From renting your drive to Airbnb hosting, five ways you can earn easy money without getting off the sofa

NEED to pay off a big Christmas credit card bill or just want a bit of extra cash in 2025? It may be simpler than you think.

Here, Laura Miller explains how “passive income” works and suggests five easy ways you can get involved.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

PASSIVE income refers to income generated with little to no work. The idea is that once you find a way to create a passive income, it ticks over almost by itself.

Anyone can earn up to £1,000 a year tax-free from a side hustle, through the “trading allowance”. But this income must be declared on a self-assessment tax return.

Traditional sources of passive income include rent from buy-to-let properties and dividends from investments.

But there are other ways to get involved that don’t require much cash up front.

RUN FACEBOOK GROUPS

£900 a month

YOU could earn hundreds of pounds by getting deals on social media pages you manage.

Tom Gill, 39, who lives in Surrey with wife Carla and their one-year-old daughter Riley, uses Facebook groups to make extra income from his campervan business, Bearwood Campers.

Tom runs three campervan-related Facebook groups which give him a passive income of almost £11,000 a year.

He makes around £5,000 a year from partnerships with campervan-related companies looking to promote themselves on his social media groups.

He makes another £3,000 a year selling campervan festival wall planners through his Facebook groups, and £240 a month from a partnership with a campervan insurance company he promotes online.

He says: “If you are part of a niche industry or hobby and there is information you want to find, but can’t, then there is a void to fill.

“Don’t underestimate the power of Facebook groups and the desire for community and information on fun things.” Tom says it was “easy and quick to set up” and he now only spends an hour a week on the side hustle.

To create a Facebook Business Page, log into Facebook, click “pages” on the left hand side and then click “create new page”. Enter the pa­ge name and category and press “create page”.

Managing the page, posting and viewing insights are free, but you can pay for optional services like ads and boosting posts.

AIRBNB HOSTING

£500 a month

RENTING out a room in your home for short-term lets through a platform like Airbnb could earn you an average of £500 a month, though it depends on where you live.

Properties in tourist hotspots will attract more visitors and can net higher prices for overnight stays.

This is especially true during the summer months or during popular sporting or entertainment events.

Airbnb has a calculator to show how much you could earn.

For example, renting out an entire two-bed property in Manchester could get you £126 a night, totalling £882 for a week’s stay.

Or one room in a house in London could earn you £65 a night, so £455 a week. In 2022, Airbnb said the typical UK host earned just over £6,000 a year by renting out property on its platform.

To join them, you need to create an Airbnb account and select “Airbnb your home”. Describe your property and upload photos, set rates and add discounts, then review and publish your listing.

You will still need to do a bit of work for your passive income. As well as managing bookings you’ll need to clean in between stays — but many Airbnb hosts hire a cleaning firm to do this.

RENT OUT YOUR DRIVEWAY

£330 a month

IF you have a house or flat with a drive or parking space, you could make up to £4,000 a year renting it out through an app like JustPark.

Simply choose the days and hours that suit you and set your own price. Then just sit back and watch the bookings roll in. You really don’t need to do anything else.

More than 13million drivers use JustPark in the UK, according to the company.

Demand for parking is highest in big cities and towns so you can charge more in those areas.

JustPark will keep three per cent from your set price.

WRITE AN E-BOOK

£100 a month

DO you maybe have a book in you? There’s no need to hire an agent or try to convince a publisher about your idea.

You can write and self-publish your book straight on to the internet in the form of an eBook.

Amazon is the biggest eBook marketplace in the world, selling around 487million a year, according to some estimates. You can use its Kindle Direct Publishing online platform.

There are no upfront costs, but you will divvy-up the cash from any sales with Amazon.

You could keep 70 per cent or 35 per cent of the income, depending on the options chosen, and there is a ceiling below which all takings are yours.

EBooks sell for anything between 99p to £13.99 and beyond. So if you priced yours at the lowest level and sold a realistic 100 copies a month, you could earn almost £100, before Amazon takes a cut.

Crime, and thrillers are among the best-selling categories, as well as self-help books and those on money and hobbies such as cooking.

USE YOUR CAR FOR ADVERTISING

£166 a month

YOU could make upwards of £2,000 a year if you have a car in good condition that you’re willing to lend to advertisers.

You just need to have a wrap put over it advertising a company with their logo and brand, according to vinyl car wrapping company 3Dom Wraps.

Just sign up to an online platform to get matched to advertisers. You can then accept or deny certain brands and campaigns.

The advertising wraps are not designed to be permanent, so can be removed quite easily.