Olds_71_442

The best line of work for opening a small business now is getting into refridgeration. Everyone is buying Heat Pumps and they need someone to install and repair them. I live in a small community and there are two guys who do this and they can't keep up with demand. They are working Saturdays and Sundays and have had to hire helpers who haven't gone to school to take the trade because they just can't find enough guys to do the work.

Olds64

Eddie, it is interesting that you mention that. My wife and I had a SERE 20+ heat pump installed in our home a few years ago. I can't remember the exact rating but I remember it wasn't cheap. Luckily that company that did it for us had excellent customer service and a great warranty.

Olds_71_442

My Mom had one installed about 6 years ago and she loves it. Last fall, she upgraded to one that is good up to -20 celsius. She never uses firewood or oil and the thing keeps her house cool in the summer.

I should also add.....doing this line of work, you won't need a shop as large as one for working on cars. Most of your work can be done out of a full sized van.

garys 68

I like the idea of specialty stuff too. That's kind of what I do. I see a guy on another board the rebuilds early C2 and C3 corvette rearends. It's expensive, really tough to find anyone that does it, and you cant buy Chinese replacements.
Problem with automotive again is it's tough to go against the home mechanics or Chinese replacement parts.
I started doing custom tops, canvas, upholstery on bigger boats by accident. They cant be easily/cheaply taken to a shop. Overhead was around $1000 (most of which I had). Can easily be done out of your house (or off my boat). Pay was around $100/hr cash, not many can deduct their boat expenses. And I was in a market with lots of older boats.
I couldn't compete with Chinese ebay stuff, but for custom and smaller volume stuff, I had to turn down work.

shatrab

First, thank you for putting your life at risk for a safer world. Keep your head down for the next few months!

I would pay off all yours bills as others say. It is easier to make decisions when you don't have debt. Get into a skilled trade (also like others said). Air conditioning, heating, CNC Machining, Auto Mechanic, etc. while you build your skill-set, (say if you do air conditioning), you can start taking on side jobs (all your friends and relatives will want theirs serviced and replaced by someone they can trust, while they get a good rate and you get the profit instead of a full shop with overhead. I was a machinist and eventually found side work as I wanted more than anything to be my own boss. Life got in the way, so while I spent 13 years working and learning all types of machining (CNC Lathe, Milling, OD/ID Grinding, Honing, Jig Grinding, Surface Grinding, Blanchard Grinding, etc.), I slowly bought equipment from EBay. My first machine was an 8,000 lb CNC Machine Center in perfect working condition, straight from an Aerospace Shop for $4,300.00 (1979 Matsuura MC-660V, definitely a very old model, but when it was brand new 23 years earlier, it had cost them $230,000.00!). I had it stored by a local rigging company for 6 months while I built a 32 x40 garage by myself, on my property after almost being talked into a 1 year lease up the road for shop space for $1,500.00 a month. The garage was a better investment than the leased shop as I had no customers as of yet, and the 1 year lease I would have paid instead bought all the materials to build the garage. I started finding a variety of small work and improvised by making this machine do things it wasn't necessarily designed for. By luck and word of mouth, I had found enough work to make much more money by myself than by working for another shop. This only worked because I slowly added equipment. Today, that machine was retired (and paid for itself 20 times over), and I have 2 newer CNC machine centers, 2 OD/ID grinders, a CNC Jig Grinder, Surface Grinder, Sunnen Hone, and some other specialty machines that I made as Job Specific. I grind hard materials (Industrial Ceramic, Sapphire, Silicon Carbide, Quartz, Zirconia, etc).

My message is that while I worked full time and enjoyed building a family, I also slowly built my future shop with all machines paid for through the money I made on the side work. That way, I didn't risk bankrupting the family.

Also a word of advice... As another has mentioned earlier also in this thread, if you keep under the radar (keep it quiet so the neighbors don't complain, don't make a fuss or do silly things like post a sign in your front yard with your business name), as far as the local government is concerned, you have a "hobby". There is plenty of time to ask for permits and all that crap when you have grown to a point that you have to move the business anyway because of a solid backlog of work. In the case of the air conditioning or heating business example, as another said, you only need a van and a phone number, and can reasonably have your business at your home without breaking any township ordinances! Hope there is some advice here that can help you. What I will say is this... Once you are your own boss for more than a year, you will be wrecked (wrecked as in, you will never want to work for someone else again)! That is a drive within itself that keeps me driven.

Olds64

Thanks for all the advice so far gents. Keep the good info coming.