8 Ways I Made Money When I Was Broke

Being completely broke and in debt is extremely difficult.

Often you are looking for a quick fix or end up in more debt because you have no options.

If you really want to make money fast, check out the free 7 day fast money challenge (it’s free).

Most of the ideas here aren’t things we continued doing because once we got our basics sorted, we switched our focus to the things that would make us the most money.

Blogging, freelance writing, consulting and similar have made us more money than anything else.

Disclosure this post may contain affiliate links.

1. New Bank Account Bonuses

Getting a signup bonus for opening a bank account can be pretty sweet and it was something we did but not the credit card bonuses.

We focused on bank account sign-up bonuses because we did not want credit cards as our emotional state at the time meant we would probably get into debt fast.

$15 from Up
If you’re after an easy-to-use, fee-free bank with great perks, excellent customer service and good interest rates, Up is a fantastic option. Get your $15 sign-up bonus now. I wrote a full review on Up Bank.

$100 from ING
They offer this sporadically and it is on until 30 Nov 2026. Get a $100 sign up bonus by following a few steps.

2. Centrelink

Walking into Centrelink made us feel like failures. Every single one of us.

Being on the single-parent pension was the only way we could see to cover most of our expenses.

It didn’t cover all of them but it helped so much. Family tax benefit, rent assistance and a carers payment meant we each got around $1,400 a fortnight.

This sounds like a lot but when you are paying for multiple speech therapy sessions, getting no child support, have a mortgage or the rent now, it does not go far enough.

We needed to make more.

Check out all our articles on ways to make and save money when surviving on Centrelink plus things you might be entitled to. Every little bit helps!

3. Online Surveys

Living in survival mode, we could barely think and not much thinking was required for online surveys.

Online surveys were easy enough to do and the weeks we cashed out they paid for groceries or a session of speech therapy. We have a full list of online survey sites for Aussies here.

Octopus Group pays $16.28 per hour, Pureprofile pays well and both of them pay 10c if you get screened out. PrizeRebel pays in USD and Swagbucks has numerous ways aside from surveys to earn.

4. Buy Things to Resell

At the time, we sold mostly books. We could buy them for $1 or less and usually sell them for $10 to $30 online. Clothing was also easy.

Once we picked up a few brand new maternity jeans which we were able to sell for $20 to $50 a pair.

A couple of years ago we decided to track it all and see how much I could make.

In the first month, we made almost $3,000 and by the fourth month, we made over $10,000.

Reselling is something we have done successfully in every city we live in.

Some areas were better than others for having great items available but if you know where to look and what to sell, it can bring in decent money.

5. Odd Jobs

We reached out to our networks and let them know we were available to do anything – mainly freelance writing, virtual assistance work and mentoring as those were things we already did.

But we took on babysitting and anything else that came up. Now, it is much easier to find ways to make money.

Check out 43 ways for single mums to make money for ideas and how to do it all.

Airtasker is a great place to look for odd jobs as well. We’ve trialled it on and off over the years to see what’s available and made over $800 some weeks doing easy, random tasks.

6. Market Research, Mystery Shopping and Reviews

Paying $100 a session, we took any market research opportunities that came up.

They were few and far between but worth it when I could do them.

Mystery shopping didn’t pay a lot but sometimes we got clothes or food for our kids plus a small amount of money.

Back then, some sites paid you to write reviews. When we couldn’t sleep or we had to wait for something, we would quickly write a few reviews.

The pay was only 20cents to $1 per review, so quite small but it was something we could do in a few minutes while waiting to pick up the kids or at the doctors or something.

7. Enter Competitions

While it isn’t directly making money it did see us win hampers, clothes, DVD’s, movie tickets and other things which were not in our budget and helped.

We’ve written about where to find the best Aussie giveaway and competitions.

In 2023, we entered all the competitions attached to items we buy normally and won 75% of them including a $1,000 travel voucher, $500 day spa voucher, $400 Adore Beauty voucher, $100 fuel voucher, food, photography and more.

Our preference is to enter competitions connected to things we buy instead of the ones on social media. We’ve been more successful with those than the social media ones for some reason.

8. Cash in Cans

It might only be 10c per can or bottle but since we’d collect them on walks, it was easy to accumulate enough now and then for some groceries.

This program isn’t available everywhere but in the places it is available, it doesn’t take long to cash them in.

Using the app you can get paid directly to your account quickly.

If you decide to collect them when you go for walks or do other things, it is handy to have something you can pick them up with and a bag to put them in so you aren’t personally handling them.

Living near schools and beaches, we often find 10 or more on a walk.

Saving Money

Making money isn’t the only important thing but it was my main focus.

We had to learn to budget better, cut back all our spending in every possible way and still look to the future.

In our view, you need to take some time to reduce your spending, do everything you can to stick to a budget then focus your energy on making more money.

There is only so much you can do to cut back but there are many ways you can make more.

Here are some articles which will help you save:
How to create a budget and stick to it
How this couple paid off $90,000 debt in 12 months (starting unemployed)
How to become a millionaire even as a single mum
Complete list of things you can use your healthcare/pension cards for (check your area to see what applies. This post is a few years old).
12 ways to get coupons and discounts in Australia