Property Investment
11 min read
Here are the most popular side hustles that actually work:
A “side hustle” is a flexible way to earn extra income without taking on a part-time job.
It’s something you do in your spare time, on top of your day job. It can be things like freelancing, buying and selling goods online, or driving for Uber.
With the cost of living soaring in New Zealand, it’s no surprise side hustles are becoming more popular. The internet and apps have made it much easier to earn money at home.
For property investors, a side hustle can help find the money to top-up your investment properties. In some cases it can help you get your next mortgage.
In this article, you’ll learn the most popular side hustles in NZ and what you can earn. You’ll also learn whether your new income stream will help you get your mortgage approved (or not).
| Side hustle | Typical earnings | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Uber Eats driver | $21–$32+ an hour | People who want something flexible and easy to start |
| Rent out a spare room | About $200+ a week | Homeowners or renters with extra space |
| Content creator | Often starts at $100–$500 per sponsored post | People with expertise, personality, or an audience |
| Tutoring | $20–$40 an hour for beginners, $70–$100 for experienced tutors | People with strong subject knowledge |
| Freelancing | About $35–$100+ an hour | People with marketable professional skills |
| Pet sitting or dog walking | Around $15–$30 per visit, $20–$30 per walk | Animal lovers with flexible time |
| Sell crafts online | Varies widely | Creative people who can make products efficiently |
| Handyman jobs | Around $25–$80+ an hour | People practical with tools |
Earn: $21-$32+ an hour
Ongoing costs: Fuel, vehicle upkeep, phone costs
Skill level: Low
Apps to use: Uber’s Driver App
Becoming an Uber Eats driver is easy to start. That’s why it’s one of the most popular side hustles. Most people already have everything they need to get started:
You’ll need to pass a background check, take some food safety handling modules (if you want to do Uber Eats). You’ll need to also prove your vehicle’s safety.
Glassdoor’s latest NZ estimate puts Uber Eats drivers at roughly $21–$32+ an hour, although that’s based on very limited self-reported data.
This depends on what days you drive and which city you live in.
While it might not make you rich, it’s a straightforward way to earn a few extra bucks.
But ongoing expenses like fuel will reduce your earnings and don’t forget you’ll depreciate your vehicle - the more you drive, the less it’s worth.
Keep in mind that Uber driving is only available in the larger cities in New Zealand. So if you live in a remote part of the country, this might not be an option for you.
More from Opes:
Earn: Around $200+ a week for a long-term room rental, or nightly rates on Airbnb
Ongoing costs: Cleaning, linen, electricity, internet, maintenance, insurance
Skill level: Low
Apps to help: Airbnb, Trade Me, Roomies
If you’ve got an extra room in your house, renting it out can be one of the simplest ways to bring in extra income.
And if you’ve got a decent setup in a good location, it can make a real difference to your weekly cashflow.
I’ve seen this work well in practice. I’ve got a client who rents out a small two-bedroom cottage for $50 a night on Airbnb. It’s booked out months ahead, and it covers about half her rent every week.
Of course, it’s not pure profit. You’ve still got setup costs, extra power and internet usage, cleaning, maintenance.
Not to mention … you’re sharing your home or property with someone else.
If Airbnb feels like too much admin, there are simpler options. You can advertise an unfurnished room on Trade Me or Roomies.co.nz. That’s if you’re looking for a long-term boarder.
A standard unfurnished room in Auckland is often advertised for $200+ a week.
Earn: Often starts at $100–$500 per sponsored post for smaller creators, but can grow much higher over time
Ongoing costs: Equipment, editing software, time, internet, phone
Skill level: Medium
Apps to help: TikTok, Instagram, YouTube
Becoming a content creator is a very 2026 side hustle. But, it’s not just beauty influencers and “mummy bloggers” making money.
I follow lawyers, psychologists, financial commentators, doctors, and even an astronaut online. They’re all turning what they know into content people actually want to watch.
That’s the best way to think about this side hustle. Don’t start with “How do I go viral?” Start with “What do I know that other people find useful, interesting, or entertaining?”
The money usually comes in layers. For smaller creators, the first decent income often comes from brand deals.
Then if the audience grows, you might add ad revenue, paid partnerships or courses.
Spreesy’s NZ TikTok benchmark currently shows creators typically around $169–$858 per post. Though those figures aren’t guaranteed.
The opportunity is real, but this is not overnight money.
It takes time to build an audience, and most people give up long before they get traction. So this works best if you actually enjoy the topic enough to keep showing up even when nobody’s watching yet.
Earn: $20-$40 beginners, $70–$100+ for experienced or specialist
Ongoing costs: Travel, teaching materials, platform fees, maybe a website
Skill level: Medium
Apps to help: Superprof
Tutoring is an affordable option for those with expertise in a specific subject. So, if you’re a high school teacher, you can offer exam tutoring for students.
If you’re a university student, you might tutor high school students.
The cool thing is, it can be done in person or online, making it flexible for busy schedules.
Tutoring offers a low-risk, high-reward opportunity, but you’ve got to market yourself properly and tap into your networks.
You can even use Superprof, a New Zealand-based website, to help find students.
Earn: Around $35–$100+ an hour depending on your skill
Ongoing costs: Software, website or portfolio, subscriptions
Skill level: Medium to high
Apps to help: Fiverr, Upwork
Freelancing allows you to use the skills you already have to make more money.
Think of careers like graphic design, writing, or web development. If you have those skills, there are people all over the world who might want your help.
This means it costs almost nothing to get set up ... considering you have all the skills and tools required.
You can then use sites like Fiverr and Upwork to find customers.
