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Buy rural land and live on investments while you start a small business. That's what I'm doing. I think we need a monthly "who wants to be fired" thread where

Buy rural land and live on investments while you start a small business. That's what I'm doing. I think we need a monthly "who wants to be fired" thread where we share our progress on this.

the_real_cher 1y ago
love this!
atemerev 1y ago
If you already have enough investments to not work, why would anyone even work in tech? Leaving the grind when you already kind or rich is easy mode. Leaving it when your net worth is negative is another story.
- AnimalMuppet 1y ago
  Why would anyone work in tech? Because making something that didn't exist before is kind of a thrill. (No, that is not the same as cranking through Jira tickets...)
  - thih9 1y ago
    Note that this joy is not unique to tech. Carpenters, farmers, painters, etc, all make things that didn’t exist before. Some of them haven’t heard about Jira.
  - tekla 1y ago
    May I introduce you to all of blue collar work.
  - codingdave 1y ago
    That thrill is present in any creative endeavor. If you like tech and enjoy that thrill, yeah, work in tech. At the same time, if you are tired of tech and want that thrill, go make something else. I'm a collector of hobbies at this point, having at least dabbled (if not more) in woodworking, stone carving, jewelry making, furniture upholstery, fused glass, painting, drawing, sculpture, clothing design, and creating nature trails in our forest. They all give that thrill. Tech pays better, though - so I work in tech to pay the bills, then spend the money on tools to get that creative thrill somewhere else.
    - AnimalMuppet 1y ago
      Thank you. I needed to hear that. As someone getting close to retirement (and with a job that's getting more boring), that was very helpful.
  - TeMPOraL 1y ago
    Right. That's what got me into tech, too. Turned out to be mostly a lie - most jobs aren't making anything exciting or new (except maybe for the wealthy in the financial sense), and those that do tend to limit your autonomy. Now I stay in tech for the same reason most people stay in their careers - it's comfortable and pays well, but because that's mostly a function of "time served"[0], it also means that I'm trapped now. I can't just switch fields anymore - at this stage of life, switching is a major multi-year project! (Also I question whether it would help. Working in some field never looks much like you imagine while being outside of it.) -- [0] - Tech has an unusually large multiplier here, but the trend is the same as with any other job.
    - kgwxd 1y ago
      Exciting and new doesn't necessarily mean novel. I get quite excited when I build a new bit of code that solves a frequent pain point for someone. It's likely built on a boring framework, in a boring language, wouldn't work at scale, and solves a boring problem only a few people have, but the drug makes for a nice little high, and the small business world has a huge supply.
  - atemerev 1y ago
    Sure, that's what Github is for. Working in corporate environments is another story.
- thih9 1y ago
  Off topic, I started working in tech because I enjoyed it. That it was also well paid was a nice coincidence. You can be in the grind and be unaware of that. Of course people like this still suffer due to overexposure to work and js frameworks; and many eventually grow to dislike tech jobs and want to leave.
gdbsjjdn 1y ago
What kind of business? Most of the dream ones people envision are capital-intensive and failure-prone (speaking as someone who started a capital intensive business that failed)
- sigmoid10 1y ago
  I think the problem is the "dream ones" part. Yes, everyone would love to make tons of money with very little work. But that almost guarantees high risks or very high capital exposure. There are countless small business opportunities that you could operate from home with almost no risk or exposure if you have a car and can afford some basic tools. But you won't get rich - or at least you'll have to work your ass off for a while.
  - pwn0 1y ago
    Some examples?
    - hackable_sand 1y ago
      Plumber
    - anonzzzies 1y ago
      Plumber, carpenter, welder, electrician etc. In the countryside where I live, I do all of these when I feel like it for myself, friends and sometimes strangers in trouble (pipe burst, no power). It pays well; I could live of that and save very comfortably here if I did it half of the time, but I only do it the odd few hours while people begging for welding jobs, wooden doors, etc. It can be a nice little business, especially if you can find employees and move on to house building or renovations, but it will never be bigger than that was of course, you would be in the countryside.
  - gdbsjjdn 1y ago
    My dream job was a specialty retail store - not low effort or tons of money, but hopefully something that could grow into a lifestyle business. Imagine something like a bicycle shop. Trust me when I say I have worked my ass off. The only small businesses I know that are succeeding in my area are basically services - restaurants, cafes, etc. They rely on exploiting a bunch of underpaid workers in a way I wouldn't ever want to. In your other comment it sounds like you're just kind of doing "handyman" stuff in a low CoL area. It's great if you can handle your own plumbing, electrical, etc. but there's definitely a ceiling on how much work you can get as a single, unlicensed person with a van driving around. Maybe that's enough to live on but it doesn't feel like a sustainable plan for 30 years.
