When the boy decided to quit his job, it was very unexpected. He couldn’t stand his job any longer, and we pretty much knew he was done with it. When he told me that he wanted to quit, I wasn’t mad. I knew it was the right decision for us and him!
However, we did know that we needed to find additional ways to save money until he found a job and we had an idea of what his income would be like. We also knew that there would be new expenses added to our budget since he would be looking for jobs.
Yes, we we would’ve been fine if we would have just kept living like everything was completely normal but we didn’t want to come out negative in our monthly cash flow, and we still wanted to keep on track with our normal debt payments.
Maybe your budget won’t let you quit your job completely. Maybe you have to work at least part-time while you’re looking for your new job, or maybe you don’t want to spend a ton of money on the job hunt and want to be more creative.
There are many expenses that I could cut (as I’ve detailed in this post) if it really came down to us needing to cut things out. Luckily, W found a job only a couple of weeks later (after turning down many job offers also).
Anyways, W applied EVERYWHERE. And had tons of interviews and even more job offers. This means that he did lots of driving and rushing everywhere. Yes, I am happy that he was able to snag so many job offers, but what I’m about to say will astonish you.
He spent over $600 in August on driving to interviews alone.
Isn’t that crazy? If he wasn’t so picky, then he would’ve spent less on gas, but we didn’t. Gas ate up a lot of our budget in August.
When applying for jobs, there are tons of expenses that need to be thought about. Are you going to have your resume professionally checked? Are you going to hire someone to find a job for you? What if you have a lot of interviews and driving to potential jobs to do, where and how will you eat?
1. Use career services at your school.
If you’re still in school, then check out the career services center at your school. I did this when I was still in school. Of course different schools offer different things in this department, but it’s still good to check out because it should be free!
Someone in the department went over my resume and critiqued it. She made changes and I was able to e-mail her until it was perfect.
She also gave me tips on applying for positions and having a great interview. Whether you’re looking for accountancy jobs, sales positions, and so on, it’s a good idea to check it out! Extra information can never kill you 🙂
2. Ask friends for critiques.
If you aren’t in school, or want extra tips and help, then ask your friends! Have others reread your resume (as there are probably small mistakes that you might have not seen). Also, if you have even more time and friends who care :), then have them practice interview questions on you.
Being prepared is a MAJOR tip for the interview and job hunting process. If your friend can catch you off guard with questions, then you can be more prepared.
3. Use the library!
If you’re like me, then you like to research everything and get books on everything. The library should have tons of job hunting books that you can read up on. Even if you think you are extremely prepared, there might still be one more thing that you don’t know.
If you have time, reading or skimming through one more book won’t kill me.
4. When applying places, call them first!
A mistake that the boy did a lot in the beginning was just driving around aimlessly and talking to managers. He would also drive back and forth a lot because he would realize that he skipped a place that he wanted to apply to.
While this did end up working in his favor (the place he was eventually hired at was a place that wasn’t initially hiring but liked him anyways), we also spent way too much on gas because of his aimless driving!
You can call the places first, or check their websites to see if they’re hiring. Save on gas money people 🙂
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