Making rl money in sl?

I'm not a "paying" member...just a free one. I was wondering if it is possible to make rl money in sl? I noticed that you can "sell" your L$. Does this really mean that if you build up enough L$ you can get real cash for it? Any other ways out there? Sorry if this is a stupid question...just wondering. Thanks.

Yes, you can.

Sorry, meant to add if you go to Buy/Sell L$ in your account options, you can see exchange rates too.

Think its about 299$L > $

cool! I'll check that out. Guess I better start saving up my tips from dancing...lol!

There are all sorts of ways to make money on SL, and you don't have to have a paying account. I don't, and I bring in perhaps $100-$200 US a month. Some people earn 'real' incomes here.

Wow! this is very interesting and encouraging. Would be great to think I could actually pay a rl bill or two playing sl.

Its possible depending on what you -do-

The big income spinners are land barony, although you wont make any friends doing that.

Some DJ's get paid quite well, but you have to have the huge amount of time and resources to do it.

Designing a line of clothes/furniture etc takes time but can pay dividends if your willing to invest in it.

Don't want you all to think I'm looking for some kind of "get rich"scheme. I realize it's not that easy. I'm just a stay at home mom who was curious if this was possible. Thanks and I'll definately try to earn some L$! LOL!

Wow.... I think i get another tip jar =D (notice i dont care real life money, but i get with 100 and 500 my computer better and better! time to play half-life 2 ^^)

Good luck, hope it works out for you. Seriously, if you can pull it off then your a better businesswoman then most of the people here.

Thanks chance! I just changed my prefrences (I think) so I accept pm. I'll look for you later if I'm on.

Land Barons may make alot of money, but its not exactly the easiest thing to do in SL.

Alot of people get the impression from their first land sale...that moving land in SL is pretty simple. Its not.

To effectively make money as a land baron in SL you have to be able to invest quite alot of money in tier. Depending on L$\sqM and buyer trends you can end up sitting on plots of land for indeterminate amounts of time.

Its also tricky because say you find a really great piece of land that should move fast and you pick that up...then some other land hawk picks up a few pieces near you and splits it all into ad land....suddenly the investment you've made that had a sure return is on hold because nobody wants to live near a bunch of ads and spam.

Dancing and escorting and DJing is a variable business as well. Several of my lady friends in SL have done one or the other, but from what I've seen they've never been able to do much more with it than fund a shopping habit in world.

For true USD returns with minimal investment (but of course, this takes skills and personal time for development)...the best thing you can do in SL is develop content that people enjoy. Back in November of last year when I started out, I did club\sim management and made a little cash for a couple of months while I learned the system and applied my inherent talents to it....but in January of this year, I developed my very first product, which turned out to be quite a hit.

I haven't paid my tier out of my own pocket ever since...and I'm a the $125.00 a month tier level now.

SL also buys my groceries and puts gas in my car.

Overall..its been a great game...and all it took is a little creavitity....some background skills, and one good idea.

Good luck to you. If you ever need any help, please feel free to contact me in world.

Wow! thanks so much for all the ideas. i don't think the land development thing is for me. I'm not quite buisness-skilled enough for that. I started dancing at the edge yesterday and enjoy that quite a bit. easy and meeting lots of people. Of course, I know I won't make much there. just really enough to buy more dancing clothes...lol. Maybe I'll try making things. Do you have to have a place to sell things if you make them? Are there open market type places (yard sales) where you can sell things on consignment so you don't have to own land. Sorry, kinda cheap in rl and want to be sure it's worth investing before i go too crazy...lol.

Yes you can make RL money from SL.

All it takes is a dollar and a dream.

Business development in SL can be pretty simple.

Many people simply rent mall space and sell their products there. Theres thousands of malls in the world..so theres never really an end to mall space availibility and its relatively cheap.

The downside to mall space rental is you have no control though over directing traffic to your products.

The best thing you can do if you want to make and sell products is to go premium and buy a nice plot of first land. This won't cost you any more than 10 dollars a month (easily payable even on a dancers in world salary) and, even though a 512 lot only supports 117 prims...thats more than enough to build a small shop on to feature your products and this gives you direct control of how to advertise your products and allows you to directly advertise to the market via the Search feature...which is not something you're guaranteed when renting mall space.

The thing about SL dear, is that it can...and does in many cases, pay for itself. When I first started out...I was a non-premium account as well. I went premium and paid my November and December membership on Linden dollars by cashing out and leaving the money in my USD balance of my account. It was very simple and painless.

In December I bought a 2048 plot of land in a nice, fast, quiet lagless sim..and developed my flagship product there and put it up for sale. Now...eight months later...I own 60% of the sim I bought my 2048 plot in and I make nearly a full time jobs monthly net income.

Everything about SL has paid for itself. I've never paid a dime out of my own pocket...I've just grown slowly and surely as my sales increased.

The biggest thing I can suggest is to spend a few days at the Ivory Tower of Primitives....this is probably the best place in world for anyone to begin to get a handle on the basic skills it takes to start developing content in the world. Clothes and scripting are a bit more advanced, but you can get a handle on scripting at Teazers University (and by using the LSL Wiki).

Clothing on the other hand takes quite alot of artistic skill (to do well) and the ability to use Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro. So I recommend starting with prims....its the best place to start learning....from there, the sky truely is the limit.