temp0826 1y ago
This is pretty far out of reach for most people, unfathomable if you have debt and/or living paycheck to paycheck.
- skwee357 1y ago
  ^ this. Even if you don’t live paycheck to paycheck, the life style of owning a place AND living off your investments, is extremely hard to pull off. You most likely need to be single (or couple both in tech), no kids, making FAANG salary, living frugally (no travel, no expenses outside of food, shelter and necessities). Or you need to use geo arbitrage, which again means probably no kids, while being able to secure a high paying remote job in the US. I wish it was more affordable, but it’s not. Therefor advice like “buy a house and live off your investments” are equivalent to filling a winning lottery ticket.
  - hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
    You don't need the "buy the house" part, which is actually bad advice now - renting is now half the cost of home ownership in many areas of the US. But I strongly believe you're making this out to be much more difficult than it is if you are making decent (not "FAANG level") tech-type salaries. Where I live tech jobs generally pay at about double the amount of people in trades, for example. E.g. a mid-level software engineer is making at least 160-180k, while a trades person (plumber, etc.) with similar experience is making 80-90k. So obviously if you can live at the level of these trades people, you can save up enough to be able to live without a salary for some time. The problem is that most people just get used to their standard of living and find it hard to downsize. That's fine, but it's still very much a choice.
    - skwee357 1y ago
      The problem with what you say is that you need to be in such environment. Not everyone pays good salaries. Europe is far behind US salaries. In US high salaries are concentrated around SF, which in turn means high cost of living, or subpar living conditions (I couldn’t imagine myself living with roommates in my 30s for example, and what do you do when having a relationship?) And then comes the downsizing. Sure you can live only with necessities, but then question do you want to find yourself in mid thirties, or early forties, without any travel experiences, no relationship, living in your parents basement? I exaggerate a bit, but the math does not work out. You either live very frugally, or you use exploit geo arbitrage (low cost of living area, with a high paying remote job). There are no other shortcuts.
ilyazub 1y ago
Cool, congrats and wishing you good luck and success! > monthly "who wants to be fired" thread Reminds me of Mad Fientist blog.
benreesman 1y ago
How to life well as an independently wealthy computer person is an important question to address and I encourage you to continue addressing it because it sounds like you'd give better advice than most. You might find the messaging more effective if it was declared in more direct terms though, its a pretty different problem than still needing to make a living when computers are your stock in trade.
drf1 1y ago
Please keep us up-to-date on how that goes. It sounds like you are having progress. Most of the smart and talented people I know that dropped out to create companies abandoned them and ended in someone else’s company later. The two exceptions were salesmen who ended up becoming rich after selling their companies.
hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
What you're describing is essentially the whole FIRE movement (financial independence, retire early). While I find adherents to that movement can be "culty"/extreme around the edges, the general advice of living below your means so that you can then have at least some number of years where you can engage in a more meaningful use of your time (doesn't have to be "retire") is good advice.
- spacemadness 1y ago
  That’s not FIRE. FIRE is keep your tech job, live very frugaly, invest, maybe make some other passive income, then actually retire. OP is rather focusing on getting out of tech to do something else but it is still going to be work. Maybe a lot of work. They’re downsizing lifestyle because they’re also downsizing their pay.
  - hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
    I don't think it's worth it to "No True Scotsman" this, but there are plenty of people who go by FIRE principles, which are generally to live below your means so you can be more financially independent later (which is exactly what OP was focusing on), without actually retiring completely. In fact, most people don't retire completely because they find they get bored as hell.
crossroadsguy 1y ago
This is such a developed world comment :) Because for the rest of the world rural (or a village) means literally rural or a village. What the people from the developed world may never understand is the wide gigantic chasm between urban and rural here, in every aspect of(un)imaginable.
- mathiaspoint 1y ago
  It means that here too. There's no infrastructure where my I'm at. No power, water, there's a very rough private road and that's it. It's very far away from pretty much everyone. I actually grew up in a place like this (yes they exist in the US) so I know how it goes.

