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Are you searching for the best stay-at-home jobs?
Today, far more types of work can be done online than ever before, which means there are many opportunities to earn an income without leaving your house.
Working from home comes with many advantages.
Maybe you want to eliminate your daily commute, believe you’re more productive in a home environment, want to balance raising a family while earning money, or simply prefer the freedom that remote work provides.
Whatever the motivation, there are plenty of reasons why working from home can be appealing.
Personally, I’ve worked remotely for several years and don’t see myself returning to a traditional office setting.
One of the biggest benefits is the flexibility. Working from home has allowed me to travel full time while still maintaining my career.
Now that I’ve had my first child, I understand even more clearly how valuable remote work can be for parents. I’m grateful to have built a business that allows me to stay home and spend more time with my baby.
Most of the jobs listed here are fully remote, meaning you only need a reliable internet connection. However, a few options may require leaving the house occasionally for a few hours each week. Even so, they remain highly flexible.
Another great thing about these stay-at-home jobs is the flexibility they offer.
Many allow you to set your own schedule, choose where you work, and decide how you want to complete your tasks.
So whether you’re trying to earn extra income on your own terms, searching for a new career path, or simply exploring different possibilities, this list of legitimate stay-at-home jobs can help.
You’ll discover nearly 30 different job options, learn how to get started with each one, and find answers to common questions about working from home.
29 Stay-at-Home Jobs
Here is a quick overview of some of the top options:
- Best stay-at-home job for freelancing: Proofreading
- Best stay-at-home job if you prefer working independently: Blogging
- Best stay-at-home job for passive income: Selling printables
- Best stay-at-home job for people who enjoy working with numbers: Bookkeeping
- Best stay-at-home job for Disney fans: Becoming a Disney travel agent
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1. Start a Blog From Home
Blogging is one of the most appealing options among stay-at-home jobs.
It’s an online career that allows you to work from anywhere, set your own schedule, and potentially build a strong income while doing something you enjoy.
I launched Making Sense of Cents in 2011. Since then, the blog has generated more than $5,000,000 in revenue.
Interestingly, the blog wasn’t originally created as a business. It started simply as a way to document my personal finance journey. At the time, I didn’t even realize that blogging could become a source of income or that it was possible to turn a blog into a successful business.
However, about six months after launching the site, I began earning money from it.
If you’re curious about starting your own blog, you can learn the basics through a beginner-friendly course that explains the process step by step.
Here’s a brief overview of the topics typically covered in a starter blogging course:
Day 1 – Why start a blog
Understand the main benefits of blogging and why many people choose it as a side hustle or full-time business.
Day 2 – Choosing your blog topic
Learn how to decide what you should write about and how to pick a niche that interests you.
Day 3 – Creating your blog
Step-by-step guidance on setting up a blog using WordPress, one of the most widely used blogging platforms.
Day 4 – Monetizing a blog
Explore different ways bloggers make money, such as ads, affiliate marketing, sponsored content, and digital products.
Day 5 – Building passive income
Learn strategies for creating income streams that continue earning over time.
Day 6 – Growing traffic and followers
Discover methods for increasing your readership and building a loyal audience.
Day 7 – Additional blogging tips
Practical advice to help you stay consistent, improve your content, and grow your blog successfully.
For many people, blogging begins as a hobby but can gradually evolve into a flexible work-from-home career with significant earning potential.
2. Find an online proofreading job
Proofreading is a flexible and detail-orientated job that only requires a laptop or tablet, an internet connection, and a good eye for finding mistakes (such as grammar mistakes).
Proofreaders look for punctuation mistakes, misspelled words, lack of consistency, and formatting errors.
If you are interested in finding online proofreading jobs, I recommend signing up for this free 76-minute workshop all about proofreading. Here, you will learn how to start a freelance proofreading business.
3. Sell printables on Etsy
Are you looking for ideas that allow you to use your creativity? If so, I recommend checking out this option.
Making printables on Etsy can be a great idea because you just need to create one digital file per product, which you can then sell an unlimited number of times.
Printables are digital products that customers can download and print at home. Examples include grocery shopping checklists, gift tags, candy bar wrappers, printable quotes for wall art, and patterns.
4. Sell stickers from home
You can sell both printed and printable stickers online.
Stickers are extremely popular right now and will most likely be for years to come. Stickers are used for so many different reasons, and you don’t need a ton of equipment to start a sticker business.
