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Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

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Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#31

Post by akg_67 »

mertevinski wrote: post #11

Peer to peer lending is the best thing I have found this year. You can get around 5 to 7 percent interest and you don't need a large amount of capital. With all the other financial markets so volatile right now this is a pretty solid rate of return. There are always risks of default that you will need to consider, but most platforms allow you to mitigate that with automated diversified portfolios.

You might want to try out my project PeerCube https://www.peercube.com, a side project that became full-time job. We provide lots of analytics and automation for Lending Club and Prosper platform and work with both retail and institutional lenders on these platforms. As others mentioned, be careful with unsecured peer to peer lending. It is not all roses. Do your homework and stay diversified in your investments on and off peer to peer lending.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#32

Post by kinnth »

mertevinski wrote: post #11

Peer to peer lending is the best thing I have found this year. You can get around 5 to 7 percent interest and you don't need a large amount of capital. With all the other financial markets so volatile right now this is a pretty solid rate of return. There are always risks of default that you will need to consider, but most platforms allow you to mitigate that with automated diversified portfolios.

also interested to know which site you use or would recommend?

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#33

Post by mmastrac »

kinnth wrote: post #30
mmastrac wrote: post #6

Perhaps a negative example might be interesting? I started working on game-development tools in 2015 and have sold a grand total of $0. Granted I have been contracting for the last year and haven't done development or marketing for a few months, but I would say it's a clear non-success. If you're curious what it was, it's here: https://codano.com/typeforge/ . The reasons I've probably done poorly: 1) I haven't spent…

Game Industry Vet here. Unfortunately middleware or tools for gaming have gone to the 0 margin, free area. Mainly because 99% of game generally don't make much money so people dont invest heavily. Those 1% that do make a lot of money tend to invest in the their own tool development or want to retain control of their middleware hence less money in the pot. Another interesting point, IMO, is that game development attra…

Interesting! Good to know, and this obviously matches with my experience.

I feel like the level of complexity required to sell software for game development has moved up a fair bit to things like procedural texture/mesh generation.

I don't know if I'm going to continue along these lines. If I can squeak out a minimal revenue stream I'd be happy, but if there's literally zero opportunity in this area I'll have to look elsewhere.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#34

Post by shazow »

kinnth wrote: post #30
mmastrac wrote: post #6

Perhaps a negative example might be interesting? I started working on game-development tools in 2015 and have sold a grand total of $0. Granted I have been contracting for the last year and haven't done development or marketing for a few months, but I would say it's a clear non-success. If you're curious what it was, it's here: https://codano.com/typeforge/ . The reasons I've probably done poorly: 1) I haven't spent…

Game Industry Vet here. Unfortunately middleware or tools for gaming have gone to the 0 margin, free area. Mainly because 99% of game generally don't make much money so people dont invest heavily. Those 1% that do make a lot of money tend to invest in the their own tool development or want to retain control of their middleware hence less money in the pot. Another interesting point, IMO, is that game development attra…

I'm finding that people spend way more money in the rough prototyping phase than during the "ok let's build the real thing" phase. Especially in things like asset stores.

Myself and a bunch of friends working on VR stuff easily spend $10-50 on a random helper to get a prototype done in a few hours rather than a few days.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#36

Post by baccredited »

My approach is simple: invest the vast majority of all money after expenses into VOO (S&P 500 index fund). First max out tax advantage accounts like 401k and IRAs, then regular accounts.

I have $1,100,000 in VOO. Trailing inflation adjusted returns are 7% ish. Call it $25,666 for the first 4 months of 2016. I KNOW market returns aren't smooth like this but it is a simple approach that works for me (I'm not selling this stock any time soon so ACTUAL returns thus far in 2016 don't matter to me at all).

The math to get to that number is (($1,100,000 x .07) / 12) * 4 months

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#37

Post by sparkling »

I recorded some tutorial/lesson videos on niche tech topics and put them on YouTube. Spent about 40 hours creating and editing the videos. They have been online now for nearly 10 months and i have a total of ~250k views. That made me nearly $300.

Not a ton of money but considering it is truly passive and will probably be making another $500 in the next 10-15 months its acceptable.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#38

Post by cylinder »

mertevinski wrote: post #11

Peer to peer lending is the best thing I have found this year. You can get around 5 to 7 percent interest and you don't need a large amount of capital. With all the other financial markets so volatile right now this is a pretty solid rate of return. There are always risks of default that you will need to consider, but most platforms allow you to mitigate that with automated diversified portfolios.

Just remember that consumers fall apart very fast in downturns.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#39

Post by rm_-rf_slash »

One technique I have seen work fairly well is web development with a retainer for X hours a month done free of charge, with an hourly rate following. Customers tend to like having someone on call that doesn't tend to cost any extra.

Unfortunately, the market is never that big, since WordPress (and bigcommerce etc) covers most small business needs and any business of a decent size have dedicated developers or a contract with a dev shop.

Re: Ask HN: Passive Income Suggestions 2016

#40

Post by [deleted] »

shazow wrote: post #34
kinnth wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Game Industry Vet here. Unfortunately middleware or tools for gaming have gone to the 0 margin, free area. Mainly because 99% of game generally don't make much money so people dont invest heavily. Those 1% that do make a lot of money tend to invest in the their own tool development or want to retain control of their middleware hence less money in the pot. Another interesting point, IMO, is that game development attra…

I'm finding that people spend way more money in the rough prototyping phase than during the "ok let's build the real thing" phase. Especially in things like asset stores. Myself and a bunch of friends working on VR stuff easily spend $10-50 on a random helper to get a prototype done in a few hours rather than a few days.

[deleted]
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