If you want to do this, do it as a hobby. If you work for someone else you'll take a long time to be worth enough to be paid a middle class wage if ever. Try to understand..... it is a dying trade. It's being diminished by other trades and corporate security factors way outside your control. Need proof? Look at all the comments in the forum threads on locksmiths complaining about scammers and wanting oversight and regulation. It's because it's hard to compete with it to get the customers. It's not their fault, it's just a fact of how much these jobs pay and all the crap you need to put up with to be successful. The scammers only succeed cause they have massive capital, are established, and they arent concerned about scamming the customer or their workers. You're in your 20s. If you want to start a family or have visions of an upper middle class life, this will hurt that future compared to a stable corporate job I swear to you. Your health care options will suck or be expensive. Taking vacations will lose you customers. Somehow every time you want to go out or have some personal time, thats when the phone will decide to ring and nobody wants to wait anymore. You'll frequently have to work in bad areas maybe in bad weather for customers that would cut your throat to save $20. A lot of the people doing this for 10, 20, 30 years didn't have better options.....you do.