Boy oh boy! (26M) here and I don’t know how I’m here but I’m here! Little backstory I’ve always worked freelance in entertainment since I was 20. I wasn’t the best saver back thing which I regret so badly. I was working two gigs averaging $3500 weekly but I was young and was blowing it on trips, clothes but always made sure my bills were taken care of. I wasn’t big on credit I always used actual cash, had two small limit cards and my car loan. Gigs were always rolling in up until late 2023. Moved to another state for a long term gig and it got cancelled one month in, talk about devastated. So I had to live off savings just hoping something new would come in, applied to other fields of work Nothing! Mid 2024 I had this crazy wild idea to start my own company in entertainment world since I had connections, taking a leap of faith. My ex partner helped me finance a huge part of it along with my savings. Had amazing credit versus mine so added me on AU for most cards and took out loans. Long story short that business tanked BADLY! So I’ve put me and my ex in about 100k worth of debt and I’m just like how do I pull this money out of my ass? I feel like everytime I try to better myself I fuck up even more. Of course I’m still looking for work but outside of entertainment because I feel as that ship has sailed but man it’s hard to find anything! I’ve never been this down bad before and honestly I’m more sad that it affected my ex, had stellar credit now can’t even get a secured card. Just had to let this out!
Literally screwed at 26
byu/Interesting_Task_114 inpersonalfinance
Posted by Interesting_Task_114
5 Comments
26 is VERY young. I didn’t even have a secured card and was making minimum wage at your age. Remember that you might be able to break into the job that you want by hopping into a different, easier to secure position and wiggling your way through the company via connections. Since you were in entertainment you should probably be good at networking! Best of luck. Learn from the past but don’t dwell on it.
You need to stop worrying about making money in a fun way and just make money. You need income. You should’ve invested in eduction in STEM or medical field. You’re already in debt now, might as well focus on getting a real career started. You could spend about $500 to take a comptia A+ IT exam and get a help desk job so you have income. Watch the Professor Messor YouTube playlist and take free practice exams. That will start a real career for you too. I’m giving you one possibility of many, this is just what I know. You need to find someone you know who has a stable income, stable life, ask them how they did it and listen to them. Stop this gig shit and entrepreneur shit. You have more than enough time to pay off that debt. In 3 months you could be starting a whole new career making 40-80k depending on where you live.
What was your entertainment business?
You didn’t say specifics of your skills, but would it be possible to try getting on a tour gig? Then you could stack money while spending hardly any? Regardless, you aren’t screwed. I would t give up on that type of work, actually I’d look for higher levels of skills to add, perhaps a different specialty within it. The people I know in the A/V industry are killing it right now, that ship didn’t sail, you’re just feeling beaten down by it and like you failed in it.
You were already freelancing and probably have lots of connections, you should be reaching out to anyone who used to give you gigs and telling them you’re looking to fill some holes in your schedule. Your connections are important, any number of people could throw one good gig your way and you end up back on track making connections again. Make the moves, it sounds like you know how to already.
If you were making 10k a month at one point:
1. Go back to whatever that was.
2. Do it for 1 year.
Now you have 100k.
Hell, do it for 2 years.