Is $1400.00 a month enough money to........?

[Antonio Bodley]

Live on? If I only bring home $700 every two weeks to pay monthly debts that are more than what I earn monthly, can I afford to get my own place to stay? I have loads of debt and I know my current debts and the debts I will have to pay to live on my own will seem like more than I can handle. Do they have housing programs available for low income single people with no kids? I am in a tough situation at home where my folks are in a rough spot financially and I am always put in a tough situation where I have to keep sacrificing my down payment for my own home to help them get over. This is constantly happening to me. I want to move out and get my own place, so it's not like I am just laid back comfortable just living under my parents roof with no plans of moving out. All I need is a bigger down payment on a home and even bigger steady paychecks coming and I am I good to go. So far my down payment has been used as a safety net to help the family out. The more I get put in a situation like this the more that decreases my chances at ever leaving. What am I missing? My parents seem to think it is possible for someone like me to survive on my own with the money I bring home every month and still pay all of the costs of living on my own including my current debts, which has to be paid every month. If there was an option to make this happen for me I would do it starting today if I could. That's how bad I want to get out.

[Ann Bellamy]

You can get by without cable, use the internet for your tv watching entertainment.

Use the internet to google North Dakota Oil Fields or check into jobs in Texas. You recently posted that you wish you knew the name of an online fax service. I replied that you could find lots of free ones by googling them. You have internet - the whole world is available to you via internet. In this age, there is no reason to say you don't know something, if you have a device and internet connection: Look it up yourself.

You do have it tough, I agree, and your student loans will follow you forever. Part of the problem, I suspect, is your location. But determination to break out of the cycle is another part of it. If you have an accounting degree, you can research accounting jobs in other parts of the country like Austin Texas or North Dakota. So just because you don't know anything about North Dakota, doesn't mean you don't have the means to get information about it. Look it up!

Pay varies dramatically by area. In Northern Massachusetts, I know real estate investors who are paying $40 per hour for bookkeepers (not accountants, bookkeepers). Two hours away on Cape Cod, CPA's are dying on the vine and lucky to get $25 when they start out. Sounds great when you are only making $15 or less, but remember the cost of living is very high. But there are ways: rooming houses to start with, or renting a room in a house. Again, you can search on the internet to start with. Look it up!