Want to Reach FI Faster? These Careers Give You the Biggest Advantage

0:00Mindy Jensen:Your career is one of the biggest factors in determining how quickly you can reach financial independence. Today, we are ranking the best careers for FI and breaking down which jobs give you the biggest advantage when it comes to income, flexibility, and long-term wealth building.

0:20Mindy Jensen:Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to the BiggerPocketsMoney podcast. My name is Mindy Jensen, and with me today is my CoSFI co-host, Evan Lawler. Evan, thanks for joining me today.

0:29Evan Lawler:Yes, absolutely. Thank you so much for having me on today. I am so excited to discuss this topic. We all know that your job is just one piece of accelerating your financial independence journey because you could have a very high paying job and save none of it and not make any progress towards your FI goal. So I think it's really important today to break this down to really understand which career is best for FI.

0:51Mindy Jensen:Yeah. And things like side hustles, house hacking, tax optimization, they all help you on your journey to financial independence. But often the primary engine of your journey is your full-time job. It can be your largest form of income. It can shape your expectation of lifestyle. It can define where you need to live and a whole lot more. Evan, what do you think is one of the top careers or the top career for people who are pursuing financial independence?

1:19Evan Lawler:My answer is simple, and I'm totally biased in saying this, but I think that engineers are in the best position to achieve financial independence better than everybody else. Why is that? I think engineers are best positioned to FI for three main reasons. Firstly, because engineers typically have very high starting salaries, but their top line salary is not always huge. Outside of a software engineer or today an AI engineer, a top line salary for an engineer that's been doing it for 40 years could be in the range of$200 ,000 to$250 ,000, which is great money, but it's not in line with a lawyer making$850 ,000 per year.

2:01Evan Lawler:So I think that helps engineers better maintain their lifestyle inflation and keep it to a more moderate level to help them achieve FI. Next, it only requires four years of schooling. So it's often a high ROI degree and the student loans are super manageable, especially early on. And finally, I think engineers are usually quite willing to tackle the technical side of financial independence. The math, the growth rates, the safe withdrawal rates are all super easy for engineers who are typically very technical people to understand. But I also think that resources like BiggerPocketsMoney and the tools you and Scott have developed can help more and more people with that technical side of FI.

2:45Mindy Jensen:Evan, I hear what you're saying. And I think that engineering is a great profession for people pursuing financial independence. But my top profession is going to be sales in general. We had Mr. and Mrs. Planting Our Pennies on episode 32 of the Bigger Pockets Money podcast. So it's been a few years since they've been on. And Mr. Planting Our Pennies was a salesperson. And he said, I was in a good company and sales is really, really lucrative. It's a grind. But anybody out there who had graduated with a humanities degree like he did, I heavily recommend sales. I know it's difficult. I know it's not for everyone.

3:20Mindy Jensen:I'm an introverted philosophy major. If I can be successful in sales and get to FI through a sales job, anybody can. The world needs good salespeople. So that's something I got did. I got better at my job. I increased my earnings power. And we just kind of kept our expenses where they were. The upside, the top of your salary is unlimited, essentially, because salespeople are typically paid a commission. So the more you sell, the more you earn, which is cliche, but it's true.

3:52Evan Lawler:And I think another element that lends itself really well to financial independence, if you're in that sales world, an area that I agree with you, Mindy, is that if you're earning a very large amount of income, kind of in unexpected areas, maybe different sales come through during different years. So one year you have a huge spike in income, then it can be difficult. I think for some people, your lifestyle inflation won't necessarily immediately uptick when you make more money. It could be that you maintain your expenses at a reasonable level, level you feel that is comfortable, and all that extra money can automatically be applied to your financial independence goals.

4:30Evan Lawler:So I think sales is a great answer.

4:32Mindy Jensen:Yeah. And kind of a sister to sales is real estate agents, not a sister. It is sales. And again, the potential is unlimited. That has a high commission. There's no base salary traditionally. I'm a real estate agent. I don't get paid if I don't work. I'm not going to say I'm a lazy agent, but I'm not an ambitious agent. I'm not out there looking for every single person that I can possibly represent. I want to represent one person at a time. But the median house price in my area is about$550 ,000. So I'm making maybe$13 ,000 to$15 ,000 when I sell that house. I sell one house in a month. I've made$13 ,000 to$15 ,000.

