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McKay Floyd was looking for a cheap dresser. She found a new job.

For Floyd, a former teacher, “flipping furniture,” or re-doing and modernizing old pieces, started as a way to get a new dresser into her son’s room. That eventually turned into her full-time job. 

With inflation still making it hard for households to keep up with essential bills, many Americans have taken on extra jobs to make ends meet. More than half of Americans say they have taken on a so-called side hustle, according to a recent MarketWatch survey.

Floyd, 29, was a fifth-grade teacher in Atlanta. One summer, she realized that updating her 2-year-old’s bedroom would be more expensive than she had anticipated. In an effort to save some money, Floyd said she used skills and knowledge she had gained working with her grandfather to fix up a cheap dresser she bought on Facebook Marketplace.

After re-doing the dresser, Floyd was curious to see if she could sell it for a profit. She listed the dresser for sale and found takers.

“I ended up selling it really quickly," Floyd said, so she did it again. "And then, honestly, after that, it just never stopped. I didn't plan on doing it full-time at that point in my life.”

After she found a steady stream of business, Floyd decided to making flipping furniture her main source of income.

Floyd typically buys furniture from Facebook Marketplace or thrift stores for $50 or less. She then takes it home to clean, restain, repaint or otherwise upgrade. The piece then goes back onto Facebook Marketplace, where Floyd lists larger pieces for $500 or more.

Floyd says she makes anywhere from $3,500 to $5,000 a month on her projects. The variation, she said, depends on how many pieces she can find as well as how many she sells.

“That is definitely something that I did struggle with—just not knowing how much I would make every month—coming from teaching where you get paid once a month, the same amount every month," Floyd said.

Social media has helped fill gaps during months when Floyd doesn't make as much money, she said.

Floyd mostly uses TikTok to advertise her projects and said most of her sales come from people who saw the piece on social media. Collaborations with companies have also helped her make some extra money.

Working from home has been a blessing and a curse, Floyd said. It can be both lonely and hectic, as she balances caring for her son while working on furniture in her garage.

“I have quite the odd schedule, and sometimes I find that really hard,” Floyd said. “But overall, I'm glad that I can do this because it also gives me the time to be able to spend with my son and to stay home, which, without furniture flipping, I would never be able to do or want to do.”

For those thinking about getting into the “flipping” business, Floyd suggests practicing on something small, such as an old dresser you already have. From there, you can build your skills and eventually transition into re-doing more expensive pieces.

“A pro is just being able to work from home and making more than I was teaching, making my own schedule and getting to flip furniture," Floyd said. "I do love flipping furniture, and I love getting to be creative and come up with designs.”

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Major U.S. equities indexes climbed Friday to wrap up a week of gains as recent data on inflation and the jobs market helped lift expectations that the Federal Reserve could be set for a steeper interest rate cut at its meeting next week. The S&P 500 advanced 0.5% Friday, while the Dow and the Nasdaq both closed around 0.7% higher.

Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) shares notched the top performance of any S&P 500 stock for the second straight day, surging 10.8% on Friday. The entertainment giant said Thursday that it renewed its distribution deal with Charter Communications (CHTR), a year before the existing agreement was set to expire.

Shares of online crafts marketplace Etsy (ETSY) jumped 7.6% on the day, bouncing off a 52-week low set by the stock in intraday trading earlier in the week. A proposal by the Biden administration to limit tariff exemptions that often benefit Chinese e-commerce companies helped push Etsy shares higher.

Align Technology (ALGN) shares added 6.5% on Friday as Piper Sandler reiterated its "overweight" rating for shares of the provider of clear teeth aligners and other dental products. Analysts pointed to strong trends in the U.S. orthodontics market over recent months that could drive strong quarterly results.

Adobe (ADBE) shares dropped 8.5%, the biggest daily decline in the S&P 500, following the release of the software firm's results for its fiscal third quarter. Although sales and profits grew from a year ago and exceeded analysts' forecasts, Adobe's fourth-quarter sales guidance came in below expectations.

