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7 Real Estate Side Hustles To Earn Up to 6 Figures

May 15, 2025

5 min Read

Written by G. Brian Davis

Edited by Jenna Klaverweiden

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Half of Americans bring in extra income from side hustles, according to MarketWatch.

They’re not all earning peanuts, either. Some real estate side hustles, for example, can generate six figures a year in extra income. GOBankingRates asked real estate experts about profitable real estate side hustles, and theses ones came up as the top options for high income with low labor.

Also see five side gigs that require a lot of work but pay off big-time.

Real Estate Photography

Professional real estate photographers know how to present homes in their best light — literally.

They use subtle lenses and angles to make rooms look ever-so-slightly larger, choose the time of day with the most flattering light, and remove clutter from frames before shooting.

“Real estate photographers typically earn $150-$400 per shoot with low overhead,” said Elena Novak, real estate analyst at PropertyChecker. And if you have a drone, you can upcharge for drone shots and videos.

Real Estate Wholesaling

Wholesaling involves finding an outstanding deal on a fixer-upper and then selling the contract to a house flipper.

For example, you put a house under contract for $150,000, even though it’s worth $200,000. You send an email blast to your buyers’ list of house flippers, and within a few hours someone agrees to buy your contract for $160,000. You just made $10,000 — and you never had to buy the property, make a down payment or lift a finger in repairs.

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Sergio Aguinaga wholesales and flips houses himself at Michigan Houses For Cash. “The gross profit on a wholesaling business can reach upwards of a million dollars per year,” he said.

Flipping Houses

Flipping houses takes more work, but it can prove extremely lucrative. Still, it comes with risks most don’t understand.

“It is really easy to overspend on a project and end up having a much lower ROI on the investment,” said Adam Hamilton, co-founder of REI Hub. That goes for both overspending the property and overspending on renovations.

Flipping Land

Don’t want to hassle with contractors, permits, city inspectors and finicky homebuyers?

Flip raw land instead. It involves sending direct mailers to land owners, especially distressed owners in tax sale or out-of-state owners, and making them a low cash offer. You can buy at $0.25 or $0.50 on the dollar, and then turn around and sell the parcel retail for full market value.

Alternatively, you can take this strategy a step further by actually improving the land’s value. That doesn’t necessarily mean building on it, either.

Wayne Seminoff explained this strategy in an episode of “The Side Hustle Show.” He finds unbuildable parcels with title issues, access issues or other constraints, and then works with the neighbors and city hall to figure out a solution to get a building permit. If he can solve the problems, that parcel jumps in value by 10 to 100 times.

Owning Short-Term Rentals

You’ve probably booked a short-term rental through Airbnb or Vrbo, and maybe even considered owning one.

“If you own a property in a high-demand area — near a beach, tourist hub or large city — you can make $2,000 to $10,000 or more each month depending on occupancy and nightly rate,” explained Drake Shadwell of Clever Real Estate.

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Managing Short-Term Rentals

Want to get your foot in the door of the short-term rental business but don’t want have tens of thousands for a down payment?

Paul Dashevsky, co-founder of accessory dwelling unit builder Maxable, noted that many Airbnb owners don’t want the hassle of managing them. “Most hire a manager to handle all the logistics like listing, coordination with tenants, cleaning and so on,” he said.

House Hacking

What if you could turn your home into a revenue-generating machine that earned enough money to cover your mortgage?

Real estate investor Phil Green of I Buy San Diego recommended multifamily house hacking. It involves buying a two-to-four-unit property with a conventional mortgage, moving into one unit and renting out the others. “In some places like California and Florida, you can absolutely cover your entire mortgage and some,” he said.

Other more traditional real estate side hustles include buying long-term rental properties, property management and selling houses as a Realtor. There’s plenty of money to be made in real estate side gigs — for those willing to find a niche and master it.

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