5. Stay at home as a virtual assistant
Virtual assistants are in demand, and the need for virtual assistants will likely continue to grow well into the future.
Not only does the internet allow us to complete more daily tasks online, but more and more people are also working stay at home jobs, such as running a website, social media, real estate, advertising, etc. That’s why virtual assistant jobs are so in-demand.
Virtual assistant (VA) tasks may include social media management, formatting and editing content, scheduling appointments or travel, email management, and more. Basically, you can get paid to do any task that needs to be done in someone’s business but doesn’t need to be done by them.
My friend Kayla is a full-time blogger, virtual assistant, and project manager who earns over $10,000 per month while working from home.
I interviewed her at How Kayla Earns $10K/Month From Home as a Virtual Assistant, and we talk about:
- How much money you can make as a virtual assistant
- How to find your first virtual assistant job
- How to become a virtual assistant
And much more!
6. Become a Disney travel agent
If you love everything Disney and love planning fun vacations, becoming a Disney Travel Agent with Academy Travel could be the perfect job for you to do from home.
A travel agent is someone who helps people and groups plan and book their trips, like flights, places to stay, tours, and things to do. They give personalized advice and use their knowledge to help clients with all the details of their trip, making sure everything goes well and is fun.
Academy Travel is a top-tier, Disney Diamond Level Earmarked Travel Agency, and has opportunities for part-time or full-time careers. Agents typically earn around $25,000 part-time, with potential to exceed $100,000 annually as they grow their business.
As an Independent Contractor for Academy Travel, you get the benefit of working your own flexible hours, blending your love for Disney with creating unforgettable memories for visiting guests. From organizing trips to Walt Disney World to planning Disney Cruise Line adventures, you’ll be the magic-maker behind every moment.
Working from home, you’ll have access to top booking platforms and training from a dedicated management team. Academy Travel also specializes in other destinations beyond Disney, giving you opportunities to expand your business further. No MLM schemes, no start-up fees—just pure Disney magic.
7. Run Facebook ads for local businesses at home
By running Facebook ads for local businesses, you can help small businesses reach new customers.
This is a skill that you can learn online as well.
Facebook is one of the largest advertising spaces that exists, so this is an area that will just continue to grow and be popular.
My friend Bobby Hoyt knows a lot about this topic. Bobby is a former high school teacher who has paid off $40,000 of student loan debt in a year and a half. He now runs the personal finance blog Millennial Money Man full-time, as well as a digital marketing agency for local businesses that he started in 2015.
I interviewed Bobby about running Facebook ads, where you will learn:
- Why small businesses need Facebook advertising to find new customers
- How you can find your first Facebook ads client
- How much you can make doing this type of work – the average is around $1,000 extra a month per client
8. Get paid to answer surveys at home
One of the easiest stay at home jobs I used to pay off my student loan debt was by completing paid online surveys.
No, I didn’t get rich from them, but I was able to earn a little side money and extra cash by taking online surveys in my spare time, such as on my lunch break or before/after work.
There were many times when I would receive a $100 check in the mail from answering easy survey questions over the course of a month. Many pay via free gift cards as well.
Companies use surveys to learn what possible customers think of their products, services, and company. With the surveys you take, companies get valuable information that helps them improve their products, and that’s what they are paying you for.
To increase your chances of making money, I recommend signing up for as many online survey companies as you can. This is because survey companies may only send a few surveys your way each month, so the more you sign up for, the more cash you may be able to make.
Below are the companies I recommend signing up for:
- American Consumer Opinion
- Survey Junkie
- Swagbucks
- InboxDollars
- Branded Surveys
- OneOpinion
- Pinecone Research
- Prize Rebel
- Opinion Outpost
- User Interviews
- Springboard America
9. Start an Online Store From Home
Creating an online store is another legitimate stay-at-home job that many people don’t initially consider. However, starting an e-commerce business from home is more accessible than ever, and you don’t necessarily need extensive experience or a large upfront investment.
Many successful store owners began with little or no background in online retail. With the right tools and a willingness to learn, it’s possible to launch and manage an online shop entirely from home.
For example, entrepreneur Jenn Leach shared her experience of building profitable online stores. She has successfully created three e-commerce businesses that generate an average of about $19,000 per month.
One of the most surprising parts of her story is the amount of time she spends running the business. Despite the strong income, she typically dedicates only around 5–10 hours per week to managing her online stores.
