Ask HN: How to find work while homeless?
I was made homeless and had my financial support dropped at the beginning of the year, and am currently staying in squats etc in the Netherlands. I have nearly no income - 10 euros a week in donations towards an open-source project I'm working on to build a live video streaming platform for the fediverse, and occasional requests for solidarity funds.
My situation is... not great. Half my time is taken up by anxiety around police violence, illegal evictions, my friends being arrested. Still, in the immediate term, it's better than sleeping rough.
I'm not sure how to find work; I've not had a paying job in the last 8 years. I've worked on software for myself and others in hackerspaces and the like; and helped run a volunteer cafe for a large portion of last year (sinking 20+ hours a week into that fairly consistently), but I can't seem to even turn that into an actual paying cafe job. I go through bursts of sending dozens of applications a week to anything that is vaguely relevant to anything I've done in the past, and receive... mostly nothing in response.
I don't know what's wrong with me. All I want is to make enough money to survive. I'm going to be dead in a few months if I can't work something out.
Does anyone have any advice, at all?
181 comments
[ 0.20 ms ] story [ 232 ms ] thread- did you study - how much coding experience do you have - which languages - what types of jobs are you applying for - do you have a smartphone (is there not something like https://postmates.com/ in Netherlands) - do you have friends or family who have jobs in businesses (or their own businesses) - Etc
I've been coding for a very long time, and am a polyglot - Python, Go, javascript on both frontend and backend, bash. Current project is largely Go+Python+bash. Previous completed projects were in node.js and Python. A pile of personal and small scale Linux server admin experience to go with that. Nothing professional, unless you count the time I told someone about letsencrypt and they gave me $200.
I've been applying for everything I can find that matches that experience and doesn't have a requirement of "a degree and 5 years commercial experience". In addition, anything cafe-wise that turns up, call center jobs (even though I have severe phone anxiety), anything else that looks vaguely bearable. I have separate CVs per job type, but the fact that I have not had paying work in such a long time is what gets me ignored.
I tried to sign up for the local cycle couriering services here and was denied, apparently I am not fast enough at cycling.
I do not have friends or family who have their own businesses, or who could help me find a role in a business they work for.
Also idk about the Netherlands but in Finland there are "open path" routes to polytechnics (and probably universities) that you can attend for a small fee with no other requirements. The trick here is that if you study long enough and accumulate enough ECTS credits, then you may either get directly accepted as a full time student (thus making you eligible for all the usual benefits), or they can let you take the entrance exam and then become a full time student. All this without requiring the secondary degree that you'd normally need to enter.
Just something to keep in mind if you ever want to consider getting a degree.
That's rough. When your resume is by default the easiest to reject out of any pile it finds itself in, a personal connection is often what it takes to receive any consideration.
If I were you I would talk to as many people who are in a position to hire as possible. If you see a "now hiring" sign, go in and talk to someone face-to-face. Try to get any 9-5 job you can at first, even if it's grocery store clerk. It will make it a lot easier to convince someone you're a steady hire when something better comes along. I was never homeless but I did have a dead-in-the-water resume at one point with a big work gap. The first jobs I got on my own were seasonal UPS helper and furniture mover. When I got hired into tech it was with months of full-time work experience. My new employer only had to worry about whether I could do the job, and not whether I was capable of holding myself to a 9-5 schedule
I don't know to what extent this squatting stuff is a choice, but I would recommend you abandon any voluntary participation in that lifestyle as soon as possible. You're not going to bootstrap yourself out of homelessness if you're linked arm-in-arm in solidarity with other anarchists, squatters, etc. It's also just not a stable environment.
You should realize that you might personally be ok with working "enough to survive", but that doesn't fit the needs of most employers. Ultimately you have to figure out what an employer's requirements are and meet those, and one of those is almost always going to be "commitment to a working square's existence". A part of this is also convincing them that they won't be hiring your replacement in just a couple months
Say you worked in a cafe for many years, then learnt programming, then show them some projects you’ve done (simple websites etc) and attempt to get an entry level job. I know many people who found entry level jobs this way.
But let me reiterate what a previous poster said: try to find a church. Offer them IT support. Ask them about their network. They often help the homeless: eating restaurant/cafe food wastage together, giving away clothes donations.
If nothing else, you may find a friendly ear, and people who value community. Your own religious beliefs or lack thereof do not matter.
I can't really relate; although I grew up in poverty and understand that aspect of things and it took me a very long time to get my first job (and, even my second job actually).
Does anyone ever give you feedback on why they are not hiring you? It's possible that it's something small but people are reluctant to give negative feedback if it doesn't benefit them to do so.
If I were in the same situation as you (IE; very little industry experience as an employee) I might consider leaning heavily on my github profile, make sure it's as polished as possible, figure out the key things you enjoy working on and then make it appear as if you do those things often. -- Finding bugs in lots of software is a great way to get your activity boxes to light up dark green!
