4 ms·

I think 6 months is unnecessarily careful. Obviously that depends on where you live but it takes like something like 3-4 weeks for a competent developer to find

I think 6 months is unnecessarily careful. Obviously that depends on where you live but it takes like something like 3-4 weeks for a competent developer to find a decent job? And in the worst case scenario, you would get paid like, about a month after you started as an employee. If your savings + available credit is equal or greater than 2 months of living costs, you can safely quit your job.

ixmatus 13y ago
That size of an emergency fund is worth having not just for dips in work but also for relocation costs (if he ever wants to move), breaks from work to focus on new skills / further education, or even big emergencies. All of these things have happened to me and my emergency fund was there to catch me everytime.
mattmanser 13y ago
And it then takes you another month to get your first paycheck. And what if that job doesn't want you to start for 2 weeks? Or more because they're doing a full background check? And say freelancing's going great, but then your first client isn't as great as you thought and starts quibbling over the bill? Or they take 4 months to pay you because finance never received the PO or finance never got a copy of the invoice or finance only begins processing the invoice when it gets chased (which is finance speak for "we're complete bastards who always pay much later than the agreed payment terms, ha ha ha, fuck you")? It depends on your commitments. If you can move back in with Mum & Dad or can couch surf a bit, then 6 months is perhaps unnecessarily careful. When you've got a mortgage and life baggage, probably not.
tomp 13y ago
6 months of savings just means you can "try" to become a self-sufficient freelancer for 4 months before you need to start looking for a job.
mgkimsal 13y ago
Personally I think 6 months is not enough. I've been massively in debt, lived hand to mouth, and that changes your view of 'careful'. At least, it changed mine. Could I go get a job and start getting paid in < 6 months. Likely, but it might not be good - just, survivable. Suddenly I'm back to check-to-check living, and that cushion slowly erodes. You're now 'check to check' vs "check plus saving". I realize that for the vast majority of people in this country, and the world, having years (or even months) of living expenses saved up is not even fathomable. I've been there - I do get it. Once you start getting to the "1 month" of savings milestone, then 2 months, etc - you start to realize how little that actually is, and how precarious/fragile your state is. At least, that's how it is for me, and at least a few other people I know - your attitude towards money/savings/safety can change a lot quickly. This all depends on your constitution, your age, obligations, family, etc, but "6 months" can go by far quicker than you'd anticipate. Also, the other notion of "6 months of expenses" generally doesn't take in to account extra job hunting expenses - travel or relocation, for starters. Or higher insurance costs if your employer was covering part of it before, etc.
- DrJokepu 13y ago
  While I totally agree that you should try to save up as much as you can, playing it too safe will inhibit your professional growth. When I decided to get into freelancing, five days after giving my employer notice I had a 12 months consulting contract lined up paying a lot more money for a lot less (but much more interesting) work. If I was worrying too much about financial runways, I'd probably still be at my old job, "playing it safe".
  - mgkimsal 13y ago
    Most people I've known who've gone in to full time freelancing have not been as lucky as you within days of quitting their job. Most had something lined up - as in a paying client with at least one project for a few weeks or couple months - not 12 months guaranteed at higher pay for less effort. Again, of the people I've known, they generally had to work to build that up over time - usually most didn't hit that "higher pay than corp job" until between 6 and 18 months. huge sample size? No, but it's not just my experience. :) While you had great serendipity (congrats!), but not everyone can consider doing that if they've got obligations. In the US at least, the 'insurance tied to employers' is a massive problem, and inhibits most of the people I know from switching jobs too much, let alone quitting to freelance. Single people, young people without health issues or too much debt - sure.
disputin 13y ago
These conversations never consider location. Finding a job in Greece is going to take a different length of time compared to finding in San Francisco, different to Little Rock, Alabama (is that a place? It sounds like a place.), etc. I see no location reference in the post.
- cstavish 13y ago
  Arkansas
uniclaude 13y ago
Remember that it's much simpler to find a job when you already have one. The theory being that if you have no job, you might not be worth hiring. Moreover, say you're over 30, have been working for a Perl shop for a while, and the market only has Rails and Node.JS offers, you'll need to learn, publish stuff on Github, and write a couple blog posts to be barely make it to the eyes of recruiters. Add to this that unless you were lucky enough not to work on CRUD apps all day, you will have to brush up a bit on algorithms and data structures, because everyone and his dog modeled their interview process on the one Google has. Now you can start to interview. I remind you that more and more companies also cargo cult the time Google takes to select candidates, because everyone wants the "top 1%", so you might want to prepare for a bunch of interviews. Count a couple months for the whole thing, double this if you are not in (or can't move to) a hot spot or if you're over 40. 6 months is not unnecessarily careful, unless you're a rockstar (in which case 6 months of emergency funds represent about only 2 months of your salary), or very connected person, that's probably just what's needed. I do know that not all companies work this way, but if we compare the average developer salaries to the amount of cash necessary to build a 6 months emergency fund, I believe this advice is sane to give to people in general.
pessimizer 13y ago
>I think 6 months is unnecessarily careful. You should be saving for your retirement anyway. You're going to need at least half a million dollars to be comfortable. Having 25k liquid on the day you quit a steady job is a pittance in comparison.

