You’ve been retired for three months and your budget is getting a little tight, or you find yourself with too much time on your hands, which you aren’t used to. You feel that you could use your mind and energy in different ways but have no idea what kind of part-time job or project would suit you. Actually, there are many routes you could take. Here are four of them to consider.
Virtual Assistant
As a Virtual Assistant (VA), you are an entrepreneur who can work from home (remotely) providing services via technology to customers worldwide. Virtual assistants offer a wide range of services including secretarial services, bookkeeping, managing databases and projects, publishing electronic newspapers, doing event planning, internet and social media marketing, designing presentations or websites, purchasing products, conducting research, providing customer support and answering telephones, translating, blogging, writing and editing documents, and assisting in real estate.
Figure out which services you want to offer and what you are good at. Maybe you have a specialty such as web design, IT support, marketing, or translating, all of which can increase your earnings. You will also have to determine how many hours a day you want to put into being a VA. Many full-time VAs started by billing between $20 and $35 an hour. Always have your budget in mind. Consider your potential expenses and income. Some of these expenses include, among others, self-employment taxes, printer ink, and internet and telephone costs. Always market your services and employ different methods to find customers.
Celebrity Writer
Are you a closet (or non-closet) devotee of celebrity gossip and the buzz on the latest movies and television shows? Consider being a celebrity writer. If you like to stay on top of trends involving celebrities (and talk about these famous folks), this could be a great job for you! You can often pitch your own stories, and you’ll need to understand what makes a certain story popular or not.
There are many different publications to write for. Magazines include People, Us Weekly, Entertainment Weekly, iHeartMedia, The Daily Beast, NBC Universal, Interactive One, VIZIO, Whalerock Industries, Bustle, and Time Inc. Interested in writing for a celebrity blog? Consider Deadline Hollywood Daily, The Dirty, Gawker, Hollywood Life, Just Jared, Perez Hilton, Pop Sugar, and TMZ. Of course, there are the tabloids: National Enquirer, Star, and Globe.
If you are interested in being a celebrity writer, here are some tips: 1) you may encounter a celebrity at a book or show tour or filming a movie or television show, 2) you can interview someone you know who has an association with a celebrity, or 3) find a retailer or restaurant owner who has a celebrity as a customer.
Voice Captioner or Transcriber
In this position, you’ll provide near instantaneous transcription using speech-recognition technology. Required qualifications include extensive knowledge of English, great general knowledge, being detail-oriented, reasonable proficiency with computers, and more. With general transcription, you might be listening to personal conversations, business meetings, college lectures, court hearings, and any number of other audio files. For this job, it can help if you have a good deal of patience. Sometimes the files are very hard to understand, and it will take a lot of patience and some repeated listening to get through the more difficult to understand audio segments.
General transcription has one advantage in that there are many companies that will consider beginners. This usually means that if you can pass their preliminary transcription test, you can get a job. What does transcription pay? Many general transcribers average between $10 to $20 or even more hourly. However, with some of the lower-paying companies that will hire just about anybody, you may be lucky to make minimum wage. A more specialized form of transcription is medical transcription, but this option requires experience and/or transcription certification before most companies will consider you.
Tax Preparer
Do you have a knack for numbers or like the idea of helping people maximize their tax status? You might be interested in being a tax preparer. To be an effective tax preparer, you’ll need to greet people and interview potential clients. Once you gather information from clients, you’ll recommend the right forms and services and complete any related tax forms. In this age, you will need to be computer literate.
Although there is variance due to experience and location, the average hourly pay for tax preparers is around $9.50. Tax preparers are paid for a combination of base salary, bonuses based on performance, commission for completed returns, and incentives for selling products like IRAs. Regarding education, a high school diploma or GED is required. The employer will instruct you on applicable tax regulations possibly in the form of an organized tax course.
Tax preparation is very seasonal. It peaks in February and March but stays busy through April 15. Job opportunities for tax preparers and accountants are growing per the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
These are just four part-time jobs for retirees, but there are many others. When considering which route to take in a part-time job, always take into account what you like, what you are good at, and how much time you want to dedicate to it.
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Originally published on https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/4-part-time-jobs-retirees-steve-king/
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