Side Jobs: Passive Income for International Students in Canada

Introduction

passive income

Passive income is income from rental properties, limited liability companies, or other businesses individuals do not actively involve. Like active income, passive revenue is usually taxable but is often treated differently by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

More detailed overview of Passive income

There are three main classifications of income: active income, passive income, and portfolio income. Passive income includes income from a rented home, limited partnership, or other business in which a person is not actively involved, such as a silent investor. Passive earners generally promote the work-from-home and professional lifestyle of their boss. Passive income has been a relatively loose term in recent years. Popularly, it is used to define that money is earned on a regular basis with little or no effort on the part of the person receiving it.

Types of passive income

Passive income includes self-charged interest, rental belongings, and firms in which the person receiving payment does not actively participate in earning money.

But students are not that wealthy to have a decent running business or have money to lend to others and earn interest. Instead, they can lend or sell their used items to other people. For instance, a student can sell his books to his juniors and earn a few dollars.

The attitude of the Canadian consumer to used-goods

Canada is one of the biggest markets for second-hand goods ranging from electronics, furniture, books, clothes, vehicle, tools and many more. Canada is a thriving country and one of the world’s immense used clothing and other items retailers. Pakistan, Kenya and Ghana are some significant destinations for used apparel exported from Canada, with a total commercial value of approximately US $ 28 million. When it comes to pre-owned clothing imports, Canada buys over $ 27 million in second-hand clothing from the United States, making Canada an overwhelmingly major import partner.

Canada has 1,400 thrift shops, many in larger states such as QuebecBritish Colombia and Ontario. In other words, many Canadian consumers generally buy second-hand goods, regardless of where they originally came from. When asked if they purchased second-hand goods in the last 12 months, about half of Canadians said they did. The most frequently purchased items include apparel, various media, such as books and games, furniture and household items. About three-quarters of used buyers in the country said that saving money is the reason for buying second-hand goods, which is the most critical motivational characteristic.

What’s here for the International Students?

Students come to study in Canada from all over the world and try hard to save as much money as possible by buying pre-owned goods. They buy books from their seniors and gadgets from sites such as kijiji.ca at a low price. Moreover, citizens also purchased used goods to save money, as mentioned in the above section.

Buying and Selling used items

So some students used to purchase used goods such as iron, headphones and speakers, furniture such as study tables and chairs and cheaper prices and sell it to others at the profit of 15 dollars or 20 dollars or even based on the product.

Every market has something that is being sold, and people are buying those things. What a student needs to do is take some time in the day, maybe 30 minutes, to search for targeted products which you can buy and sell to others to earn a few dollars. You have to do some research, analyse the current market and act on it.

Moreover, in cities, you can conveniently get needed items. Still, if you do some more search, you can get to the city outskirts where usually retired and older people live, and they sell their used goods through Garage sell even cheaper than cities and increase your profit. In the Garage sale, you can get any antique things, guitars, old gold-plated kitchenware, toys, books, tools, currency, and the list is long.

Content creation

Content creators are responsible for developing new content ideas and moving them from concept to final product. The content creation process, whether digital creators or printed matter, usually consists of multiple steps.

This content is usually educational or entertaining and is designed to attract your company’s target audience. For example, social media content creators spend most of their time investigating hashtags and audiences, creating photo or video content to post, and reviewing reports from previous campaigns to analyze their success. These types of creators are often referred to as “influencers” because they usually have their social media audience and work with sponsored content brands to promote their business to their followers. Social media creators work on a small number of platforms, and content is created specifically for each platform to resonate with that particular audience.

Celebrities usually act as social media influencers, but many individuals have named and gained significant followers online. Khaby Lame, Linus Gabriel Sebastian, Huda Kattan, and Eleonora Pons are all digital with millions of viewers, very popular with brands, and charging tens of thousands of dollars for one brand post on the channel. A great example of creativity.

