The Diplomats’ February Side Hustle Report

The cold,  dark days of February were upon us.   Freezing cold temperatures, shoveling snow (what felt like every day), and long hours, man it was a “fun” month.   But despite everything, the two of us never side hustling and trying to earn every extra dollar possible and MAKE EVERY DOLLAR COUNT.  You can’t take the hustle out of the Diplomats!   Let’s see how much we were able to earn in our February Side Hustle Report.

The side hustles

Ebates – We’re pretty sure most people are familiar with Ebates, the website that offers cash back and coupon codes for nearly all major online retailers and travel sites.  In addition,  each new user also can receive a free $10 gift card upon sign up (yes an affiliate plug), which is an added bonus.  The two of us always visit Ebates prior to making an online purchase to see if we can earn cash back by visiting the website through Ebates or using one of the listed coupon codes.  Since we travel a lot for work, we will access the hotel’s website through Ebates first to earn a few extra dollars on the business trip.  We really mean it…it is EASY money for a simple additional step in the online shopping experience that maybe adds 10 seconds to your transaction.  Here is our February summary for cash back earned from Ebates:

Lanny – $6.01 – Still churning out dollars, but not as much as last month..  I wasn’t able to screen shot my “profile” on 3/1, but here it is as of 3/10.  Most of my activity was from hotels and rentals cars (small benefit of traveling for work).  In total, I have received over $400, with the $6.01 posted last month and activity this month.  See below’s snip from their website:

Bert – $0 – Back to back months recording a goose-egg for Ebates.   This amount also matches the number off career home runs I hit in my short stint playing baseball in high school (very short stint).  With limited time available to shop and spend my hard earned dollar, I haven’t had the need to use Ebates.  Further, I booked all my travel for January and February in December and it takes a while for Ebates to credit travel rewards.  So hopefully I should realize the rewards from those travels in the second quarter.

Swagbucks –  One of our longest tenured side hustles.  Every day the two of us our battling and challenging each other to make sure we hit out minimum “Swagbuck” goal.  The earnings build up quickly!  Swagbucks is a website the provides gift card or cash rewards for performing activities on the website.  The activities include using their search engine, answering surveys, answering polls, watching videos, printing off coupons, shopping (similar to Ebates above), signing up for different offers, etc. Bottom line is that there are a ton of different ways for people to earn!   Here is our referral link if you would like to give it a try as well!  Here is how much each of us earned from Swagbucks:

Lanny – > 1,946 Swagbucks or $19.46 – Busy season blues continue, as I dipped below $20 for the first time.  I was only able to do one cash out during the month and I am almost cashed out again in March  The way I was able to monitor the total amount earned was take my end of previous month lifetime amount and subtract out my lifetime amount at end of month (found in the activity section of your account).  I am expecting March to be in the mid $20’s, given the slow down of busy season to start.

Bert –  1,827 Swagbucks or $18.27 –  An increase compared to January’s weak performance, but still down from the $30 and $40 months that I had in the fourth quarter.  I’ve really enjoyed my renewed focus on earning Swagbucks, making sure I hit my goal, and trying to earn cash back and searches through this website.  The turnaround time for booking travel is less than Ebates and I love the short turnaround once you do cash out a $25 gift card.  It takes one or two days to deposit your reward to Paypal.  It is all about finding what is the best, highest reward system between Swagbucks and Ebates!

Ibotta – Ibotta is one of our favorite apps because it is so easy to use and barely adds any time to your routine shopping experience.  It is so easy to earn money that they even give you $5.00 just to sign up!  The app allows you to earn cash back from nearly every grocery store and an expanding list of online retailers (such as Jet.com, Target.com, and so on).   Before shopping, you scan the available rebates on thee app and see which items you are planning on buying.  Some example of rebates that may be available any given week are $0.25 for different fruits/vegetables, $1-$2 off of  yogurts, $1.00 for purchasing a certain type of coffee,  or $2-$3 back for purchasing beer or wine!

One of our favorite things about Ibotta is that the discounts don’t just apply to goods that are impossible to find or are very expensive.  There are always a few name brands to choose from! Ibotta makes it easy to redeem cash as well and the process takes less than a minute after you complete your purchase.  You simply scan the receipt, select the rebates that were purchased during that shopping trip, and then receive the credit within 24 hours.   If you would like to try the app, we included a referral link in the banner below our monthly summary and at the beginning of the paragraph.

Lanny – $2.50 – Sadly I am starting to realize, which may be a good thing, with travel for work – this reduces my iBotta (hopefully this means my groceries are reduces as well though!).  In total, I’ve earned over $190.00 in cash back from the app.  However, I highly URGE you to sign up. Yes, sadly we do get a referral kick back, but this is by far the EASIEST way to get cash back.  Further, the beer, wine categories make it fairly simply to rack up (usually $1.00 – $3.00 for a 6-pack and/or bottle of wine, eh, I’m Italian and Irish).  Additionally – supplements like vitamins are a bigger cash back piece as well.

Bert – $18.35 –  I owe my success this month solely to my wife and I personally only contributed $1 to our Ibotta total.  She has really taken to using Ibotta with each shopping trip.  This month, she found an awesome deal where she received $.75 off of Chobani yogurts on Ibotta and they were 30% off of Cartwheel at Target. So let’s just say those yogurts were very, very cheap.  That, coupled with some wine and other household goods, made for quite the month on Ibotta!

Selling Household Items

Lanny – $0.00  – I have sold nothing, again, for the third month.  I plan on selling more after busy season.  Further, one should see 5 benefits of getting rid of “stuff”, I know I own too much crap in my life that is consuming space, time and resources.  In the end, the idea is that the items sold or donated will add value to someone else’s life, as that’s the purpose of owning something, to add value.

Bert – $0–  This was a slow month and our inventory wasn’t moving.   We have a few pictures and a light fixture listed on Facebook Marketplace.  My wife received a few inquiries; however, the one potential commitment fell through at the last-minute. Bummer!  I expect this will pick back up in April when we start spring cleaning and working on cleaning out our third floor attic!

Total Side Hustle Income in February: 

Lanny: $27.97, total of $661.66 since tracking on the blog!

Bert: $36.62, total of $492.63 since tracking on the blog!

Diplomats Side Hustle Total: $64.59, Cumulative Total of $1,154.28 since tracking on the blog!

14 thoughts on “The Diplomats’ February Side Hustle Report

  1. MrsSLM loves selling things on craigslist, and is especially happy when she can buy something used, use it, and then sell it again for roughly what she bought it for.

  2. This was a fun post to read! I find that once you’ve sold all your best items at home it’s harder to make good money selling things. You may want to consider a used book store or clothing shops. I am selling some fur items (I just don’t want to wear fur any more) next week so that should bring in some income.

  3. Good job on the side hustles guys. Very motivating. Every month when I read this update, I think about looking into one of more of the suggested methods you use to generate income. I’m also considering alternative methods for generating income which I might pursue by the end of this month. If it works, I’ll be posting it on the blog. But, regardless, I will keep coming back to seeing how you guys are doing with your side hustles.

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