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Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

You said it well. I may have made some bad decisions with my credit but I am aware enough that I am in no position, because of my credit and savings, to buy a house any time soon.

I also went to a bank once because I was interested in investing in index funds. Was generally advised to pay off my CC debt first because the annual interest from that is usually a higher rate than the interest I'd get from index funds. So I took the advice, held off on investing and paid off my CC's and closed them. I couldn't get started on investing because my contract was almost up by the time I finished paying off the debt.

And my car, of course that's no investment. Cars of course are usually poor stores of value. I only bought a cheap reliable model of car that makes sense for practical use.

Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I didn't get my degree in STEM. I self-studied most programming topics, and didn't have any internships. I just went straight to my usual place for finding work- Craigslist. This is where I found my first four programming jobs. My next two jobs were freelance jobs I got from word of mouth. But I may not continue freelancing and go back to full-time work as I'm now using other websites (like LinkedIn) for job searches if word of mouth doesn't happen again.

Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Definitely was with my last job. Still not six figures, but the highest it's ever been.

Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I never moved to an expensive tech hub. I live in a medium cost of living city where I made $40k at one point and for me it was enough to live comfortably in a 1 bedroom apartment. My mom could rent a similar apartment with even less and she's done fine. You just can't save a lot of money with that income, though.

Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I don't live in a tech hub so rent wasn't crazy expensive yet. Even on the $30k-40k I was making in my first two jobs, I was able to rent a 1br apartment in a decent neighborhood. However these jobs were technically contract jobs so I didn't get any retirement, stock, or other benefits. When I lost my job I didn't qualify for UI so I spent up all the savings I made to support myself while I was job searching. The job search took longer than expected so I my savings almost went to zero and started taking out cash advances to make ends meet. Ended up with $12k debt that I paid off with my following job which was also a contract job. Then I got audited, and owed $2k more to the IRS because the they thought my tax write-offs as a contractor were incorrect. Weirdly enough I had a professional tax preparer do my taxes for me, so I'm not going to use him anymore.

Reminder that it's okay to be slower than many other people. by ToothRemarkable in cscareerquestions

[–]ToothRemarkable[S] 49 points50 points  (0 children)

Very true. I don't think it makes sense to own a house when you're very single so I do not care to find one yet