41–50 of 61 posts
Exchanging programming services for money is a great idea in the long term, but it typically takes on the order of months until the first chunk of money arrives, which means it's far too late for that alone to help you right now. What you need right now is an emergency bail out. You say you're in a foreign country, and you don't have any family back home who could help with the price of an airline ticket? In that cas…
Look into couch surfing or staying with friends/family for the short term if that is possible.
Look for a way to get quick cash legally. In the U.S., collecting recyclables is a common way for people on the street to do that. A quick google does not indicate you can do that in Canada. You might consider pawning something, accepting donations, finding some kind of short term work that pays cash.
While drawing on those resources, then try to get more long term solutions in place. You cannot crisis manage your way to a more middle class life. You have to make real plans and do a lot of problem solving.
I hope that some of the advice here on how to market yourself as a serious professional is useful to you in the long run but I will say that it makes some really big assumptions which may be completely off the mark. First, in order to charge $100/hour for anything at all, the quality of your work needs to be worth that much. Your work may not be that good. So you may need to find out how to improve the quality of your work. Second, simply relabeling yourself as a "consultant" instead of a "freelancer" may not be some kind of magic bullet to get you better clients.
Some of the advice here is a good long term thing to shoot for but, really, if you are on the verge of homelessness, the odds are high that you have bigger problems than what label you are using for your business model. So you may have some serious work ahead of you in terms of figuring out exactly what went wrong and how to fix it.
Also, asking for help here on HN in this manner may be doing you more harm than good. The people you want to hire you for your programming skills may well be reading this forum and may well basically blacklist you because of this post.
I am sorry you are in this situation. (I have been homeless for 2.5 years, so I am not looking down on you.)
Best of luck.
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The only thing you have to do to hit $100 an hour in e.g. Python programming, which you appear to do, is to stop taking gigs which pay less than $100 per hour. People express disbelief at this, and it is headdesk inducing to me. For general Python contracting work, go to people who already employ Python programmers, demonstrate competence, and then ask if they are hiring or know anyone who is. This can be virtually o…
Sorry to ask what are probably silly questions, but: how do I, uh, find these people? Like where do they gather? Should I look up local businesses in my area, call them, and talk about their problems?
I know that sounds snarky, but that's really that's all there is to it. Once you find your way into a local dev community, you'll quickly find more and more connections. Good luck!
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The only thing you have to do to hit $100 an hour in e.g. Python programming, which you appear to do, is to stop taking gigs which pay less than $100 per hour. People express disbelief at this, and it is headdesk inducing to me. For general Python contracting work, go to people who already employ Python programmers, demonstrate competence, and then ask if they are hiring or know anyone who is. This can be virtually o…
Sorry to ask what are probably silly questions, but: how do I, uh, find these people? Like where do they gather? Should I look up local businesses in my area, call them, and talk about their problems?
The organizers of that event probably know of companies in Vancouver who are looking for Python developers. You could also comb the attendee list and try to figure out what companies they are working for, as they'll probably be using Python.
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10,000 times this. I do freelance work, and THIS advice is the advice that has helped me the most. Be, act, and appear a consummate professional at every front. Quality of clients, size of projects, it all depends on acting the correct part. Might drop the term freelancer as well, although thats a little more controversial. It has appeared to me lately, that freelancer has begun to give the impression of cheap roll-o…
This. Be a consultant. Bill by the hour.
Exchanging programming services for money is a great idea in the long term, but it typically takes on the order of months until the first chunk of money arrives, which means it's far too late for that alone to help you right now. What you need right now is an emergency bail out. You say you're in a foreign country, and you don't have any family back home who could help with the price of an airline ticket? In that cas…
Freelancers should require a deposit upfront. 50% for jobs 1 month. The rest can be paid at milestones or hourly/daily. If it's hourly/daily , bill bi-weekly, and try to get paid net 15 [1]. For long term jobs, if the client does net 30+, increase the deposit to secure your cash flow. And always use a contract.
1: http://www.freshbooks.com/blog/2010/03/02/the-best-invoice-p...
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Sorry to ask what are probably silly questions, but: how do I, uh, find these people? Like where do they gather? Should I look up local businesses in my area, call them, and talk about their problems?
You could start by Googling "Vancouver Python meetup" like I just did, and you'll find that there's a meetup happening this coming Wednesday at 6 p.m. at Facebook's offices there. http://www.meetup.com/vanpyz/ I know that sounds snarky, but that's really that's all there is to it. Once you find your way into a local dev community, you'll quickly find more and more connections. Good luck!
Couchsurfing.com for the immediate housing problem, maybe even make a friend you can lean on for the first week and try to get them back with a nice dinner once you got some cash flowing again. If cost of living/food is a sustained problem, try to save up and fly to a place where that won't be your noose around your neck. Perhaps southeast asia once you've saved a bit. Again couchsurfing for a softer landing there as…
It doesn't cost that much actually; once I find a permanent place and buy groceries etc. I can live off maybe $600-$700/month. The issue is really just that I need money last-minute.
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> You say you're in a foreign country, and you don't have any family back home who could help with the price of an airline ticket? In that case I would suggest going to your country's embassy and explaining your situation. Embassies aren't "get out of jail free" cards. Sure, it's better than nothing - but they get tourists without a return ticket home so often that there are strict policies on these sort of things. E…
I'm not an expert, but I don't think the US gov't ever just gifts you a ticket home. They could probably help you receive a wire transfer from friends or family, but it's very unlikely they would buy you a ticket.