7 Ways to Make Money from the Paranormal

A question I get asked a lot is, “How can I make money from the paranormal?”

It ties for first place with the other question I get asked all the time, which is: “How do I get my own paranormal TV show?” Which, coincidentally, is actually one of the answers to how to make money in the paranormal. But it’s perhaps the least easy to accomplish.

Speaking of, if you’re looking for easy ways to make money in the paranormal, however, dream on. Like anything else, you’re going to have to exert some effort and harness some creativity before you see any money rolling in. And really, in most cases, it’s side hustle money, not full-time or even part-time pay.

However, if the paranormal is your passion, it won’t feel like work at all so in that respect it is easy money! Because as Marc Anthony once said, “If you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in your life.”

Still, it should be noted that if you’re looking for a career change and believe the paranormal is your ticket to a new, better life, don’t quit your day job. At least not right away. But if you become successful enough? Who knows?

That said, if you are looking for ways to make money from the paranormal, here are seven revenue-generating ways to do it.

1. Make money creating content

I’m starting here because this is the one I have the most experience with. Blogs, YouTube channels, and podcasts are all ways of creating money-making content in the paranormal. Books can also fall into this category. I discuss them a little here under the “Ways to Monetize Content” as well as in the “Making Money Selling a Paranormal Product” section.

Just creating content won’t earn you money, however. There’s a lot that goes into it.

Probably the most important is that you have to commit to creating consistently and well. Among other things, that means crafting info-taining, SEO-friendly content. (Which applies uniformly to blogs, podcasts, and videos, but doesn’t translate as well to books because people consume them differently, which is why I treat them more as a product.)

But when it comes to creating online-accessible content, it’s all about the hits, baby. If you’re not bringing in eyeballs, you’re not going to generate any revenue.

But traffic alone won’t make you money. You also have to monetize your content and there are several ways to do that.

Ways to Monetize Content

1. Ads

Google Adsense is a top choice for blogs, but there are other ad networks too, such as Media.net, BuySellAds, Sovern //Commerce, and more. (HubSpot and Blogging Wizard both have great posts listing Google Adsense alternatives if you’re interested in other options.)

But you could also sell ad space directly. Again, visitor and watch numbers matter. If you can prove you get traffic, advertisers will be willing to pay for space on your platform. There are also ad networks for podcasts, or selling directly is another option here too.

YouTube has its own criteria for monetizing, which starts with having enough followers and views. It’s why you see so many YouTubers reminding you to subscribe to their channel.

But how much you can make? StatsMash estimates popular YouTube channel Amy’s Crypt’s YouTube net worth is about $33,000, The Paranormal Scholar’s is $41,000 and Sir Spooks is a whopping $283,000!

So, yeah. It pays to grow and monetize.

2. Affiliate marketing

Earning commissions when you sell something for a company you’ve entered into an affiliate relationship with is another way to earn money. There are affiliate marketing companies like ShareASale or CJ that have a bunch of different merchant programs you can apply to. Even Amazon is one! (You may have noticed the disclaimer at the top of this post? To see other companies I’m affiliated with, visit the Our Affiliates page.)

3. Selling a product

You don’t need a blog, podcast, or a vlog to do this one necessarily, and it will also appear as its own suggestion for making money, but if you create paranormal equipment, arts and crafts of any kind, write books, or make movies, your blog, pod, and/or vlog can help you sell your product too.

Pro Tip: If you sell it via an affiliate, you can double down on your earnings. For instance, say you write a book and sell them on Amazon. Create an affiliate Amazon account that you post on your blog. You’ll earn money when people buy your book but you’ll also earn a commission if they buy that book via your affiliate link.

4. Tips and Donations

Buy Me a Coffee and Patreon are good examples of ways people can show their support and “tip” you to help you earn a monthly income. I’ve watched a lot of my fellow content creators go this route, but I’ve only seen a handful successfully earn money this way. You have to have a very strong following, and a large one, to earn more than a couple of bucks a month this way.

Using Amy’s Crypt as an example again, Patreon Owl estimates she’s making about $455/month from her Patreon account.

Pro Tip: Don’t start with this one if you’re just starting out. Build up your platform first. Otherwise, you look like a beggar and turn people off before they get a chance to know you and what you have to offer.

2. Make money selling a paranormal product you’ve created

We’ll just go ahead and recap this one, even though I also covered it above. Whatever it is you’ve created, from paranormal equipment to art, clothing, books, or movies, you can sell your products on sites like Etsy or Amazon, or via social networks like Instagram and Twitter.

And if you like getting out and meeting people, setting up a table at paranormal events, conferences, or psychic fairs and selling your wares in person is also something to consider.

3. Make money with ghost tours

Nowadays, except for very cold states that have brutal winters and only offer ghost tours during the milder months (usually April/May through October/November), you can pretty much find ghost tours in every state and major metropolitan region year-round.

There are a couple of ways to cash in on them too, including being a ghost tour operator or a ghost tour guide. In some cases, the companies are small enough that the ghost tour operator and guide are one and the same, as is the case for many small-town ghost tour companies.

Popular paranormal destinations, such as Savannah, Charleston, and New Orleans, are oversaturated with ghost tour options. You’ll find stiff competition from larger ghost tour companies like Ghost and Gravestones, Nightly Spirits, or US Ghost Adventures, which all offer tours in multiple cities across the United States. Starting up a new tour in a place like that might prove difficult. However, there’s always the possibility of working as a guide for one of the bigger, more established ghost tour companies.

