Make Extra Money from Unexpected Household Objects

January and February are always the months that we feel the pinch. Payday is a few weeks off and clash flow is tricky after Christmas! You may have tried to sell unwanted items on eBay or Gumtree but did you know that you could make money from recycling?

Garment collection

Clothes, bedding, tea towels and bath towels can be taken to retail giant H&M which has a garment collection box usually near the cash desks. If you take them in and deposit them into the store you’ll get a H&M voucher – at the moment this is £5 for every £25 you spend.

The sister & Other Stories runs a similar scheme where you’ll receive a 10% off voucher  in exchange for your donation.

M&S will also offer you a £5 voucher each time you donate a bag of clothing to Oxfam (a standard carrier bag is enough).

Ink cartridges

If you get through ink cartridges on a regular basis, you could make some money by visiting The Recycling Factory and registering for an account. Send your cartridges off and you’ll get paid as much as £3 per cartridge

Recycling tech

If you have old phones, iPods, cameras, computers or gaming devices lying around your home you could make money from these by sending them to an online collection. Music Magpie is one such website – you just go online, put in the details and it tells you what your item will be worth. Postage is free. Price comparison site Compare and Recycle can help you check who will give you the most for your money.

You could also trade in an old device if you want to upgrade and receive money off from phone suppliers like Carphone Warehouse or Tesco Mobile. Apple also have trade in prices if you want to upgrade your laptop, phone or iWatch.

Ditch the disposable cup

We get through an incredible amount of disposable cups in the UK, so it’s time we did something about it! By taking your own cup to the coffee shop you could receive a discount. For example, Pret a Manager offers a 50p discount when you use your own cup and Costa and Starbucks will give you 25p off, which will soon add up.

Beauty

Don’t throw money away by getting rid of beauty containers. Kiehl’s will give you a loyalty stamp each time you return an empty bottle, and when you have 10 stamps you’ll get a travel sized product as a reward. Lush also have a reward for recycling where you can get a free face mask and Mac offers a free gift in exchange for six empty lipstick tubes, eye palettes, foundation bottles, or eye shadow pots.