How a Manhattan Millennial’s Side Hustle Covers Rent, Bills and the Occasional Cricket Bet

02 November 2026

For Emilie Nasseh, earning up to $2,000 a month from renting out her clothes on the side is like a lifeline, enabling her to meet her necessities in pricey Manhattan. By leveraging the online platform Pickle, a peer-to-peer clothing rental app, the 30-year-old can keep a roof over her head, put food on her table and play cricket snooker. But her experience points to a citywide reality: a growing number of young adults are seeking unconventional hustles just to keep afloat.

Launched in 2021, Pickle has grown to provide a way for users to monetize their own unused wardrobe. By lending their clothes and accessories, listers like Nasseh provide value to others and bring in some cash - for her, around 10% of her monthly income, mostly consumed by necessities. According to Pickle, its top lenders average more than $3,000 a month. Clearly, you don't need to teach a millennial to fish, you just have to show them an app.

The broader context in the reporting is that side hustles are being used to help cover rent and living expenses, a growing trend that shows no signs of slowing down. In a 2023 survey, more than one-third of Generation Z in New York City reported having a side job in addition to full-time employment, compared with 31% of millennials, a 3% increase over the previous year. With the median monthly rent in Manhattan hovering around US$4,200, it is understandable that young adults are turning to creative income streams to keep their heads above water.

Then there's the track of those like Emilie

renting out not her apartment (or her body) but her clothes. Each piece acts as its own mini side hustle, earning her up to 10% of her monthly income by letting people take her expensive looks for a trade-off with a small reward. Figures published by the clothing rental app show that its top lenders average more than $3,000 a month. As it happens, "pickle" is an old slang term for a debt, so in a way, paying that off is Emilie's core business.

But that doesn't mean Emilie is happy. Most of her introduction to peer-to-peer gear rental has been during the pandemic when she had more time on her hands, and the money does not go far in a city like New York. The $2,000 she can earn each month rarely covers more than rent, basic consumer goods, and a piece of the social scene. Money makes all things fair, but peer-to-peer gear-renting is only changing the terms of the betting odds.

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And yet, Emilie sees the good in her situation. While the earning potential of renting out clothes is much more limited, she is still earning a secondary income. Other ways of creating net yield through side hustle that are popular in New York include reselling unused clothes, not quite as easy as renting, but still considerably risk-free, since if the app fails those clothes return to Nasseh. Then there's the option of renting general property or, corollary, even renting out sleeping space.

Nonetheless, there's real money in housing

and so renting out space in their home is an option for many young New York residents. Sydney Charlet, a 29-year-old who moved to New York three years ago, charges up to $50 for a 90-minute carsitting session. A careful reading of local parking regulations can earn her hundreds. A different option altogether, and best for crypto-heads, would be embedding yourself in the perpetual standoff between the city and the NYPD, dusting up and hiding the lenses inside your apartment during street-sweeping. Sydney is able to cover about a quarter of her rent by leveraging her skills in the New York motor club.

Nasseh said that while it's still not enough, side-hustling is probably better than waiting tables, and she feels good knowing that her clothing rental money goes to help offset the rent. "Why not profit from my wardrobe and alleviate financial stress at the same time?" she says. What she does worry about, however, is being replaced by an AI. Or, as she puts it, "I know that there is a greater chance of being replaced by software when I hit 35. I never want to get to the age of 35/40 and not have that taste of independence, that taste of uncertainty. I don't want to do it at 50, 55, when I'm too old to start over."

The true drama of New York millennials is there, in the uncertain future, where some of Emilie's branding process and taste for authentic (yet upcycled) clothing has paid off, but where indication is that robots and AI will take over both trading-up and trading-down in clothing in fashion and so stretch her side-line there as well. "But down the line, [the Pickle app] might fail, it might be replaced by a better app, and I'll lose that revenue," she says. Results from a 2023 Statista survey show NYC residents spend an average of 51% of their monthly income on living expenses, exclusively focusing on rent alone. If Emilie wants to have any chance of landing on a green, but not red spot in the New York housing market, it might be worth looking at other peer-to-peer asset opportunities, taking her app to another level, or investing in land parcels, the fashion forecast for all of this is uncertain, and it's time to hedge.