms like Carvertise and Wrapify to get matched with companies that have ongoing marketing campaigns in your region.
Once your car gets admitted, it will get wrapped with ad banners and you’ll get paid depending on the miles you covered during the campaign.
According to Carvertise, you can make up to $1,500 from just a single campaign, which isn’t bad at all for passive income. It’s a great side hustle for accountants.
19. Sell stock photos
If you have a good quality camera and you love taking photos, you can make passive income by selling your images on stock photo websites like Shutterstock and Adobe Stock.
You don’t even need to have any professional equipment, your smartphone camera could be good enough. Whenever someone licenses any of your photos, you get paid a royalty.
You could literally upload thousands of photos on such platforms and just sit back and watch the money roll in.
20. Buy and sell domain names
This business idea entails buying domain names that have some brand affiliation and then reselling them for profit.
Many companies are willing to spend fortunes on domain names that represent them. Just a few years ago the domain “vacationrentals.com” was sold for $35 million, and “carinsurance.com” for nearly $50 million.
It usually costs about $10 to buy a domain, so depending on your budget, you could literally have dozens of domains waiting for someone to purchase them.
21. Buy storage units
Self-storage units are a good investment, and often less expensive than real estate. They have a strong track record of good returns and tend to be recession-resistant.
22. Affiliate marketing
If you happen to have a large following on social media, or a blog/YouTube channel, then you can make money promoting affiliate products.
Whenever somebody buys something via your link, you get paid a small commission from the sale. Some popular affiliate networks include CJ Affiliate, Clickbank, and Amazon.
23. Dropshipping
With dropshipping, you are essentially selling products that you don’t own. Whenever somebody places an order through your e-commerce store, you then use the money to buy the product from a cheap supplier and then have it shipped directly to them.
It’s a great side hustle for accountants because you won’t ever have to worry about inventory or storage issues. Your biggest task will be marketing, which you can also outsource if you’d like to completely automate the business.
Shopify is the most popular platform for creating dropshipping stores and AliExpress is the most popular supplier for inexpensive items that can be resold for profit.