Buy rural land and live on investments while you start a small business. That's what I'm doing. I think we need a monthly "who wants to be fired" thread where we share our progress on this.

the_real_cher 1y ago

love this!

atemerev 1y ago

If you already have enough investments to not work, why would anyone even work in tech? Leaving the grind when you already kind or rich is easy mode. Leaving it when your net worth is negative is another story.

AnimalMuppet 1y ago
Why would anyone work in tech? Because making something that didn't exist before is kind of a thrill. (No, that is not the same as cranking through Jira tickets...)
- thih9 1y ago
  Note that this joy is not unique to tech. Carpenters, farmers, painters, etc, all make things that didn’t exist before. Some of them haven’t heard about Jira.
- tekla 1y ago
  May I introduce you to all of blue collar work.
- codingdave 1y ago
  That thrill is present in any creative endeavor. If you like tech and enjoy that thrill, yeah, work in tech. At the same time, if you are tired of tech and want that thrill, go make something else. I'm a collector of hobbies at this point, having at least dabbled (if not more) in woodworking, stone carving, jewelry making, furniture upholstery, fused glass, painting, drawing, sculpture, clothing design, and creating nature trails in our forest. They all give that thrill. Tech pays better, though - so I work in tech to pay the bills, then spend the money on tools to get that creative thrill somewhere else.
  - AnimalMuppet 1y ago
    Thank you. I needed to hear that. As someone getting close to retirement (and with a job that's getting more boring), that was very helpful.
- TeMPOraL 1y ago
  Right. That's what got me into tech, too. Turned out to be mostly a lie - most jobs aren't making anything exciting or new (except maybe for the wealthy in the financial sense), and those that do tend to limit your autonomy. Now I stay in tech for the same reason most people stay in their careers - it's comfortable and pays well, but because that's mostly a function of "time served"[0], it also means that I'm trapped now. I can't just switch fields anymore - at this stage of life, switching is a major multi-year project! (Also I question whether it would help. Working in some field never looks much like you imagine while being outside of it.) -- [0] - Tech has an unusually large multiplier here, but the trend is the same as with any other job.
  - kgwxd 1y ago
    Exciting and new doesn't necessarily mean novel. I get quite excited when I build a new bit of code that solves a frequent pain point for someone. It's likely built on a boring framework, in a boring language, wouldn't work at scale, and solves a boring problem only a few people have, but the drug makes for a nice little high, and the small business world has a huge supply.
- atemerev 1y ago
  Sure, that's what Github is for. Working in corporate environments is another story.
thih9 1y ago
Off topic, I started working in tech because I enjoyed it. That it was also well paid was a nice coincidence. You can be in the grind and be unaware of that. Of course people like this still suffer due to overexposure to work and js frameworks; and many eventually grow to dislike tech jobs and want to leave.

gdbsjjdn 1y ago

What kind of business? Most of the dream ones people envision are capital-intensive and failure-prone (speaking as someone who started a capital intensive business that failed)

sigmoid10 1y ago
I think the problem is the "dream ones" part. Yes, everyone would love to make tons of money with very little work. But that almost guarantees high risks or very high capital exposure. There are countless small business opportunities that you could operate from home with almost no risk or exposure if you have a car and can afford some basic tools. But you won't get rich - or at least you'll have to work your ass off for a while.
- pwn0 1y ago
  Some examples?
  - hackable_sand 1y ago
    Plumber
  - anonzzzies 1y ago
    Plumber, carpenter, welder, electrician etc. In the countryside where I live, I do all of these when I feel like it for myself, friends and sometimes strangers in trouble (pipe burst, no power). It pays well; I could live of that and save very comfortably here if I did it half of the time, but I only do it the odd few hours while people begging for welding jobs, wooden doors, etc. It can be a nice little business, especially if you can find employees and move on to house building or renovations, but it will never be bigger than that was of course, you would be in the countryside.
- gdbsjjdn 1y ago
  My dream job was a specialty retail store - not low effort or tons of money, but hopefully something that could grow into a lifestyle business. Imagine something like a bicycle shop. Trust me when I say I have worked my ass off. The only small businesses I know that are succeeding in my area are basically services - restaurants, cafes, etc. They rely on exploiting a bunch of underpaid workers in a way I wouldn't ever want to. In your other comment it sounds like you're just kind of doing "handyman" stuff in a low CoL area. It's great if you can handle your own plumbing, electrical, etc. but there's definitely a ceiling on how much work you can get as a single, unlicensed person with a van driving around. Maybe that's enough to live on but it doesn't feel like a sustainable plan for 30 years.

