In the ever-evolving landscape of the gig economy, the pursuit of unconventional yet highly lucrative side hustles has become a road less traveled by many. If you’re ready to step into the world of unconventional opportunities – ones that might get a few raised eyebrows but are entirely legal and incredibly profitable – then you’re in for a wild ride.
In this guide, we unveil 21 dirty side hustles that could pave your way to a six-figure income in 2024. We’re not talking about your typical 9-to-5, clock-in, clock-out kind of gigs.
No, these are the ventures that fly under the radar, thriving in niches you might not have considered. And each hustle carries the promise of financial success if you’re willing to get your hands dirty.
Buckle up as we delve into a world where cleaning garbage cans can be a gateway to consistent monthly revenue, and sorting through someone’s garage can turn into a profitable venture.
The possibilities are as diverse as the opportunities themselves. Intrigued? Let’s uncover the clandestine world of side hustles that could redefine your financial landscape.
The number one on the list is roadkill collector.
You might be wondering if that’s actually a thing.
Yep, this is actually a thing, believe it or not, and there are people who are making six figures a year doing this. Yeah, this is not a job for animal lovers, plus you have to be on call.
So basically, if someone sees some roadkill, they’re probably going to report it to the police, then they would call you, and they would have you go pick it up and dispose of it.
But in order to do this, you’re obviously going to need a strong stomach, the ability to work independently, and an understanding of the local wildlife.
And yeah, I don’t think I need to say anything more about that one. It’s pretty self-explanatory, probably a job that just about nobody wants to do. So there’s a lot of opportunity for it.
The next one on our list is a graffiti removal specialist. And this involves professionally cleaning and restoring public places by removing unauthorized graffiti using specialized techniques and products.
This is kind of like being an eraser for a city’s coloring book, wiping away the doodles to reveal the pristine pages below. And there’s a YouTuber, Aaron’s Lean & Mean Academy, that basically revealed that they charge $500 to remove graffiti which takes about 45 minutes of work.
So that’s $500 for less than an hour’s worth of work. And this is obviously another one where you’re going to be on call.
You’re probably not going to be able to do this every day, but all you really need is some basic equipment like a pressure washer, some chemical supplies, and some surface cleaning equipment like sponges. So a lot of opportunity here.
The next one on the list is going to be a lawn care specialist. And this one is pretty self-explanatory. You are going to be mowing lawns, and you’re going to be weed whacking different weeds.
Believe it or not, there are lawn care businesses out there that make tens of millions of dollars a year. And a lot of them started off as tiny operations where they just mow a few lawns around the block.
Most lawn care services out there charge about $1 per minute or $60 per hour. Now obviously, you’re going to need some basic lawn care tools. You can either rent or buy these for a few hundred.
And yeah, it’s a pretty solid, pretty good one to look into. Definitely a great way for you to make some extra money on the side.
Let’s just put it as an extra one on this list since it isn’t really a dirty job, but it’s also not something that everyone wants to do. And that’s basically anything IT-related.
So installing computers in people’s houses, fixing people’s computers, etc. Anything IT-related can be awesome.
Of course, it requires you to be technically savvy. And in some cases, you may have to have some equipment. But there are countless IT-related businesses out there that make over six figures a year.
And it’s just a great little side hustle that you can do.
The next on our list of the most profitable dirty side hustles is going to be a junk removal service. Now, this one, believe it or not, is actually extremely lucrative.
These types of businesses basically offer clutter-clearing services. They help clients declutter their spaces by responsibly removing unwanted items and restoring order to homes, offices, or even buildings.
Now, not only do you get paid quite a bit to remove the junk from the house, but in many cases, you’ll get paid to take the junk from point A to point B.
That may be a storage unit or maybe they’re just trying to get rid of it. And in a lot of cases, they will actually just give you whatever you want for free.
So if you find something in the junk that’s actually somewhat valuable, you can just take it. In fact, a lot of people go and search through dumpsters, find stuff, and then sell it online.
