Using Postmates and Ubereats On Date Nights

My wife and I love our date nights. We enjoy outdoor activities such as hiking, biking, and snowboarding. We also love long drives along Lake Michigan with our windows down as we hear the waves crashing and feel the wind blowing in our faces while we watch the beautiful Chicago skyline ahead of us. We love the lavish, romantic date nights as well - streak dinners, expensive cocktails, and luxurious restaurants.  While these experiences with my wife are priceless, the harsh reality is that these activities don't make us any money. In fact, most of the activities cost money (and often, a lot of money!). And this, of course, has negative consequences on our spending and, inevitably, our investing.  

After reading Scott Trench's book, Set For Life, we were reminded of how important it is to  invest in our future in order to eventually obtain financial freedom. We have had to, therefore, redirect and adjust our thinking a little bit and ask ourselves this question - 

How can we still enjoy our dates without significantly breaking the bank? 

And, after days of pondering this question, one morning I caught up with an old friend of mine who I had not seen in a few months. He had mentioned that he had been working several side gigs in order to supplement his income. Specifically, he had been delivering for various couriers like UberEats, DoorDash, and Amazon. 

And then, I had a moment of epiphany with this prevailing thought:

"My wife and I love to bike and we love to drive...

What if we started delivering for those couriers too? This could potentially be a great way for us to enjoy our hobbies while making some extra cash on the side." 

Truthfully, at first, the idea of making money while going on dates seemed unrealistic. There was always that fear that if we tried to incorporate money-making schemes into our dates then our dates would no longer be dates; it would just be work. However, I presented the idea to my wife and to my surprise, she was up for it and extremely enthusiastic about the idea of turning a cost-expenditure into an income!

So, on one random Saturday afternoon when the weather was nice, my wife and I took our bikes out and headed over into the city. We rode along the beautiful Lake Michigan and when we got to a reasonable location in the city where we knew there was demand for delivery we turned on our delivery app, which was, in this case, Postmates. 

(Note: This is in no way to advertise for various couriers like UberEats and Postmates. I am simply telling you my story. I do not gain any incentives by mentioning these couriers.) 

We chose Postmates this time, mainly because it allows bike deliveries as opposed to other couriers like UberEats that only allows car deliveries. In any case, as soon as we turned on our Postmates app, we were connected with a delivery right away. We hurriedly biked over to the restaurant. My job was to physically get the orders and put them in our insulated delivery bag. My wife's job was then to navigate us to where the customer was located. Long story short, we made several deliveries in a span of 2-3 hours and made about 30-40 bucks, not including tip. We didn't make a ton of money, but we were satisfied with the fact that we didn't have to SPEND any money as we spent some quality time together. And we had A LOT of fun doing it!

And now, we regularly go biking or driving while delivering for UberEats or Postmates. When we drive in particular, my wife prepares snacks and brings our dog. She often turns on a movie to watch in the car and feeds me snacks as I make my deliveries. We really cherish these experiences and again, they're extremely fun as well! 

My wife and I are legally married; however, we haven't had a wedding ceremony yet. We have about three months until our wedding, where we will be in what my wife calls, "Wedding-Shape." This basically means that I will have to be 20 pounds lighter and she will only be 3 pounds lighter (since she is already in shape...unfair!). 

By delivering for Postmates on my bike, we kill several birds with one stone. We get a significant amount of exercise, spend quality time together, make memorable experiences with each other, have lots of fun, and make some extra cash! 

As real estate investors, we all need to have the mindset of - How can we turn every activity in our lives into income-producing activities? How can we turn our liabilities into assets? How can we turn our expenditures into savings? And by doing this, we will be a step closer into achieving financial freedom!

I hope that my wife and I will continue to find more fun ways to save (or make) money on our dates and also get into shape WHILE on our dates!