The 5 ways I made £30000 from home in 2017/2018

Posted on 1:50pm Tuesday 24th Apr 2018

This is a blog post from one of those really annoying people who completed their tax return as soon as possible and files it nine months before the deadline. Hello! Honestly though, a genuine query, why do people leave it so late or until the last minute? Every January I see people on social media and in networking groups panicking about getting their tax returns in on time. Why not turn it around and file it as soon as the year end is up? This way there’s no panicking and plenty of time to pay it. My advice is to save up for your tax return through the year so you have the money ready to pay it at the end of the tax year.

I had a really good self-employed tax year and as my tax was over £1000 I now have to ‘pay on account’ for 2018/2019. This means I have to pay half of my predicted tax (they give me the figures) by January 2019 and the other half by June 2019. So by the time the January 2020 deadline rolls around I will have already paid my tax or most of it. I’ll pay it in April 2019 anyway so I only need to worry about paying the first payment on account which I’ll save up for each month anyway.

I was thinking of leaving my tax money in savings until it had to be paid in January as it makes sense to earn interest on it, but I just panic too much that I’ll forget to pay it altogether, so for my own peace of mind I have to pay it right away.

My total bill was just under £4000. Luckily I had been saving this every month. This bill is for income tax, class 2 national insurance, class 4 national insurance and student loan repayments. I check the government and student loan websites each year to find out the personal allowance thresholds and the percentages they take above these. I then add formulas to my spreadsheet so it works out the exact amount I owe from my profits. That way I can save enough every month by popping the money into a savings account and forgetting about it. In the UK I pay my student loan repayments when I fill in my self assessement and it used to go directly out of my wage packet using the PAYE system, but if you're in the US then you may wish to refinance student loans repayments to make them more affordable. I save for mine monthly and pay as part of my self assesment.

Not all of my methods of earning money from home are taxed. For example, matched betting and selling used personal belongings on eBay are tax-free. Blogging, side hustles and selling online for a profit is all taxed.

To give you an idea of outgoings, I spent around £4000 on business expenses. Take this and my tax bill off and I earned approximately £22,000 after tax and expenses. Not too bad for my first tax year of working from home full time. In fact I’m very impressed with myself!

I’m not sure if next year will be as successful as I know matched betting will be a lot lower as the sign up offers were most lucrative when I began in January 2017. But on the other hand I have found a couple of new side hustles such as testing websites which I hope to do more of. I’ve also increased my blogging fees and have more contacts than this time last year. So we’ll see.

Here are the five ways I made money from home in the tax year 2017/2018 and my approximate total turnover:

Approx Total Turnover 2017/2018
Everything blogging: reviews, sponsored, giveaways, blogging for others, blog comp winnings, social media, ads, affiliate, referrals	£22,930
Online selling: personal eBay, LR shop & reselling	£3,209
Matched betting	£2,649
Side hustles: Mystery shopping, shop audits, surveys, website testing, receipt hog, etc	£557
Top Cashback	£293
TOTAL	£29,638

1. Blogging

This has been my most successful way to make money from home. I had a head start when I decided to monetise my blog as I’d already been blogging for five years by that point. I then just accepted some paid posts that landed in my inbox until January 2017 when I decided to really go for it, apply for blog opportunities and get myself out there.

The best thing about blogging is you can blog about whatever you like. If you love writing, then I’m sure you’ll love blogging. It’s so brilliant to build a website and have something that’s mine. Blogging has given me the freedom to seriously work from home and to have more flexibility whilst we have a young family.

2. Online selling

I do love online selling. This was probably sparked from being an e-commerce fulfilment manager for a few years before I had kids. It’s a thrill every time I sell something online. I sell our used personal belongings on eBay and Facebook Marketplace. There’s a constant stream of things I can sell as the kids are quickly growing out of clothes and toys. I also have a small online boutique on this website. I have dabbled in a little reselling but I don’t find it very profitable and it’s quite time consuming. It’s probably better for someone who can devote a lot of time to it and spend time sourcing good stock.

3. Matched betting

I started matched betting in January 2017 and made the majority of my profit then. In total I’ve made over £4000 since I started. This is even more amazing as it’s tax free! The only outgoings are my monthly Profit Accumulator membership fees which were £17.99 per month but after 12 months they reduced to £14.99 per month. You can also sign up for a yearly fee and save money on membership, but for flexibility I use the monthly option. I just take the fee out of my profits.

The company I use who have enabled me to learn the process and make so much money is Profit Accumulator who I still use and highly recommend. It’s possible to make more and it’s possible to make less. It depends how much time you can devote and which methods you continue to use after the sign up offers.

Here are some great posts if you’re thinking of starting:

4. Side hustles

I love finding and testing other ways of making extra cash from home and have tried so many ways over the past year from surveys to mystery shopping. My favourite ways are using Roamler and Streetbees for random tasks and mystery audits. I have also started website testing with What Users Do for £5 per test and they’re very easy to do: Easily make money from home by testing websites

Get paid doing simple tasks from your phone with Streetbees

5. Top cashback

I joined Top Cashback in April 2016 so I’ve been a member for two years this month. It was one of the best financial decisions I ever made and I should have joined so much sooner. I get cashback on almost a weekly basis on all sorts of normal things. I’d never buy anything just because there is cashback, but if I am already going to buy something then I’ll check to see if I can get cashback on it. I’ve earned almost £300 cashback on things I’d buy anyway in the past year. As a household we’ve earned even more cashback as my husband has an account too, but I don’t track his cashback withdrawals on my blog.

Learn how to earn cashback on things you already buy and be amazed with amount of extra cash you have back in your pocket!