The 5 year plan to £50k

Pudney · 11 Oct 2016 at 23:23

diamount said:
Yeah, something that probably took 5 seconds and immediately forgotten about and reminded on the date is weird. What kind of logic is that?

Well, the first thing to realise is that weirdness isn't proportional to effort. So how long or how easy something is doesn't impact whether it's weird.

rubberduck said:
Yes

That's weird. What particular reason made you feel the need to bring this up again almost exactly 2 years later?

Dr House · 11 Oct 2016 at 23:31

Housey said:
You have a plan, direction and clear vision. Short term hit, long term gain and you're on a new journey, from the position of having done it before already so fairly sure you'll do it again. Most people live from week to week, month to month and find 100 reasons why they can't, haven't or won't and because of that they are pretty much guaranteed that they can't, haven't and won't.

Yep the future is less about money now but more about doing something positive with my life for me and for society but I am on a good long term path which will bring me a lot of satisfaction and a decent living.

BTW I still have the GT4

regulus · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:14

At the risk of twisting nipples and getting some effeminate bearded Hillary-loving hipsters upset, 50k is very simple to save. I by that I mean in far less than 5 years. 99% of people 'seriously trying' (in their own minds) will fail and call it impossible. Nobody wants to downgrade their lifestyles, adjust hobbies and priorities or do the hardcore budgeting required to save a certain amount. And then sticking with it too.

OP, if you're still serious about it, there's quite a funny blog and forum called 'Mr Money Mustache'. Probably already mentioned in this thread. You may know about it already? It's about learning to enjoy life without spending money, some budgeting advice and interesting views this guy have. The forum is quite good too. Rather active and a lot of people seem to take it quite serious. Quite funny some of the things people do to save money. In my opinion a lot them take it too far for my 'rich' tastes but horses for courses.

dowie · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:24

You've misread the thread, he's not trying to save 50k in 5 years he is/was* aiming to land a job that would eventually pay him 50k a year within 5 years of the start of the thread.

*(IIRC he gave up rather quickly got a cat and had decided he didn't want to leave his home town - which is fair enough as life isn't all about money)

regulus · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:32

dowie said:
You've misread the thread, he's not trying to save 50k in 5 years he is/was* aiming to land a job that would eventually pay him 50k a year within 5 years of the start of the thread.

*(IIRC he gave up rather quickly got a cat and had decided he didn't want to leave his home town - which is fair enough as life isn't all about money)

Ah right.

Wonder why he's been ignoring this thread

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:34

£27000 with only GCSEs?? Plenty of post-doc jobs in academia are starting at not much more than that,and that is with somebody with a PhD. I think the OP was doing quite well TBH.

Boycey0211 · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:34

IIRC he's also still living at home with his mum and said cat and has possibly lost his job due to council cuts.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:44

Boycey0211 said:
IIRC he's also still living at home with his mum and said cat and has possibly lost his job due to council cuts.

Ah,OK - I just looked at the OP. But a lot of academic jobs are short-term contracts,so I think the OP might have not realised they were not as bad off in the job as they suspected.

Having said that I assumed the OP must have saved a decent amount of money when they were in the job? Living at home is far more cheaper in many cases than having to rent your own place or even just a room and even though you have to live under family rules,the fact is that you are not stuck in some contract too.

In that situation it should be quite easy to save a decent amount of money if you wanted too IMHO but YMMV.

Boycey0211 · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:46

He's around 35 and still living at home with his mum, cat and potentially no job.

If he was going to make decent life choices it would have happened by now.

dowie · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:53

CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
£27000 with only GCSEs?? Plenty of post-doc jobs in academia are starting at not much more than that,and that is with somebody with a PhD. I think the OP was doing quite well TBH.

Someone I used to work with is now earning a low six figure sum with only GCSEs. He doesn't have any IT certificates either but he is a pretty awesome techie.

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 12 Oct 2016 at 00:55

Boycey0211 said:
He's around 35 and still living at home with his mum, cat and potentially no job.

If he was going to make decent life choices it would have happened by now.

