Asklemmy

I’m still living with my parents. I’m in my 30s. I’m unemployed. Yeah, I’m a failure.

stress eat

I'm assuming you are in the US. The problem with being broke is it is stressful. Stress impacts decision making, causing a cycle. The US is a capitalist society that educated people to behave as socialists with regards to business, career management, and employment.

The people that REALLY need financial planning advice can't afford it. Those that can use it to go from rich to richer.

The best thing you can do is get some help going through your expenses to see what you can optimize. Once you start getting a little bit of a breather, you will feel a lot better.

I've been following the FIRE community for close to a decade, so if you want, I can probably help you find some fat to trim.

This is going to be from my very American perspective on being broke. Your circumstances may be significantly different.

I used to be in your boat. I started working in the trades and being an apprentice at the same time. It wasn't amazing pay to start, but it was enough and significantly better than the minimum wage I'd been earning before.

The way I managed for years on minimum wage was the following:

1. Live with others. Spread the bills around, have some good times, and save money.

2. Food prep and creation. Spend a bit of money to save some time and effort. I own a rice cooker and a breadmaker. The rice cooker is a bit extra, but the breadmaker is wonderful. Just load in the ingredients, set it and let it go. You can go to work or whatever and come home to an awesome loaf of bread. Another lovely one is a slow cooker. I spent 2 hours and 12 lbs of chicken with other ingredients and made 7 meals for 2 prepped and in gallon bags that can just be dumped into the cooler and turned on.

3. Side work or donations. If you don't have family to rely on, another solid source of income is helping the elderly. 70+ year Olds often need help with daily tasks, from yard work to light bulb replacement. It may be a bit awkward to put yourself out there like that, but if you can put forward a decent enough impression at first, and you're honestly there to help, they will pay you a bit and be very thankful. As for how to find the elderly, either wander around or take on a political canvassing job. The listings for political flyers on where to go usually have an age listed with an address. You could also donate blood or plasma. It's very simple to do and (at least in my area) a quick way to get up to $100 per visit, which they allow up to 8 a month. Only annoying part of that is the diet restrictions. Hell, even a cooler with some Ice and bottles of water on the side of a road On a hot day can yield some mild results.

4. Couponing/second hand shopping/flea markets. Self explanatory. You can save quite a bit on food and some other stuff if you are willing to sacrifice your precious time to travel and hunt for deals.

5. {Risky} credit card. If you use it responsibly, there is free money to be had by spending money you were already planning to spend anyways. Getting a card with cash back, even with awful interest rates (mine is sitting around a lovely 26%) can be fundamental in earning you a bit over time. The way to do this is very simple. Pay for required items with the credit card, pay off the card at the weeks end. It doesn't do much for your credit score, but earning card points on money you already have to spend is the goal. The thing you want to avoid is having a remaining balance on that account near a pay period. If that even starts to get away from you, it won't be saving anything and actually costing you.

And finally 6. Government assistance. If you simply cannot make ends meet, applying for food stamps and/or medical insurance is something you should do. People generally don't want to think they need it or just don't know how to sign up for it. Having a bit of savings on food and at least some medical safety/help for any prescriptions is always useful.

The thing you will definitely run into as you more than likely know is a complete lack of free time.

What's your social network look like, OP? For people in your situation, your friends and family will have to be your safety net. Shared resources can also bring expenses down.

I used to go over to my friends and they would feed me. They weren't much better off than me but they could afford to get some extra ramen and KD.

Not in the same boat as you as I got decent financial education about saving money from my parents. Okay legit advice here. You have only two options. Earn more OR cut your expenses. The best is doing both. There's of course a minimum to expenses. You have to reflect on every part of your expenses, make a list of all fix costs that are not immediately changeable (rent, electricity, water etc) then make a list of changeable expenses (food, restaurant visits, cell phone contract etc). Then a list of completely redundant expenses that are not needed for survival which you've done in the last year/365 days. (New TV, cell phone, expensive clothing etc). Compare all of that and analyze what you can cut down. If your rent is high and/or your apartment is too big for you, move into a smaller one with the saved up money from above cost cutting. And on the side look for better paid jobs and change jobs/companies every 2 years. It's too much of a hassle to discuss with your employer why you should be paid more just look for other companies, statistics show this is the best strategy to get a salary increase. Sounds like your situation is pretty dire, so start right away! All the best, mate, hope it helps.

Do you have roommates? If not that is rather expected as a single guy with no family. Check you budgets but if you're working a mcjob, likely will not see any real future. Mcjobs are for kids or those that just want some spare cash or don't need the 'responsible' type of job. Job shop as many say here. Just do it. Keep in mind that real career type jobs that can eventually pay higher require you to take a real investment in what you want to do. Pick something that fits you in other words.

Sorry if it is kind of tough love advice. Most other posts have covered your typical suggestions but ultimately it comes down to solely the direction and effort you take.

What do you do for a living?

When I had a job that didn't pay enough, I did side work. For me, for a long time, that was reffing mens hockey.

Another time I was struggling I approached my boss and said I know I'm not your best employee right now, but I want to turn it around and get into a higher paying position. What do you need me to do? Then I did it, and moved up.

5 yrs ago we moved to anew city and I started over in a new thing. I took a job that didn't really cover our bills, and my wife and I had to make some cuts.

But I wanted certain freedoms like the freedom to do my hobbies or take a vacation, so identified ways to earn additional income through the job I had (in my case it was handling little repairs like replacing smoke detector batteries and light bulbs, installing missing door stops and changing deadbolts). I've kept grinding until I took over for my boss, and I continue to handle repairs also. Effectively I work a job and side job at the same time 6 days a week. I work fucking hard, but I had nice vacations with my fam this summer, live in a good house and drive a good vehicle.

So honestly - and while I don't think this is how it should be - in the system we have, I just grind harder. I am amazed at my ability to do this now in my 30s and now 40s compared to how lazy (in hindsight) I was in my 20s.

By the way! I'm also pretty happy now because my job is (mostly) ok, I don't dread Mondays or anything most weeks.

This isn't your situation, but this is how we did it while living very paycheck to paycheck. Plan and budget. We had a plan for everything. It hurt, but we planned our store trips, our meals were the sales and manager specials. We knew how much gas we were buying and which kid had birthdays and gifts to buy for, and we shopped ebay gift cards and scrapped by. We also made hard decisions, and it sucked. We cut cable, and other non essentials, we almost never went out. We were able to plan a path out, we refinanced our house, by taking a title loan on my car. We consolidated our cc debt.

What I'm trying to say is, you find a way. Maybe you can work towards a promotion, or a new career. Or find a different living situation which would be cheaper to help sort it out. Try not to lose hope, try to find a path to prosper. I'm pulling for you.

Similar to what others have said you need to make some changes. Figure out how the game works. Get educated. Find a new job, get certs, go back to school, rehab your credit, find a cheaper place, make moves.