Never Move for Money!
I’ve moved for jobs twice in my life: First to Washington D.C. and later to St. Louis, MO. The first time, I moved because it was time to ‘become an adult and start a career’ and the second time is because I got a ridiculously generous job offer.
I shouldn’t have moved the second time. Don’t get me wrong, the job offer was very generous, and I actually quite liked the position. But I wasn’t moving because I loved Midwestern sensibilities, or St. Louis style ribs (yum), or anything like that. I moved because they offered me a salary that was 50% higher than what I was making at the time. And I got greedy.
Do you know what happened? I was so miserable I ended up begging my old manager for my job back and moving back to D.C. And I’m glad I did it. Money isn’t everything, and it goes pretty fast when you’re on a plane home ever 3 weeks – it’s amazing how expensive traveling can be under those conditions. The funny thing is that my standard of living in D.C. still hasn’t caught up with what I had out in Missouri (even though my salary more than has), but I’m still 100x happier now than I was then.
How do you know when moving across the country for a job isn’t the right call? Ask yourself these questions:
- Will I love the job?
- Do I know anyone there?
- Do I love the area?
- Will someone go with me?
- If the job were for the same amount of money I’m making now, would I still consider going?
In my opinion, if you answer ‘No’ to more than two of those questions, you probably shouldn’t take the job unless you are otherwise unemployed. Being wealthy is more than just about getting rich, it’s about being happy and enjoying your journey through life. A big part of that happiness (at least for me) is the time I spend with the people I care about and being social with my friends (whom I generally consider to be my extended family, for all of their foibles). Is a bit more money really worth leaving that all behind?
Update: This post recently got included in my first two blog carnivals (one at PTMoney, and one at InstantInternship.com) so if you came from there, thanks! I hope you like this enough to check out more of my posts.
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4 Responses to “Never Move for Money!”
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So, you want to know what's up with the brackets in the name? "Curly brackets (also called braces, or "squiggly brackets") are sometimes used in prose to indicate a series of equal choices" and "Square brackets are mainly used to enclose explanatory or missing material usually added by someone other than the original author, especially in quoted text." So basically, if you really want to be wealthy in life, you have to figure out how to get happy. Since that whole spiel would make a crappy name for a blog, I decided to do something a bit creative with some brackets.
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Definitely early on in your career where you work and for how much isn’t as important as whom you work with or live around. For that reason I definitely agree with you. I hated my first job out of college even though I banked because it kept me out of town most of the week and I was forced to hang with my work crew, and never got to see my post college buds or family. I assume there are cases where the people you work with are so great it doesn’t matter. But for the most part it pays to like where you live early on.
You’re lucky though. DC is a great area with lots to offer.
On the flip side, when you get older and your family is built up (wife and kids), you can take your circle of comfort with you so moving isn’t as hard, I think. And makes more financial sense if the pay is better.
First off, thanks for the comment. I’m excited that some other personal finance bloggers are reading my site – that’s the huge “keep it up” that I need.
I agree that if you have your family moving with you, it’s a lot easier to make a move. I’ve never been in that situation, where someone moved with me, but I would think even then moving “just” for money would be a bad idea.
However, what I think you’re getting at is that if its a good move both professionally and personally, then you should consider it. I agree – if you are a huge skier and get the chance to move to Colorado for a better job and the chance to ski every weekend, maybe it’s a good move. In my situation, I was moving for just the paycheck, and I feel it was a mistake. Had I moved somewhere I wanted to be for a new job, maybe things would have been different.
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