7 Boring Businesses That Quietly Make $100K+ a Year
No hype. No venture capital. Just cash flow.
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If I lost everything tomorrow, I wouldn’t launch an AI startup.
I wouldn’t build a personal brand.
And I definitely wouldn’t chase the next shiny thing.
I'd find something overlooked. Something local. Something simple. And I'd build it into a machine that prints cash while everyone else tweets about scaling unicorns.
Here are seven “boring” businesses I’d start or buy in 2025.
Every one of these can be run solo or scaled with a crew. All of them solve a real problem in your community. And every one is a viable path to financial freedom if you're willing to work.
1. Dumpster Rentals
One trailer. Ten bins. Local demand from roofers, remodelers, flippers, and landlords.
Rent them out at $400 to $500 per week. If you rotate them efficiently, you're grossing over $200,000 a year.
I've seen people buy small dumpster rental businesses doing $20K a month with no website, no marketing, and zero systems. Just a flip phone and a handwritten schedule.
Add Stripe checkout, route automation, and a decent online presence. You can double revenue without doubling headaches.
2. Pressure Washing
You can start this for under $5,000. A pressure washer, surface cleaner, trailer, and some basic branding. The residential market is wide open if you're consistent and professional. But the real money is in commercial.
Think fleets, apartment complexes, warehouse districts.
Lock in recurring contracts, upsell services like sealing or striping, and build a real business out of $300 driveways.
The guys who treat it like a brand, not a hustle, win here.
3. Self Storage
We’ve built these across the Midwest, and I keep going back to them for a reason.
No toilets, no tenants, and demand that doesn’t slow down.
If you build a 100-unit site in a secondary market and manage it well, you’re easily looking at $20K to $30K in monthly revenue once stabilized. That’s with a skeleton crew or none at all.
Want to shortcut it? Buy a mismanaged mom-and-pop facility. Raise rents, clean up operations, and refi it once you’ve stabilized NOI.
Plenty of these are owned by people ready to retire who’ve never heard of online payments or remote locks.
4. Concrete Business
This is where I started. Pouring driveways, shop pads, and garage slabs.
It’s dirty, hard work. But it’s honest, simple, and consistent.
If you can run three crews doing $4K per week, you’re staring at a $600K+ per year operation. Margins are solid if you own your equipment and control your backlog.
Find good subs, train a strong foreman, and keep your reputation tight. The trades are wide open for builders who know how to communicate and finish on time.
5. Equipment Rentals
Mini-excavators, skid steers, scissor lifts.
Buy used, rent them out for $200 to $400 a day.
One $22,000 machine can bring in $2,000 or more each month. Add delivery, insurance, and attachments, and it starts compounding fast.
Start small. List on Facebook Marketplace, BuildZoom, or local job boards. Partner with general contractors who don’t want the hassle of ownership. Build your fleet one asset at a time.
6. Utility Locating
Every city, GC, telecom, and contractor needs utilities located before digging.
No one digs without calling 811. It’s the law.
This business is niche, high-margin, and usually ignored.
If you’re certified and professional, you’ll stand out. One or two contracts can get you over $250,000 in revenue annually.
You don’t need fancy branding. You need relationships with the guys who dig.
7. Parking Lot Ownership
One of the most overlooked assets in real estate.
You don’t need a building to generate rent.
If you buy land near a stadium, hospital, or downtown core, you can gravel it, stripe it, gate it, and start collecting. $4,000 to $5,000 a month from what looks like an empty lot.
Add EV chargers. Lease to fleets. Open up overflow for events.
Most people don’t see it because they’re only looking up.
This one prints while you sleep.
The Pattern
None of these require funding rounds, followers, or fancy software.
They require real work. Clear systems. Local demand.
If you’re tired of waiting for the perfect idea, pick one that already exists and execute better than the next guy.
Every one of these is a path to $100K+ per year in personal income.
So here’s the question:
Which business in your town is sitting right under your nose? What are you driving past every day that could be cash flowing by next quarter?
Because the quietest wealth is built in places no one is paying attention to.
See you next week,
Marc Kuhn
P.S. If you’re a real estate investor or entrepreneur who wants to partner on future projects together, shoot me a message on LinkedIn.