Put your resume on dice.com and other contracting sites. There are a ton of recruiters there who need people. You probably won't get paid well and the work won't be glamorous but it should be fairly quick to find a contract somewhere in the country. Wherever you find a contract you can rent a room cheaply and send money home.
Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
131–140 of 192 posts
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#1321. Borrow money from trusted source.
2. Buy time with it.
3. ...
4. Return that money.
Don't let finance bring you down in your life, ask for help from people around you. Good chance someone will be able to help you.
This Ask HN is a good start, so I think you're on a good path back up already.
Good luck.
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#133Check out this group community/forum. Many people getting along in life with similar circumstances.
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#134This sucks! I'm so sorry to hear man. I've spent a lot of time with people who are homeless, which has caused me to think about this very question though I haven't had to put any of this into practice so grain of salt. - Get a membership to a cheap gym so you can use their shower (and potentially wifi) if the shelter doesn't work out. In many areas it's possible to get a membership for $10-20/month. Clean your clothe…
You can also do your laundry in a self-service laundromat. Usually just a few cents plus the detergent.
They tend to be $1 for the smallest and up to $7.50 for the largest machines. What I'd consider a normal load at home costs about $3. Then, dryers are .25 cents for 5-10 minutes, so it's usually $.50-1 per armful of clothes. That means it can easily cost $15 to do a couple's weekly laundry including sheets and towels, plus consumables.
Also, you have to get to the laundromat and spend over an hour there. Not a huge expense, but not really a few cents. On the positive side the best laundromats I've found supply WiFi, multi-game arcade emulators and free coffee.
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#135Apparently my post has been flagged for some reason. I attempted to post the following last night but kept getting a message that I was posting too fast: Questions / answers thus far: there's been a lot of good advice in this thread thus far and a few understandable questions. I'm going to answer them all here as I can no longer edit the main thread. first off, great suggestions - some of these were already on my min…
People aren't being very fair to you here and I'm flat out embarrassed by HN. The most relevant thing is that you're going through something terrible. If I had anything, I'd give it to you, but I've had a very tough year. The best I can offer is that I'm genuinely sorry. Not only for the way you've been treated here, but for everything that has happened. I've had some good friends go down the homelessness path and th…
>People aren't being very fair to you here and I'm flat out embarrassed by HN.
Me too, it probably the just world hypothesis at work.
Hang in there and don't listen to the negative talk.
They cannot possibly understand what you are going through, because they aren't going through it.
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#136I know the feeling, in fact a little over two years ago I posted something similar on HN and got 0 responses. It’s always empowering to finally acknowledge that there is no safety net. Forget computers and engineering interviews, start looking for any and all work that pays. If all else fails, go to McDonald’s and work there until you save up a little. Once you have an income restart your job search. If you go homele…
"Go work at McDonald's/Walmart/whatever retail for a few weeks/months" is generally not great advice.
Hiring is an investment at all levels and oftentimes restaurants (especially chains/corporations) and retail stores don't want to invest in training someone with higher level skills out of the fear that they'll just leave immediately when something that more closely matches their skills comes along.
Not to say that food/retail jobs can't be found, but in my experience you need to a) not go try at a chain and b) make a more personal connection with the person doing the hiring, not just filling out an application.
If OP is able and has a bike or car (and doesn't mind doing non development work), food delivery through postmates/caviar/whatever has a lower barrier to entry and doesn't require certain models the way ridesharing apps do.
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#137I know it's not the main focus of your question, but since the eviction hasn't happened yet, it may be worth continuing to work on making it not happen, by consulting a tenant lawyer familiar with Colorado law. There may be legal resources available to you at low or no cost that could improve your chances of a favorable outcome in court.
https://www.hud.gov/states/colorado/renting/tenantrights
http://theactioncenterco.org/program-services/tenantlandlord... (although "helpline navigators do not give legal advice" it sounds like they might help with some of your questions and might also be able to help you find legal help)
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#138- Public libraries can help with the job search if they offer free internet access - If you don't mind camping, its an extremely cheap way to live, and a gym / YMCA will help before interviews. - If you have any friends / family, ask them if you can crash. Have a friend who lived this way for ages. - If it comes to it, there are often abandoned structures that are reasonable for keeping rain off. Lived in an abandone…
Sidenote: how does a place like AL have so much government money poored into it?
Maybe some government decisionmakers decided to spend money there as a deliberate matter of social policy, others saw it as a good place to get certain property and services that the government wanted at low cost, and maybe some legislators were good at getting procurement and grant preferences for their home state?
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#139Just wanted to chime in, I'm in Utah and can totally relate. (My car will be repo'd next friday if I don't have enough, and we're struggling w/ eviction possibilities too. For me, I had an employer not pay me 2 months of wages.. 14k. The CEO is a corrupt scam-artist, and me and all other devs/ex employees have filed wage claims, but he went to jail for check fraud, and I'm assuming he's poor too, possibly a drug abus…
The subreddit link is www.reddit.com/r/forhire
I've also got a multi-reddit for jobs, careers, and freelance: https://www.reddit.com/user/zvive/m/jobs_and_freelance/
Re: Ask HN: How to survive as a homeless engineer?
#140Apparently my post has been flagged for some reason. I attempted to post the following last night but kept getting a message that I was posting too fast: Questions / answers thus far: there's been a lot of good advice in this thread thus far and a few understandable questions. I'm going to answer them all here as I can no longer edit the main thread. first off, great suggestions - some of these were already on my min…
People aren't being very fair to you here and I'm flat out embarrassed by HN. The most relevant thing is that you're going through something terrible. If I had anything, I'd give it to you, but I've had a very tough year. The best I can offer is that I'm genuinely sorry. Not only for the way you've been treated here, but for everything that has happened. I've had some good friends go down the homelessness path and th…
What about a PO box? Would that work?