Her experience shows that with the right systems—such as automated order processing, digital marketing, and reliable suppliers—an online store can become a flexible and scalable work-from-home business.
10. Find an online bookkeeping job
A bookkeeper is someone who tracks the finances of a business.
Now, before you skip this one because you think you’re not qualified, you might be surprised to learn that you don’t need to be an accountant, have any previous experience, or even have a bachelor’s degree. This is one of the stay at home careers you can grow over time.
Ben, from Bookkeeper Launch, helps people get started as bookkeepers even when they don’t have any experience. Ben is a CPA who founded his business after realizing that many businesses needed better bookkeepers.
In our interview, he answers questions about:
- What a bookkeeper does
- How much a bookkeeper can earn
- How to find a bookkeeping job
- The positives and negatives of bookkeeping
11. Flip items to resell at home
This is one of the best part-time stay at home jobs, and my friend’s family has earned over $100,000 in one year by flipping things.
Some of the best items that they’ve resold include:
- An item that they bought for $10 and flipped for $200 just 6 minutes later
- A security tower they bought for $6,200 and flipped for $25,000 just one month later
- A prosthetic leg that they bought for $30 at a flea market and sold for $1,000 on eBay the next day
This is one of the stay at home jobs that anyone can start because I know we all have lots of stuff in our house that we could probably sell online.
12. Become a freelance writer from home
A freelance writer is someone who writes for a number of different clients, such as websites, blogs, magazines, advertising companies, books, and more.
Because all of this can be done from the comfort of your home, freelance writing is a popular stay at home job.
My friend Holly is a very successful freelance writer and has earned over $200,000 writing online each year for many years now.
13. Transcribe audio or video content into text
Transcription is when you turn audio files or video content into a text document.
There are many businesses looking for transcriptionists too – since general transcriptionists convert audio and video to text for virtually any industry, there really isn’t a typical client.
Examples include marketers, authors, filmmakers, academics, speakers, and conferences of all types.
Beginning transcriptionists earn around $15 an hour to begin.
You can learn more about becoming a transcriptionist in the interview Make Money At Home By Becoming A Transcriptionist. The interview explains:
- What a transcriptionist does
- How much you can earn transcribing content
- The type of training you need
- How to find transcription jobs
14. Work for Amazon at home
Did you know that you can work for Amazon from home?
Amazon has many people and businesses who sell items and earn money at home.
Jessica Larrew, of The Selling Family, uses her site to explain how selling on Amazon is one of the best stay at home jobs for parents and how it may be a possibility for you.
In the first year that Jessica’s family started selling items on Amazon, working less than 20 hours a week total, they made over $100,000 profit!
If you want to learn more about starting an Amazon business, I recommend signing up for this free training that will teach you how to sell products on Amazon and make $100 to $500 per day.
You can also learn more about this topic in my interview with her at How To Stay At Home Selling On Amazon FBA, which answers questions such as:
- How her family started selling on Amazon
- How to decide what items to buy and sell on Amazon
- How much money you can make
15. Make money from home selling Canva templates
You can create Canva templates to sell and make money all from your home – and never have to ship a thing.
Creating Canva templates can be a great way to make extra income because you just need to create the templates once, and you can sell them an unlimited amount of times.
If you’re interested in learning more, I have an interview that covers:
- What exactly is a Canva template? What is Canva?
- Can I sell Canva templates?
- How do I sell my designs on Canva?
- Who buys Canva templates?
- How can I learn how to make templates to sell?
- Can someone with no tech skills make a Canva template?
16. Make affiliate income at home
This is one of my most favorite ways to make money at home.
Affiliate marketing is when you earn an income by placing a referral link on your website, blog, Instagram, and so on and have people purchase a product or service through your referral link.
An example would be Amazon book sales, where you link to a specific book on your blog and try to get people to purchase the book through your affiliate link. Amazon and other companies want quality affiliates under their belt because they want all the help they can get to promote the products and services they are selling.
If you get someone to sign up through your affiliate link, the company rewards you for promoting their product.
You can share an affiliate link with your audience in many different ways, such as:
- By adding an affiliate link to your blog (you can do this by inserting a link within a blog post, page, email, etc.)
- Sharing it on social media
- And more!
17. Become a podcast virtual assistant
Podcasts are extremely popular, and it seems like everyone has a podcast these days.