Well,TBF,people loosing their job can strike at any time - its the fickle nature of how things are sadly.

I don't see living at home as an issue,if you can put up with it,as it is a good way to save up money without splunking it on some ****** landlord.

dowie said:
Someone I used to work with is now earning a low six figure sum with only GCSEs. He doesn't have any IT certificates either but he is a pretty awesome techie.

Yeah,well I know a few programmers who are not massively qualified but earn decent money since they are good at what they do and have practical skills which is more important in that area than a uni degree.

The thing is I think the OP needed to consider that getting nearly £30000 working for the council with no degree and no A-levels is not that bad going,especially if you are not a business person of some sort,or have an extensive practical skillset,ie,a good programmer,etc.

They could have been earning £7 an hour working in a shop!!

Richdog · 12 Oct 2016 at 05:47

If I was Fox I would just have this thread closed... no idea why he has left it open as it's just a little embarassing for him.

Tunney · 12 Oct 2016 at 08:32

CAT-THE-FIFTH said:
Well,TBF,people loosing their job can strike at any time - its the fickle nature of how things are sadly.

The kicker is that he voted Tory and for the austerity measures that killed his job.

Uther · 12 Oct 2016 at 08:55

Tunney said:
The kicker is that he voted Tory and for the austerity measures that killed his job.

Oh dear...

Housey · 12 Oct 2016 at 16:57

Dr House said:
BTW I still have the GT4

You minimum wage lot could never afford the GT3. I feel sorry for you bin divers.

Housey · 12 Oct 2016 at 16:59

dowie said:
Someone I used to work with is now earning a low six figure sum with only GCSEs. He doesn't have any IT certificates either but he is a pretty awesome techie.

Skill and experience will eventually outweigh bits of paper with ticks on. Good people as I have said many times on this forum float to the top and at that point can start to determine their own destiny and in turn, earnings.

I cant post photos · 12 Oct 2016 at 17:10

Boycey0211 said:
He's around 35 and still living at home with his mum, cat and potentially no job.

If he was going to make decent life choices it would have happened by now.

You can always get dealt a crap hand in life, at any age. Millions of people have fallen off thrones due to circumstances beyond their control.

Felon · 12 Oct 2016 at 17:21

It's a long road if you want to earn big bucks... I passed the 50k mark about 9 years ago and a CCIE, JNCIE and a whole load of big consulting gigs later I've more than doubled that as a permie... My life is far from ideal though, single, living in a town with no friends, no relationships - just work work work work, it really isn't for everyone.. But I somehow enjoy it, I guess it takes a certain kind of personality for it to work.

I remember the first time I did my CCIE, I spent 6 months studying from 6:30pm till 2am 3-4 nights a week, after work to pass the exam first time, I changed jobs and got a 20k rise immediately - the payout was worth it, but the 2-3 stone I gained, plus the stress (which have thankfully all been resolved now) really took their tolls.

Housey · 12 Oct 2016 at 17:25

Screeeech said:
It's a long road if you want to earn big bucks... I passed the 50k mark about 9 years ago and a CCIE, JNCIE and a whole load of big consulting gigs later I've more than doubled that as a permie... My life is far from ideal though, single, living in a town with no friends, no relationships - just work work work work, it really isn't for everyone.. But I somehow enjoy it, I guess it takes a certain kind of personality for it to work.

I remember the first time I did my CCIE, I spent 6 months studying from 6:30pm till 2am 3-4 nights a week, after work to pass the exam first time, I changed jobs and got a 20k rise immediately - the payout was worth it, but the 2-3 stone I gained, plus the stress (which have thankfully all been resolved now) really took their tolls.

It is a balance and you need to decide what's right. Last year my balance was wrong and I changed it, but I am still earning the same, which is often the case I've found over the years. You can get to a point where you decide how much pressure you put on yourself and you find that often much of the pressures are self inflicted and you can actually reduce them significantly doing things differently.

Spook187 · 12 Oct 2016 at 18:22

lol at the guy who says saving 50grand is easy, most of his posts are all about saving this savings that, Ok we get it you like to be a hermit.