14 Best Side Hustles For Stay-At-Home Parents
It is sometimes called the most honorable profession. Staying home and raising kids. In this stressful and fast paced world, it is refreshing and admirable to see moms and dads staying with their kids to ensure they get the right level of support, nurture and education to be successful and well rounded later in life. But what about your income? What about your self-worth. Sometimes it’s nice to feel like you’re contributing financially, thats why we put together this list of the best side hustles for stay-at-home parents.
While there are many benefits of staying at home, being a stay-at-home parent can have also have downsides.
In this article, you will also understand the downsides of being a stay-at-home mom (or dad) and discover the benefits of choosing to work part-time while staying at home. But most of all, you will learn how a stay-at-home parent can make money on the side.
The Downsides of Being a Stay-at-Home Parent
There are a lot of joys to being a Stay-at-Home parent, especially being able to take care of your children. It also means you have more knowledge and control of what happens at your home. Although, despite its multiple advantages, there are also downsides to being a full-time homemaker.
Financial instability
Usually, women stay at home because their husbands are capable of providing for the home’s financial needs. However, you have to consider that nothing is permanent in this world. Financial stability may change in a span of a day. This is why it is important that the household does not depend on one member’s salary alone.
As an example, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, a lot of economies experienced a recession. Many workers experienced being laid off due to companies closing down or cutting back on expenses. Some families experienced deaths of the household’s financial provider. Seeing as unexpected financial instability is a major possibility in today’s world, it’s good to be prepared. This is why stay-at-home parents should consider having their own source of income, no matter how little.
Potential Lack of Cognitive Stimulus
When your brain is active, especially in business or work, it develops many aspects of your cognitive abilities. To explain, when you encounter day-to-day issues in your field of work, you get to enhance your problem-solving skills. When you’re challenged to provide work outputs, you sharpen your creativity and wit! However, these are not fully exercised while at home.
Having these skills helps women become more effective in managing her home because she has gained enhanced cognitive abilities. It also helps her pass on what she has learned to her husband and her children.
Psychological and emotional challenges
Staying at home can get pretty boring. You get stuck doing the same routines over and over again every day. So, it’s not exactly unusual to feel anxious or depressed. You might want to try something out of the box at some point.
Besides, having more time to do nothing also allows your mind to conjure up some unwanted thoughts. This becomes toxic for your mental and emotional health. Once these aspects of your health are affected, you might negatively affect people around you. This is why it’s best for all people to keep themselves at work.
Financial Guilt
It’s common among people to feel shame for having to spend what isn’t their hard-earned money. In addition, you most likely also want financial freedom. When you can contribute to your household’s well-being, it truly is a wonderful feeling. Regardless of how much you earn, contributing to monthly expenses is helpful.
Besides, you probably also want to buy things for yourself without the guilt of asking from your husband. Having your own income means you’re also financially empowered, meaning you won’t have to feel insecure. This is why it’s important for stay-at-home parents to earn income on the side.
Feeling Unproductive
When you’re stuck to doing day-to-day routines, you might feel a slump in productivity. Sometimes, you might even belittle the things you accomplish at home. There have been several instances wherein stay-at-home parents have felt as if they should be doing something better with their time.
Staying stuck at home all day can cause little to no productivity. It not only affects your intellectual abilities, but also your people skills. Having something else to do except care for the household maintains healthy social relationships in and out of the home. So, it’s essential that these moms and dads have more things to keep them occupied apart from homemaking.
Benefits of Being a Working Stay-at-Home Parent
Happier marriage
Getting stuck at home doing routines can get frustrating. Also, putting all the financial burdens on your husband may be taxing for him. This kind of set-up has a good chance of leading to even more arguments in the household. This is not so healthy for your marriage.
On the other hand, if you are able to immerse yourselves in other activities besides homemaking, you become more active. You also get to contribute to the household expenses and experience financial freedom. This equalizes the financial burden at home and allows more room for a healthy balance in your relationship.
Healthier lifestyle
Since working while at home keeps both your mind and body exercised, you’re able to commit to a healthier lifestyle. Not only are you able to take care of your family, but also of yourself. This helps you to achieve more things while living your best life.
Financial empowerment
When you’re starting to earn your own money, you’re also able to take care of yourself more. You get to buy your personal needs and wants without any worries. Apart from this, you’re also able to invest in more essential things. This includes you and your family’s insurance, healthcare, and other utilities.