There are over 2,000,000 podcasts, and that number just continues to grow and grow. Podcasts are still a pretty new area, and that opens the door for lots of new stay at home jobs helping with all of these podcasts.
While the podcast host can record themselves, other tasks like editing and publication take time, so many podcasters outsource their work to freelancers or virtual assistants. Also, some podcasters may not know how to do those things, or they may choose to focus their time on other areas.
Some of the different services you could offer as a podcast virtual assistant include:
- Audio editing
- Marketing and promotion
- Publication
- Distribution
- Show note creation
18. Work from home as a freelancer
Freelancers are people who own their own business and contract out their services to other business owners or clients. A business may hire you for one-time gigs or you may get a long-term job with a company as a freelancer. You typically work at home for these companies.
This may include doing freelancing tasks such as:
- Graphic design, such as creating logos
- Web design and development
- Video editing
- Sound design
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Programming
- Photography
This is one of the best stay at home jobs for moms and dads who want to use existing skills to start working from home. You can leverage your experience and start finding work on job platforms like UpWork and Fiverr. Plus, if you are looking for jobs where you work alone, many of the above can help.
There are many job sites where you can make a job profile or browse job listings for either free or a small fee.
19. Sell an online course
I created Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing in July of 2016 as my first online course. Since then, I have earned $1,000,000 from that single course.
And, you probably have a course in you too!
There are successful courses covering all sorts of different topics, such as:
- Parenting
- Woodworking
- Dog training
- Playing the guitar
- Languages
- Programming
- Traveling
- Watercolor painting
- Gardening
- Calligraphy
- Business
20. Write an eBook at home
Writing your own eBook is a great way to make money from home, and there is probably something super helpful that you could write about (even if you think otherwise!).
In fact, my friend Alyssa self-published her first book and has sold more than 13,000 copies.
She is now earning a great passive income of over $200 a day from her book ($6,500 in one month alone!).
21. Sell romance novels online
My friend Yuwanda Black has found one of the most interesting stay at home jobs. She writes romance novels, and in one month, she was able to make over $3,000!
I was able to have her share her experience here on Making Sense of Cents, and in the article (linked below) you’ll learn:
- How much money she has made writing romance novels
- Her top tips to start writing successful romance novels
- Why your romance novels don’t need to be as long as you think (in fact, her most successful romance books are under 10,000 words)
- How to sell romance novels on Amazon
22. Find a stay at home job in customer service
Many large companies outsource their customer service departments to people who are working from home.
Customer service representatives may be responsible for a number of things, such as:
- Working at an online call center
- Working as a chat agent
- Offering technical support
- Virtual assistant tasks
- Working as a travel agent
This is becoming one of the best stay at home jobs because the number of large companies that need online customer service reps is growing. Companies like Apple, American Express, UHAUL, and more are now all outsourcing their customer service jobs to workers at home.
23. Mystery shop at home
This won’t be a full-time job, but it could give you some extra money each month. And, yes, there are some mystery shops that can be done by phone and online.
I remember when I first heard of becoming a secret shopper. I was working at a retail store and we regularly had mystery shoppers come in and grade how we were doing. We never knew who the mystery shopper was, but we would get to read their report afterwards.
I thought it was so interesting that people were getting paid to shop!
Not long after hearing about it, I decided to try mystery shopping to make extra money to help pay off my student loan debt.
I regularly earned around $150 to $200 a month mystery shopping, and I earned free items/services as well, such as $100 to spend at restaurants (which I had to grade while I was there), makeup, and more.
If this sounds interesting to you, you can join Bestmark by clicking here. This is my favorite mystery shopping company, and the only one I used back when I was mystery shopping, so I know it’s legitimate.
Learn more at Want To Make An Extra $100 A Month? Learn How To Become A Mystery Shopper.
24. Be a voice over actor from home
A voice over actor is the person you hear but rarely see on YouTube videos, radio ads, explainer videos, corporate narration, documentaries, e-learning courses, audiobooks, TV commercials, video games, movies, and cartoons.
In 2014, Carrie replaced her salaried day job to become a full-time voice over actor. People are constantly asking her how she got her start and how they can too.
So, she created a six-week online class, and it sold out. Several of her students booked voice acting jobs before the class was even over!