If you’re not sure if you have got the skills to freelance, go to those sites. Then look at how other people are marketing their skills.
For instance, you might not realise that people are making money freelancing:
That said, you might need a personal website to showcase your work. This can cost $50-$200 a year.
Here’s some of the freelancing rates, according to Zealancer’s NZ rates study:
| writers/copywriters | $35–$45 an hour |
| graphic designers | $28–$40 |
| web designers | $20–$50 |
Most people start freelancing as a side hustle to test the waters, and then wait for it to ramp up before quitting their day job.
Earn: Around $15–$30 per visit, $20–$30 per walk
Ongoing costs: Travel, treats or supplies, insurance, platform fees
Skill level: Low
Apps to help: Pawshake, PetBacker, Neighbourly
If you love animals, pet sitting is one of the more enjoyable ways to make extra money.
The key thing to understand is that this usually pays per visit, per walk, or per night, not by the hour. So your income depends on how many bookings you can stack together, and how close those clients are to home.
You generally don’t need any qualifications, but if you plan to walk 5 to 12 dogs you must apply online for a certificate from Auckland Council.
But for this side hustle, trust also matters a lot. That’s why platforms like Pawshake are useful. They make you look more legitimate from day one, and help with the whole “Why should I trust you with my dog?” question.
Neighbourly is also great if you want local, after-work-friendly clients close to home.
Earn: Varies a lot depending on what you sell and how efficiently you make it
Ongoing costs: Materials, packaging, postage, platform fees
Skill level: Medium
Apps to help: Etsy
Selling crafts online can work. But only if you treat it like a business.
The best products tend to be the ones that are easy to make consistently, easy to send, and easy for someone else to understand at a glance. Think art prints, personalised gifts, or stationery.
I know someone who turned custom name labels for school lunchboxes into a real business.
Etsy is the obvious place to start, and it is available in NZ ... but there are fees. It currently costs:
The biggest trap is under-pricing. If you’re not charging enough to cover your costs, you’re not running a side hustle ... you’re subsidising your customers.
If you’re a bit handy, but are not sure if your crafts could cut it as a business, head over to Etsy. See what others are selling. That will give you ideas for crafts that could work.
Earn: Around $25–$80+ an hour depending on the task
Ongoing costs: Tools, transport, tax, platform fees
Skill level: Low to medium
Apps to help: Yada, Ezy Peazy
This one sounds almost too simple, but people will pay surprisingly good money for help with everyday jobs.
The stuff people either can’t do, don’t want to do, or thought would “only take 20 minutes” before it ruined their Saturday.
Furniture assembly is a great example. Plenty of people buy flat-pack furniture and then immediately regret it.
Recent examples on Ezy Peazy show people are paying:
So if you can follow instructions, use basic tools, and put things together properly ... there’s real demand for you.
The nice thing about this side hustle is that you don’t need a big audience or polished website to start.
Platforms like Ezy Peazy or Yada.co.nz can help you find those first jobs. Once you’ve got a few positive reviews behind you, it becomes much easier to get repeat work.
Having more income can help you pay your mortgage off faster.
But, your side hustle won’t automatically mean your mortgage gets approved. That’s because when you include side hustle income in a mortgage application you need to provide ‘evidence’ around that income.
To do that you need 12-24 months of trading history. The bank will want to know how much money you make, how regular the income is, and any debt your side hustle has.
For instance, I once worked with a first home buyer who imported racing car seats and sold them online to car groups and petrolheads. He bought them for $800 and sold for $1,500.
He had a legitimate business. It was GST registered; he paid tax on all profit, and claimed expenses. Even after all that, he still took home about $400 per car seat. And he sold about 6 a month.
Because he had been doing it for a few years, he could use it in his mortgage application. The bank could see a track record of the business.
But, if he had just started the bank would not have included this income. That’s because they think: “What if it doesn’t work out? Or what if you stop doing it?”
If you’re not leaning on your side hustle to pay your mortgage, you can just treat your side-hustle as extra income. But it will turn up in a credit check, so always disclose it. That’s both to the bank and the IRD.
I recently had a young couple buying their first home. The wife had a side hustle as a consultant. She provided immigration advice to Filipinos coming to NZ (the couple themselves were Filipino).
She did it after work hours and didn’t charge much (about $25k a year). They didn’t use that income to get the mortgage application across the line.
But the bank did want to know that there wasn’t debt or liabilities tied to her business. There wasn’t. So they got the mortgage.
The good news is, this couple can use that income to reduce debt. That will indirectly make their next mortgage application stronger.
Starting a side hustle can be a smart way to boost your income and ease the cost of living pressure.
The key is finding something that fits your skills, schedule and goals. Ideally, if you’re applying for a mortgage you don’t want to be leaning on your side hustle to get the deal approved.
But if you do want to use that income for a mortgage, be prepared to show a solid track record.
Mortgage broker for over 10 years, property investor and Managing Director at Opes Mortgages
Peter Norris, a certified mortgage adviser with 10+ years of experience, serves as the Managing Director at Opes Mortgages. Having facilitated over $1.2 billion in lending for 2000+ clients, Peter is a respected authority in property financing. He's a frequent writer for Informed Investor Magazine and Property Investor Magazine, while also being recognized as BNZ Mortgage Adviser of the Year in 2018 and listed among NZ Adviser's top advisers in 2022, showcasing his expertise.
This article is for your general information. It’s not financial advice. See here for details about our Financial Advice Provider Disclosure. So Opes isn’t telling you what to do with your own money.
We’ve made every effort to make sure the information is accurate. But we occasionally get the odd fact wrong. Make sure you do your own research or talk to a financial adviser before making any investment decisions.
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