Hi everyone, I’m not sure if this is the best subreddit for this, but it’s my first stop. If you have any suggestions on other subs I can post this to, please let me know. Also thank you in advance for reading through my entire post, if you can manage getting through it. I feel like I need to preface a lot in order to really gain any valuable advice. It’s a long read, so thank you for your time.
I’m seeking some advice on life which heavily revolves around making some financial decisions. It’s not money I really have, it’s money that I am considering seeking on loan. But first...
A little background on myself, I’m 31 and have a steady paying job in a career I love. I’ve been a full stack web developer for around 7 years now. Graduated with a BS in Computer Science from a small-fry private university on a small island in the Caribbean. I live in Los Angeles California. I currently make $93,000k a year, but live with my mom in a huge house that resides about 60 miles from my current job. Currently about 70% (~$3000) of my income is going towards paying off bills every single month including a loan that I used to consolidate my credit cards, loans on two cars, ($514 / month loan and $314 dollars / month lease), an inflated $360+/ month car insurance (it was doubled this year due to a traffic infraction), gym, and combination of more excess credit card spending and micro-loans from affirm. I am getting ready to sell the $514 / month car, but am upside down on the loan since the mileage I’ve put on the car has decreased it’s value dramatically. So I’ve been trying to get the pay off amount down to more of it’s market value.
I have slowly been bringing down all of my debt and in the process my credit score has been sky rocketing (750). I expect to resolve all of my debt in under 2 years time given my current budget towards paying debts. I’m in a comfortable situation financially where I can afford to take vacations and pretty much do a lot of nice things. Of course I am trying to become more frugal because 70% of my monthly income towards bill is obviously excessive and ridiculous, but it’s mostly catching up on spending I had done years ago, I was very irresponsible with my spending and ended up racking a lot of debt. Then I uprooted my entire life in 2016 and moved to California to support my mom and step dad, my step dad had been suffering with ALS for over 3-4 years, which sadly took his life this year in March. I basically put my life on hold to help my mom, and in the process added more to my crippling financial situation.
I got lucky that within two weeks I found a great job with a top insurance company in California and have been working with them now for about 3 years. It has been a great gig, I have good health insurance with an HSA, HFS, and a good chunk of money in a 401k, but I definitely feel undervalued and underpaid for the amount of work that I do. I get just enough money to basically live pay check to pay check, I do save a little bit, and this would be even harder if I was paying rent as well, but this is also do to 70% of my income going towards bills. Not to mention it is not where I expected to be career wise at this point in my life. I have had dreams of working for big tech and startups since I was 13 years old, and to this day strive to become the best version of myself possible. I consistently study and invest a lot in my own education to one day feel confident enough to knock out any technical interview thrown at me.
My current job and living situation really make it hard for me to move in that direction though. I literally spend on average 12 hours a day commuting and working combined, M-F. I come home exhausted and unable to really focus on myself and study. I barely have time for myself or my hobbies on the weekend either since I end up having to do a lot of chores, and end up being more selfless than I should; taking my energetic pit bull out on adventures as much as I can (she really looks forward to the weekends), or helping my mom with maintenance on the house. Work also creeps into my free-time off hours during the week and on my weekends as I’m pressed to meet deadlines and help out with extracurricular job duties that don’t really pertain to my role. As a result I’m struggling with staying on top of what I love most, software development and coding. I’m barely able to create personal projects to showcase my skill set, and what I do have out there I’m not even proud of. Working for an insurance company with no real focus on science and technology means that I am out of practice on a lot of the technical aspects that you’re tested on during interviews for the better paying jobs that I want. Not to mention I’m 7 years out of school, a lot of the fundamental, theoretical, critical thinking subject matter is buried deep inside my brain, if not forgotten entirely.
I struggle with interview questions and how to think outside of the box when approaching problems because I am out of practice, and honestly forgot a ton of things. This is why I pick up a book every night and fall asleep with it on my bed, my brain struggling to retain any information because of exhaustion from a 12 hour day of work and driving. It’s becoming a vicious cycle of trying and failing to achieve my goals and its stressing me the f out...
