As you read this post, I will be boarding my fight and heading to England! But my blog won’t be taking a vacation, thanks to my wonderful guest posters. I’d like to introduce you to my first guest, Sun Lutz. She shares how she uses her frugal hobbies to generate income – and as a special treat, she is also hosting a giveaway for Super Coupon Girl readers!

About Sun:

I live in Madison, WI – a little oasis in the Midwest. Married 14 years with 3 kids. The two older kids have moved out of the house. Just the 13-year-old boy lives at home with us. My husband and I both work as independent consultants. We work when the right opportunity comes along and enjoy our time off.

Saving money is great, but my true passion is generating income. I especially like hobbies that generate money. I have been a mystery shopper on and off for the last 20 years. I currently shop for 5 mystery shop companies. Over the years, I have mystery- shopped grocery stores, car washes, bicycle stores and restaurants to name a few. I recently completed a mystery shop where I was able to get 3 rooms professionally shampooed for free. I was fully reimbursed $100 for the carpet cleaning and was paid an additional $10 shopper fee. Once the shop was completed, I filled out a short evaluation form on line. A common pay structure is full reimbursement for the purchased item and a small shopper fee. As you might guess, the pay greatly depends on the popularity of the shop, and availability of mystery shoppers in your area. I have been paid as much as $25 bonus to complete a simple submarine shop. That was on top of the full reimbursement for the meal + drink and a $8 shopper fee. If you’re interested in mystery shopping, I highly recommend checking out the MSPA website. This website will show you opportunities available within your areas. Each mystery shop companies have their own enrollment process. Be sure to sign up separately for each company, and follow their specific instructions. A legitimate mystery shop company will never charge you to become a mystery shopper. Do not pay a sign-up fee, however nominal!

My second way of generating additional income is by selling things on E-bay. I only sell things I get for free or items I no longer need. I often sell junk mail on E-bay. The old saying “ one man’s junk is another man’s treasure” could not be more true on E-bay. I once sold a hotel voucher for $50 that I got as junk mail. Hotel vouchers generally sell very well on E-bay. I am currently selling a $75 off a night’s stay, and the bid is already at 7.99. I also scour the Free section on Craig’s List for potential items to sell. My biggest score came 2 months ago. This lady had boxes of specialty baby oil she needed to get rid of. She was moving out of the state the next day, and could not take it with her. I have over 150 units of this oil. I am selling it on E-bay for 10.99 shipped. I sell at a rate of 10 units/month. I will make close to $1000 dollars with this deal. If you’re interested in selling things on E-Bay, I recommend that you set up a Pay Pal Account. Pay Pal is the payment of choice on E-Bay, and you will lose a lot of business if that payment option is not allowed. Before you place your ad on E-bay, do a search for similar items. Take a look at the auctions that are doing well. Write your ad in a similar fashion, and start your bid around the same price. If the starting bid is too high, you will scare off all the bargain hunters. I find that bids beget more bids. Bids that start out low and generate a buzz will often fetch a higher final price, than bids start high and fizzle out. However, I also find that opposite is true. If you start your bid too low, there is a perception that your item is of bad quality. So, here is my rule of thumb. If an item is a popular commodity, (e.g. an I Pod) start the bid low. The quality will never be in question, and you will attract a lot of attention. If an item is truly a popular commodity, your down side is low even if you start out with a ridiculously low starting price. If you’re selling a niche item (antiques), start your price moderately high. If someone wants that specialty item, price is usually of little concern. And besides, you likely will only have a few buyers, and your item may even sell at the starting bid price.

And Sun has kindly offered to give away one of her baby oil sets to one lucky reader! What a fun way to kick off my vacation posts!

This set includes cradle cap baby oil, a brush, and comb.

Here’s how to enter:

1. For your first entry, just leave a comment on this post! Be sure to leave an email address with your comment, so that I may notify you in the event that you are the lucky winner!

Want extra entries? Do any of the following, and leave a separate comment for each one:

2. Link to this post on your blog, then come back here and leave me the link!
3. Write about this on Twitter, then come back and leave me the link to your tweet!

This giveaway will end on May 18th at 11:59 PM PST. A winner will be chosen on May 19th via Random.org and notified by email. Please be sure to leave your email address, either in your post or in your blogger profile, so that I can get in touch if you win. Email address will be used only to notify winner. If the winner does not respond after 48 hours, a new winner will be chosen. Giveaway is open to US residents.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 1st, 2009 at 1:00 pm and is filed under Giveaways, Guest Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.