Same here in southern NH. There are help wanted signs everywhere.
The problem is that many of those jobs are real work. Meaning you have to wait tables or do something physical.
I do not mean roofing or landscaping either. Those jobs are so physically demanding that they are almost exclusively done by illegals.
I think I could make a living just doing odd jobs for things people need done around their house. I see them asking all the time on my local Facebook page.
IF you have a pickup truck you can make money just taking things to the dump for people.
I sell firewood on the side. It started mostly just to clean up my 12 acre property. Trees die, they break, fall over. Last fall I sold ten pick up truck loads. I could have sold twenty easily. It is hard physical labor though. I sell them for CASH. No credit cards, no VENMO, no Apple pay. No checks. CASH.
“I think I could make a living just doing odd jobs for things people need done around their house.”
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Very true. But one problem is that most people don’t want to pay you sufficiently for your services, especially when it comes to “small jobs” (which they think should all be quick and easy). Always charge enough to cover your time, materials, profit, and a possible call-back.
You could never charge them enough. The homeowners are reaching out on Facebook because there isn't a viable market in place.
You can go online and see contractor after contractor talking about how their business was previously 80% wealthy customers and 20% regular folks but is now 100% wealthy customers. The work is almost all new construction and installation instead of repair.
We've reached a stage where labor is prohibitively expensive while parts are inexpensive. It costs less to wire up a floor of a brand new house than it would cost to replace just one outlet in an existing house. The tooling and construction techniques for new work compared to renovation are a large part of the equation. Also, even just the cost of driving to the job site often far outweighs the cost of materials and labor for the actual work.
All that's before you get into the liability issue. Nick one water line or electrical line and it's game over. That $75 job the homeowner wanted just turned into thousands of dollars of damage.