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I went to school in London, got a job at a U.S. law firm in London which also has an office in Pittsburgh. Made good £ there & lived very cheaply - at least as much as one can do in London (shared a house with 6 other people, had no car, never ate out, etc) did do some traveling & seeing the sites as I figured I wouldnt have as good an opportunity later to do so, but managed to save up a decent amount of £, and then a couple of years later I transferred to the Pgh office & magically my bank account almost doubled when converted into $. I also was practicing in a very specific area of law there that is pretty nonexistent here but the demand for is slowly growing which helped immensely in getting the salary I was able to negotiate.
Bought a nice house in the southside and yes one of those dreaded german cars.... (though if you get one just a couple of years used they arent much more expensive then other cars really - i'm not a fan of paying the markup for new cars). Now I just turned out of my 20s (eek, gettin old), and I can't find much to complain about how I have fared in this city.
Yep, although it takes a few more years of education after college, some young lawyers can then get pretty high-paying jobs, enough to buy a house in Pittsburgh and afford a premium-brand car, particularly if they avoid accumulating too much in terms of student loans.
Not that it is relevant, but please note that not all lawyers by any means get high-paying jobs (some do, some don't).
Location: Pittsburgh (via Chicago, via Pittsburgh)
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Originally Posted by BrianTH
Yep, although it takes a few more years of education after college, some young lawyers can then get pretty high-paying jobs, enough to buy a house in Pittsburgh and afford a premium-brand car, particularly if they avoid accumulating too much in terms of student loans.
Not that it is relevant, but please note that not all lawyers by any means get high-paying jobs (some do, some don't).
not to mention that nowadays if you don't graduate from a top 10-15 law school you're sh** out of luck trying to get a job
Yep, although it takes a few more years of education after college, some young lawyers can then get pretty high-paying jobs, enough to buy a house in Pittsburgh and afford a premium-brand car, particularly if they avoid accumulating too much in terms of student loans.
Not that it is relevant, but please note that not all lawyers by any means get high-paying jobs (some do, some don't).
Yea, the market here regarding lawyers it totally saturated. I wanted to work here right out of school, but couldnt find any offers over $60K which doesnt fly very well with all those loans to pay back, and that was before the whole economic downturn.
Yes, some law graduates can make well over $100K their first year here, but those positions are pretty limited & unfortunately many graduates these days are lucky to get any job. Law is not a field I would recommend to anyone today unless you are absolutely condifent you will graduate at the top 5% of your class at a minumum if you didn't get accepted in to a top 20 school (or even better, you know someone with hiring clout).
I'm glad in the end I took the route I took, but it was pretty demoralizing back in the day accumulating thousands of rejection letters and some very bizarre interviews including one that lasted about 5 mins, where the interviewer told be he didn't know how I got scheduled because he hates candidates who are from pittsburgh and that he has a west coast law firm that just happens to be in pittsburgh (whatever that means) and that people in this city are not bright enough to understand how things work there.
not to mention that nowadays if you don't graduate from a top 10-15 law school you're sh** out of luck trying to get a job
I remember reading recently that some companies in Pittsburgh have trouble finding IT people. Many of those jobs are high paying--I wonder if many of the current crop of local college students are now studying IT, like the generation before pursued law degrees?
I don't hang out with the '20's who inherited their money crowd' (I am part of the 20's making a somewhat decent salary who got their on their own crowd), but I have never known a single person to set foot in the Duquesne, rivers or oakmont clubs...
I went the the duquesne club once to sit in on a venture capital meeting, but I have never 'hung out' there
i've been to the rivers club for charity events and some work related stuff and yeah, the crowds there are a lot older than their 20s. uniformly. maybe the young people just go to the gym.
and i bought a house at 29, and my husband and i are far from rich. most of my friends bought houses before they were 30, many in their early 20s. this is pittsburgh. my house cost under $40k. as long as you can save up a down payment, and are willing to live in a house and/or neighborhood that is not the suburban ideal, a mortgage is cheaper than rent. granted the value of our house has doubled since we bought it a few years ago and we got in right before the housing collapse led lenders to tighten up on credit, but home ownership is still very attainable here.
I remember reading recently that some companies in Pittsburgh have trouble finding IT people. Many of those jobs are high paying--I wonder if many of the current crop of local college students are now studying IT, like the generation before pursued law degrees?
While down slightly from a few years ago, unfortunately law school applications are still very high. Part of this is due to law schools continuing to spout off some very creative number reporting on their end regarding graduate salaries & job placement (their methods are very unethical in my opinion [for example claiming "98% job placement" & using as their calculation of any graduate that has a job doing anything within 2 years of graduating & also counting those who don't respond as employed as well for just one example] & they are finally being called out on it either through lawsuits or a general dressing down by their peers.
That said, any potential student who does not do his/her own independent research in the job prospects in the field that they are considering studying for only has themselves to blame regardless of what a school tells you.