But smaller towns also make great places for ghost tours, especially if they don’t already have one and you dig up interesting history.

Another thing you can do is create a limited-time ghost tour experience sort of like the Tragic Tour paranormal bus tour. Graveside Paranormal only offers it for a couple of dates each year. This can be a good option if you want to make a little money here and there but don’t want to commit to giving ghost tours every week.

Ghost tours don’t necessarily need to involve a town or multiple locations around a city either. In some cases, haunted places like hotels and museums offer their own ghost tours. (In the “Haunted Places with Ghost Tours and Ghost Hunting Events” section of the Ghost Hunting Event Companies & Haunted Places page, we’ve listed some hotels and museums that offer their own ghost tours.)

As the saying goes, “If you offer them, people will come!” (Okay, maybe that’s not the exact saying, but close.)

4. Make money hosting events

Kind of like ghost tours, there are several ghost hunting companies that offer investigations of haunted places. You could explore opportunities working for one of them, or you could branch out on your own. All you’d have to do is find a haunted place willing to work with you and to host your ghost hunting events.

Similarly, there are lots of paracons all over the country. While the most haunted cities usually already have established ones, sometimes they don’t.

Take Savannah for instance. It often makes the list for most haunted cities not only in the world, but in the U.S. but they didn’t have a paracon until Wandering Further created one, which was held in 2022!

5. Make money owning and/or operating a haunted location

Obviously, if you buy a haunted location, you’re going to have to (a) spend money, and (b) have money to spend, so this option is a little more capital intensive than some of the others. (It really doesn’t cost much more than time and energy to start a blog, make some YouTube videos, write a book, or give a ghost tour.)

That said, if you time it right and get the right location, you can earn bank.

I enter the sale of the Conjuring House into evidence as exhibit A. The Heinzens bought the property in 2019 for $439,000. They operated it as a paranormal business, offering both tours and overnight investigations. So they earned money that way, but they also recently sold it for over three times what they paid for it ($1.525 million) just two and half years earlier.

However, if you don’t have the money to buy something, but have management, hospitality and/or caretaking experience, you could always manage a haunted property.

Take US Ghost Adventures’ purchase of the Lizzie Borden House, for instance. They were looking for an assistant manager for the property with a salary of $36,000. (They were also looking for a part-time paranormal investigator and ghost hunter to conduct weekend ghost hunts. Certain haunted properties have the potential to generate more work opportunities than others!)

6. Make money with your supernatural gifts and abilities

Whether you’re psychic, intuitive, an astrologer, tarot card reader, or a dream interpreter, if you have gifts that you feel can be useful to others, you can earn money from them.

ZipRecruiter estimates that psychics earn between $36,000-$43,000 a year, or about $23/hour on average. Similarly, Comparably estimates a median salary for an astrologer of $28,300.

But if you pair in-person readings with any of the other ways listed above for making money, there’s always an opportunity to earn more.

7. Make money with a TV Show

This is the one so many people, especially paranormal investigators, fixate on and aspire to achieve because they believe with fame also comes fortune. (They’re not entirely wrong, which we’ll get to.)

However, this is also the hardest way to make money in the paranormal. Entertainment in general is a tough field to break into and the paranormal is no exception.

But if you are lucky enough to create a show that gets picked up, or audition for one that’s under development, and it proves successful, you can earn bank.

Take Zak Bagans for instance. Whether you like him or not, he’s arguably one of the most popular and prolific paranormal personalities out there —and the highest-paid. In 2021, both Celebrity Net Worth and Hollywood Worth estimated his net worth at $30 million. In a 2022 update, Famous People estimated it at $35 million.

There’s no way to know how accurate the numbers really are. Only Bagans and his accountant(s) know that. But they’re probably not far off considering his Haunted Museum and many discovery+ projects.

But Bagans isn’t the only one making money from the paranormal. So are his contemporaries. They may not be making quite as much as he is, but it’s still nothing to sneeze at. Here’s the net worth of some other popular paranormal stars:

• Amy Allan: $1 million (source: Affair Post) to $17 million (source: Idol Networth)
• Jack Osbourne: $15 million (source: Wealthy Gorilla)
• Adam Berry: $1-$5 million (source: Popular Bio)
• Jason Hawes: $3 million (source: Celebrity Net Worth)
• Steve DiSchiavi: $2 million (source: Bio Gossip)
• Nick Groff: $1 million (source: Celebrity Net Worth) to $2 million (source: The Personage)
• Amy Bruni: $800,000 (source: Biography Tribune)
• Katrina Weidman: $500,000 (source: Biography Tribune)

So, yeah. With salaries like those, it’s easy to see why some believe the ultimate goal is getting their own paranormal show on TV.

But if that’s not possible, there’s always creating your own on YouTube.

In Summary

If you want to make money from the paranormal, there are ways to do it. And you don’t have to settle for one way to do it. You can combine them to generate multiple revenue streams.

The important thing is to keep your expectations realistic. Sure, you can earn upwards of $1 million or more if the stars align just right, but in general you’ll earn a lot less than that.

But hey. If you’re having fun and making money doing it, even if it’s only a little extra mad money, that’s priceless, isn’t it?

Check-In

What other ways of making money in the paranormal would you have included on this list?