Shares of GPS navigation and wearable technology provider Garmin (GRMN) slid 5.1% after the investment bank Barclays downgraded the stock to "underweight" and reduced its price target. Analysts suggested Garmin's valuation has become overextended following a year of strong gains for the stock. Barclays analysts also said Garmin could see softer sales in the second half of the year.

Boeing (BA) shares fell 3.7% as thousands of workers for the aviation giant went on strike Friday. The first strike at the company in more than 16 years began after workers voted overwhelmingly to reject a contract deal. The labor dispute could complicate Boeing's efforts to stabilize its supply chains and resolve production issues after a series of safety incidents.

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Adobe (ADBE) shares plunged nearly 9% Friday amid concerns about its weaker-than-expected outlook, but analysts were bullish on the stock, suggesting the company's projections were conservative and that it could get a boost from artificial intelligence (AI) demand.

Adobe’s Digital Media arm, which includes Creative Cloud subscriptions, brought in record net-new annualized recurring revenue (ARR) for the third quarter, but missed analysts' estimates for fourth-quarter guidance. Jefferies analysts said they suspect Adobe's outlook "could be very conservative," citing strong tailwinds from pricing and AI monetization.

The analysts said fiscal 2025 “could be the year of AI monetization" for Adobe, noting that the company is “already seeing some monetization, though early, as new users buy higher-priced plans, existing users upgrade, enterprises buy Firefly Services, and new products such as Acrobat AI Assistant get adopted.”

Upgrades by Adobe Creative Cloud subscribers to access Firefly, the company's family of generative AI models, will be a key performance indicator to watch, Bank of America analysts said.

“It is notable that Adobe is driving meaningful AI generation and running training and inferencing on large scale Firefly models, while delivering healthy margin expansion,” the analysts said, adding that it “also speaks to the advanced nature of Firefly models, relative to competing [large language models].”

Nearly three-quarters or 11 of the 15 of the analysts covering Adobe tracked by Visible Alpha held a "buy" or equivalent rating for the stock as of Friday. Their average price target of $620.86 would imply over 15% upside from Friday's closing price of $536.87.

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The U.S. government is on track to spend more than $1 trillion on interest payments this year, surpassing military spending for the first time in history.Interest payments on the national debt (held by the public in the form of Treasury securities) will cost the government $1.2 trillion in the government's fiscal year ending in October, the Treasury Department said in a monthly report on the budget. Net interest outlays are the third costliest item in the budget behind Social Security and Medicare benefits.

Economists have grown increasingly concerned about the potential impact of those payments on the U.S. economy. Interest payments took up 2.4% of the entire U.S. gross domestic product in 2023, and The Congressional Budget Office estimates that could swell to 3.9% over the next 10 years.

Two major factors have driven those payments skyward. First, the government spent trillions to support households and the economy during the pandemic, paying for it by borrowing rather than raising taxes. Second, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates starting in 2022 to fight inflation, which pushed up how much the government owes for that debt.Although the Fed is set to gradually lower those interest rates starting next week, the pressure on the budget is likely to keep ratcheting up in the years to come.The results of the presidential election could have a major impact on the trajectory of the budget deficit. Both former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris have proposed tax cuts and new spending that could push up the budget deficit. Harris has also proposed offsetting those new costs with tax increases on the wealthy and corporations. Trump has proposed heavy tariffs on foreign goods, but mainstream economists are skeptical those would bring in much revenue compared to the impact of the tax cuts.

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The Lagos State Government has sealed off a fast food restaurant owned by Nigerian socialite, Pascal Chibuike Okechukwu, popularly known as Cubana Chiefpriest.

This was disclo on Sunday by the state’s Commissioner for Environment, Tokunbo Wahab via his X account.

According to him, the decision to seal the business was due to the restaurant’s failure to adhere to several warnings issued regarding noise pollution and other environmental violations.

He went further to share a video of loud music emanating from the premises of the fast food restaurant which was shared by an anonymous resident.

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