temp0826 1y ago

This is pretty far out of reach for most people, unfathomable if you have debt and/or living paycheck to paycheck.

skwee357 1y ago
^ this. Even if you don’t live paycheck to paycheck, the life style of owning a place AND living off your investments, is extremely hard to pull off. You most likely need to be single (or couple both in tech), no kids, making FAANG salary, living frugally (no travel, no expenses outside of food, shelter and necessities). Or you need to use geo arbitrage, which again means probably no kids, while being able to secure a high paying remote job in the US. I wish it was more affordable, but it’s not. Therefor advice like “buy a house and live off your investments” are equivalent to filling a winning lottery ticket.
- hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
  You don't need the "buy the house" part, which is actually bad advice now - renting is now half the cost of home ownership in many areas of the US. But I strongly believe you're making this out to be much more difficult than it is if you are making decent (not "FAANG level") tech-type salaries. Where I live tech jobs generally pay at about double the amount of people in trades, for example. E.g. a mid-level software engineer is making at least 160-180k, while a trades person (plumber, etc.) with similar experience is making 80-90k. So obviously if you can live at the level of these trades people, you can save up enough to be able to live without a salary for some time. The problem is that most people just get used to their standard of living and find it hard to downsize. That's fine, but it's still very much a choice.
  - skwee357 1y ago
    The problem with what you say is that you need to be in such environment. Not everyone pays good salaries. Europe is far behind US salaries. In US high salaries are concentrated around SF, which in turn means high cost of living, or subpar living conditions (I couldn’t imagine myself living with roommates in my 30s for example, and what do you do when having a relationship?) And then comes the downsizing. Sure you can live only with necessities, but then question do you want to find yourself in mid thirties, or early forties, without any travel experiences, no relationship, living in your parents basement? I exaggerate a bit, but the math does not work out. You either live very frugally, or you use exploit geo arbitrage (low cost of living area, with a high paying remote job). There are no other shortcuts.

ilyazub 1y ago

Cool, congrats and wishing you good luck and success! > monthly "who wants to be fired" thread Reminds me of Mad Fientist blog.

benreesman 1y ago

How to life well as an independently wealthy computer person is an important question to address and I encourage you to continue addressing it because it sounds like you'd give better advice than most. You might find the messaging more effective if it was declared in more direct terms though, its a pretty different problem than still needing to make a living when computers are your stock in trade.

drf1 1y ago

Please keep us up-to-date on how that goes. It sounds like you are having progress. Most of the smart and talented people I know that dropped out to create companies abandoned them and ended in someone else’s company later. The two exceptions were salesmen who ended up becoming rich after selling their companies.

hn_throwaway_99 1y ago

What you're describing is essentially the whole FIRE movement (financial independence, retire early). While I find adherents to that movement can be "culty"/extreme around the edges, the general advice of living below your means so that you can then have at least some number of years where you can engage in a more meaningful use of your time (doesn't have to be "retire") is good advice.

spacemadness 1y ago
That’s not FIRE. FIRE is keep your tech job, live very frugaly, invest, maybe make some other passive income, then actually retire. OP is rather focusing on getting out of tech to do something else but it is still going to be work. Maybe a lot of work. They’re downsizing lifestyle because they’re also downsizing their pay.
- hn_throwaway_99 1y ago
  I don't think it's worth it to "No True Scotsman" this, but there are plenty of people who go by FIRE principles, which are generally to live below your means so you can be more financially independent later (which is exactly what OP was focusing on), without actually retiring completely. In fact, most people don't retire completely because they find they get bored as hell.

crossroadsguy 1y ago

This is such a developed world comment :) Because for the rest of the world rural (or a village) means literally rural or a village. What the people from the developed world may never understand is the wide gigantic chasm between urban and rural here, in every aspect of(un)imaginable.

mathiaspoint 1y ago
It means that here too. There's no infrastructure where my I'm at. No power, water, there's a very rough private road and that's it. It's very far away from pretty much everyone. I actually grew up in a place like this (yes they exist in the US) so I know how it goes.