Best and Worst Passive Income Ideas for 2022

Mandy C.
9 min readJan 25, 2022

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Get off on the right foot.

So, what’s one of those things that’s better than winning the lottery?

I’ll answer that for you — Passive Income.

First things first, when I say passive income, I don’t really mean that you won’t have to do a thing to bring in the cash. Remember, to make money, you need to offer value.

So, with that in mind, a passive income activity offers value to people and thus generates money, but without requiring you to trade your time and effort.

But even with that said, passive income activities might still need some maintenance to some extent.

Writing and then publishing a book is an excellent example that I love to use to explain the idea of passive income. See, once you are done, it’s now available in book stores and other retailers for sale, which means you can now even make money as you sleep.

Keep in mind, you did all the work “once,” but now, every time it sells, even years later, you make some money in the form of passive income.

Are we together up to this point?

Great.

Now let’s look at the 5 best passive income ideas for 2022.

1. Start a YouTube Channel

Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash

Starting a YouTube channel kicks off our list of the 5 best passive income ideas for 2022. It’s straightforward since all you have to do to create your channel is go on YouTube.com, film some videos with your phone, and upload them for people to see.

But that’s just the surface of things. To actually grow on YouTube, you need to create excellent videos and offer valuable content, which is something I am still learning to master (I am a Youtuber in case you don’t know yet).

What about making money on the platform? That’s what you want to know. Right?

To start earning passive income from the platform, you must be eligible for monetization. That means reaching the 1,000 subscribers’ milestone and 4,000 hours of watch time.

Don’t let that worry you.

These milestones are achievable but note that “achievable” does not mean easy in any way.

All the same, if the averages are anything to go by, it takes about 90 something videos to get to 1,000 subs.

In my case, I reached 1,000 subs after 5 months of posting videos once a week, which essentially means that it took me around 20 videos to get to 1000 subs, and I am really grateful to my subscribers for that.

Even so, I still haven’t attained the 4,000 hours watch time milestone because my retention rate needs to be improved.

This is one of my goals for 2022 as I plan to offer viewers even more valuable content to make them stick around for longer!

Basically, I am saying that you need to be ready to put in the effort and time to start making money on YouTube.

So, let’s assume all of this is already behind you; how much can you make in passive income from YouTube?

For the sake of easy calculations, let’s use the average of $2 for every 1,000 views. That means that if you want to make $100 in passive income from YouTube, you need 50,000 views.

Not to forget, views from old videos count too, and this is where the passive thing really plays out.

2. Start a Membership Website

Photo by Igor Miske on Unsplash

In case you do not know, a membership website is a site that you create and put content on, and for people to access this content, they need to subscribe to the website.

You will often have to provide content that people can access at no cost, just to give them a taste of things. But to access the premium content, they have to pay a monthly membership fee. You will charge the subscriptions depending on the type of content or how premium it is.

On average, the cheapest membership sites go for $5 while the most expensive ones go as high as $ 100's.

So, it’s really up to you to gauge how much income you want every month to see how many subscribers you will need and how much your subscriptions will go for.

As of the filming of this video, I am working on my membership website where you and other members can access my meditations and courses on activating your financial and spiritual power. I really look forward to sharing more info with you.

Feel free to head on to my website — www.mandyc.co — and check out my blog posts for the time being.

3. Vending Machines

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Vending machines are an excellent example of a passive income idea since they provide a steady income stream without requiring much effort, especially if you automate things.

It is a very promising activity seeing as the global market for vending machines, estimated at $134.4 Billion in the year 2020, is projected to reach a revised size of $146.6 Billion by 2027.

The trick with vending machines is location.

You want to put yours in a good neighbourhood and visible place so you can rake in decent returns per week. Besides, you also have to sell the right products for your target area.

What does the investment cost? You might ask.

The majority of the costs to start a vending machine business come from the vending machine and the stock items. With as little as a $2,000 investment, you can easily have your basic vending machine business up and running.

Keep in mind; many vending machine operators recommend buying used or refurbished machines, which you can find between $1,200 and $3,000.

Depending on its size and features, a new vending machine will cost anywhere from $3,000 to $10,000.

What about licensing?

The licenses and permits you will need to operate a vending machine will vary depending on the state and even the country where you live.

Licenses and costs are a detail to check into before you purchase machines so that you have them established before installation.

Do vending machine owners pay rent?

Yes, vending machine owners pay rent or commission to the building/property owner. Vending machine owners generally pay between 5% to 20% of their vending machine sales as rent or commission.

And are these machines taxed?

Vending machines are charged sales tax on the revenue they generate. The amount of sales tax varies depending on your state.

Last but not least, be sure to explore your vending machine business financing options. Speaking of which, the best financing options include a short-term loan, equipment financing, and inventory financing.

