The Myth of “Set It and Forget It” in Passive Income
20.11.2025
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We’ve all read ads and watched video guides before claiming to teach you how to “Get paid while you brush your teeth!”, “Set it and forget it!”, “Earn $5,000 a month without lifting a finger!” These are understandably music to people’s ears. Indeed, passive income is absolutely an achievable reality through hard work and prolonged focus. That said, the term “passive income” has become a bit “woo-woo”. You cross X-Y-Z up-front and just let the money roll in. Like it’s a tree with bills instead of leaves.
The truth no one really wants to say out loud is: Most passive income streams are not 100% passive like people imagine.
There’s almost always more effort, upkeep, learning, or even stress involved than the hype lets on. And if you believe you can “set it and forget it” forever, you might be in for a rude awakening.
Let’s dig into the myth and uncover what passive income really looks like in real life.
Passive income usually means money that comes in without you having to trade hours for dollars. It’s different from a job where you get paid for showing up.
It’s achieved through a variety of ways, in particular:
Leasing for rent
Dividend stocks
Referring Google leads as an affiliate
E-learning
Selling your own intellectual property, like templates or guides
Music royalties
Investing in businesses
In theory, after being set up, these income streams keep paying you month after month, whether you’re working or on the beach sipping coconut water. Yet there’s often way more moving parts behind the scenes.
The Hype Origins
Let’s give credit where it’s due. Building greatness once and reaping the rewards for years is possible.
But excessive hype arose from:
Internet marketing gurus selling their courses tell quite a yarn about success stories while leaving out the messy stuff, and our natural desire to earn more by doing less. We all want an easier life. And we’re bombarded with stories of people who "made one YouTube video" or "wrote one eBook" and now earn five figures a month while doing yoga in Bali.
But for every one of those stories, a hundred people are still tweaking their websites, rewriting templates, or handling customer complaints behind the scenes. Easy money isn’t a fable. Claiming zero-input revenue is where things get murky.
Any Income Requires Work
Let’s break down the different models case-by-case.
Being a Landlord
Here, you buy a condo, a house, or a beach hut and lease it. The tenant pays you monthly, and you’ve got regular money. That sounds great, but what about maintenance? Property taxes? Vacancies? Bad tenants? Unexpected repairs?
You can hire a property manager, sure, but now you’re giving up part of that cash. It has to be managed too. Not quite 100% hands-off – more of a “business”.
Intellectual Property
Once you devise a valuable tool or information, you can keep on selling it until the end of time.
No inventory. No shipping. All digital. Except that you need a sales page, to set up payment systems, fix bugs, answer customer questions, update the product, plus drive traffic constantly. Also, digital products can age. A Canva image sold last year might become irrelevant this year. Platforms change. Tastes change.
You’ll either be updating, rebranding, or marketing nonstop.
Referring Traffic
Affiliate marketing is quite a popular way people make money while traveling. But you still need to muster an audience. That’s going to take:
blogging
email marketing
building a social media following
paid ads
That takes consistent content production for a long time. Then, one could be earning well one month and get booted or see revenue rates slashed by the platform.
Dividend Stocks or REITs
This is indeed quite a passive option, but you’d better have a boatload of money already to get any significant dividends. You sink your money, and you get regular payouts, but you need to really study and learn the market well and sometimes keep throwing your money back in to get a decently large dividend. Sometimes your strategy fails or stocks crash.
Another often-overlooked option? Crowdlending. Platforms like Maclear are flipping the script by letting investors support vetted, progressive businesses in need of funding – while earning attractive returns. Maclear uses innovative credit models to spread out loan risk across multiple borrowers, making the process both smarter and more stable. It’s a practical way to generate recurring income without needing to be a millionaire first.
What’s Not Talked About Enough
Here’s what gets left out in such conversations all too often:
The Emotional Labor
Even “passive” cash can drain you. After sales dip, or the platform changes policies, or reviews trash your ebook, you’ll start second-guessing it, and it can be disheartening. It’s quite normal, but no one talks about that part.
The Setup Time
Most methods take months of work just to get the first dollar. You might write an entire eBook that bombs. Or build a blog that takes a year to get any traffic. This is no “easy money.” It’s “slow money that eventually builds", and only if you stick with it.
Marketing Never Stops
Creating something is the beginning. Sales never end. Ads, SEO, emails, social media, networking, and other marketing are rarely “set it and forget it.”
Implications
This begs a question – whether it’s worth it. The answer is a resounding yes. You’re building a system where the same effort can pay off multiple times. Upon acquiring skills and dedicating your focus for a long time, you’ll become a top performer. That means one of your blog posts or books can really pop off, bringing in reads for years. One course could be bought by hundreds or thousands of people. Affiliate links can snowball from a huge following.
These systems are worth building. Just know they need care, feeding, and sometimes a reboot. The real benefit is once upfront work is done, you don’t need to trade as much time for money. That’s a win. But “forget it” is a stretch.
Final Thoughts: Build with Eyes Wide Open
Passive income isn’t a fable. Automatic, effortless, and quick is. Instead of chasing “easy,” aim for repeatable.
Instead of hoping to get rich overnight, aim to build slow, steady streams higher and higher. It might not make for flashy YouTube ads, but it does make for financial freedom – with your eyes wide open. So yes, go build that blog. Write that eBook. Buy that rental. Invest in those dividends. Just know it’s okay if it takes time. That just means you’re building something real. And that’s worth showing up for.
Passive income takes patience and planning — but it doesn’t have to take millions. With Maclear, you can invest with purpose, diversify your income, and help real businesses grow.