ixmatus 13y ago

That size of an emergency fund is worth having not just for dips in work but also for relocation costs (if he ever wants to move), breaks from work to focus on new skills / further education, or even big emergencies. All of these things have happened to me and my emergency fund was there to catch me everytime.

mattmanser 13y ago

And it then takes you another month to get your first paycheck. And what if that job doesn't want you to start for 2 weeks? Or more because they're doing a full background check? And say freelancing's going great, but then your first client isn't as great as you thought and starts quibbling over the bill? Or they take 4 months to pay you because finance never received the PO or finance never got a copy of the invoice or finance only begins processing the invoice when it gets chased (which is finance speak for "we're complete bastards who always pay much later than the agreed payment terms, ha ha ha, fuck you")? It depends on your commitments. If you can move back in with Mum & Dad or can couch surf a bit, then 6 months is perhaps unnecessarily careful. When you've got a mortgage and life baggage, probably not.

tomp 13y ago

6 months of savings just means you can "try" to become a self-sufficient freelancer for 4 months before you need to start looking for a job.

mgkimsal 13y ago

Personally I think 6 months is not enough. I've been massively in debt, lived hand to mouth, and that changes your view of 'careful'. At least, it changed mine. Could I go get a job and start getting paid in < 6 months. Likely, but it might not be good - just, survivable. Suddenly I'm back to check-to-check living, and that cushion slowly erodes. You're now 'check to check' vs "check plus saving". I realize that for the vast majority of people in this country, and the world, having years (or even months) of living expenses saved up is not even fathomable. I've been there - I do get it. Once you start getting to the "1 month" of savings milestone, then 2 months, etc - you start to realize how little that actually is, and how precarious/fragile your state is. At least, that's how it is for me, and at least a few other people I know - your attitude towards money/savings/safety can change a lot quickly. This all depends on your constitution, your age, obligations, family, etc, but "6 months" can go by far quicker than you'd anticipate. Also, the other notion of "6 months of expenses" generally doesn't take in to account extra job hunting expenses - travel or relocation, for starters. Or higher insurance costs if your employer was covering part of it before, etc.

DrJokepu 13y ago
While I totally agree that you should try to save up as much as you can, playing it too safe will inhibit your professional growth. When I decided to get into freelancing, five days after giving my employer notice I had a 12 months consulting contract lined up paying a lot more money for a lot less (but much more interesting) work. If I was worrying too much about financial runways, I'd probably still be at my old job, "playing it safe".
- mgkimsal 13y ago
  Most people I've known who've gone in to full time freelancing have not been as lucky as you within days of quitting their job. Most had something lined up - as in a paying client with at least one project for a few weeks or couple months - not 12 months guaranteed at higher pay for less effort. Again, of the people I've known, they generally had to work to build that up over time - usually most didn't hit that "higher pay than corp job" until between 6 and 18 months. huge sample size? No, but it's not just my experience. :) While you had great serendipity (congrats!), but not everyone can consider doing that if they've got obligations. In the US at least, the 'insurance tied to employers' is a massive problem, and inhibits most of the people I know from switching jobs too much, let alone quitting to freelance. Single people, young people without health issues or too much debt - sure.

disputin 13y ago

These conversations never consider location. Finding a job in Greece is going to take a different length of time compared to finding in San Francisco, different to Little Rock, Alabama (is that a place? It sounds like a place.), etc. I see no location reference in the post.

cstavish 13y ago
Arkansas

uniclaude 13y ago

Remember that it's much simpler to find a job when you already have one. The theory being that if you have no job, you might not be worth hiring. Moreover, say you're over 30, have been working for a Perl shop for a while, and the market only has Rails and Node.JS offers, you'll need to learn, publish stuff on Github, and write a couple blog posts to be barely make it to the eyes of recruiters. Add to this that unless you were lucky enough not to work on CRUD apps all day, you will have to brush up a bit on algorithms and data structures, because everyone and his dog modeled their interview process on the one Google has. Now you can start to interview. I remind you that more and more companies also cargo cult the time Google takes to select candidates, because everyone wants the "top 1%", so you might want to prepare for a bunch of interviews. Count a couple months for the whole thing, double this if you are not in (or can't move to) a hot spot or if you're over 40. 6 months is not unnecessarily careful, unless you're a rockstar (in which case 6 months of emergency funds represent about only 2 months of your salary), or very connected person, that's probably just what's needed. I do know that not all companies work this way, but if we compare the average developer salaries to the amount of cash necessary to build a 6 months emergency fund, I believe this advice is sane to give to people in general.

pessimizer 13y ago

>I think 6 months is unnecessarily careful. You should be saving for your retirement anyway. You're going to need at least half a million dollars to be comfortable. Having 25k liquid on the day you quit a steady job is a pittance in comparison.