Are you now a stay-at-home dad due to the present economic situation, and you are seeking a source of income that is achieved from home? Then below are the top 20 small business ideas for stay at home dads. When Billy, a 33-year old Advertising Executive lost his job, he spent six months trying to find another job.
When none was forthcoming, he and his wife Angela, who is a successful lawyer in New York, reached a compromise and decided that since both of them were so busy with their jobs and had less time for their kids, Billy should quit trying to find another job and become a stay at home dad so that the kids can be better taken care of.
Billy had no problem agreeing to this new arrangement but after some months, he started to complain. In his words “Not being able to support my family financially makes me feel less of a man”.
Being a stay at home dad is a great idea, an idea that is beneficial for the kids and the family but the challenge is that it could get so boring and frustrating for someone who is so used to working and earning a living.
There are so many dads out there like Bill who choose to be stay at home dads so their kids can get more attention, and there are also some others who are retired or forced to stay at home because they lost their jobs.
As a stay at home dad, there are lots of business opportunities you could explore to keep you busy and give you extra income to support your family. However, you have got to be careful with scam online businesses or get rich quick schemes.
A lot of people, in their quest to get jobs online have fallen for these cheap scams. My general advice is “Never pay anyone to employ you” There’s only one party that should be doing the paying in an employment contract and that party is definitely not you-the employee. So what legitimate businesses can you do at home as a stay at home dad?
Small Business ideas for Stay-at-Home Dads
1. Freelancing in Your Career Field
There are opportunities for freelancers in almost any career field and companies hire freelancers to help them reduce costs of operation.
Billy for instance, is an advertising executive, which means he could sell his services to advertising companies without necessarily working for them full-time. He can help to produce jingles, come up with brilliant advertising concepts for products and sell them to advertising companies or even write marketing copies for business owners.
2. Blogging for a Living
There are lots of people who earn a living from full-time blogging. You can blog about any topic or subject that is of interest to you.
The key to making money as a blogger is getting a lot of people to visit your blog. To achieve this, you would need to be a good writer and be able to write engaging content. If you are not so good at writing, you could employ freelance writers and get them to write good contents for your blog.
3. Online Retailing
You could make money from selling virtually anything you choose via the internet. You could sell sporting goods, men’s wear, computers, mobile phones, electronic gadgets etc. You could even sell services online.
4. Stock Trading
Another business you could conveniently do from home is trading in stocks. You could buy stocks for yourself and sell for a profit or even become a home-based stock broker.
5. Real Estate
There are two options you could explore in this business category. You could either choose to become a real estate agent, helping people to sell and lease out their properties for a commission or become a real estate developer, buying and building properties for resale.
6. Antique Refurbishing and Sales
Antique items are really trending. You could take advantage of this opportunity and buy old, discarded furniture and then refurbish them for resale.
7. Taking paid surveys online
There are lots of scam websites out there so you have to be careful when choosing this business idea. Make sure you do your due diligence before you decide to register on any paid surveys platform.
8. Sports Prediction and Betting
Another convenient way to make money from home is by sports prediction and betting. There are several websites which offer such services and let you win huge sums of money if you can correctly predict the outcome of a game or football match.
9. Accounting
You could start a home-based accounting service, supporting individuals and businesses with taxation, payroll services, fraud investigation, financial management and internal control.
10. Transcription
This is another business you could do easily online. It involves converting recorded audio speech into written script. You can offer your services in the legal or medical industry.
11. Child Care
Don’t laugh just yet, who says men cannot take care of kids? Men are very great with kids and could also tap into the opportunity of starting a baby-sitting or nanny service.
12. Data Entry Services
A lot of companies are converting all their hard copy data into soft copies; this leaves room for people to make money by offering data entry services to such companies.
13. E-book Publishing
You could also think of writing and publishing your own books for sale. Again, if you cannot write it yourself, you can employ ghost writers, share your ideas with them and have them put it into writing for you.
14. Tutoring
You could also start a tutoring business, you could help kids prepare for the new school year during summer or help them get better at subjects troubling them at school You could even register on online tutoring companies.
15. Interior Design
If you have a passion for making people’s home look better, you could start an interior designing business which you can conveniently run from home.
16. Event Planning
Event planning is on the list of suitable business ideas for stay at home dads. You could start from helping friends plan events for free and gradually increase your client base through referrals and networking.
17. Virtual Assistance
You could also start a virtual assistance service, helping clients with secretarial and clerical services from the comfort of your home using your computer and access to the internet.
18. Remote Computer Engineer
A new trend in computer repairs and maintenance is remote computer engineering which involves helping people solve problems with their PC’s online.
19. Farming
If you have enough land space, you could a farming business. You could go into fish farming, poultry farming, fruit farming, vegetable farming or even herbal farming.
20. Consultancy
Lastly, you can become a consultant, offering expert advice and support to new comers in your industry.