How to Make $15,000 Fast AF (Online & Offline Strategies)

Wondering how to make $15,000 fast?

You’re in good company. 

Scraping together $15k can have a huge impact on your life.

Maybe you’re eyeing a trip to the Maldives. 

Maybe you need to cover a medical emergency. 

Or maybe you’re ready to give your debt the final middle finger it deserves.

Either way, here’s how to make $15k fast with realistic strategies.

How to make $15,000 Fast: 11 Proven Ways

By “fast”, we’re talking in 3 months or less. 

By stacking some of these ideas together, it may be significantly less.

The goal is to be realistic here. 

Sure, you could head to Vegas, throw all your chips on red, and pray for the best. But that’s just plain dumb (sorry to all you gamblers out there). 

Today, we’re focused on ways that keep you in control of the outcome. 

1. Sell your stuff

The first step is to put a dent into that $15k goal by profiting from items around your home. 

Selling non-essential belongings can quickly add a few thousand dollars to your bank account. This makes it easier to hit your goal using the rest of these strategies.

You can sell things like: 

✔️ Quality furniture
✔️ Unused gift cards
✔️ Work tools and equipment
✔️ Electronics such as laptops and cameras
✔️ Designer clothing, shoes, and accessories

Heck, if you’re really desperate for those 15 Gs, you may even consider selling your car or downsizing. This works best if you live in an area with solid public transportation. 

To sell, list your items on sites like eBay, Craigslist, and Facebook Marketplace. You can also through an old-fashioned garage sale if you want a blast from the past. 

I’ve sold quite a few items in my day. And I’ve found that if you want money fast, it’s worth it to slightly underprice your items. 

For example, by charging 5% to 10% less than similar listings, you could sell your item in a day vs. a month. 

To me, that time savings is usually worth it — especially when you need cash fast.

2. Virtual assistant

By becoming a VA, you can make solid money if you have a few high-paying skills under your belt. 

Entry-level assistants may not earn enough to reach $15,000 in less than three months. But if you invest a week in learning a valuable skill, your earnings can skyrocket.

The math:

If you work 50 hours per week for 12 weeks (I’m assuming you’re willing to hustle to hit your goal), you’d need to charge $25 per hour to hit $15,000. 

By honing your skills, you can charge more and reach your goal even faster. As a specialized VA with a productive system in place, it’s not unheard of to charge $40 per hour (in the US). 

At 50 hours/week, you’ll hit $15k after 7.5 weeks. 

Now, if we’re being totally realistic, you’re not going to instantly have 50 hours per week of client work. Finding clients takes time, so you need to factor that in as well. 

You don’t need any qualifications to become a VA, and you can teach yourself everything you need to know using the internet. 

That said, if it’s your first rodeo into running an online business, you may want to use these virtual assistant courses to help you slash the learning curve.

This free VA checklist is another solid place to start. 

3. Flip things for profit

You can turn a profit by buying undervalued items and reselling them for more. 

For example, flipping cars can be a lucrative venture. Spending just 15 minutes on Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist each morning may reveal undervalued cars ripe for flipping.

The math:

Hypothetical example — Let’s say you flip two cars per month for $1,500 profit each. After three months, you’re over halfway to your goal. 

Now, in reality, you may have to get a little more creative than cars. There are legal limits on how many car flips you can do without a dealer’s license (yeah I know, rules are so dumb). So it’s important to do your research for your area.

Even if you’re restricted in the number of cars you can flip, combining this side hustle with other types of flips can get you closer to your goal.

Here are some other ideas:

▶️ Look for clearance items or garage sales to find deeply discounted items. 

▶️ Use apps like eBay, Depop, or Poshmark to resell clothing and accessories.

▶️ Search for other high-value items like furniture, other types of vehicles, expensive electronics, cookware, etc. 

Think of it like a treasure hunt, where every new find can potentially add to your overall earnings. 

4. Create a course

Creating an online course is a powerful way to rake in cash fast. 

If you already have skills and expertise others want to learn, why not share it with the world?

The math:

If you sell your course for $300, you’d only need to find 50 customers to reach that golden $15,000 mark. That is perfectly achievable in less than 3 months if you’re strategic about it.

The first step is picking an in-demand (and ideally underserved) topic.

This could be fitness plans, cooking lessons, gardening tips, meditation guides, language learning lessons — you name it. The key is to find the overlap between your knowledge and a problem that people have.  

For example, Julie, a self-taught web developer living in an RV, created an online course called WP Rockstar that teaches women how to build WordPress sites. It is now a 7-figure business.

