35 years old, living in Denver, and in need of a career facelift.. any advice? (real estate)

[zizozozi]

I have been in the financial services / banking / real estate world ever since I graduated from College. I have a Bachelors degree (English) from a liberal arts college which i have not put to use in my career because, well, it's an English degree!! Basically since the recession started I have been bounced around from job to job to job to job. Out of college I had a good job with a bank for 8 and half years and since the recession began I have had 5 different jobs in a little over 3 years. 2 of the layoffs were from companies (one was a startup) closing down and I left the other jobs due to poor pay and sweat shop style environments. i even tried moving to Ohio for a job and that was not a good choice. anyways, i am in dire need of a career facelift. I have considered going back to school for a graduate degree (perhaps getting my MBA or completely changing things up and pursuing an education degree to become a teacher). I am not interested in making a million dollars, but am just looking for a stimulating career rather than just obtaining another "job". The fact that I am 35 and feel like I am stuck in a rut is a little scary. Is there any one out there that has been in this same position? What kinds of things did you do to get the hell out of this situation??!! Just looking for any advice / stories from some fellow Denverites! Thanks.

[evan arellano]

The company I worked for went "Belly up" last year. I tried very hard looking for a job but nothing came up. I was tired of sitting around so I went and took the Real Estate Broker exam and now I am a Realtor. I am lucky because we have my wife's income so I would not recommend this unless you have a little savings but I believe the market is picking up and it might be a good idea to get in now before it gets really good.

[filmsequal]

I went from engineering to video production. Quite a drastic change. I just got tired of the cubicle work environment. Felt like I was a zombie.

Look at Ben Stein: That dude has the most interesting career history. It's really amazing how he went from being a speech writer, to a boring school teacher in a movie, to running a comedic television game show host. A lot of people of his education level would never had taken that small part in that movie. But the lesson is that he didn't think he was ABOVE the part. He delivered his small part excellently and it's now known as one of the most memorable scenes in movie history, and obviously paid him off well in the long term.

[davidv]

I will weigh in on the part where you said about being a teacher.

DO NOT pursue teaching credentials unless you are very sure that you LOVE children. Many people find out too late that they love a subject, but they do not love children. It is a recipe for failure.

You could do volunteer work in some field related to what you want to do and go from there.

[livecontent]

I think there are too many people pursuing and getting MBA degrees. There are too many in the marketplace; many from less stellar schools and the value has become diluted. It is has value if you graduate from a top tier school and is more valued added with good experience in this career path. However, just to get an MBA without interest or a growing level of experience and responsibilities, at your age, is a waste of time and money.

You must first pursue something that you have interest, regardless of any degree. Did you just get an English Degree because it was an easy way to a BA or did you have interest in that discipline? If you had interest, then go further in a career path that perhaps has some aspects of your youthful interest, such as Library Science or Technical Writing.


Livecontent

[ChrisFromChicago]

I graduated college with a computer science degree. I worked at a fortune 500 company for 5 years and then went back to school to make the transition from information technology to product/marketing and brand management.


1) know what you want to do. Your post seems wishy-washy. If you don't start an MBA program with the determiniation to get a Finance MBA and a job at Nestle. . .then the MBA isn't for you. MBAs are not for finding yourself.

2) Pick the companies, then the school. If you want to work in the midwest and for consumer goods. . .then Indiana University is a great school. If you want to work on the east coast, pick differently. The top 10 MBA programs you can go anywhere . . .10-30 you should know who/what recruit there.

3)your old. Average MBA candidate is about 27. Your 7-years older than your competitors.

4) Go full time. You will need the internship.


5) Your post seems very non-MBA. . .I mean 9/10 of the MBA is the initiative to take off 2 years and a passion to do a job and get paid for it. . .That is the people who you will be competing for.


6) MBA salaries are depend on schools. Mine are currently averaging 99k (between 75-125K). If your making close to that. . .it may not be worth it (though 5-year trends are strong).

[Katarina Witt]

I would say someone 35 years old is hardly "old" in the scheme of things. So what if the average MBA student is 27? That means some of them, at least, are in their 30s. I've known people to get an MBA at 40! With the constantly rising retirement age, someone 35 is looking at working at least 32 more years, maybe more by the time s/he gets to retirement age.