5:12Mindy Jensen:I sell 10 houses in that same month. That's$130 ,000 to$150 ,000. You can make as much money as you want to. There was a kid that graduated with my 19-year-old daughter. he already has his real estate license. His mom's an agent and he's out there selling real estate. My daughter is not making$13 ,000 in one month. And if she is, she's working a lot harder. I think being a real estate agent is an excellent path to financial independence and it doesn't have to be your full-time job. And I know there's a lot of real estate agents yelling at the radio right now. What do you mean? You have to be a full-time agent to be a good agent.

5:50Mindy Jensen:You really don't. You have to be detail-oriented. You have to be on top of your calendar and you have to be personable and knowledgeable. And you can do that at any age. You can do that at any time that you have. Evan, you've got a traditional nine to five job, right? Approximately.

6:06Evan Lawler:Right.

6:07Mindy Jensen:When are people looking for a real estate after their own traditional nine to five job? So you work your job and then at night you go show houses and on the weekends you go show houses and you write up somebody to be there during a home inspection, or you may need to take time off during a home inspection. I'm very fortunate that I have a flexible day job of recording a podcast. So when I have a home inspection coming up, I just make sure that I don't have a recording schedule about that same time. It does need a little bit of flexibility, but it's a great career. And all that money can go into my self-directed solo 401k.

6:44Mindy Jensen:So I'm not paying taxes on it because I am a 1099 employee. It all goes into my pre-tax 401k. I just, I can't say enough good things about being a real estate agent.

6:55Evan Lawler:And there's so many things that I love about your, your pick of sales, especially with that uncapped income potential. Somewhere that I would push back potentially is that great salespeople who go on to earn lots of money can apply that money towards their financial independence goals in a really powerful way, especially if they're someone who really finds the rhythm very young. But if I were to push back on my point of engineers and your point of sales is that I think the variability could prove to be a problem. When you're pursuing financial independence, sometimes we're making 10 to 15 year plans, right?

7:31Evan Lawler:Where I'm going to invest X each year or each month in a place like sales, potentially real estate. It could be difficult if the market moves in a way that you don't expect and then you don't have that commission you are counting on.

7:43Mindy Jensen:Yeah. And I think there is a real concern about variable income and that is the variable income that comes with sales. And the way to combat that is, okay, this month I made my base salary and that's it. But I know next month I'm going to have a huge month. You don't spend everything in that huge month. You take into account, okay, I want to save or I want to invest $2 ,000 a month. And this month I'm not able to, but next month I will have way more than the $2 ,000 for this month and the$2 ,000 for next month. You don't spend what's left over. You either invest that ahead of time and count for these slower months, but you need to have a plan.

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10:31Mindy Jensen:Okay, Evan, I can hear people listening to the show saying, I really don't want to be in sales and engineering isn't for me. I don't know if you know this, but college is not the choice for everyone. One of the things that I really like for people who do not want to be in college is the trades. Your plumbers, electricians, HVAC technicians. I don't know if you've ever had anything that broke. Recently, I had something that broke and trying to find somebody, first of to answer their phone or to give me a quote, the world needs more trades. And this is an AI-proof job. I think that's something that you should be considering, especially if you're younger and listening to this episode and thinking, hmm, what am I going to do with my life?

11:11Mindy Jensen:Look for something that's AI-proof. Physical in-person jobs are going to be far more AI-proof than anything you can do typing on a computer.

11:19Evan Lawler:Yeah. And some of the salaries that you see posted on these different trade positions can be absolutely spectacular. And Mindy, you're totally right. If I have something break around my apartment, now I'm in an apartment, so they have like on-site maintenance, but I mean, I'm helpless, right? And I'm a mechanical engineer. I think I should know a thing or two about how to fix something. I don't know a thing, right? So I think that the trades is an awesome answer to what career can lend itself to financial independence because you can really build a very strong income and there is so much potential for side hustling, for building income outside of a traditional job.

11:57Evan Lawler:There's so much opportunity there. And like you said, AI proof, future proof allows you to plan long into the future. I think that's a great option.

12:06Mindy Jensen:And you can work literally as much or as little as you want. I have a friend who's a plumber. We call him Mike the Plumber. Hi, Mike. And he installs water heaters. That's all he does. He is always booked. He can get you in, but he's always booked and he works as much or as little as he wants. That's a job that I could not do because I'm not a plumber. But also it's like a water heater is a really unwieldy big thing. Mike's a big guy. He can heft these water heaters around no problem. But like an electrician, that's a very easy, lightweight job. Electricians, please don't yell at me. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

12:44Mindy Jensen:You're not hauling around these big, heavy things. Also, my father-in-law was an electrician and I have done a lot of electrician work with him side by side because I used to be a stay-at-home mom. But anyway, these are the kinds of jobs that are, I don't want to say they're easy to do, but you don't need to go to college to do them. You traditionally have an apprenticeship with them. In fact, we had Tinian Crawford on the show back on episode 44, where he talked about how he got his associate's degree, which is a two-year college degree, in just six short years. And the reason it took him six years is because college was not his jam.

