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I honestly wonder if the secret to quality of life is just to save up money and buy a profitable small or medium sized business mostly financed against the busi

I honestly wonder if the secret to quality of life is just to save up money and buy a profitable small or medium sized business mostly financed against the business. If you want to grow it, you can. Otherwise, you can get relatively passive income out of it and experience as a CEO that allows you to apply to other CEO jobs if it fails.

nradov 2y ago
"Passive". Ha ha. Most of those businesses will fall apart within a few years if the owner isn't constantly on top of things.
w4 2y ago
If you're serious about it, there is an entire cottage industry dedicated to precisely this (especially popular amongst new MBAs): https://hbr.org/2017/02/you-should-consider-buying-a-small-business-but-when https://hbr.org/2017/02/you-should-consider-buying-a-small-b...
- bdw5204 2y ago
  The "saving up money" part is the bottleneck for me right now because of the state of the tech job market but I was originally planning to save up money and launch a self-funded startup once I had enough runway. After discovering the "buy an already profitable business" route though, I have been thinking about it. I know I don't want to spend the rest of my life constantly competing in the interview Olympics for the privilege of writing code to make somebody else rich.
jarsin 2y ago
I don't know about that. Everyone and their mom is Founder/CEO of some business now days. Almost everyone in my network that can't get a job is running a "company".
- taylortrusty 2y ago
  That's not the same thing. Those aren't real companies. This is buying existing, profitable companies with real employees and customers.
infiniteawning 2y ago
IBM entered the personal computing market on the basis of non-proprietary duplication of existing tech - part of the reason for the company's success was its name. Nobody ever got fired for buying an IBM. Once the name is established, officers can remotely defy the FUD factor.

nradov 2y ago

"Passive". Ha ha. Most of those businesses will fall apart within a few years if the owner isn't constantly on top of things.

w4 2y ago

If you're serious about it, there is an entire cottage industry dedicated to precisely this (especially popular amongst new MBAs): https://hbr.org/2017/02/you-should-consider-buying-a-small-business-but-when https://hbr.org/2017/02/you-should-consider-buying-a-small-b...

bdw5204 2y ago
The "saving up money" part is the bottleneck for me right now because of the state of the tech job market but I was originally planning to save up money and launch a self-funded startup once I had enough runway. After discovering the "buy an already profitable business" route though, I have been thinking about it. I know I don't want to spend the rest of my life constantly competing in the interview Olympics for the privilege of writing code to make somebody else rich.

jarsin 2y ago

I don't know about that. Everyone and their mom is Founder/CEO of some business now days. Almost everyone in my network that can't get a job is running a "company".

taylortrusty 2y ago
That's not the same thing. Those aren't real companies. This is buying existing, profitable companies with real employees and customers.

infiniteawning 2y ago

IBM entered the personal computing market on the basis of non-proprietary duplication of existing tech - part of the reason for the company's success was its name. Nobody ever got fired for buying an IBM. Once the name is established, officers can remotely defy the FUD factor.