Being a techie at heart, this sort of business fascinates me as you can tweak one small part of the process and have HUGE gains down the line as a result. A case in point is an increase from R1.7k/month in AdSense to over R5k in the space of under 4 weeks.

I'm addicted to this sort of thing. I've lived off of it before, for a period of a few months, and it was good! So now I've rediscovered it and I'd like to explore it more deeply. Specifically, I'm wondering how many different types of passive or ALMOST passive income businesses there are out there that have worked for you or someone you know... Here's my list...

Qualification Criteria: Any business that requires less than daily work on it. Preferably once a week tops.

  • AdSense - I've had reasonable success here. (R6k/month being my record)
  • Online SaaS Business - I've had huge success here as well but this requires a LOT of up-front work and possibly 1 or 2 cheap employees to offer support. Well worth it though. (R40k/month being my record)
  • Gumball Vending Machines - One of my business partners does quite well with this. (R2.5k-R7k/month)
  • Property - Lots of success stories here, provided you can find motivated sellers. This is the big end-goal but something I'm darned afraid of touching right now


Over to you - what do you know works - through personal experience or via a friend.