I did it. Change is coming.

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Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 42
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,612
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

12 Nov 2015, 1:58 am

So many people in my life are changing jobs & making career moves. A couple guys at work are moving on for career reasons. My twin brother just got a new job. His girlfriend is looking for a new job. A close friend of mine is looking for a new job. My high school best friend just bought a shop in a nice industrial park and hired a few employees as his business is expanding - his only regret is that he didn't do it a year ago as he had both the money and the plan already.

So all of that spurred me to make some changes and better myself. I put an ad online stating what I was looking to do & a few basics about me and relevant work experience. I got a handful of decent responses, but one of them stood out as the one I'd like to do.. so I arranged an interview last Monday morning & checked out the site and met with the bosses/workers etc.. in less than an hour I had a job offer & the only details to finalize are my wage (which I know what it will be more than at least, and it's acceptable) & start date. Now I have the start date and the wage almost doesn't matter since I know what it will be at minimum - but obviously higher is better.

So, I gave my notice at work. I'm not gaining skills/knowledge/experience there that's relevant to my future career plans.. and I'm not making good money, so, time to change things up. I have learned a lot there about other things that will definitely help me in everything else I ever do, so no regrets. They asked if I'd still stay on and come in once every couple weeks or so to get some things done (at a higher wage) & I said yeah, we can work something out. But for now I'm pretty stoked to be moving on to my next adventure.

I'll be leaving the brew pub/restaurant that I was on the construction crew to help build (which is why they'd still like me to come around to do some maintenance/repair work now and again) & moving on to work for a very high end home renovation company. The main project I'll be working on for the next year (pending everything works out. fingers crossed!) is a restoration/renovation of a 110 year old heritage house in a very very beautiful neighbourhood in Vancouver with large properties and homes. The crew there has been working on it for a year already w/ all of the structural & framing work done (meticulously) as they made it back into one large single family home from the 5 suites it had been butchered into over the decades. It's now time to build the rest of the interior & finish it, as well as restore the exterior - which will be some very tedious work preserving 110 year old wood and window frames.

The tax assessed value of the property is $9,497,000.00 for this year - so chances are it sold for more than that.. maybe $12M? I'm not sure - can't find any copies of the real estate listing online that still show the asking price.. only that it was 5 suites and the lot is 30,000+sf. Anyways, the renovation costs are projected to be North of $4M. This is going to be an absolutely awesome project to be a part of & I expect to learn a lot of skills/techniques from talented tradesmen - which I am definitely looking forward to.

I have a free transit pass good until June 30th, so I might just take the bus/train that long. Then by the time my free ride is up I'll have the cash to buy an old truck and some tools (and still have more cash/investments) & then work out the rest of this project and then see what I do next... stay on with these guys, or with a truck and tools, consider bouncing over to the world of banging in finishing trim/mouldings in new construction condos.. sure, it's boring repetitive work in comparison to a fancy mansion build out, buuuuut if you're quick it can be pretty lucrative & money is what I need to move forward with bigger better business plans in the future.

But that's just thinking out loud and getting ahead of myself.. one positive change at a time. For now it's time to peace out (for the most part) from a job I'm not making a lot of money at & move on to one where I'll make about double the pay to do something I enjoy better & will learn a lot more valuable and marketable skills from.

TLDR? New job. Likey better. Mo money.