What does a typical day look like to a digital creator? Different platforms create different types of content. In most cases, normal working days include:

  1. Brand and Competitor Analysis: Understanding what a brand is, your target audience, and what your competitors are doing is the starting point for all your successful content. This allows you to narrow down your ideas later and increase credibility if you get approval from a brand representative before you actually create the content.
  2. Brainstorming: This is where you can be creative! Coming up with multiple ideas is a good starting point for working with your brand when deciding on the ones that are most relevant and appealing to you or their target audience.
  3. Content Creation: When working with a brand to create or shoot content that realizes a campaign idea, the content creation process can involve multiple stages. This can take hours, weeks or months, depending on how complete the final result is.
  4. Editing and Approval: Editing photos and videos to match the brand’s aesthetics and tones can take some time, but this is where the final product begins to take shape. What’s left on the cutting room floor may surprise you, but when you give it to the brand for final approval before it’s published, you’re very proud of your work.
  5. Promotions: Brands can do this on their own, but this is where money is made for influencers. Content is shared across various digital channels, and tracking is added to track the performance of posts.

Your favourite influencer may seem easy, but there’s a lot of work behind these Instagram reels and YouTube videos. If that doesn’t sound so daunting and you’re still thinking of becoming a content creator, we have some ideas for you to get started.

Buy and sell used cars

The next thing on the list is mainly for boys or any other person fond of cars. A student can flip used vehicles, primarily cars, from websites like kijiji.ca, Facebook marketplace, and even try local used car markets. One can easily buy a decent car for 1500 or 2000 dollars and sell it at 3000 or even 4000 dollars.

Usually, people in Canada do not have time and here is where international students can take advantage. If you are selling a car for 3.5K dollars and somebody else 15-20 kilometres from you is selling a car for 2K or even 3K, they won’t go there and will purchase from you because they want to save their time.

If you don’t know anything about cars, before buying cars to sell further, at least have a basic knowledge about vehicles. You can ask any known mechanic or do some research on the internet.

Think if you make a profit of 500 dollars on a car and in the month you sell two or maybe three cars, it is around 1.5K dollars which is a reasonably outstanding amount.

Buy and sell books

Just open amazon.ca and amazon.in and search for top-selling books on both sites. You will be surprised by the pricing. For instance, Wimpy Kid in India costs 350 INR, whereas, in Canada, it costs 11 CAD, around 650 INR. Hence one can easily earn 10-15 dollars on a book and more money on an expensive one by importing books from other countries.

Since students try to save money and spend less, you can sell your books and earn a few dollars.

Freelancing

If you have skills like video editing, designing and creativity, or business knowledge, here is another way to earn more money.

A student from the IT field with the knowledge of web development can make a website for a small business startup, and a programmer can build software as per company needs.

If you have lagging skills, you can gain them from YouTube and other tutoring websites such as Udemy and EdX.

Conclusion

  • Passive income is income from rental properties, limited liability companies, or other businesses individuals do not actively involve.
  • Passive income includes income from a rented home, limited partnership, or other business in which a person is not actively involved, such as a silent investor.
  • Students are not that wealthy to have a decent running business or have money to lend to others and earn interest.
  • Canada is one of the biggest markets for second-hand goods ranging from electronics, furniture, books, clothes, vehicle, tools and many more.
  • When it comes to pre-owned clothing imports, Canada buys over $ 27 million in second-hand clothing from the United States, making Canada an overwhelmingly major import partner.
  • Many Canadian consumers generally buy second-hand goods, regardless of where they originally came from.
  • The most frequently purchased items include apparel, various media, such as books and games, furniture and household items.
  • About three-quarters of used buyers in the country said that saving money is the reason for buying second-hand goods, which is the most critical motivational characteristic.
  • A student needs to take some time in the day, maybe 30 minutes, to search for targeted products you can buy and sell to others to earn a few dollars.
  • Still, if you do some more search, you can get to the city outskirts where usually retired and older people live, and they sell their used goods through Garage sell even cheaper than cities and increase your profit.
  • The most suitable way to earn passive income for an International student in Canada will be selling and buying used goods and freelancing.

Check out other articles