43 Best Passive Income Streams & Opportunities

RichardBy Richard | 7 min read

Most passive income ideas will either generate poor returns or consume lots of y
our time (not very passive!). So the question is what really works?
passive-income-streams-opportunitiesI ve spent 100s of hours thinking about all so
rts of crazy ideas for making passive income online
From the smart ideas like an online course to the dress-me-in-the-white-jacket i
deas like writing articles for adsense, I ve thought about pretty much every passi
ve income stream there is.
During this time the one thing I wanted more than anything else, was a big fat e
pic list of ALL the possible passive income streams there were.
Everything in one place so I could compare them and work out what was best for m
e.
Unfortunately no one has even till this day
made a complete list. So I spent the
last week getting loaded on strong Ethiopian espresso and compiling every diffe
rent income stream from my head, my notes and the world wide interwebs!
Enjoy!!
PS if you want to cut to the chase you can get access to 3 of my favorite ideas
right here >
What Is Passive Income?
When I say passive income, I m talking about what happens after you do the hard wo
rk up front.
ie first you need to haul ass and do something crazy, eg write a quality 20,000
word ebook (insanely not passive hahahah), but then you get to sit back and enjo
y seeing PayPal sale messages pop up on your iPhone each morning as sale after s
ale after sale is made on an ongoing basis and without any additional work. That s s
ome seriously Pina Colada flavored passive goodness!
As you can see passive income streams simply come from assets, and assets are ei
ther bought with money (eg rental property) or in the case of most of the ideas
below, bought through sweat (eg ebook)!
Let s Get Started
1. Sell An Ebook
The much loved model for bloggers and content creators everywhere and for a good
reason it s pretty easy to write a 60-80 page ebook, not hard to sell say $500 wort
h a month through online networking, guest posting and your own SEO optimized bl
og, and well you get to keep a large whack of the pie after paying affiliates.
Hells yeah! Continue reading >
2. Create A Blog And Get The Affiliate Links Cranking
Who doesn t like some down and dirty affiliate
y this way than with an ebook, because all you
out the content for your own site and getting
t an affiliate sale within 30 days of starting
3. Sell An Online Course With Membership

fees?! It s even easier to make mone

need to concentrate on is pumping
the traffic in
most people can ge
a blog. Continue reading >

We re talking a members-only multimedia-driven website here. Straight up I have t

o say, this is a looooot of work. I ve done it and it nearly killed me. Continue
reading >
4. Create A Comparison Site
I really like this idea, but must confess I ve never earned passive income from a
setup like this before.
I ll be putting something together soon though and really wanted to share this one
with you. Continue reading >
5. Build An Ecommerce Store And Drop Ship
This idea is for those of you hell-bent on making some serious passive income on
line.
There s a lot of work upfront and by comparison to other ideas, there can be a fai
r bit of work on an ongoing basis. But if you automate as much as possible and/
or hire a VA in the Philippines for example, you can get it down to just a few h
ours a week. Continue reading >
6. Put Together Static Guide Websites And Directly Sell Advertising Space
I want you to think very specific here
I m not talking about writing a blog on cats and inserting some Google Adsense up
in there. Continue reading >
7. Create A Lead Capture Website For Real World Businesses
You can make $1000s a month with this idea, easily!
Think simple Google-friendly content site with a high converting inquiry form fo
r capturing details (maybe even a free report attached to that or something else
to boost conversion). Continue reading >
8. Build An Online Store For A Real World Service And Outsource The Work
For this one it s easiest if I give you an example I m thinking of launching next mo
nth.
Build and SEO optimize a website for people looking to convert 8mm home videos t
o DVD / USB. Continue reading >
9. Get An IPhone Or IPad App Built
Oh hello bankruptcy!
Haha, nah apps aren t that expensive to get made anymore. And if you want to crea
te a mainly info-based app there are plenty of easy to use programs online for D
IYing this for a couple hundred bucks. Continue reading >
10. Vending Machines, Games Machines, Laundromats, ATMs Etc
Joking!! Got you! These suck big time.
I ve read so many blow-by-blow financial accounts of these businesses and in no wa
y can they add up to profit, apart from the exceptional few business operators w
ho are crafty at selecting locations, negotiating deals with vendors and efficie

ntly outsourcing all the leg work and maintenance. Continue reading >
11. Get A Rental Property
This is so tried and true it s not funny.
If you buy at the right
for your personal taxes
this again and again
e you ll be retiring by

price, at the right time, structure the deal so it s good

and achieve full occupancy and most importantly, then do
then just pour yourself a freaking Pina Colada son, becaus
50. Continue reading >

