Finding side hustles can be tough. Sure, you could start a side business that takes up all your time or part of it, but what if you don’t want to do that? What if you just want something small and easy?
After all, side hustles are usually to earn some extra cash, and even when many start them as a future option to make it their primary source of income, you don’t always aim for an extra job that could consume your life.
Thus, if you truly want something easy and small, renting out your parking space might be the answer.
This side hustle idea is perfect for people who live in an apartment complex with parking and are usually not using it (or several ones) either because you don’t have a car or you have an extra one you are not using at all.
Many people make that extra cash every month with just a parking lot that is completely free, and, usually, other people use it without their consent (rings a bell?).
So, you might want to consider it. If you are going for it, we will leave you some information that can be extremely useful to get the most money out of it.
Should You Rent Your Parking Space?
We don’t really think this needs more introduction or explanation than the latter, but we will add some details we skipped (on purpose) to accompany them with some examples of this side hustle.
Since this is all about renting your empty parking space, you need to make sure you can rent it to anyone you want.
What does this mean?
Many apartment complexes or spaces where you live won’t allow you to rent the slot to someone who doesn’t live in the complex or area. As a result, you might need to find a tenant inside, and it can be hard on certain occasions.
For example, if you are giving two parking spaces like everyone else, it is hard to know if someone would genuinely want to rent an additional one since two are usually enough for everyone.
In addition, you need to decide whether you will rent it full-time or get different payments from people who need to use it for a couple of days or maybe hours.
There are different ways to approach this side hustle, and depending on the options you choose, you can either have more difficulties and income or make it simpler for both parties.
If you own a car and have only one parking space yet, you don’t use it that often for whatever reason; you might want to consider the time you will need it and rent it for the rest of the hours or days you aren’t there.
If it is not a full-time side job, but you rent out parking spaces for extra cash every month, you don’t want to rent one on days when you actually use your vehicle or if there are specific hours when you would like to have it empty.
Usually, we wouldn’t recommend going for this option because, sometimes, you might have an emergency and need the space, yet it will be occupied.
So, take the time to assess and think this alternative over.
On the other hand, if it is truly a parking space you aren’t using, you can go for any renting method: Full-time, per hour, per day, or how you choose to rent it depending on the occupant.
This Is What You Need: Getting Started
Besides a parking lot space, do you actually need something else? Or is it as simple as asking someone, “Hey! Do you need a parking space? Here’s mine.”
Well, yes and no.
The truth is that it requires a couple more steps and even physical elements besides the lot itself.
Many owners of the space believe they just need to get pay without taking this to the legal part, but if you are truly the parking space owner, you have to treat it as your property. Thus, a written contract is necessary, at least for long-term deals and not hourly ones.
You want to make sure the tenant will follow the rules you will set (we will get to this later) and establish the payment depending on how you decided to rent it.
Next, if you have a mortgage for your entire property or the parking space itself, you need to ask your mortgage provider for authorization.
As much as you’re paying for the loan, it isn’t completely yours yet. So, the right procedure is to ask all the parties involved before you decide to gain money with it.
Now, here’s a question: Is your parking space clean, with the proper lines painted and illuminated? If it isn’t, you will need to remodel those aspects and ensure the lot is optimal enough to be rented. Besides, this will help you to charge more.
Finally, let’s get into the rules you should set to get started:
- Make sure to forbid any illegal activities or actions of any indole. This will save you some problems if any of your tenants actually commit them.
- Determine if you will allow the person to park any car or just one or two as maximum so you can have control of who is truly using your space (we suggest the latter).
- When choosing the hourly option or any other that doesn’t involve leaving the space to the tenant entirely, set the hours, days, or dates specified in your contract and verbal deal.
- Despite the option you choose, always set an hourly rate, daily rate, or a whole month’s rent so people can evaluate their options, and you can work around everything or charge extra when it is necessary and based on the rates.
- Ask the tenants to leave the space clean, without any stains of liquids on purpose, or at least remove most of the dirt when they either continuously use the space or not.
Doing Math: Expenses & Earnings
All right, let’s talk about the interesting part: Numbers.
With such a side hustle that seems very low-key and doesn’t require much effort, do you actually need to invest money in it? Only if upgrades are needed.
What we previously mentioned about cleaning, painting liens, and so on are included in the expenses you might need to deal with to make this side hustle work.
Fortunately, they are quite cheap to handle, and you won’t spend more than $20 to $50. We dare to say even less if you just clean it yourself and paint with a simple painting.
Therefore, this side hustle of renting out your parking space is very low-cost, and when it comes to your earnings, this part might surprise you.
First, you must know how much you charge for your parking space will vary since it depends on the city you are located in, the renting option you choose, and similar factors.
However, we can give you an average based on several cities in the USA:
- Per day: Most people charge between $10 to $20.
- Per hour: Believe it or not, it isn’t that common, but people tend to charge between $0.50 to $1.50 (it can go higher, not lower).
- Per month or long-term contracts: This part usually depends on the price you set or find out about others charging per day. If people set a rate for $15 a date (which is the example we will follow here), that means 30 days are $450 in total. The monthly contract or even trimestral should set the rent cheaper, so people feel attracted to rent the parking space in this way. About $300 or $350 is optimal.
Considering these numbers, you can either earn $350 monthly without finding several tenants or having lots of people using it at once or go for the other two options that pay off more but can be harder to deal with since your schedule will be tough to adjust.
However, an average income per month by following the daily option involves $450+, while the total following the hourly rate starts at $360 per month.
Final Thoughts & Tips
As people who have been making extra cash every month with this side hustle for over two years, we can tell you it is worth arranging your schedule or just go for the monthly contract.
We easily make about $400 a month without moving a finger, but that’s because of a factor we didn’t mention before: Our parking space is on-site, not on the street.
This aspect can either increase or reduce the amount of money you can charge during your rent for obvious reasons: One is safer and the other… not so much.
You can still make about the same amount of money, but you might want to start with a few lower rates until you prove to people your parking space is safe and a great option if it is on the street.
Also, as a final piece of advice, we suggest you take the time to meet people before renting it.
Many have such bad habits that they are even parking their cars horribly.
You have a community to please in terms of the tenant parking the vehicle properly to avoid any complaints from the owners of the side vehicles. You want to make sure this person will be responsible in all aspects.
Thus, don’t hurry so much and even if it is per hour or similar, make sure you at least get to see people’s faces, so you know who is using your lot.
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