371. Real estate brokers earn a 6% commission on every house they sell. That's $6,000 every time they sell a $100,000 house. So with all that profit potential, the real estate business is extremely competitive.
But a similar business - with similar profit potential - exists, yet there's absolutely ZERO competition. Instead of brokering houses, what about brokering cars? Most people are forced to try and sell their used cars themselves. But if you offer to do all the work for them for a 6% commission, many many people will take you up on your offer. I certainly would. The owner cleans it up and certifies that it's running okay. Then all you have to do is the same thing a real estate broker does - advertise it for sale and then "show" it to prospective buyers. On a $10,000 car, your commission would be $600, so I don't see any reason why this couldn't be a $60,000 a year part-time business, at least.


372. We live in a celebrity culture. But we also live in a throw-away culture. A man in Florida is taking advantage of these two tendencies simultaneously. First, he created a list of all the "celebrities" in his area. Then, he determined the garbage pick-up routes for those areas. Early in the morning, before the garbage truck arrives, he scopes out the "celebrity trash" for anything interesting. Occasionally he finds some amazing things... with real collectibility. Once he found a celebrity's entire album collection in 4 paper bags on the curb! (Apparently the celebrity had re-purchased everything on CD.) Because of the provenance of this collection, he was able to sell it for thousands!


373. Local professionals are always looking for ways of attracting new clients. They also tend to be too busy to actively promote their practice. Here's a way of taking advantage of those two facts. If you can write, there's a tremendous market for ghostwriting articles for these professionals. These articles are intended to be submitted to their local newspapers. In other words, you could approach a local attorney and offer to write him 52 weekly articles that he can submit to the local newspaper. This will provide the attorney with excellent publicity and it also increases his credibility as a local expert. And as long as your rates are cheaper than traditional newspaper ads of the same size, it makes financial sense for him. And it's not just attorneys you can sell this service too... accountants, dentists, bankers, chiropractors, eye doctors, dermatologists, travel agencies or anyone else who can benefit from a weekly column in their local paper.


374. The reason why pizza is so popular in America is because of home delivery. I know people who aren't even particularly fond of pizza, but who order it anyway because they don't have any food in the house and because they don't want to go out. Here's a way to take advantage of that tendency. Offer a service that turns EVERY restaurant in your area into a "home delivery" restaurant. By offering a flat fee of say, $5 or $10, to home-deliver items from any restaurant, you will be absolutely SWAMPED on the weekends. I know a guy who does this JUST for the local "Outback" restaurant, and he gets 15-20 orders a night on Friday and Saturday. And since he only delivers to homes with about a 5 mile radius, he doesn't waste much time. This would also be the kind of business where you could actually hire a couple of drivers on-the-cheap, and expand the business tremendously.


375. Almost every medium-to-large business has an "employee manual" and 99% of the content in it is completely independent of the company. In other words, the employee manual at Company A, with just a few changes, could work just as well as the employee manual for Company B. So here's how to make money with this. Get hold of as many employee manuals as you can and come up with a "template" that covers the bulk of the material in typical manuals. Now, approach medium-sized businesses that SHOULD have an employee manual, but don't, and offer to create an employee manual for them at 1/10th of the cost they could do it themselves. You've already got the template written. Just fill in the specific information regarding that particular company, and get paid. You should be able to make $2,000 or so per company, and the whole thing could literally be done in one day! Your potential in this kind of business depends entirely on how well you can market yourself, but there are at least 1,000,000 businesses out there in need of this service!


376. Used books are not created equal, but people having yard sales seem to think so. You can buy an entire box of old books for $1 at a yard sale, and then turn around and take some of the better items to a used book store and get $10 or more. This might take some practice and experience at being able to spot what used book stores want, but any sort of how-to book or popular novel within the past few years will do well. Books that are local in nature are GREAT sellers. You're not going to get rich this way, but during the summer, you can hit 5 or 6 yard sales a day and earn $50 a day pretty easily.


377. There's a man where I live who makes a decent living by collecting wildflower seeds. There is a huge national movement to return to native plants, and almost every state has a "Native Plant Society" of one sort or another. There are also a number of groups dedicated to landscaping with native (as opposed to invasive) species, such as "Wild Ones". All the members of these organizations are potential customers for wildflower seeds, and I think you'll be surprised at the prices that these seeds go for. Go online and do some research about the best way to harvest seeds, and also to browse through some wildflower seed catalogs and have a look at the staggering prices.


378. When a very popular movie comes out, it's almost impossible to get tickets on opening night. Two local guys have turned this fact into a business. When blockbusters like Independence Day, Star Wars Episode II, Matrix 2, etc. come out, they buy tickets early and then actually scalp them right at the movie theater for $20 each. When true fans show up at the theater and are told that all of the showings are sold out, many of them will happily fork over the extra money to see the film they've been waiting for... rather than having to go home empty handed. It's downright conniving, but these guys make about $400 a night when a well-hyped movie opens.


379. Almost every state has an agency in charge of unclaimed money, and it's usually part of the state's treasury department. If you've never investigated this, it can be quite amazing how much unclaimed money there is in the world. I looked myself up on a couple of unclaimed money websites and found that I was owed $65 from a deposit I made with an electric company 20 years ago. That's a pretty small sum, but there are people who are literally owed hundreds of thousands of dollars (usually from abandoned or unknown bank accounts). I propose that you find these people and tell them that they're owed this money... in exchange for a 1/3 commission. These states do not actively seek out these people, so some of them will never know that they're owed money unless you find them and tell them. And by providing this service, you can reap some pretty significant commissions yourself. First, design a simple contract and have your lawyer review it. You want to make sure that you get your cut when you tell the person about their unknown money. Then, search the records of unclaimed money (you should be able to get this information in a computer printout - directly from your state government) and find the people who are owed the most money. Next, find them. You can use switchboard.com or other online people-finders. Once you find them, tell them that they're owed some money, but they have to agree in writing to give you a "finder's fee" for providing them with the details. If they agree, you get your cut. If they don't, you just move on. I've heard there are people earning $5,000 a day using this approach. I can't promise you'll make that kind of money, but the principle is absolutely sound.


380. We live in security conscious times, and most neighborhoods would appreciate having a dedicated security patrol. You could approach homeowners in some of the nicer neighborhoods in your area and ask if they'd be interested in a personal nightly security patrol for just $19.95 a month. Many people will take you up on your offer, and you will eventually have 250 homes as part of your patrol network. That's nearly $5,000 a month and you've got your entire day free. Also, your only real expense is a few gallons of gasoline.