12. Setup Your Own YouTube Channel And Take The Adsense Share
Hang on, I said that relying on Google adsense is mental above.
What s changed?
Well, I think that getting the traffic to a blog is a lot harder than getting vi
ews on You Tube these days, because the text-based content world is so freaking
full (and thus crazy competitive), whilst the video world is so relatively empty
since most people are too shy to turn their prose into video. Continue reading
>
13. Resell Online Products And Services
The first thought that pops into my mind is web hosting and the second thought i
s mobile websites.
These are just two examples of the types of things you can resell to businesses
(or people) in the real world. Continue reading >
14. Build Up An Investment Portfolio
I really didn t want to have to put this in as it s oh so freaking unoriginal and bo
ring, but hey it works sooooooo well.
In fact, if you look at your average millionaire, the majority of their income o
ften comes from the dividends and capital gains their investment portfolios spit
out reliably every month. Continue reading >
15. Write For Money, I Mean Adsense
This is different to setting up a blog and putting up adsense on it.
With this idea instead, you write like a freaking nutjob and distribute your con
tent to one of dozens of high page rank content publishing platforms. Continue r
eading >
16. Create A Niched Up Stock Content Library For Others To Use
Build a library of whatever your creative ass can muster and live off the royalt
ies like a fat prince (well kind of).
From photos to icons to melodies, go nuts. Continue reading >
17. Create Software Or A Simpler Online App
Whatever it is, from WordPress themes to online productivity tools to a very ind
ustry-specific thing like an online billing service for architects, thiscould ma
ke you serious coin.

Obviously, you can get all the heavy lifting done by professionals, and then you
just sell the software online yourself through your own marketing efforts. Cont
inue reading >
18. Make A Book Reviews Website
Obviously your monetization strategy here is Amazon affiliate links.
Now I know Amazon pays sweet F all (say 5-10% on a book that sells for $10-$30),
but a dollar here and there can add up I think. Continue reading >
19. Make A

Fake Store And Hook It Up With Amazon

This is a very interesting idea for those of you who think your own online store
with drop shipping (where you take payment and liaise with the supplier) or ful
filling orders yourself is too hard.
I hadn t really thought about this idea until I came across an online bedding stor
e recently. Continue reading >
20. Buy And Rent Out Expensive Equipment, Tools Etc Again And Again
I m thinking Canon 6D camera, photo booth, treadmills etc.
Obviously this is not so passive and something s could be a biaaaatch to deal with
(ie anything big that doesn t fit in your closet), but hey, this is just another
form of rental income and the ability to reap in rentals week after week is pret
ty cool. Continue reading >
21. Become A Digital Publisher
So the idea here is simple you build the website and do the online marketing, whil
st someone else creates the info product, whether that be an ebook, online cours
e, template or whatever. You go 50-50.
I love this idea and that s why we ve teamed up with a lawyer friend recently to cre
ate some legal kits for online sale. Continue reading >
22. Rent A Room, A Space, Anything
We re getting desperate with this one.
But who cares, I want this list to be comprehensive and all encompassing. Conti
nue reading >
23. Unleash Your Inner Loan Shark On Peer-To-Peer Lending
What the f am I talking about?
Peer to peer lending is basically what the name says; you chuck a bunch of cash
into an online account and then divvy it up amongst dozens of people looking for
loans around the country. You lend say $25 to each person (you and a couple 10
00 other people together give that person enough money for their loan). Continue
reading >
24. Create, Manufacture And Sell Your Own Product, Gadget, Whatever
If you look at the success stories on Tim Ferris s 4 Hour Work Week Blog, you ll not
ice many of them involve people who had a problem, couldn t find an easy solution

and so decided to just get a product manufactured themselves.

