I think of myself as a pretty average person, especially in school. Had some trouble here and there with particular subjects but for the most part I was able to get through college with ease. I did the whole experience living in the dorms had a part time job and went to school full time while also interning for my future career. In 4 years I obtained my Bachelors Degree in Criminal Justice with a Paralegal Certificate and a minor/license in Real Estate and Business. I wanted to be prepared for life so I tried to cover all my bases. I wanted to work in the legal field, maybe as an investigator or in a legal office but I also wanted to learn how to invest but had no idea where to start so I got into real estate and business.
I think I did a pretty good job picking my degrees, when I graduated I did get some pretty good job offers. At my last job, I worked for the Orange County Superior Court. It was great! I was going into work everyday feeling proud that I made it! I was actually putting my degree to good use and it felt like my college tuition didn’t go to waste. I even put that real estate license to good use because I went ahead and purchased my own property. I was my own agent and represented myself. Everything was going great for a while but after a few years I felt different.
I started to feel tired. I would get up at 6:30 am to get ready for my 8:00 am shift and would not get back home till around 6:30 pm after fighting traffic or going to get food. I gained some weight from sitting in a office chair in front of a computer for 10 hours a day and when I get home I only had about 4 hours left in the day before I had to sleep and repeat the process. Everyone gets a little burnt out, I thought it was normal. So I changed nothing and kept doing the same, day after day.
I wan’t necessarily making it rain stacks of cash. With my government job I was still making less then the median yearly wage. I was making $35,000 a year. This is suppose to be a lucrative field for the criminal justice department. It got me a little worried that was doing something wrong when the average person makes double my salary. So, I started looking for a new job. But thesse new opportunity’s pay ranges even come close to the $79,000 number. They were asking for a 20 year resume and only offer you $50,000 a year. There was definitely something wrong, I was starting to see some flaws.
It got worse when I would go out to eat with my friends and discuss each other’s salaries. I have a lot of friends who work in the restaurant industry making just as much as me in tips and serving drinks while I am standing 2 feet away from a murderer and handing him his papers for his next court date, like …what? An eye opening experience was when my friend who drives for Uber showed his earned income of $59,000 for the year while having the ability to choose his own hours. Now I know every job is hard but at the moment I felt like my friends had it easier and were making more then me.
The last straw was when I had a family emergency and had to request time off. Unfortunately the time off lasted a few months and I ran out of vacation time so I had to ask my job for special permission. I had to worry about keeping my job even though I had already given them years of fantastic work. During a time of need I hated having to ask for permission to be with my family. It should not be this way and yet a lot of jobs are like this, many places don’t have a big enough staff to carry the work load of people who need to be gone for a long period of time.
During my family emergency I started working odd jobs. I was making just as much money as I was in the courthouse, the only difference is that I was able to work it at whatever time I wanted. My family emergency meant I could no longer work a normal 9–5 schedule. I had to decide if I wanted to keep my job or be there for my family, so obviously I chose family. I said goodbye to my job, thanked them for everything they had showed me and they told me I am always welcomed back.
When I was saying my goodbyes to my coworkers and boss, no one could understand how I was going to make money and were concerned. I didn’t have an answer either, it was more of a “I’ll just figure it out”. Most of the people I worked with were in their 40’s-50’s and had worked there for half of there lives. I could understand their confusion when I had no plan.
I had no idea what was going to happen, bloggers always seem to be so happy about leaving there 9–5 cooperate job but I had no idea what I was doing, no direction. My main plan was to always work at an office type setting, not go out and do my own thing. I was surviving on savings for awhile and I rented out my property, which was good. It meant I had no bills to worry about, no debt. I was mainly just paying for my own food, gas, and phone bill.
I picked up a bunch of little side hustles by going on craigslist. I found some clinical trails that I was able to join, did some stock trades, went online to find free items to flip and sell for profit, I tried Uber for a little. At the court house I was making $2,476, $1,238 bi weekly. For the first few months I was making no where near that amount of money, but I told myself that if I could get back to $2,400 a month then I have essentially made it, that was the goal.
Things got better with the family emergency and it did not require so much of my time upfront anymore, so at night I started flipping couches as my side hustle. If you have never heard of couch flipping then here are the basics: you look for free or cheap couches and you go and pick it up, bring it home, clean or refurbish it and then sell it. I would go online every day to check out the free section and for awhile there I was doing it every day. On an average month I started making about $2,000, on a really good month, I could get a little over $4,000 a month. I figured out how to make as much money as I need with putting in less hours compared to the courthouse.
I spent months figuring out how to make money without using my degree, I no longer wanted to go back and I probably never will. I would type into google “how to make money” “what side hustle bring in good income” and the only answers I would get would be clinical trials and online surveys that pay you 5 cents. Remember I tried a bunch of things until I saw some real results with couch flipping. Now that I have a secure way of making fast money I want to explore other hustles, like airbnb and mobile home flipping. Especially now that I have the time that I desire, I can put it to good use and try new things for me.
Now, I am not saying that the 9–5 corporate jobs are horrible and you should not do it. It just didn’t end up working for me. I needed more money and more time, I felt trapped in away. I come from an immigrant family and there was no way I would ever be able to afford a house for us or anything nice for my family if I was going to continue down that same route. When I did the calculations of how I could retire on that salary or beat the race of inflation I was never going to make it with $2,400 a month by working 200 hours a month. If you sit down and work the math out it almost seems like a scam. I wish you luck on your money making journey.
