12 ways to make your house a cash cow |
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Make a day care connection
If you're a parent, you know that quality day care is expensive.
Enterprising stay-at-home parents may consider starting a home day
care facility.
"A full-time day care center with a dozen kids in your home year-round is a very profitable business,"
Brabec says.
Such businesses have become heavily regulated in many jurisdictions. Be sure to check with your local
and state agencies to make sure you can legally operate a day care where you live.
“A full-time day care center with a dozen kids in your home year-round is a very profitable business.”
If you have the room and the temperament to consider a home day care business, there are dozens of books
available that walk you through the steps.
Ready for your close-up?
Does your home have star potential? You might be surprised. According to Gary Bond, director
of film marketing for the Austin (Texas) Film Commission,
ordinary houses can be the hardest to find when scouting film locations in Texas.
"The toughest houses for me to find are the ones that have no character, because we just don't take photographs
of those houses," he says.
How can you turn your house into a film location?
"We have a location database," Bond says. "We will either come and photograph it or accept your digital
photos, which we put on our Web database."
When a film crew comes looking for locations, Bond prepares a digital casting call from properties in the
commission's database that match the director's needs.
If your house has the setting or visual features to star in a major Hollywood film, Bond estimates you might
receive $1,000 a day for use of the exterior and considerably more if you have to be relocated so the crew can use the interior.
On a lower-budget film, you may receive anywhere from nothing to a weekend at the Four Seasons.
Before you sign on, remember that script demands sometimes call for the house to be "taken down," or aged, to
show the passage of time. Interior shots sometimes involve carving holes in the wall or removing walls entirely to get the
right camera angles.
Be sure to stipulate in the location agreement that you will choose the contractor to repair the set
designer's damage.
If you think your house oughta be in pictures, contact your local or state film office.
Become a sitter, baby!
It may seem old-school, but baby-sitting is also one of the easiest and most lucrative ways to make money in your home.
"That's so obvious that it's often overlooked," Brabec says. "But do you know what baby sitters are getting
right now? About $20 an hour here in affluent Naperville, Ill."
And it's no longer limited to Friday and Saturday nights, either. Today, there's a growing need for supervision
of "latchkey kids" on weekdays between the time they leave school and their parents arrive home.
"A neighbor teacher of mine took two kids in last summer and kept them two or three hours until their parents
got home, and she made a lot of money," Brabec says. "It really solves a problem for parents."
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