Once you’ve nailed your topic, the second step is running a successful course launch. 

If you don’t have an audience of your own to promote to, you can “borrow” other people’s audiences through collaborations, guest blogging, guest podcasting, and setting up an affiliate program. 

5. Amazon FBA

Amazon FBA is a business model that allows you to get your products in front of a massive audience, all without having to hassle with handling inventory and shipping.

Reaching your income goal of $15,000 in 3 months is possible, but only once you have at least one well-performing product stocked and selling on Amazon. 

The math:

Let’s say you had 3 products that earn an average of $10 per unit sold, and you sold these 3 products in 5 different countries. You would need to sell an average of 1 unit of each product per country per day to hit $15,000 in three months.

Not so bad when you break the numbers down, right?

If you’re starting from scratch, this will obviously take longer. That’s because it takes time to research products, order and wait for samples, order and wait for inventory, test to see how the product sells, order more inventory, etc.

That said, you could do all the preliminary work now, put the project on the back burner for a couple of months while you work on another money-making method, and then ramp things up once your products get to Amazon.

This business model has certainly gotten more competitive over the years. Before jumping in headfirst, you might wanna read this post on if Amazon FBA is still worth it. 

The cheapest, lowest-risk way to dip your toes in the water is with this Amazon selling blueprint.

Other E-Commerce Platforms (Etsy, Shopify, etc.).

Amazon isn’t the only e-commerce platform in town. 

You can also make good money using other platforms like Shopify and Etsy, although they each have distinct strategies. 

If shipping physical products sounds like too much of a hassle, you can also sell popular digital products on Etsy. 

6. Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is a strategy that essentially lets you sell products without stocking inventory or handling customer service. 

Sounds great, right?

In this hustle, you promote and sell products from other companies. You earn a commission when someone purchases through your unique affiliate link.

Affiliate marketing is a win-win-win situation if done with integrity. You earn a commission from the products you promote, the buyer gets value from them, and the company makes sales.

The math:

Let’s say you join an affiliate program with a 50% commission rate. To hit $15,000 in 3 months, you need to generate $30,000 in sales — about $333 per day. 

With an average product price of $100, that’s just over 3 sales a day. If the average product price was $1000, you could hit $15,000 in one month with just 1 sale per day. 

This is much easier to achieve if you already have your own targeted audience to tap into, whether that be a blog, social media following, Youtube channel, or community. 

But even if you don’t have your own audience, there’s still hope. You could:

☑️ Run paid ads targeting people interested in the products you’re promoting.

☑️ Use Pinterest to send users to a landing page that promotes a product. 

☑️ Write engaging product reviews and tutorials on platforms like Medium.

☑️ Actively search out people who are looking for product recommendations in Facebook groups and forums. 

☑️ Tap into your current network to see if there are any opportunities (Ex. A friend starting a business who needs a website could use your affiliate links for different services). 

☑️ Start a niche blog and learn SEO strategies to drive traffic and earn affiliate income passively (long-term strategy). Here’s a free resource to get you started. 

This last method is what I personally use to earn passive income, and I learned some cool strategies from The Affiliate Lab and Authority Hacker training programs.

See my full list of best affiliate marketing courses for my other top recommendations (I’ve taken a lot!).

7. Freelance your skills

One of the best ways to earn $15,000 fast is to put your skills to work as a freelancer. 

This can include both online and in-person services, like:

Online:

▶️ Writing, proofreading, and editing
▶️ Graphic design
▶️ Social media management
▶️ Web development

In-person:

▶️ Power washing
▶️ Dog walking
▶️ Wedding photography
▶️ Event planning
▶️ Skill teaching

These ideas just scratch the surface of what you could offer. 

Let’s say you offer a basic WordPress website setup for new small businesses. 

This is something you could learn to do in a couple days with a free trial of Skillshare. 

The math:

You charge businesses a $300 setup fee, and it takes you one day to finish each site. If you’re able to find one client a day using platforms like Upwork and Fiverr, you’d hit your goal after 50 days. 

The best way to get your first client is to tap into your existing network. When you’re brand new and don’t have a portfolio to show, you’ll have better odds of landing work with someone who already knows and trusts you. 

Do an awesome job for them, gather a testimonial and results, then use those to land future clients. 

8. Drop servicing

Drop servicing is like freelancing on steroids.

You land clients, then outsource all the work to other freelancers, keeping a piece of the profit for yourself.

Since you’re not doing the work yourself, your income is no longer tied to how many hours you put in. You’re only limited by the number of clients you can land.

The keys to success are:

☑️ Choosing a high-demand niche with high profit margins.