So this one, you’re probably going to need either a truck or a van or you can just rent one. You’re also going to want to have some really good gloves, but that’s about it. You don’t need much to get started.
The next one on the list is going to be a house cleaner, but a very specific type of house cleaning.
This is highly recommended if you’re going to open a house cleaning side hustle or a house cleaning business, you can differentiate yourself by cleaning carpets as well as beds because you need specialized equipment in order to clean these things.
It’s a lot harder than just normal cleaning, but you also get paid a lot more per hour. So there are a lot of examples of carpet cleaning businesses and bed cleaning businesses that are making over six figures or even multi-six figures per year.
And as said earlier, you do have to buy the specialized equipment. It’s not that expensive, a few hundred to buy and even less than that to rent.
The next one on the list is going to be a gutter cleaner. Gutter cleaners are tasked with removing debris and obstructions from gutters, ensuring proper water drainage, and preventing potential property damage.
A lot of the time, you can charge $50 to $100 per hour for gutter cleaning, and you can hire people to do it for you for about $24 an hour.
Basically, all you’re going to need is a ladder, gloves, and a gutter scooper. So yeah, another really good one. I’ll give this one a 7.5 out of 10 opportunity score.
Another one on the list is going to be a pool cleaner. Now, this one is pretty self-explanatory. You’re going to be cleaning pools, ensuring optimal water quality and a clean swimming environment for a family.
What’s interesting about this one is that the only people who have pools are typically people who also have money. People who have money can spend more money. This is why you see pool cleaning businesses that are making multiple six figures a year.
There’s actually this guy on the internet who cleans pools for a living and now has more followers on TikTok than Kim Kardashian.
This one does require some equipment to get started. You’re going to need skimmers, vacuums, and test kits. But if you get this one started, it can be extremely lucrative.
The next one on the list is going to be a home painting business. This could be painting the outside of the house or even the inside of the house. You can make a ton of money doing this.
Here’s a Reddit thread about a guy who quit his $ 70,000-a-year 9-to-5 job, and two years in, he was doing $600,000 a year in revenue painting houses.
So yeah, very lucrative. This one’s been around forever. It’s also really easy to hire people for this one and teach them how to do it.
The tenth on our list is going to be picking up trash, and this one is exactly what it sounds like. There’s a story of a businessman who started making over $650,000 a year after he quit his full-time job, and he did it all with a waste disposal business.
It only took two months for him to make more money from picking up trash than he was at his full-time job.
There are tons of opportunities out there for these types of businesses because most people just don’t want to do this stuff.
Most people don’t want to pick up trash all day long. This one is phenomenal. This is a really good opportunity if you’re not afraid to do some hard work and get your hands a little bit dirty.
The next one on the list is going to be curb address painting. This is basically where you paint house numbers on curbs to make addresses more visible and accessible for emergency services, delivery persons, and visitors.
This one has been all over social media, lots of YouTube channels talk about this, and TikTok channels talk about it.
There’s even a story of a 14-year-old who started a lucrative side hustle by doing this. If a 14-year-old can do it, then you can as well.
Most painters charge only about $20 per curb. So if you’re able to paint 10 curbs per day, you make $200 a day.
This one is really easy to do. You basically just need some spray paint and you need some cutouts of letters and numbers.
That’s about all. Not as lucrative as some of the other ones on the list, but it’s just super easy to get started with this one.
The next one on the list is going to be appliance repair. This involves diagnosing and fixing faulty household appliances like refrigerators, washing machines, and dishwashers to restore functionality and save homeowners the cost of replacement.
According to indeed.com, appliance repairmen make an average of $27 per hour, but that includes employees. You’ll probably make quite a bit more than that if you start your own business.
If you’re someone who’s really good at fixing things, and really handy, this could be a great opportunity for you. You do have to know how to fix all these things.
The next one on the list is really going to surprise you, but this is actually a really good side hustle, and it’s super easy to get started. That is trash can cleaning. We all know that trash cans can get a little bit dirty and a little unsanitary.