I was excited to learn more about this stay at home job, so I interviewed Carrie to learn:
- How she got into this interesting career field
- Who the common clients are
- How much money a beginner voice over actor can expect to make
- The positives of this job
- How to find your first job
- The costs, and more
You can read my interview with her at How To Become A Voice Over Actor And Work From Anywhere.
25. Rent out spare rooms or a home
Yes, you can make money from home by renting out a spare bedroom or by investing in rental property to rent out in whole (such as an apartment or a house).
I interviewed my friend Paula, a woman in her 30’s who owns 7 rental homes, on this topic. Paula has been investing in real estate for over a decade. She’s been an out-of-state investor for five years and is able to make money from home. She currently has a portfolio of seven buy and hold rental properties, and she recently bought a duplex in March of 2021.
In this interview, you’ll learn:
- Is owning rental property profitable?
- How do you know if a rental property is a good investment?
- How much profit should you make on a rental property?
- How do you manage rentals from another part of the country? What happens if there’s a repair needed or if a tenant moves out?
- How do you deal with a bad renter? Have you had one before?
- What do you think of the current real estate market? Is it too hot to get into?
- What’s the best way for a person to get started with real estate investing as a beginner?
You can learn more at How This Woman In Her 30s Owns 7 Rental Homes.
26. Start a home bakery
Do you like to cook? You may be able to make money from home by starting a home bakery.
You can learn more at How To Make Extra Money By Starting A Home Bakery. Here, you’ll learn about the equipment needed to start a bakery, food laws, tips on pricing your baked goods, and more.
I also recommend reading How I Earned Up to $4,000 Per Month Baking Dog Treats (With Zero Baking Experience!) if you are interested in baking dog treats specifically.
27. Pet sit from home
If you love pets, then this is one of the best stay-at-home jobs for you. Pet owners are always looking for loving people to care for their pets when they go out of town.
You may be asked to go over to someone’s house, but you can specify that you only do in-home pet sitting. That’s actually what we’ve done with our pets when we can’t bring them with us.
If you’re interested in watching pets in your home, Rover is a platform where you can list your services and find clients.
28. Rent out your stuff when you’re not using it
Peer-to-peer rental platforms have gotten more and more popular over the past few years. It saves consumers money, and real people can make money from home renting out their stuff.
Renting out your stuff can feel somewhat passive, and that will allow you to pursue other stay at home jobs on this list as well.
Here is a list of things to rent out and which platforms are best:
- List your car on Turo: If you’re not using your car as much these days, you can list your car on Turo. Jeep Wranglers are the most popular vehicle to rent on Turo, and the average monthly earnings with one are $851.
- Rent out your pool: You can offset the cost of pool maintenance and make extra money from home by listing your pool on Swimply. How much you can make varies by location and pool amenities.
- Make money with your garage, attic, basement, or shed: Neighbor.com is a site where you can make money by letting people use your home for extra storage.
- Rent our RV: Instead of letting your RV sit in your driveway unused, you can list it on RVShare and make some semi-passive income. My sister rented an RV from them, and she had a great experience!
29. In-home daycare
This is one of the best stay at home jobs for parents because it allows you to easily stay home with your kids while making money.
Even if your kids are grown up and out of the house, your experience as a parent will go a long way with this job.
Depending on where you live, there may be some special licensing required. However, you may be able to start with just one or two children and not need to do any extra legal work. Just make sure you check with your city or state first.
You should also make sure your home is safe for kids and be CPR certified.
30. Sleep consultant
Sleep plays a crucial role in the growth and well-being of infants, as well as for their parents.
However, parents often encounter difficulties in ensuring their child gets the necessary sleep.
This is where pediatric sleep consultants prove invaluable. These professionals have expertise in addressing children’s sleep issues, enabling families to achieve restful nights. If you have a passion for working with children and aspire to make a positive impact on their lives, pursuing a career as a sleep coach could be an excellent choice.
Learn more at How To Become A Sleep Consultant And Make $10,000 Each Month.
31. Earn income as a Pinterest virtual assistant from home
Working as a Pinterest virtual assistant is a more specialized version of the job above, and it’s a growing field as more and more business owners are using Pinterest to grow their business.
This is where you help businesses reach new customers on Pinterest. This could be:
- Designing Pinterest images for a website
- Helping business owners set up their Pinterest account
- Scheduling pins (this can be very time consuming for the average business owner)
- Brainstorming a marketing plan
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