Rent out a room
If you’ve got a spare room sitting empty, you could think about renting it out to a lodger. You can bring in up to £7,500 a year tax-free by letting out a furnished room in your home thanks to the government’s 'rent a room' relief. This amount is halved if you’re sharing the income with your partner or someone else.
Become an 'olderpreneur'
If you’ve always dreamt about setting up your own business, whether it’s selling home-grown produce or hand-crafted goods, or working as a consultant or tutor, retirement could be the perfect time to do it.
As you’ll be your own boss, you can decide exactly how much time you want to dedicate to your business. Make sure you draft a business plan before you get started, so you can see how much you might have to put into your business to get started.
Make use of your driveway
Lots of drivers are prepared to pay for off-road parking in cities and towns if it costs less than parking in a car park every day, so if you’ve got a driveway or garage sitting empty, think about putting it to use.
There are lots of websites which will advertise your garage or driveway on your behalf, although they will often charge commission. Sites include JustPark.com, ParkLet.co.uk and YourParkingSpace.co.uk.
Earn cash-back every time you shop
Fancy getting paid every time you shop? Then it’s time to register with a cashback website such as Topcashback.co.uk or Quidco.com which will give you money back when you spend.
These sites are able to provide cashback because they get commission from retailers for pointing shoppers in their direction, and they then pass some of this back to their members. If you’re not a big online shopper, you can still earn cashback on your high street shopping by registering your debit or credit cards with one of the cashback sites so that every time you spend using them you’ll get some money back.
Clear out your clutter
One man’s trash is another one’s treasure, so the saying goes, which means if you’re planning a clear out, see what you can sell rather than taking it straight to the tip.
Auction sites such as ebay.co.uk are a great place to sell things, or you could get a pitch at your local car boot sale. If you’ve got lots of CDs or DVDs gathering dust, you can sell these via the website MusicMagpie.co.uk, which it has a free courier service so you don’t have to pay for postage. There are lots of sites to sell electric gadgets too such as unwanted mobile phones, iPods, cameras or laptops. These include cashinyourgadgets.co.uk, gadgetmill.co.uk and recyclezone.org.
Track down all your pensions
If you’re retirement income isn’t enough to make ends meet, make sure you’ve located all the pensions you’ve contributed to over the years, as they can be easy to lose track of, especially if you’ve worked for lots of different employers or have moved home regularly.
Find out more about lost pensions in our blog ‘Could you be entitled to a share of the UK's £20bn lost pensions mountain?’ and if you think that you need help with this you can read how we track down old pensions here.
