More frugalness: my new side hustle

"Good things come to those who wait, only the things left by those who hustle."

I'm a big fan of the side hustle (a little side job), always have been. One of my favorite frugal writers talks more about the concept here.

Side hustles I've done over the past few years:
-English tutor
-Spanish tutor
-Algebra tutor
-Statistics for non-math majors tutor
-Flower delivery person
-Babysitter for a couple who were starting up a restaurant
-Lawn mower

When I first arrived in the UK, I didn't have so much to do, not yet knowing anyone. In addition, I started working earlier hours to avoid the traffic thus ending up with even more free time.

In addition, I feel all my energy and creativity which has been dormant in Germany coming back. I find a side hustle a great way to learn about something outside of my normal work world.
For fun, I put an ad up on gumtree (more popular here than craigslist), offering to do odd jobs on an occasional basis, just to see what would appear. I have a varied set of 'Girl Friday' skills: gardening, cleaning, organizing, packing, grandma driver, babysitter, whatever.

A woman called me, she had a farmhouse which she had been renting, and she wanted help to put it back into tiptop shape after the last tenants (four young men). We spoke and then I popped over to see the place earlier in the week.

It's a 200 year farmhouse, with a large backyard, pool, overlooking rural land. It's beautiful, with all of the old woodwork, a solid structure which just needs a heck of a lot of work to put it back in order. It's the type of place that when populated by a family really needs a regular gardener, cook, nanny, etc. She's decided not to rent it again, but instead to get it in order to sell it sometime in the summer.

I was over there tonight for 3,5 hours and we spent the majority of time on the kitchen. The gentlemen didn't really do regular cleaning, it seems, as there was a layer of grease on everything. They spilled sugar in the cabinet and it melded to the shelf, they spilled rice in the back of another cabinet, left a large amount of useless crap to throw out, and on and on. After both of us working together for 2,5 hours, it now looks like a farmhouse kitchen which you'd see in a magazine. We scoured from the top of the cabinets to the floor. The pure beauty of the place is underneath all of the months of disuse. In addition, she bought some flowers and plants so that as it goes in order she's adding the staging bits to get it ready to show, so it really looks super.

I spent the last hour getting stains off the carpets, handprints off the walls, and scouring windowsills. These old windows aren't doubleglazed and it seems no one dusted for at least a year so there was a layer of grime on the windows and all of the woodwork.

I've been asked back for 8 hours on Saturday, to get the flower beds ready for spring and to tackle the other rooms which we didn't touch. Her brother has been up to do the heavy yardwork already, but it has a lot of flower beds to re-establish.

I've been asked to become the regular temporary caretaker for the next few months. It's only 12 minutes from benevolent company J and she doesn't live in this area. So she'd like someone to stop by regularly and check on the mail, water the plants, take care of mowing the grass and adding the weekly pool chemicals.

This one appeals to me for a few reasons:

-I'm considering longer term, to buy a property expressly for the purposes of renting it out. I was 50/50 on whether that should be a house or a flat. I'm now 100% feeling that it should be a flat, without a yard, having had this limited experience on the topic. I think there are more points here for me to learn regarding property renting based on this experience, so I'm here to learn them.

-The place is absolutely gorgeous. I imagine once it's fully back in order and only in maintenance mode, it will be divine to attend to.

-She hopes to have it on the market early in the summer, to use it on some weekends during the summer while it's still not sold, and then finally sold by the end of the summer. This schedule aligns perfectly with my (hopefully!) LSE October start (more on that soon--two more weeks to decide).

-The hours are flexible and not so many after this initial clean-up effort. For now, I could use the extra cash (and that's a whole other blog post still to come!)

-My lazy self likes a bit of physical activity after sitting 8 hours in the office.

-She paid me in exact change tonight, as well as offered me tea, coffee, etc.