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How Can I Make Money at Home if I’m Under 18?

by Jerry JuaMaking Money

Oct 24, 2020

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Because I’ve been doing online business for a few years, I have some know-how and experience making money from home. So, I thought I’d share how to make money at home if you’re under 18. So, I put together this article for under 18-year-olds, because what better time to start making money.

So, how can I make money at home if I’m under 18? You will want to start a small business such as selling a service you can do for people, and buying and selling products. Although all of them can be done from home, you do need to learn a few things first to do it successfully.

Getting into business is tough, and many of them fail. This is because there is a lot to learn, and most people just jump in straight away with a lot of confidence. But before knowing what to do.

They soon realize that it takes a bit of experience or the right help to make a lot of money, but some people can get lucky.

So, keep reading. I will explain to you the common mistakes to avoid when making money from home when you’re under 18. Also, give you more information about all the different businesses you can start and how to pick one.

Different ways an 18 year old can make money from home

I would say the easiest way for an 18-year-old to make money from home is to do some kind of service for other people. This is also called working remotely and freelancing and is becoming more common.

When you do a service for other people, it is similar to doing a job. For example, ‘take out the trash, and I will give you $5’. Or, ‘wash all the windows on the outside of my house and I’ll pay your $50’. But, instead, it’s ‘translate this document for me into English, and I’ll pay you $20.’ Or, ‘answer any emails from customers I got yesterday, and I’ll pay you $10.’

Since Covid, people have realized that there can be a major disruption to our everyday way of life. And going to work by car, bus, train, or Uber, may at times not be possible at all. That’s why it’s more of a guarantee to make money from home by doing work for people on the internet.

There are many websites online where customers are looking for people to do online services for them. But you should know that some services are very popular, and some websites are very popular. So, just jumping on straight away is sometimes a bit hard. But, if you do your research and a bit of work beforehand, you can easily be successful.

I’ll provide a list of websites where you can learn on online service below, and then explain how to see what services are in demand and some ideas about easy ones to get into:

Websites that restrict people who are under 18

Some websites require you to tick a box that says you are over 18.

A good idea to get around this is to have a family member create the account for you. If you can’t, I would choose a different website where you don’t have to be over 18.

There are many that don’t require you to be under 18 to list a service such as Fiverr.com where you have to be 13 and over.

Also, sign up for a Paypal account and use that to accept payments.

Choosing what to sell

It can be easy to get a bit overwhelmed with all the options. And get demotivated. But, I provided this big list just so you can see that there are many, many options out there. Some of the most in-demand skills and those what will be sticking around for a long time are:

Web design (includes web developer and programming, more on that below)
Virtual Assistants (there are too many people doing it though, I’ll explain more about it below)
Writing
Video editing
Other small services
Selling products online

1. Web design (includes web development and programming)

Web design is where you design a person’s website. People who sell products or sell services need a website that looks nice.

Amongst people that do web design as a job or as a freelancer, separate web design from web development. This is because they are two separate stages. Web design is first ‘designed’, and then it is programmed.

The design is done on a visual software editor like Photoshop. But, there are now specialized tools that are more suited to web design. Such as Figma. Once the designer and the person getting the website are happy with the design will be turned into an actual website.

There are many ways to create a website. But, they all involve programming, which is also called development. You will see people looking for a web programmer or a web developer on the websites above. I included a website screenshot below.

As you can see, there are currently 400 companies looking for a remote web designer in California. There are similar opportunities on the other websites on this list.

You will want to get a few web design and web development websites under your belt because you are just starting out.

So, you’ll feel confident and then send your portfolio and resume to the different companies looking for a web designer or web developer to make money from home.

Although this is a very popular and in-demand skill, it does take a bit of time to learn. Depending if you took it in school or taking it in school.

Generally, you will want to know how to use HTML, CSS, Javascript, and PHP. From there, all the other programming languages function the same way, so you can learn them pretty quickly. Some roles only require you to have the computer skills you have now and know HTML and CSS. Such as an Email developer.

You should also learn web design from a particular course. For example,

All the programming languages and design skills you will need can be learned in about 80 hours of both watching videos and practicing. The answers to any problems you run into can be found on Google.

The best person to learn coding from is CodingPhase. His Youtube channel is https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC46wWUso9H5KPQcoL9iE3Ug.

2. Virtual Assistants

Virtual Assistants do the same job a personal secretary would do. But, they do it on their computer from anywhere in the world.

People who own or work in a business have many small tasks they need to do throughout the day. Such as responding to emails, sending out invoices, researching some information for a customer online. But, usually, that work is very time-consuming. And on a normal day, it takes too long for the person to do everything.

