Tbh, that’s not true. If your standards are low enough, you can get by with very little money.
When I was at university (10 years ago) I could get by with 5-10h of work per week. I had a single-room flat and no car, a 10yo laptop, a cheapo second-hand phone and ate cheap food. The total amount of assistance that I received from my parents were birthday and christmas presents with a total worth of €700 over 5 years.
Now I have a larger flat, a wife, two kids and a car. Now I need much more money.
Of course, neither the cost nor the lifestyle are comparable.
i sincerely doubt you could afford to live on barely part time work 10 years ago, which would be 2015, unless you were massively subsidized by unemployment, an angel investor, or you were a squatter
I don’t think that surviving on €800/month is extremely lucky. I know quite a few other people who also did that. I also know quite a few other people who just stayed with their parents during university so they didn’t have to work at all.
Being able to live on 800€ a month isn’t that hard if you’re in a lower COL area, like a smaller town.
What’s hard is making those 800€ while working 10 hours a week. I checked the tutoring prices in an area like that (my small central European hometown) and the only people charging 20+ eur per hour were people with decades of experience.
It’s not that difficult. First, you need to start with the right subjects: Maths with English on the side. Maths alone is usually enough, but English is a good side for slow times of the year.
Then get into an agency that does tutoring at home and employs you as self employed. The don’t pay that much, but their clients pay a lot. In my area, they paid €19 for 1.5h to the tutors, but the clients had to pay €65.
So after the pre-paid package that they booked was done, I took them on as direct clients for €40-50/1.5h. Together with the travel time (I used public transport and had the flatrate subscription) that came out at roughly €20/h. And since I was a student at the time, I used the travel time to study, so it wasn’t really wasted time either.
(The big advantage of these agencies is that their high prices prefilter the clients, so that only wealthy people use these services, and if they got a decent tutor for their kids, they are willing to pay a lot for that. Also, it’s super easy to get into these agencies. They are always looking for tutors and their tutor screening is incredibly easy to pass. If you managed to finish school, you’ll have no trouble getting into one of these agencies.)
When I was a bit futher into my university course, I switched over to freelancing as a software developer and made €40/h, working from home.
Tbh, that’s not true. If your standards are low enough, you can get by with very little money.
When I was at university (10 years ago) I could get by with 5-10h of work per week. I had a single-room flat and no car, a 10yo laptop, a cheapo second-hand phone and ate cheap food. The total amount of assistance that I received from my parents were birthday and christmas presents with a total worth of €700 over 5 years.
Now I have a larger flat, a wife, two kids and a car. Now I need much more money.
Of course, neither the cost nor the lifestyle are comparable.
i sincerely doubt you could afford to live on barely part time work 10 years ago, which would be 2015, unless you were massively subsidized by unemployment, an angel investor, or you were a squatter
Neither nor.
I paid €350 for my flat and made €25/h doing maths tutoring. I had a monthly budget of €800 in 2015 and that was enough.
I never received unemployment benefits and why on earth would someone invest in a random student?
When I compare to my own experience ajusted to inflation, that seems alright. Totally doable.
I think you just got extremely lucky, and it’s not exactly transferrable to most others especially today.
I don’t think that surviving on €800/month is extremely lucky. I know quite a few other people who also did that. I also know quite a few other people who just stayed with their parents during university so they didn’t have to work at all.
Being able to live on 800€ a month isn’t that hard if you’re in a lower COL area, like a smaller town.
What’s hard is making those 800€ while working 10 hours a week. I checked the tutoring prices in an area like that (my small central European hometown) and the only people charging 20+ eur per hour were people with decades of experience.
It’s not that difficult. First, you need to start with the right subjects: Maths with English on the side. Maths alone is usually enough, but English is a good side for slow times of the year.
Then get into an agency that does tutoring at home and employs you as self employed. The don’t pay that much, but their clients pay a lot. In my area, they paid €19 for 1.5h to the tutors, but the clients had to pay €65.
So after the pre-paid package that they booked was done, I took them on as direct clients for €40-50/1.5h. Together with the travel time (I used public transport and had the flatrate subscription) that came out at roughly €20/h. And since I was a student at the time, I used the travel time to study, so it wasn’t really wasted time either.
(The big advantage of these agencies is that their high prices prefilter the clients, so that only wealthy people use these services, and if they got a decent tutor for their kids, they are willing to pay a lot for that. Also, it’s super easy to get into these agencies. They are always looking for tutors and their tutor screening is incredibly easy to pass. If you managed to finish school, you’ll have no trouble getting into one of these agencies.)
When I was a bit futher into my university course, I switched over to freelancing as a software developer and made €40/h, working from home.
Yeah, I guess if you live in a place where people can afford 65 eur per hour for tutoring but also has 800 eur studios it works.
Rich people who don’t mind paying a lot for their children’s success exist everywhere.