They ve then gone and setup a simple online store
many using Shopify(store done in
2 hours!) and spread the word through online networking, guest posts through an
affiliate program. Continue reading >
25. Buy An Existing Online Business
It sounds too good to be true, right?
Just stump up a couple thousand and then you have a cash-generating machine in y
our hands. Continue reading >
26. Compile And Organize Fragmented Public Domain Information
In today s world we don t suffer from lack of information, we suffer from lack of ac
cessible information the kind that is organized and easy to use.
If you can organize an unwieldy body of knowledge into one tight, succinct set,
you can charge for it like a mofo. (I apologize for not setting a very good exa
mple with this comprehensive and structured article on all the different passive
income streams around ;). Continue reading >
27. License Out Your Smart Ideas
If you re not super excited about risking a bunch of capital to create and sell a
product, but you have ideas for products that fill real gaps in the market, you
could become a freaking inventor.
This is a pretty nice passive way of earning recurring income over time. Continu
e reading >
28. Create A Business System And Franchise It Out
Now get the idea of creating the next Subway out of your head immediately.
I don t want you to think so complex. I mean, Subway ain t really all that passive,
since the system requires so much support from head office; from food supply to
leasehold to training, head office ain t a passive place to be. Continue reading
>
29. Sign Up To Solid Reward Or Discount Programs
I kinda hate myself for including this as it s not really going to net you much mo
re than $1k a year in income so to speak, but hey, every dollar counts.
So the idea is so brain dead simple. Continue reading >
30. Buy Bulk From Overseas And Sell It Down Via Ebay
How passive is this idea really?
Well, if you get someone to take care of the fulfillment side of things, pretty
passive. Continue reading >
31. Invest In A Real World Business As A Silent Partner
Hello silent partner investment!!
Oh no! There are so many horror stories of people investing in their mate s pub o

r bar or whatever, that the idea sends shivers up my spine. Continue reading >
32. Create A Deals Site For Your Niche
This is gonna take some serious work, but can pay off big time.
It s important to think outside the box with this one and realize that any niche c
an work well with this. Continue reading >
33. Design Tshirts, Mugs, Shot Glasses, Whatever And Sell Them Via An Online St
ore Like Cafepress, Zazzle Etc
If you ve got any design talent at all, this can be a very cool idea.
Sites like Cafepress make it super simple to submit designs, which means just li
ke with the stock photography idea above, you can pump out a ton of designs in a
n afternoon and leave them up there waiting for people to buy. Continue reading
>
34. Create A Highly Niched Up Online Community And Market Place
Think nichey here.
The idea is to get a bunch of people involved, creating content through forums a
nd posts, and then sell them all kinds of products and servicesrelated to their
interests. Continue reading >
35. Build A Niche Focused Jobs Board
This ain t going to be easy! But once again, think niches here.
The upfront work can involve a fair bit of programming, even if you do use a lot
of template and existing off-the-shelf programs. Continue reading >
36. Give All Your Content, Software, Plugins Etc Away For Free And Ask For A Do
nation
This is a popular passive income stream for lots of WordPress developers, especi
ally of plugins, and is also quite popular amongst bloggers who pump out lots of
useful content for free (eg Steve Pavlina)
not to mention a great lead generato
r for future premium product sales.
The idea rests on your product adding a ton of value to users lives and you syst
ematically and nicely / in a fun way, asking for donations. Continue reading >
37. Systematize, Automate And Outsource Any Active Business
This is the craziest kind of passive income I can think of, because it basically
involves executing Michael Gerber s e-Myth idea 110% ie so much so, that you are no
longer involved in the daily running of the business.
But it isn t that hard. Continue reading >
38. Repackage Your Content Into A Structured Product
The average blog is like the average wardrobe a complete fecking mess; with gold n
uggets of wisdom spread throughout 100s of articles.
How much more useful would it be
Continue reading >

to your reader

if you created a unified guide?

39. Build A Niche Site Focused On Physical Products And Hook Up With Amazon
This is different to the fake store idea above, because here it s not an online stor
e we re building, but rather a content-rich site with tons of product-focused arti
cles and videos etc.
ie one idea is for an online shop and the other for a blog/affiliate site of sor
ts. Continue reading >
40. Build A Mini E-University
This is going to make millions for those that get it right, but to be honest it s
not entirely passive.
The example that springs to mind with this idea, so I can really explain what I m
talking about here, is Corbett Barr s Fizzle. Continue reading >
41. Create A Podcast Or Video Based

Interview With Experts

Series

Kind of like Mixergy, but for any niche!

You give away a ton of the content for free, and then charge for the premium stu
ff or for the latest stuff. Continue reading >
42. Sell Merchandise On Your Blog
Why the feck did I include this?
Well, because I am OCDing all over the joint and want to make this list uber com
plete. Continue reading >
43. Buy Up Keyword Rich Domain Names
If you were knocking around on the Internet back in the early 1990s you could ha
ve snapped up domains like business.com for next to nothing (actually they were
completely free prior to 1995!).