What that ends up doing is it ends up attracting lots of different bacteria, insects, and vermin, and we don’t want that stuff around our house, right?
So there’s actually a great business where people will hire you to come in, you know, once or twice a week and clean their garbage cans on garbage day. You have this monthly recurring revenue, which is great.
Someone will hire you, and they just pay you monthly. So when you get one client, you might have that client for 5 years, and you might end up making $10,000 from them.
There’s a story of a 13-year-old who had the nickname of the ‘garbage kid’ who started doing this as a side hustle.
The average price per trash can is about $10, so if you can clean 10 cans in a day, that would mean that your weekly income is going to be $500 if you work 5 days a week, and your annual income would be $26,000 a year.
If you clean 20 cans a day, your annual income would be $52,000 a year, and if you clean 100 cans a day, your annual income would be $260,000 a year.
Now, these cans don’t take that long to clean at all. You basically just need a power washer and some basic cleaning equipment, and that does the trick.
So this one is actually surprisingly good. There are people who are absolutely crushing it doing this one.
Continuing our list of most profitable dirty side hustles, the next one we have is a sofa cleaner. Have you ever gone to somebody’s house or maybe even at your own house and you realize that your sofa just gets progressively more and more dirty?
But the problem is most cleaning equipment is going to stain your sofa. So it’s actually really difficult to clean it. Well, that’s when you would hire a sofa cleaner.
They would have specialized equipment that can clean sofas without damaging them, and a lot of the time, they will charge around $500 to steam clean a sofa or a couch.
But at minimum, you would charge $150 to $300 each, and so at a minimum, if you did three per day, you’d be making $450 to $900 per day.
That’s easily over six figures a year, and if you made $900 a day, that would be over $300,000 a year. So yeah, this is another one that’s very similar to rug cleaning or bed cleaning where normal cleaning companies typically don’t do this.
That’s an opportunity for you to come in, for instance, contact the cleaning company and tell them, “Hey, if you have any clients that need their bed, sofa, or carpet cleaned, just send them over to me, and I’ll give you a referral fee.” So yeah, this one’s really good.
The next one on the list is going to be mailbox installation or mailbox repair.
In some cases, somebody might not have a mailbox or maybe they have it, but it got damaged. So you could come in and either repair the mailbox or if the damage is too bad, you would go ahead and replace it.
Now, you can make a bunch of money just replacing mailboxes, or you can upsell them to get fancy mailboxes. A lot of people buy stuff that they don’t need, so you could probably charge like twice as much for a fancy mailbox versus a normal one.
On average, one mailbox costs about $60 to $380 to repair. Now, this one does take some time to get started.
You kind of have to go throughout your town and look for mailboxes that have been damaged and then maybe just knock on the people’s doors and ask them if they need your services.
Eventually, you’ll kind of just be known by word of mouth, and people will just send referrals to you. So it’s not one that you can start off super easily.
The next one on the list is a super lucrative one if you’re a little bit tech-savvy, and that is going to be mobile phone repair.
This one is so lucrative that there’s a story on CNBC make it of a guy who started a multi-million dollar company out of his college dorm room. You guessed it; it was a phone repair business.
If you think about it, this is a problem that so many people have. You might be looking at your phone right now; it’s got a cracked screen, or maybe your phone is way slower than it used to be, or maybe your phone’s battery stops working, or maybe your phone starts to overheat, or maybe it just won’t turn on, or there’s just something wrong with it.
Well, it does take a little bit of tech-savvy, but it’s not that hard to figure out how to fix them, especially if you do it all the time.
A lot of the time, people will charge like $200 to fix a $1,000 phone. This is a really good one. There are several people out there, who make hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars a year doing this.
The next one on the list is going to be a garage organizer. So there are a ton of people out there who have garages that just keep on getting more and more messy as they throw new stuff or old stuff into them.
And for a lot of people out there, messiness drives them crazy. If you’re one of those people who’s really organized and you really like to clean stuff, you can actually make money doing that.
