Download These 5 Mobile Apps To Make Extra Money Using Your Smartphone

We could all use some extra cash, right? How would you like to make money without even leaving your house? We know we would! There are companies that will pay you to watch movies and listen to music, or you can earn so-called “Swagbacks” by taking surveys and participating in focus groups. And now, you can even make a little moolah with nothing more than your smartphone. Yep, we found five mobile apps you can use to earn money. Download them and watch your wallet get fatter!

1. Acorns

Acorns is an investing app that makes playing the stock market easier than ever. The app rounds up the cost of your purchases and invests the “spare change” for you. Not an investment expert? You don’t have to be. Acorns does all of the work for you. You can allot a certain amount, say $20, to be invested per month, and you can increase your account a few pennies at a time when you opt for purchases to be rounded to the nearest dollar. Almost too easy, right?

2. OfferUp

Do you have things lying around the house that you’re not using, like an old Roku model, and you’re not sure what to do with them? Sure, you could donate them, but you’d like to make some money, too. Check out OfferUp. With this app, you post an item and suggest a price. Interested parties then can accept your price, or offer you another amount. But, just because they want your old Roku for $10 instead of the $20 you posted it for, that doesn’t mean you have to accept it—someone else may offer you $15. No matter what, it’s a win-win for everybody—you’re purging items you no longer need and someone else is buying things they want at a discount. Then, with the money you make, you can invest it into something like Acorns, above, or start a savings account or vacation fund just with your OfferUp earnings!

3. Amazon

Want to sell some books you’re no longer reading? Amazon can take them off your hands. With the online marketplace, you have two options. You can sell books as a professional (after paying a registration fee of $39.99 a month), or sell as an individual, in which case you pay a 99-cent closing fee on each transaction, but no monthly fee. Sounds great to us!

4. Ibotta

Ibotta is so simple to use, everybody should be downloading it right now! All you do is scan your receipts, and the app generates applicable rebates on purchases from over 300 stores (Target, Rite-Aid, Food Lion, Kroger, to name a few). Forty-eight hours later, you’ll see the cash in your Ibotta account. You have the option to transfer funds to your PayPal or Venmo accounts or cash it in for gift cards. You can also find and unlock mobile app rebates before you shop. Plus, the app is currently giving a $10 bonus just for trying it.

5. goBaby

We’re in love with the goBaby app, which makes traveling with our little ones much easier.  If you have a baby or toddler, you know how challenging it is to travel with bulky gear like strollers and car seats. Well, you can solve that problem with goBaby (there’s no app yet to quiet crying babies on airplanes, but this one is pretty handy!). Essentially, goBaby is a marketplace where traveling parents can rent baby gear from local parents. Genius, huh? So if you want to make some extra cash—perhaps start your baby’s college fund with it—you can download the app and start renting out those strollers and car seats you’re not using at the moment. The app is available in New York City now, and will soon be expanding to other big cities, including Boston and Chicago.

So the next time you’re wondering how to make some extra money, download these apps, and then sit back, relax and let your smartphone do the work for you!