I want to move out of California entirely, I’ve been here for around 11 years total now and honestly love what the state has to offer, but I just can’t take living here anymore. With over 11 million people in Los Angeles county alone and more people moving here from all over the world every single day, there is an evident crisis in overpopulation. I can no longer handle having to endure 1.5 - 2 hour commutes to travel a 60 mile distance, 120 miles a day in this has become mentally exhausting. The rent situation is ridiculous with astronomically high costs of living, especially when you consider what you are getting for your money. This has really put a damper on being able to get out on my own, so I am grateful for the big house and all the space I have here with my mom, but all in all I am not cut out for this type of life where the hustle is truly what everyone lives and honestly feel like it will be a long time before I am able to afford a decent life here.
I recently took an opportunity to visit Washington state and fell in love with it immediately. In contrast the cost of living is very similar to what I see in California, but it IS cheaper, and the quality of life is leaps and bounds better than Los Angeles imo. I decided that I would do whatever it takes to move there and work. There are amazing companies based out of Seattle, ones that I would love to work with, not to mention living in the Pacific Northwest has been a long life goal of mine (and I currently live in a barren desert, not somewhere I want to be). I’ve also put my love life and relationships on hold, because I know I am not where I want to be...expecting to uproot another persons life entirely to experiment with life in a new place, to me, is selfish. Not to mention I expect it to be even harder with another person involved.
Since I am starting to feel desperate and like I am literally losing my mind, I was thinking about what I could do to uproot my life once again and follow my dream. Ideally I want to take some time off work so that I can focus on myself, study, and get to where I want to be. Doing this while I am here at my mothers home is not an option, despite a close relationship with my mother, she does not have my best interests in mind and would try to stifle any attempts of leaving the nest again (so to speak). She also has no means to assist or help me achieve this dream in anyway, she definitely makes it harder. I seem to excel when there is a fire lit beneath my feet, and the pressure is on, so playing with the idea of incurring more debt to ultimately get to where I want to be in life is not so crazy to me. In theory, if I get the job that I want and I know I can get if I apply myself, I will be earning roughly 40 - 50% more income than I currently do. Meaning I would be able to easily cover costs of living, while paying off my debt at a much faster rate.
So with that in mind, I am seeking advice on a choice I am considering making... Yes, I realize I haven’t even gotten to the point yet, but just feel like all of this is necessary to understanding my situation and what is driving my thought process.
I am thinking of taking out a loan to invest in my future. I am confident I can reach my goals, but just not quite sure if its what I should do. Since my credit is in good standing I think I can attain a reasonably large loan that will help me with this endeavor. My intentions would not be to spend it all, but use enough of it to get me by for 3-4 months, living extremely frugally, while I take a break from work to study and relocate myself to the Seattle area. I know that I may not be able to find a place to live without proof of income, but perhaps I can provide paystubs from my current job and somehow play it off that I am working remotely for the company if I can manage to move the Seattle in a relatively short time after leaving my job. Or find somewhere to live, that doesn’t mean signing a Lease.There actually exists a possibility of being able to work remotely for my company for a month or so before telling them that I will not be returning, but this would definitely eat into my preparation for interviews with the companies I want. I may also have the ability to leave on a leave of absence which might buy me time away from work, but reserve the possibility of being able to return to the company when I am ready. All in all I understand it’s a tough call for anyone to make, that most people wouldn’t even consider something like this. But I am getting desperate, and the currently cyclic hell I live is ruining my life and killing my spirit. It’s also extremely hard to expect to form any sort of meaningful relationship living at my mothers house in the ass end of LA county. I don’t want to wait any longer, and I want to take control of my life already. I need this for myself and for my future, but is it the only option I have that will allow me to take action NOW? I do not want to wait another 2-3 years to do this the slow and “right” way... I just want to take a jump, take a risk, and do it now. Because if I reach my goals, then it will pay off... and when it comes to my career, I take it seriously and I’m passionate about it, I’ve never fallen short when it comes to my career. I just want to finally chase my dream, and feel like the risk is worth the reward at this point... but maybe I am wrong.
Thank you so much for your time and for your insights on the matter, I appreciate any help I can get. I feel like I have no one I can honestly talk to about this, so it’s why I’ve turned to the web.
Submitted May 18, 2019 at 02:54PM by webdevneedshelp http://bit.ly/2JPa7WW