Basically, what you’d be doing is sorting, decluttering, and implementing efficient storage solutions within garages. This actually creates more space for them so that they can clutter it up even more, and it also makes them look a lot better.
There’s a great story on CNBC make it of a 40-year-old mover who went from working six jobs to earning $109,000 a year doing exactly this and Garage organizers actually make, on average, about $50 to $85 an hour.
So, this one is another dirty job. You’re going to be sorting through people’s stuff, but you also have to have some good organizational skills as well.
It really doesn’t take anything to get started other than maybe some gloves, but it’s going to be a little bit harder to find clients for this one because it’s not obvious to just look at a house and see if it has a dirty garage. The business is just going to start rolling in.
The next one on the list is going to be pet waste removal. So, this one’s pretty obvious.
You go into someone’s backyard or their front yard, and you remove the pet poop basically. And this is something where a lot of the time, they might pay you weekly or monthly.
That’s great because if you get one client, you might have them for 5 years. It’s not just a one-off deal where you only clean once.
You can actually make it to six figures with a poop-scooping business, believe it or not. So overall, this one isn’t as lucrative as some of the other ones on the list, but it’s still pretty good, and it’s very easy to get started.
The next on the list is going to be mobile car detailing or mobile car washing.
Car detailing is basically where you clean the inside of a car, and car washing is where you clean the outside of the car. A lot of the time, they will go together
But doing this mobile is even better because that means that the person doesn’t have to come to you, and you can make a ton of money doing this. So obviously, this one is one of the most lucrative ones on the list.
For instance, Belk Mobile Detailing makes about $240,000 a year, and that’s with a team of three people.
Honestly, with doing this business, it would probably be hard for you not to make six figures.
There’s a YouTube video of a person who told their story of going from $500 to 30k per month with a mobile car detailing business. So, this one is super, super lucrative.
The next on the list is very weird but also surprisingly lucrative, and that’s going to be an environmentally friendly diaper service.
What you’re going to do is you’re actually going to be doing weekly home delivery of compostable diapers and wipes, and you’re going to be collecting the diapers and wipes that you delivered the week before and disposing of them.
Now, this is another one where you can get that monthly recurring revenue, or MRR, which is great because they’ll probably pay you weekly every single time you drop off diapers.
And not only do they pay you for the diapers, but they pay you for the service of dropping it off and disposing of them.
So you’ll probably make about $20 to $30 each time you drop something off weekly. That’s about $120 per month. So all you really need is about 30 clients or so, and you’ll have a full-time income.
And in some cases, they’ll actually want reusable diapers. So, in that case, you would pick them up, and then you would clean them, and then you’d deliver them again.
Typically, you are going to be doing this service for upper-class clients, so these are people who have a ton of money. So you might get paid even more than that.
So yeah, this one’s pretty niche. You have to live near an affluent neighborhood typically.
Plus, it’s not as profitable as some of the other ones on the list. Also, it’s honestly just really disgusting. But if you’re willing to do it, you can make pretty good money.
Last but not least on our list of most profitable dirty side hustles is furniture restoration.
Next, let’s talk about furniture restoration, which basically involves repairing, refurbishing, and enhancing the appearance of old or damaged furniture to restore its original beauty.
Someone might have a chair, for instance, like a wooden chair that’s been in their family for a hundred years, and you know it’s broken; it doesn’t look very good.
You would come in; you’d fix the chair; you’d make it look good again, and they would pay you a good amount of money to do that. Now, there are many different ways you could do this.
In some cases, you would just go ahead and pick up old furniture that people threw away; you’d repair it, and then you’d resell it.
So there are a lot of different ways to make money from furniture restoration, and there’s an article on LinkedIn about people who are actually making a good amount of money doing this.
Now, it does require some craftsmanship, and it’s also probably not as profitable as some of the other ones on this list, but it’s still a good one, and it’s still one you can make a lot of money from, especially if you live kind of closer to affluent neighborhoods.
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