13:21Mindy Jensen:He was not a great student. He didn't want to be in college. And then funny enough, he went and worked at a college as their onsite electrician until he went out on his own, making as much money as he wants. He works as much or as little as he wants. It lends itself to the financial independence space because you don't have to quit. You can just not take jobs for however long you don't want to, and then you jump back into it.

13:47Evan Lawler:Absolutely. Yeah, I totally agree. I think the trades are a great option here. I actually have a hot take for my next one. For what career I think might lend itself to the financial independence community, I think could be teachers. My girlfriend is a teacher and she does a spectacular job. They typically have a very strong pension program. Teachers, you know, they don't have the highest starting incomes. It can grow over time pretty substantially, But the teachers I know are very good at budgeting their money, making sure that they have enough. And that lends itself well to budgeting and keeping track of your financial picture.

14:23Evan Lawler:I also think the stability of the job makes it very easy to project forward. You know what you're going to make if you continue to teach for 5, 10, or 15 years, which I think is a really big superpower in financial independence. And I also think that it lends itself well to side hustles. That can be tutoring. It could be getting jobs in the summer. And a pension is a great way to know that your traditional retirement is covered. So I think that teachers are a great option as well.

14:52Mindy Jensen:That's really interesting because my first thought was, what are you talking about? Teachers don't get paid squat, even though they should. Everybody should give their teachers like a 300 % raise. But all these reasons make a lot of sense. The stability, the summer's off. You can work all summer long. You can work weekends because you get off at around three o 'clock. The pension? Absolutely. I really like that idea. That is a hot take. I love it.

15:19Evan Lawler:One of the reasons that teachers were on my radar when we were talking about financial independence is that the Ramsey Solutions team, we all know Dave Ramsey, did this huge study and they found that the top five careers for millionaires, everyday millionaires, they call them, teachers are one of them. Engineers, accountants, teachers, management, and attorneys. And so I don't know if everyone would expect to see teachers on that list. But I think when you really think about it and you imagine it, it makes a lot of sense.

15:46Mindy Jensen:You know, another reason teachers are now on my radar, I am remembering this, is the 457 plan. A lot of teachers have access to a 457 plan, which has the same contribution limits as a 401k. But when you separate from your employment, you can then access that 457 plan without penalty. You're only paying the taxes on it, unless you did it as a Roth and then you're not even paying the taxes on it because you already paid those. So if you are a teacher married to someone who has a job that you can both live off of, you could essentially throw all of your salary into your 457 and 403B plans. As we are talking about teachers, I am remembering episode 650 with Dave Fleischer, who is from financiallyindependenteachers.com.

16:30Mindy Jensen:He also has a podcast called Financially Independent Teachers, And he talks about the differentiation in states and how they are paying their teachers, how their pensions are working, et cetera. It is a great resource if you are considering becoming a teacher. I also want to recommend themillionaireeducator.com. He talks about the 457 plan. This is where we really started getting into the 457 plan and all the benefits of it. He used it to change jobs frequently and reduce his taxable income, then have access to those funds, went to the next job and put that salary into the 457 and then would just pull from his previous 457 plan.

17:12Mindy Jensen:A lot of benefits to being a teacher. If you're thinking, oh, I'd like to be a teacher, but I'll never reach financial independence, definitely go back and look into that a little bit more.

17:21Evan Lawler:Absolutely. Yeah. I wasn't even thinking on that 457 thing, and it sounds like those are awesome resources. So I appreciate you mentioning that.

17:27Mindy Jensen:Another one I'm going to bring up is travel nursing. So my daughter, my 19-year-old daughter, is changing schools actually because she wanted to be a nurse and could not get into the nursing program at the state school she was in last year. She's changing schools and is now directly admitted into the nursing program. Travel nurses are a great way to combine travel and seeing different things. You take a short-term contract at a hospital and then you stay on for the next short-term contract or you change. You're like, I don't really want to be in Duluth, Minnesota in December. I think I'll change down to Florida for December.

18:07Mindy Jensen:Or maybe I do want to be in Duluth, Minnesota for December because that's where they're paying a lot of money because nobody else wants to be there. There's some huge upside potential. In my opinion, the downside is you got to see blood and gross things, but I am not a nurse on purpose. And I am so thankful for all the nurses who are there.