I love reading posts like this, and congrats on being a self-made person. It's great to see so many on this forum saying similar things, too--the ability for so many people to buy a house at an early age is one of my favorite things about Pittsburgh.
I don't really have a specific question in mind. I didn't start this thread to go in any particular direction, I just thought it might produce some interesting conversations. Maybe some good questions would be "How were you able to save the money for your house" "are you glad you bought it" and "what has been the biggest challenge so far"? Oh, and in keeping with the OP, "Do you think owning a house in your 20's means that you are a 20-something with $$$"?
I started looking for jobs when I was a sophomore in college, I spent sophomore-senior year networking with major companies. By the time I graduated, I knew a VP and a few people in HR pretty well for one company in particular, and that networking resulted in a job upon graduation. That first job after graduation paid $55k/year. I lived on a minimum-wage level salary initially (doing the math, I could have kept the same lifestyle making $8/hr), sharing a s**thole apartment with two roommates for two years (my rent was under $300/mo to live in shadyside, but we could feel a breeze from the outside through the outlets, and the heat never went above 60 degrees in the winter). For the first year, I aggressively paid off undergrad loans and for the second year, I saved every spare penny for a down payment on a house.
In my free time I started reading about investing (I read/study about business/investing roughly 1.5hrs/day and have for two years now) and opened a portfolio which has done very well. I used that knowledge I gained from reading/studying at night to switch jobs a little over a year ago, which bumped my salary up significantly.
I spent about 7 months looking for a house until I found a good deal from a guy who flips houses, and now I spend $300/month less on my mortgage than I would if I rented a similar place.
I am borderline OCD about money...I have tracked every penny I have spent since graduating college, and I have spreadsheets showing my projected monthly spending for the next nine years (the time I estimate it will take to own my home outright). I have automatic withdraws set up so that my long and short term savings, mortgage payments, etc. are all taken out of my paycheck before I even see the paycheck. It all comes down to planning and patience
I started looking for jobs when I was a sophomore in college, I spent sophomore-senior year networking with major companies. By the time I graduated, I knew a VP and a few people in HR pretty well for one company in particular, and that networking resulted in a job upon graduation. That first job after graduation paid $55k/year. I lived on a minimum-wage level salary initially (doing the math, I could have kept the same lifestyle making $8/hr), sharing a s**thole apartment with two roommates for two years (my rent was under $300/mo to live in shadyside, but we could feel a breeze from the outside through the outlets, and the heat never went above 60 degrees in the winter). For the first year, I aggressively paid off undergrad loans and for the second year, I saved every spare penny for a down payment on a house.
In my free time I started reading about investing (I read/study about business/investing roughly 1.5hrs/day and have for two years now) and opened a portfolio which has done very well. I used that knowledge I gained from reading/studying at night to switch jobs a little over a year ago, which bumped my salary up significantly.
I spent about 7 months looking for a house until I found a good deal from a guy who flips houses, and now I spend $300/month less on my mortgage than I would if I rented a similar place.
I am borderline OCD about money...I have tracked every penny I have spent since graduating college, and I have spreadsheets showing my projected monthly spending for the next nine years (the time I estimate it will take to own my home outright). I have automatic withdraws set up so that my long and short term savings, mortgage payments, etc. are all taken out of my paycheck before I even see the paycheck. It all comes down to planning and patience
Great post! I'm a huge believer in networking and in being frugal. FWIW I think a lot of those young people who appear to be sponging off their parents are actually making their own way in this world, in just the same way you did. I'm really impressed by the money managing and networking done by kids today. I did a little bit of networking when I started my career, but my son and his friends have made an art of it and really benefited. No only did he manage to land a good job, but he also developed a nice group of friends and he's active in a few activities that give him fun things to do that don't end up costing that much. For example he's part of a group that is helping to restore historic homes at this local site. It gives back to the community but it also gives him a fun project to work on that doesn't cost him a dime--plus he does his networking, and gets invited to parties and events for free, too.
Getting back to college kids sponging off their parents--is that really so common? I find it a little hard to believe-- these days parents just don't have money to throw around anymore. Of course, it's been a while since I've spent time on a campus. Is it really that bad?
Getting back to college kids sponging off their parents--is that really so common? I find it a little hard to believe-- these days parents just don't have money to throw around anymore. Of course, it's been a while since I've spent time on a campus. Is it really that bad?
Things to keep in mind:
(1) Although recently the economy has not been good for the median household, it has been considerably better for higher-income households, including households in which both parents work and make a good income.
(2) College students, particularly at four-year schools with at least somewhat competitive admissions, are not a random sampling of Americans their age. Specifically, their parents are much more likely to be college-educated and higher-income--in fact, there is a robust correlation between SAT scores and family income.
When you combine these insights, it isn't hard to imagine why a disproportionate number of college students would have parents capable of providing them with a fairly generous lifestyle. Not all of them, of course, but enough that their extra numbers would be notable.
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