Low-Maintenance Business Venture

[BrooklineBiker]

I'm debt-free and looking to find a low-maintenance/ passive business I can operate to make some extra cash. I'll spend up to $10k to get the venture off the ground. I was thinking of maybe buying some vending machines but was told they no longer produce much return. I also thought of buying a driveway and renting it out but real estate prices are insane here (Eastern MA). Does anyone have similar ideas that might be workable?

[RollingGreen]

I'm in the same situation (and part of the state .) I have been thinking about this, too. I'm following this thread, but please let me know if you have any good leads!

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[BrooklineBiker]

Hi Rolling Green,
Great to hear from another Mass. person. Unfortunately, I haven't gotten any replies so I can't suggest anything to you now.

[SeattleCPA]

I think lots of "alternative asset class" investment opportunities exist. But I don't think any simple, straightforward scalable ones do. Or at least not ones that require no work and which generate high returns.

I think (assume?) that all of these deals are one-off opportunities that you do once or twice... Or opportunities that require quite of bit of specialized tacit knowledge... like knowing how to rebuild a car engine or repair a some piece of equipment.

[BrooklineBiker]

I wasn't necessarily thinking literally no work. For example, I might have to plow out a driveway I rented out. But the absolute minimum of work would be preferred.

[electriceagle]

There aren't any, really.

Any business that produces a real profit will require that you contribute some of the following:

Skill: you know how to do something that others don't
Labor (Time): you are willing to spend time doing something that others don't want to
Risk: you are willing to risk losing money
Knowledge: you know something that other people don't
Positioning: your uncle is the governor/mayor/etc (some gatekeeper lets only you in)

You can get cleaner risk in the stock market than in any small business, so in practice you probably want to balance skill, knowledge, and positioning.

You're not going to get any secret knowledge here and I don't think that anyone here has an uncle in high places to lend you. Thus, you are better off starting by talking about your skills than anything else.....

[Michael in ABQ]

There are plenty of small businesses that sell for around a 3x multiple of annual profit. Now at $10,000 that's not going to be much but something like an established website the earns money from advertising or affiliate links could definitely be bought for $10k. There are many websites for sale out there that claim to be "passive" which is a bit of a misnomer. If you bought it and let it sit there with literally no input it would probably continue earning money for a while. But if you weren't checking on things and fixing issues or adding new content eventually it would probably wither away. That being said, the return on a couple of hours a week of your time can be pretty high. If you want a truly passive investment, i.e. the stock market, you're never going to exceed 10-15% annual returns without taking huge risks such as investing money in a wildcat oil play that might double your money or might lose it all. At that point you might as well just go put $10k on red at the roulette table.

https://www.flippa.com/ is a pretty large online marketplace for buying and selling websites and other online businesses. Be forewarned there's a lot of garbage for sale but there's some decent things mixed in as well. Obviously the lower the price point and the more passive something is the more people will be interested so the good listings sell quickly.

[msministache]

PTF

[anonymouscow]

I just posted in a different thread about vending machines. I did it for 2 years and I think it can be a profitable business if you go about it the right way (I didn’t).

An example would be, you start out with one soda machine, it holds 240, 16 oz drinks, you pay between $0.33 and $0.42 per drink and sell for $1.00 each. You refill once the machine reaches 40% capacity. So each time you fill it you make $0.58 x 144 drinks sold = $83.52 profit, less expenses, but you can deduct mileage and such.

There is a forum out there specifically for vending (not sure if I can name) but it’s full of really helpful people.

[MoneyQuirk]

I disagree about the vending machines. I think it's all in finding the right spot. I know at my work there's no vending machines and there's a lot of semi-annoyed IT persons craving a Mountain Dew that would blow up your earnings.

I think the same holds true for most pursuits. It's very easy to find people saying that it can't be done, but there's always plenty of room for another GOOD effort. Sure, if you just pick a random-ish location without serious thought, it probably won't do well. But if you know where people are looking for snacks and address that need, it will pay great rewards.

[BrooklineBiker]

Thanks everyone for all of the good ideas. Please keep them coming!