☑️ Partnering with reliable freelancers at lower rates.

☑️ Marketing your services and closing clients.

Let’s assume you provide a service priced at $500, your freelancer’s cost is $200, and you spend $50 on advertising. 

Your profit per project would be $250. To reach $15,000, you’d need 60 clients within 3 months – that’s about 5 clients per week.

If you offer a service that requires ongoing work and charge a monthly fee, you’d need even fewer clients to hit your goal.

To learn more about how all this works in practice, check out these free and paid drop servicing courses.

9. Rent your belongings and space

Don’t underestimate the power of renting out your stuff to boost your earnings. 

While you might not get to $15k just from renting, combining this passive income source with other money-making projects will speed up the progress toward your goal.

You can rent things like:

▶️ Property, bedrooms on Airbnb
▶️ Cars on Turo
▶️ RVs on Outdoorsy
▶️ Parking spaces, backyards, and storage space on Neighbor
▶️ Clothes on RentMyWardrobe

The math:

Imagine you rent out a room on Airbnb for 20 nights per month, earning $50 a night. That’s an extra $1000 per month. 

On top of that, you rent out a parking space on the side of your house for $100 per month, and your car on Turo for 10 days per month at $40 a day, pocketing you another $400. 

Over three months, that’s $4,500 in almost passive income.

Since renting doesn’t take up much time, you can still use active earning strategies to earn the remaining $11,500.

10. Get paid to be an online friend

It sounds weird, but it’s real.

You can make money in your downtime by becoming an online friend. 

No, it won’t make you $15,000 instantly, but every little bit counts. 

Filling your free time with an easy income-generating activity like virtual friendship will get you to your goal faster than binging Netflix. 

Start by offering virtual friendship services on platforms like Rent a Friend. 

According to their website, skilled friends can charge up to $50 per hour, while basic companions earn around $20 per hour. 

These income rates won’t turn your world upside down, but they can certainly give your bank account a lift.

As a virtual friend, you can do things like:

 ☑️ Be a listening ear for someone who needs to vent.

 ☑️ Help people learn and practice languages like English.

 ☑️ Share your hobbies and interests with curious clients.

 ☑️ Offer expert advice in areas where you have experience.

Get paid to talk to lonely people who are craving companionship.

It sure is a crazy we live in, isn’t it?

Here’s a video on what it’s actually like to be a “rental friend” that I found super interesting. 

11. Move to a cheaper location

If you’re really determined to make $15,000 fast and willing to do whatever it takes, one powerful strategy is to move somewhere cheap. 

This could be:

✔️ A country with a lower cost of living, like Mexico.
✔️ Moving into your motorhome.
✔️ Finding a long-term housesitting gig.

By cutting your living expenses, your savings go into hyperdrive — especially if you’re able to simultaneously rent out your current home. 

This is exactly what I did when I started my online business from Colombia.

The best part is, this strategy can be combined with the other side hustles we covered. 

The math:

• Monthly rent earned from your home: $2000
• Monthly savings from moving somewhere with a lower cost of living: $1500
• Monthly side hustle income: $1500

This is probably one of the easiest ways to make $5,000 a month in terms of actual work. 

That’s because in this hypothetical scenario, you’d only have to earn $1,500 per month from your side hustle. The rest comes from simply changing up your location.

This is one of the cheapest ways to live, and it’ll make your savings account smile. 

What’s your timeline? 

Your game plan all comes down to exactly how fast you need to make $15k. 

We covered how to do it in 3 months max, but what if you need the cash even faster?

How to make $15,000 in a day

To make $15,000 in a day, you don’t have many options. You could try to sell your car and any expensive belongings you have, but there’s no guarantee you’ll find all the buyers in 24 hours. 

You may just end up having to take out a loan. 

This is assuming that you’re starting from absolute scratch.

If you’ve already built up a business or audience, you can run a special promotion for a quick payday. 

How to make $15k in a week

A week gives you more wiggle room to sell your belongings.

If you need the money for a good cause, you may also be able to use a fundraiser like GoFundMe to hit your goal. 

Between selling stuff and fundraisers, you can help close the gap by offering handyman and yardwork services around your neighborhood (or through handyman apps). 

The more specialized skills you have, the more you can charge. 

How to make $15,000 in a month

With a month, you can combine multiple strategies including renting your stuff and property, fundraisers, selling your belongings, and in-person or online freelance work. 

Since time is still tight, you need to choose strategies that allow you to find customers fast. 

You won’t have much time for training in new skills or working your way up the ladder. So make a list of skills or services you could offer today, then think of people you know who might be interested in them.