Virtual assistants became popular about 5 to 10 years ago when the internet became widespread. Before that, companies had to hire secretaries that would work at an office.

It is a good idea for you if you live outside of the USA, Canada, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand. In these countries, the cost of living is much higher than in other countries. So, it doesn’t make sense to do it. This is because Virtual Assistants usually charge about $5 to $10 an hour to do very complicated and specialized work.

The Philippines, for example, is a country that is well known for having many Virtual Assistants. This is because the price to live is very inexpensive, and they are pleased to work hard for only a small amount of money. Because to them, it’s a large amount of money.

For these reasons, this is one way to do it. But, I do not recommend you do offer this as a service online unless you live in a country where the cost of living is very cheap. Otherwise, you will be working too hard and not making much money.

3. Writing

Nearly everyone knows how to read and write. It is also a service that businesses need a lot and is very easy to do from home on your computer. You can use Word or Google Docs and easily type up anything people need doing.

The biggest opportunity I see is that most people want writers to create blog articles for their websites. Writing blog articles is hard work. Even though you’re just sitting on your computer, it is mentally exhausting. For this reason, people love to get writers to do it.

Also, many businesses are wanting to produce a lot of content that they can’t do themselves.

There are many good websites where people are looking for writers. And people like cheap writing and expensive writing.

When I made money online for the first time, I wrote for the website iWriter.com. But, there are many others.

Because writing can be quite challenging, it can be tempting to use an article spinner, or article rewriter. These are computer programs that will ask you to give them an article. The program then swaps words for other words that mean the same thing – synonyms – and they might mix up some of the sentences that it knows how to do. Then it will give you the new article.

Although this does work, often, what you get back is something that isn’t natural, and you can tell that a person didn’t write it. So, in my opinion it’s best to avoid these, especially when writing for clients. When I first got started with an AI (artificial intelligence) one, it worked ok.

But, I still had to go through and fix up certain parts, and in the end, it was faster to just take the points that the original article was making and rewrite it in my own words.

It can be difficult to know what to write when you’re starting with just an article topic. A good way to get over this is to use a template for your article. There are many good blog templates available, and you can adjust based on how many words a particular client wants.

You can read many good articles online about how to improve your writing. I recommend Problogger.com. They also advertise blogging jobs on their website.

Also, once you get good at writing blog articles, you can use that to create your own blog. I briefly covered how to do this in another article I wrote on Is It Hard to Make $500 a Month Blogging?, click that link to give it a quick read.

The long and short of it is that it takes time for your blog to start bringing in visitors so you can make money on it. So, it’s not a good option if you want to make money from home in the next year or two. But, it is definitely an investment in your future.

4. Video Editing

Some businesses use a lot of video, for example those that regularly post to Youtube. For example massive Youtubers like Pewdiepie who posts everyday. But, even channels that only have 10,000 subscribers or less will likely want you to edit their videos for them.

According to many people I have heard from that have Youtube channels, editing them, adding the intro part, and cutting out all the unwanted scenes takes an enormous amount of time. And it isn’t necessarily the most fun. That’s why people who make videos choose to pay someone to do it. Once, you get good at it; you will likely really enjoy it. As with most things, once it becomes a habit, you hardly even notice, and time goes by so quickly.

The other good thing, much like web design and writing, is that you can do it using only free software if you do your research. So, getting started will cost you hardly anything. When I was a teenager, I worked at McDonalds and lived at home, so I had some money to spare. But, starting off for free is my favorite.

5. Other small services

There are other small services that are more popular because they’re kind of funny or interesting. For example, I will send a potato in the mail to a person with your unique message on it. They are very funny, and can get quite popular. But, choosing the right one can be a bit more luck than anything.

You will see a lot of these come and go on websites like Fiverr.com. In my opinion you’re better off developing a skill that will be in demand because it’s an important part of every business, such as websites.

If you’re interested in making money in other ways that aren’t online, I wrote an article a few days ago about How A Teenager Makes $1000 a Month. It covers some more information about online and offline methods, so definitely give it a read.

6. Selling you own products

Selling your own products could easily be 100 blog posts. So, rather than covering it here I’ll put some links below to previous articles I wrote about this topic:

Tips for Selling Stuff Online

Where Can I Buy Cheap Stuff to Resell

In fact, the website you are on now is an online marketplace, where they offer a free account where you can sell your items for Free. The cool thing about our marketplace is that we do not charge a selling commission like other marketplaces. All transactions are between the buyer and the seller via Paypal. If you are interested in listing your items, click here and start saving.

Conclusion

You can make money at home if you’re under 18 by offering a service to existing businesses. You can simply set up a Paypal account, and receive payments on that for your services. To offer a service you should list it on a range of different websites available. This is also called working remotely or being a freelancer.