u/weirdworldyes

I sadly do not have many people in my life that I can ask, so I am coming to Reddit.

Context:

I am 22 (23 next week if that matters 😅), currently living with my boyfriend and one roommate. My boyfriend owns the home (his mom passed and her life insurance was enough to buy a small starter home), and all three of us put $550 a month into a bank account dedicated to the house. This account pays all the bills associated with the home. I don’t really have anything to do with it, my boyfriend keeps track of it.

I am currently still on my parents health insurance, and I can stay on it until I’m 26. I am also on their car insurance, but I’m in the process of switching over to my own insurance. I moved from NJ to FL to be with my boyfriend, so I need to register my car and find my own insurance.

As of right now, the only bills I’ll have are my car insurance, phone bill, $550 rent, and whatever money I spend on necessities. I also have one secured credit card with a $200 limit. Overall, I think I’m doing pretty well on that side of things, and the fact that my boyfriend already owns his home puts us way ahead of the game.

Now onto what I already have money wise. I just accepted a job offer for $18/hr, 80 hours bi-weekly. I’m still employed at my current job, which I will be leaving. The new job starts on the 26th.

I do not have any savings at the moment. I have just over $1,800 in a traditional IRA with Principal from a previous job. I had a 401k, couldn’t keep it there when I left, so I rolled it over into an IRA. I want to get into investing, so I opened an account with Robinhood and put $1 into VOO and $1 into SPY (obviously I’ll add more over time). I will also be doing a 401k with my new job, and they match up to 3%.

My questions:

- How much money should I be putting into a savings account each paycheck?

- How much money should I be putting into VOO/SPY?

- Is there anything else I should look into for investing?

- What should I do with my IRA? Should I keep it as is or add to it?

- Is there any other advice you’d give for someone in my situation?

Given my lack of bills and living situation, I feel like I have the perfect opportunity to save a LOT. I mainly want to know the best way to go about it. Thanks in advance!

When I say 'gone wrong', I mean more that it didn’t do exactly what I intended it to do, and I wanted to share my experience. I think it’s a really cool example of how a spell you intended to go one way can end up taking a slightly different path.

At the time, I was working a commission based job. The base pay was pretty 'meh', but the commission added up quickly if I did well enough. So I decided it would be the perfect time to make my first money bowl. My intention was simple, I wanted to make more commission. More commission = more money. Well… turns out the money bowl had different plans 😆

My boyfriend also works a commission based job. His base pay is much better than mine was, and he could still bring home decent money even without making sales that week. But as soon as I made my money bowl, he came home with a $900 paycheck. Then the week after was $1,300. And the week after that was $800. Those are amazing paychecks for him! Meanwhile, I was making less and less commission at my own job.

Not making enough money at my job ended up pushing me to start looking for work elsewhere. Somehow, I managed to land a business clerk job with no experience! Those jobs are insanely hard to come by where I live, especially finding someone willing to train you from the ground up. It offers higher pay and a steady 80 hour paycheck every two weeks. Honestly, it’s perfect for me! Now I won’t have to stress about making commission just to bring home a halfway decent paycheck.

I got the official offer letter this past Monday, and today it finally clicked for me what happened. The money bowl technically did exactly what I intended it to do, it brought more money into my life. Just not in the way I originally planned. It brought quick money through my boyfriend making amazing sales, and it also led me toward a better paying, more stable job long term.

I just think it’s so cool how it all worked out. And honestly, I’m really happy with the outcome. I now have a job that fits my lifestyle better, and my boyfriend is doing great at his job too. Win-win if you ask me 🤣