365 Ways To Make Money (The Book) – Interview and Give Away!

This give away has now closed, thank you to all those who entered.

Kylie OfiuToday on the blog I have interview with Kylie Ofiu. Kylie is a stay at home mum of 2 daughters who has set herself the challenge to have $1,000,000 in cash and assets by 2015. From the time she started this challenge, it gave her 289 weeks to become a millionaire. Broken down it meant she needed to go from earning nothing to almost $3500 a week. To see how she is tracking towards her goal, you cna chek out her blog Kylie Ofiu.

One of the ways Kylie will be making money is from her recently published book 365 Ways To Make Money. Kylie tells me a little bit more about the book. Be sure to read to the end of the interview to have a chance of winning your very own copy!

For those who don’t know you Kylie, would you like to give them a little bit of background about yourself and your online presence?

I am a stay at home mum to 2 young girls, who decided one day I wanted to be a millionaire by the time I am 30. I had grown tired of my husband working crazy hours so I set up a blog to track my progress and write about what I was doing from home to make money.

You have just published a book, called 365 Ways To Make Money – who is the target audience for the book?

The target audience is predominately stay at home mums; many of the ideas can be done either part time or from home. But there are ideas in there for everyone from children right through to grandparents.

Like myself, blogging helped you gain a publishing contract.  How did your book come about?

I originally went to write a post called 101 ways to make money and easily thought of 101 ways, so decided to go for 1001 ways. I was planning on turning it into an eBook, but decided to turn it into 2 posts on my blog instead. It was one of my most popular posts. When I signed up for the Aussie Bloggers Conference, Mary Masters, the acquisitions editor from John Wiley Australia saw the name of my blog as an attendee she thought it sounded interesting. When she checked out my blog and saw the 1001 ways to make money post, she didn’t even read the whole thing before contacting me to turn it into a book.

How did you juggle your family, the blog and writing the book?

To be honest, it was not easy. My husband was really supportive and half the book was already written through having done the posts, so it was easier than trying to write the whole manuscript from scratch. I scheduled posts for my blog, so I didn’t really need to think about it much during the time I needed to write the book. I set times when I would work and when we would do family stuff. Being organized was key to be able to get it all done.

What advice do you have for families who are finding it harder to cope with rising grocery bills?

There are many ways to reduce grocery bills such as eat less meat (which does not appeal to most), buy when things are on sale, menu plan and buy in bulk but the biggest thing that has reduced our grocery bill has been going shopping late. I do a menu plan, write my list then go to the shops 30 minutes before it closes. I have a time limit to get in and out which makes me less likely to ‘stroll’ and add things I don’t really need, plus everything is marked down. By coordinating the night I do it with the night the shops change for sales I can usually buy items from both the week before and the week coming.

What are the top five ways you can earn some extra cash while you are at home full time?

It really depends on what skills you have and what you enjoy doing as well as how much time you have to devote to making some extra cash. Making money from home is all about looking at what you can do to fill a need. My top 5 would probably be:

1.)  If you have knowledge about blog backgrounds, designs and setting up blogs there is a huge demand for that kind of work now. There is lots of information on how to do it, so you could teach yourself as well.

2.)  Ironing. Most people hate doing it and everyone I know who has put a sign up at their local shops has ended up with more business than they know what to do with.

3.)  Mending or alterations. If you can sew there is so much work for mending and alterations. I have a few friends who do this and they are heavily booked. Some even make wedding veils as well as altering wedding dresses. There are lots of extras you can add into an alteration service, it need not just be sewing.

4.)  Sell stuff online. It could be your own second hand stuff, other peoples stuff where you take a percentage for selling it for them or it could be things you buy to resell such as books or brand name clothing. You don’t have to sell on eBay, there are many other sites such as gumtree, quicksales or even use social media.

5.)  Use your home either through family day care or getting a boarder/exchange student. With either of these options you need to be comfortable having other people in your home. FDC is a lot of work, but can be very rewarding and is done all from home. Having a boarder you need to set some rules and be ok with someone else who was not raised as you were or live as you do living with you.

365 Ways To Make Money is available in bookstore across Australia. It has a range of ideas for different ways to make money, many which can be done from home. You can choose one idea or combine a few to create multiple income streams. You can order a signed copy from Kylie’s website here ($20 for Australian postal addresses).

Win a copy of 365 Ways To Make Money

One lucky reader of Planning With Kids will win a copy of 365 Ways To Make Money. To enter:

  • Leave a comment below to enter.
  • The giveaway is open to Australian residents only.
  • You may only enter once.
  • Entries close at 5pm AEST 31st July 2011.
  • The winner will be drawn randomly and announced on the blog later on the 31st July.
  • Winners will be notified by email. If I don’t receive a response within 3 days, another winner will be drawn.
  • Good luck!