Halloween is over, and every store from Macy’s to Walgreens is already changing its decor to drive home an important point: Thanksgiving and Christmas are right around the corner, and your budget is about to take a hit. A big one.
In fact, according to Deloitte’s annual holiday spending survey, Americans spent $1 trillion during the 2016 holiday season, and that number is expected to jump by at least 4% this year. The average family will spend $1,226 this season, Deloitte reported.
If your bank account is not ready to shell out your share, November is your last chance to rake in some extra cash before you become the worst gift-giver in the family.
Scrambling to figure out how to earn a little extra this month before those Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals? Don’t worry — we’ve got some ideas for you.
Get Cash Back on Thanksgiving Dinner Ingredients
Whether you’ve got a long list of purchases on your pre-Thanksgiving grocery run or you’re just picking up a few stray cans of cranberry sauce at the last minute, you can earn cash back on nearly all of it with Ibotta.
Here’s how it works:
- Sign up for Ibotta with your name and email address.
- Before your next trip to the grocery store, browse the app’s cash-back offers. They change every week, so check each time you shop.
- When you earn at least $20 cash back, you can request payment via PayPal or Venmo. And right now, Ibotta is giving new users a $10 sign-up bonus for redeeming their first receipt — so that first $20 won’t be hard to hit!
Got Personal Health Insurance? Get Paid for a Research Study
If you purchased private medical insurance this year, you could qualify for a Joany research study that will pay you for your answers.
If you can check off each of the following requirements, you can take the survey here:
- You bought insurance through your state exchange, Healthcare.gov, through a broker or directly through a health plan, such as Oscar or Aetna.
- You don’t receive your health insurance through an employer.
- You are not currently enrolled in a short-term plan.
- You currently have this health insurance active.
- You are not on Medicaid, Medicare or VA health insurance.
- You don’t receive your health insurance through your school/university.
You will be asked to upload or text a photo of your insurance card to verify your eligibility and may have to answer some additional questions to make sure your insurance policy is still active. Once the process is complete, you get paid.
Make Your Home Work for You
Whether you’re hopping a plane for a formal Thanksgiving at grandma’s or a more relaxed Friendsgiving with your college besties, you can put your empty apartment to work while you’re on vacation if you list it on Airbnb.
Family visiting you this year? Putting your listing up early and renting out your guest room before your mom arrives could help you pay for her gift.
If you want to give Airbnb hosting a try, we’ve got a few tips to make sure your listing brings in as much cash as it can:
- Make your space available during high-demand times. Think: concerts, conventions and sporting events in your area.
- Be a good host, and make sure your place is stocked with the toiletries you’d expect at a hotel — toilet paper, soap and towels.
- Be personable. A lot of travelers turn to Airbnb for the personal touch they won’t find at commercial properties.
Here’s the link to sign up as an Airbnb host.
Hosting laws vary from city to city. Please understand the rules and regulations applicable to your city and listing.
Turn Your RV Into a Cash Cow
If you can’t rent out your home, RVshare, a peer-to-peer rental marketplace that allows you to rent your RV to other travelers, can help you use the RV sitting in your driveway to stretch your gift-giving budget.
How much you’ll earn per day will vary based on your location and the type of vehicle you have. You can even get an estimate for how much you could make with your specific RV before signing up.
Ahead of the Gift-Buying Curve? Don’t Miss Out on Deals
This holiday season, consumers are expected to spend more shopping online than in stores, according to Deloitte. If you’re truly a Penny Hoarder, you might want to do even more of your shopping online.
If you do, don’t forget to create a Paribus account.
Paribus is a tool that gets you money back for your online purchases. It’s free to sign up, and once you do, Paribus will scan your email archives for any receipts. If it discovers you’ve purchased something from Target — or one of the more than 20 other retailers listed on its website — it will track the item’s price and automatically issue you a refund anytime there’s a price drop!
That should help give you peace of mind if you’re worried about buying at the wrong time and missing out on the best deals.
Forget Netflix and Chill. Try InboxDollars and Cash
Downtime might be hard to come by when you’re running from store to store looking for the perfect gift for dad, but we’ve got an idea that might convince you to trade in your Netflix-watching time for a different kind of video streaming.
Now, most of the videos you watch on InboxDollars won’t be as entertaining as binge-watching “Stranger Things,” but you’re getting paid — so who cares?
The videos are sponsored by brands that need to get them in front of as many eyeballs as possible. Every time you watch one of the ads, InboxDollars will credit your account with a little bit of cash. You’ll get a free $5 just for signing up.
Give a few of these ideas a try, and you can see your holiday funds spike — a month early.
Desiree Stennett is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder.
This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, one of the largest personal finance websites. We help millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. In 2016, Inc. 500 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the No. 1 fastest-growing private media company in the U.S.
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