How did you get your first job? Apartment/house? Dating?
I ask because I really only did so after years of bouncing around from colleges, summer abroad programs, living with friends, and really just use Zillow or StreetEasy to look.
(I also ask because I want a distraction from the world that isn’t entertainment or documentary/non-fiction and often daydream about what things I could have done different had I known things - real life skills - earlier.)
Necessity. I got tired of flying by the seat of my pants and wanted stability. You have to give up some freedom to get to stability, but I don’t lose sleep expecting the landlord knock or the collection letter in the mailbox.
I always wanted to get married and homestead. My twenties were nothing but turmoil and bad relationships and landlords. I got tired of always being behind on everything. Sometimes you have to go deeper in before you get out though. I walked to work for years. My wife and I bought a shitty camper and lived in it to save up money for a down payment on a house. When I had a car, it was always cheap.and something I could work on myself. We don’t overindulge. My hobbies are cheap or free.
I’m not suggesting bootstrapping you way, I’m just telling you how I got here. We’re still paycheck to paycheck, but our bills are met every month and sometimes we can afford a little splurge.
To answer your questions, and I will add this caveat, I did a lot of those things before everything got harder. I bought a house right before COVID. Your state might have programs for home buying that make it so you don’t have to put down the whole down payment. We took a home buying class that turned us on to a government loan for rural properties that tolled our down payment into the loan somehow.
I met my wife online, but only because I used to stay up late smoking weed and reading personal ads for fun. Hers spoke to me so I answered. I probably don’t have great advice there
Getting a job is always who you know. Not what you know. I didn’t grow up wanting to be a baker but here I am. I got the job because my dad kept trying to get his friends to hire me as another way for me to stay under his thumb. I busted ass to get a job outside of his scope and stuck it out long enough to be top dog at any bakery I’ve worked at. I have 14 years experience now. There is no real incentive to staying at a job anymore, but a resume with few jobs that you stayed at a long time still really blows the wig back on your gen x recruiter.