Happier household
Having a financially secure household makes for a happy home. It also helps marriages stay strong in the face of challenges. It also allows for a healthy balance between being a parent and being your own person. Because of this, you’re able to inspire and positively influence your kids!
Best Side Hustles For Stay-at-Home Parents
What opportunities are out there that let you be flexible with your time? What jobs would be best suited for you?
For parents with great caring or teaching skills
Babysitting
Since you’re equipped with the knowledge of how to take care of kids, you might want to earn from it. It’s also helpful to know that parents usually trust other parents to care for their children. So, that’s a good market right there. Plus, you could also find playmates for your babies or toddlers! It’s a good way to earn income while staying at home.
Tutoring
If you’re knowledgeable about a certain subject or course, you could earn from that! Helping students out who are struggling with their academics can be a source of income. You could either tutor them from their houses (if you no longer have toddlers) or in your home. This is also a sure gig because their parents may trust you more.
Speaking gigs
There are already several career opportunities for people staying at home. These include occasionally taking up speaking gigs to educate others about different topics. You could talk about topics of interest that you have knowledge of and earn from it. All you need is a laptop with a working camera or even just a phone and internet connection.
Teaching
Homemaking often equips you with knowledge about cooking, baking, and other life skills. There are a lot of kids or even grown-ups who have yet to learn these, and you could teach them! Bypassing on your practical life skills to others, you help them become more independent. Plus, you also become more financially independent!
You could do this either at your home, their home or virtually. It all depends on your availability and resources!
For stay-at-home parents with talents and unique skills
Dance lessons
If you know you can bust some moves, you could try making it into a living. Many kids or even adults want to learn how to dance. You can easily turn your home into a makeshift dance studio! You could conduct your dance lessons even virtually if you’re far away from your client.
Voice lessons
Same as dance lessons, you could provide voice lessons either virtually or personally. If you have a voice blessed by musical talent, it’s easy to earn from it. You could also choose to do it at your home, your client’s home, or virtually!
Musical instrument/self-defense lessons
Most people want to learn either how to play musical instruments, do self-defense, or both! If you know one or two of these skills, you could earn from them by teaching them. Same as the other lessons above, the location could be settled between you and your client/s!
Writing
If you have a way with words, there are multiple ways to earn from this. You could try writing a book and getting it published! You could also do freelance writing gigs (through a platform like Fiverr) depending on your availability. Lastly, you could host writing workshops at home or virtually!
Offering services
Apart from teaching what you know, you could also offer what you know. If you have a knack for cosmetology, you could turn your house into a mini salon! All you need is the equipment. When events roll out, you’ll get a swarm of clients! On the other hand, you can also offer freelance services online through platforms like Fiverr or Upwork.
Content creating
If you’ve got a lot of time on your hands and you have large amounts of creativity in-store, try this. Your content can range from videos of you showcasing talents or skills to doing podcasts. By gaining traction on social media, you can monetize your content.
For parents with great entrepreneurial skills
Social media managing
Social media managers are pretty much in-demand nowadays. It requires time and creativity. But, it can be done at home! So if you have what it takes to manage a brand’s social media, you may look into this career.
Buy and sell
Since online shopping has become a craze nowadays, there is a lot of money in it. You can easily become an online seller in the comfort of your own home. One option for online selling is buying and selling. This is when you buy a product and resell it for a higher price. All you have to do is find your niche.
Selling pre-loved products
Thrifting is one of the fast-rising trends nowadays. Not only is it because it’s affordable, but it’s also sustainable. Apart from your own stuff, you could also try buying interesting and valuable stuff to resell. An example is philatelic investment. This is when you invest in collectible postage stamps and resell them when the value appraises.
Being at home with your kids all the time is not a walk in the park. But, as mentioned above, there are various ways to keep the spirit going and make money even at home. Just widen your perspective and you’re on your way to your own success.
Emotional Support
If you’ve become quite good at coping with the common challenges that other stay-at-home parents face, consider starting up a social group for your peers and get paid doing it. Many stay-at-home parents are suffering from isolation and the other challenges detailed above. Image creating an outlet for these individuals and helping them through this difficult times.
Conclusion
Being at home raising children and taking care of the home can be a difficult and sometimes thankless job. However, it also creates opportunities to use that time to find new ventures to begin. Whether to make money or even just to fulfill a need, there are endless options and opportunities that even the busiest of stay-at-home parents can do to change your current situation, if you need to