You see those ads of "make money from home", based on my experience they are for the most part pyramid schemes.

I'm a 25 year old international student studying in Chicago. Being here on a student visa means that my employment opportunists are extremely limited (no SSN or work authorization) so I was looking for some sort of revenue stream, which is hard without breaking the law which I prefer not to do.

Dear 2+2 BFI community, help a poor ambitious student who left his home country and payed a sh*t load of money to study here and achieve his dreams!

Do you know of any real jobs from home or have ideas? Not looking to get rich.. $500-$1,000$ a month for rent and food would be incredible.


Beat
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I'm from a warm country and this is my first winter in Chicago, every time I step outside the wind feels like million of needles stabbing my face.

Variance
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Every time someone writes EAD makes me think of "Employment Authorization Document" that I don't have.

Brag
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Living in America!

Why does it need to be from home?

I'm at school for 18-20 hours a week (without homework and commute) so that leaves almost no time for a "real" job and it's hard to find someone who is hiring with that schedule and be willing to pay off the books.

Buy stuff on craigslist/facebook, resell stuff on craigslist/facebook.

real ways of making money:
- poker on the internet
- surveys that almost nobody has access to
- streamer

scams: most stuff you see on facebook. unless you're comfortable ripping off friends and family ie. selling them a difficult situation or a mediocre product, or things that quickly take your money while offering almost nothing in return.

what is streamer?

Hello Saylem! Congrats on coming to America!

You can definitely make $500-$1k/mo online!

The easiest way to do it is to have a skill and to sell that skill to people who need it. I don't know your skills. What are you good at?

You came from another country - are you bi-lingual?

You can use a marketplace like fiverr.com, plus email and social media to find clients who need translation services.

Translating to English is definitely a skill that pays...you just need to find the clients who need a translator. If you find the right one, I bet you could make $500-1k/mo from one single client.

First thing is to do some research on how to construct a sales pitch. There's a million free resources on this. Next, you identify your potential customers. Then, just reach out to them with your pitch. If you send enough emails and direct messages on social media, you'll eventually land a client.

Hopefully that gave you an idea, because it doesn't need to be translation. Just think of a task that you can do from home that someone would potentially pay you for.

Then, use social media to find that person!

A few years ago mturk was still a thing and Hybrid.io and a number of other places like that. Mturk was dying when I quit tho, so not sure the current state of affairs.

This is the easiest way to make money listed so far. You can't do it 100% from home obviously, but it's a relatively low stress way to make money.

You'd be surprised by what people get rid of for cheap.

Additionally it's cash only, which is something OP needs. Flipping stuff is really his only viable option.

When I was in my musician days, I would constantly buy music gear and flip it on eBay. At the time I lived near Full Sail, which is a multi-media school that has an audio engineering department. Kids would go to learn recording and buy all kinds of recording gear with mommy and daddy’s money, then lose interest and need to sell it cheap. I made decent money and only took a loss a couple times out of 50+ transactions.

Someone that streams themselves online, such as a twitch streamer who streams himself playing video games.

or streams himself masturbating! the possibilities are endless!

I've made $100K+ for the last seven years with cpa marketing.

Takes a decent amount of capital to get started though and a very strong knowledge of marketing.

It can become fairly passive after a while.

It's pretty boring work though.

I spend the rest of my time being a bike messenger and attempting to learn trading.

Make money from home stuff is a pipe dream. Don't waste your time.

Selling stuff on Ebay is a terrible idea. You will get eaten alive by shipping and mailing fees. Also, Ebay favors buyers over sellers and you can get ripped off. If you are going to flip stuff, do it local.

Getting a part time job that offers steady income might be ideal. You need to be focused on your schooling and not whether you'll be able to pay next months rent.

Is there a specific day where you don't have classes? You may be able to get a part time job at a coffee shop or restaurant. Places like these often have flexible schedules.


Haha, this winter has been really warm compared to most winters. This is probably the warmest winter in the last decade. Maybe even longer.

Thank you, Excited to be here. Before I settled in Chicago I did a 4 months coast to coast trip across the country, visiting 35 states all by car and I just fell in-love with this place.

Yes I do speak a second language, translating is a good idea but finding the clients might not be easy but it's worth a shot! I might even pair that with tutoring, there are people who study my language in school who probably need help with homework and stuff..

The idea of flipping items real appeals to me and I think you chose the best items with the biggest margin. Did you actually buy the instruments before posting them? Because I think of maybe just take the ad from craigslist and post it of FB with my markup and once I have a buyer I'll actually go and buy it, what do you think?


Yeah I wish I could just focus on school, accounting is hard enough. I have Tuesday, Friday and Saturday off.. However working illegally can get you in trouble and the last thing I want to do is to put my visa at risk, to find a job off the books you need someone you can trust and they trust you and that can take time.

Also lol yeah I've been told this winter is nothing compared to normal winters here haha hopefully this nice weather continues.

Keep in mind that you normally translate from your second language into your first not vice versa.

What school are you studying at in Chicago? Most have a great list of on campus jobs you can pick up to make money (i.e. managing the auditorium or student center for conferences etc.)

Personally (and I dont recommend this for most folks) but I grinded my way through b-school in LA playing in local cardrooms to help cover rent/books, but you have to completely change your style of place (in most cases) and even then the ROI is no guarantee. that, plus the school would send business owners to me to write their business plans/create their financial models was what really helped me through the non-tuition costs of school.

Being in Chicago your cardroom options are limited basically to the Majestic or the Horseshoe in Indiana (a few others sprinkled throughout but those are the rooms that get consistent action.) and as others have mentioned you could go the gig economy route, but your earning options with that are gong to be relatively limited.

My best advice is to use your programs resources as much as you can and see if they can help you with getting placement on-campus or through a local organization they've partnered with before. you arent the first student to seek that type of help and the fact that you're willing to work for it won't go unnoticed by the administration. So reach out and inquiry with the student center or student services organization and see what they have available (usually either a printed folder/binder of jobs or nowadays they will be online.) all the other avenues have risks/anyone can access, so use your status and relationship with the program as a student to leverage whatever you can with them.

Welcome to Chicago

I was in the same boat back in the day which is what brought me to poker. Your visa should also allow you to work on campus or in work relating to your major. Those are better bets then some wfh opportunity you read on the internet.

I'm in Chicago, I flip stuff on the side.

This wouldn't work. Stuff sells in minutes. The people who make money doing this are the fastest to find things.

I'm sure it is a space dominated by bots and scripts alerting people to specific items and prices

Can we please get this spammer banned?

i did it, but you re posted his link!

Thank you! I study at Roosevelt, there are a few employment options here, but there is still the same problem of going through so much bureaucracy to get a SSN and an EAD however I have another meeting next week with an employment adviser so we'll see.

Grinding poker is not easy, I'm pretty sure I have an edge over the average player but I can't compete with the regs but I'm looking for some soft home games here in school.. Maybe I'll get lucky.

I love the idea of writing business plans, I owned 2 business in the past and wrote a couple of them. How did you start? Do you still have the one you wrote that I can maybe use? Also how much did you get for each plan?

I think you mean OPT(?), the problem with this is that it's limited to 12 months and if you use 1 month during school you'll have only 11 when you graduate. In general you want to save the whole 12 months to work for a company that hopefully will sponsor your H1b Visa during that time.

I would love to hear what's your story.. What Visa did you have? What did you do after you graduated etc.. And if you have any tips it would help a lot

one way to make money at home is through freelancing. one big market for such activities is upwork, although it has its pitfalls to be sure. but if u have abilities as a coder, graphic designer, copywriter etc. you can work from your computer.