4. Start a Print on Demand Business

Photo by Onlineprinters on Unsplash

A decade ago, this business was impossible. It only became mainstream in recent years, which means it has room for growth.

So, what is the idea with this activity?

Print on demand is a process where you work with a supplier of white-label products, for example, baseball hats or tote bags, and then you customize those products and sell them on a per-order basis under your own brand and with your own designs.

You do not pay for the cost of the product until after you’ve actually sold it, so there’s no need to buy in bulk or hold any inventory yourself.

The best part?

With print-on-demand services, everything after the sale, whether it’s digital printing, order fulfilment, or shipping, is handled by your supplier.

Once you’ve set everything up, it takes only a few clicks to fulfil an order after you’ve made a sale.

What’s more passive than that?

What are the best print-on-demand companies out there in 2022?

If you are in China, the best print-on-demand companies include Yoycol, Printy6, and Alibaba.

For those in the US, consider Printful, Printify, CustomCat, and SPOD.

5. Investing in Index Funds

Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash

If you have your money sitting in a savings account, it’s really not doing much for you.

You can use it to generate passive income by investing in index funds such as the S&P 500.

Speaking of which, if you put say $1,000 in this index, that essentially means that your money is distributed across the top 500 biggest US companies, think Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Google.

The S&P 500 index has been known to offer a 10% return on investment (ROI) over decades, making it an excellent index to consider for generating passive income.

The Invesco QQQ Trust (or simply QQQ) is also an excellent option for you.

It is an exchange-traded fund (ETF) based on the Nasdaq-100 Index. The Fund will, under most circumstances, consist of all of the stocks in the Index.

QQQ includes 100 of the largest domestic and international nonfinancial companies listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market based on market capitalization.

In the last 10 years, the Invesco QQQ Trust (QQQ) ETF obtained a 22.88% compound annual return,

Ready to get started? Sign up with an online brokerage like Webull.

Now for the Worst Passive Income Ideas for 2022

While a business idea may sound enticing, especially when you see someone else doing it, it may be far from rosy or even worth it. With that in mind, what are probably the five worst passive income ideas you can pursue this year?

1. Real Estate Investments

Photo by Tierra Mallorca on Unsplash

If you’re a beginner looking for a viable passive income idea, I wouldn’t recommend real estate investing.

On the outside, it seems easy. You buy a piece of property, markup the price, and sell it, right?

Not quite.

Apart from being highly capital intensive to start, real estate investments are also time-consuming in terms of customer care, property maintenance, marketing, etc.

2. House Flipping

The same goes for house flipping.

Don’t be deceived by what you see on TV.

House flipping isn’t about buying /renting a beat-down house, applying a coat of paint, and cashing in big time.

Repairing and renovating a home to resell at a profit takes several hours of intense work and can run on for several weeks.

So, unless you plan on getting professionals to do everything for you, house flipping is definitely not a passive income option.

However, if you do want to invest in real estate, you can still do that by investing in real estate investment trusts, REITs, which function like index funds.

2. Buying Standalone Stocks and Private Companies Equity

This idea is probably the worst on the list (in my opinion). And that’s because it’s super-risky, especially if you’re just looking for a regular and steady stream of income.

Also, you require a lot of knowledge and time researching that particular company and industry.

This method also requires you to ‘time the market right’. You’re better off going for dividend-paying index funds.

3. Social Media Influencer

Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash

There’s a common misconception that being an influencer is all about making money by posting selfies.

But not many people see the work behind the content that influencer produce every day.

It is intense work and can never really be a passive income option.

Also, when we talk about passive income, we are talking about an income stream that doesn’t rely on our effort in the long term, which you can’t achieve by being an influencer.

I have also heard of many people who are very popular on social media but not making a decent return from that, and that’s my message for you — Popularity doesn’t equal Profitability.

4. Content Creation Without Marketing

One of the worst passive income ideas you can try is churning out creative videos, blog posts, eBooks, or any other type of content with little to no promotion.

Your target consumers won’t find your content just because it’s online.

There are millions of other things competing for their attention.

For my YouTube videos, I have hired a team of SEO experts to help me improve my titles and descriptions, which may be one of the reasons people found me and my channel grew faster than average.

The bottom line is, if you aren’t promoting your content, it’s probably never going to give you any ROI.

I hope you got some valuable pointers from this article. If you want to learn more about how to reclaim your emotional, spiritual and financial sovereignty, be sure to check out my pages / YouTube channel.

If you would like to support me and read other amazing articles on Medium, join Medium with my referral link. ❤️

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Mandy C.

Licensed Corporate Finance Adviser, Spiritual Wealth Coach, Podcast Host