1> You need a portfolio. I don't know what sort of development you're looking to do, but make 3-5 nice looking sites/programs/apps. Remember, you can't show off

1> You need a portfolio. I don't know what sort of development you're looking to do, but make 3-5 nice looking sites/programs/apps. Remember, you can't show off snazzy technical stuff (as clients won't understand it), but you can make it look pretty or do something that would interesting to a layman. This should likely take you a couple months to finish, if you're putting the quality in I'm talking about. Now you can do these for free for someone else, but that makes the relationship a hard one to transition to paid eventually. 2> Don't ever charge low amounts of money. The people who offer work for that amount are often horrible to you. I'm not saying start out charging $150 an hour, but get far north of $20 an hour for any sort of development. 3> Borrow or beg a standard contract from someone else. Include cancellation clauses, so the manner in which a cancellation occurs is dictated by prior agreement. Make sure you include what payments are still due, who gets what rights to use code or already finished products, etc. 4> Just start! Seriously, you'll learn most of this by doing. Remember though, these people aren't your boss like at work, they're clients. If they say jump, you need to make sure you Really should be jumping that high. Oftentimes, they'll make outrageous demands and the first alternatives that come to mind aren't the only ones. 5> If they ask for extra work: Attach price tags to it. If it matters to them, they'll buy it. If it doesn't, they won't.