Hiring managers (I speak from experience as I am responsible for hiring peers, though not as a manager) love to see something clear and consistent. So if you're a dabbler it might be more tricky to convey competence. Try to find a focus area; contribute to, or build something with a clear singular purpose (like saltstack or grafana)
Second is to get as many eyes from technologists on your profile, your CV, whatever. Feedback will go a long way. You can find people on freenode (or here) to do this.
Third I would look for companies _outside_ of my local country, because:
This is easier to do if you're in Europe. :)Cafe's are obviously your friend when interviewing. But getting your foot in the door is probably the hardest thing.
FWIW; my studio is hiring relatively aggressively and we're based in Malmo, Sweden.
The relocation package is reimbursement for expenses and 6months of living in our apartments, in general the people working in the studio care about competence not experience, you just need to get around the HR filter somehow.
https://www.massive.se/career/
2. Keep applying to jobs. Don't give up on that. Something will work out.
3. In the interim, have you considered doing some freelance work via Upwork or something similar? The pay will likely not be great, but it'll be a hell of a lot more than 10 Euros / week, and can grow as you build a client-base.
Now your boss will ask you to write more reports for HIS boss, and suddenly you are employed as a programmer. If you like that job, keep it, or leave for somewhere else that will hire you with a more appropriate programmers salary.
Good luck, hope everythig works out.
If you're on HN, I'm guessing you have marketable skills, even if that means office admin work. So the challenge might be something other than your skill set. You say you haven't had a regular job in 8 years which makes me wonder if that's because the stuff that comes with regular jobs is particularly difficult for you (having to show up at x time, sit there for y hours, fitting into the culture of the office, etc)?
Next, I’ll drop tech for a while. I’ll look for any job that has low or no barrier to entries. Washing cars, cleaning carpets, collecting garbage, etc... These are jobs with little barriers to entry and that will have no problems accepting you if you did sleep on the street yesterday.
After you get yourself a place to stay, better clothes, and a haircut then I’ll start branching into tech again.
Get whatever help you can from the government (and possibly a church as someone else suggested), then get a job - any job that gives your life some stability and structure, as well as some income. When you are back on your feet a little bit and have taken care of the necessities, namely food and shelter, start looking into doing some freelance work with whatever technical skills you have. I would focus on remote work - there are plenty of sites where you can sign up to do work for $50 or $100. A few hours of work maybe. That can help you build up some experience and you can use that to get more business (at higher rates) or help you land a job in technology.
I suggest remote freelance work because your appearance and clothing aren’t going to be an issue, and it should be easier to work around the schedule of your other job.
I’d also advise you seek out some mental health services. I’m not assuming anything about you or attempting to diagnose you, but at the very least being able to talk to someone about your situation and the circumstances that led to it will help you prevent it from happening again and help you move forward. If you are suffering from depression or substance abuse problems then by all means get help with that as well. I’m not sure about the Netherlands, but in the US there are some non-profit organizations that are specifically focused on helping the former homeless get back into the working world, even going as far as conducting mock interviews to improve your skills, and providing professional clothes to wear. You may be able to find something similar where you live.
Most importantly, know that there’s a community here that is in your corner and wants to see you improve your situation. Make sure you come back and give us an update when things improve.
Going "home" is kinda pointless - there's not actually any support in the UK for people like me, so I'd be sleeping rough there quickly anyway.
Then any reason why you are there? Are you allowed to legally work in the Netherlands.
> there's not actually any support in the UK for people like me
I'm pretty sure there is. 2/3 of British families receive some kind of benefits in Britain. You might have to ask for it. I also suspect there is more to this story (like do you have something serious in your records).
I'd go to the British Embassy, ask them to get me to the UK, present myself to the government and ask for any help. Then proceed to the plan outlined previously.
Heck, I'm from Tunisia, an almost non-functional and bankrupt country and the government does have some benefits (like food, basic medical care) for the really in need.
I am.
> I'm pretty sure there is.
There's a very complicated system, but tl;dr being unable to find work would cause me to lose benefits and be left without a home. I don't trust that I would be able to find a job, so I would prefer to keep a roof over my head for now.
To add to the mess, I'm trans, which means companies (even big ones) will not put me in a position where customers might possibly see me, or where they might wind up with another coworker causing an HR incident, which means an awful lot of traditional jobs for people without qualifications are out. I've had this said to my face in the UK, and I've had interviewers in the UK visibly disappointed when they saw me.
Navigate that system. People with much lower IQ are relying on it, you should be able to do that too.
> I'm trans, which means companies (even big ones) will not put me in a position where customers might possibly see me,
Same if you were homeless. I wouldn't hire a homeless barista that will turn off customers.
> I've had interviewers in the UK visibly disappointed when they saw me
Find places that are gay-trans friendly. Even where I live such jobs exist and are valued (ie: a woman hair dresser will prefer hiring a trans-gay as straight guys might put off customers, etc...)
To be clear, I currently have a shower, mattress, access to a washing machine, etc etc. Living in squats is pretty ok, police repression aside. I don't look like... whatever you're guessing, and nobody I'm applying to knows I don't have a permanent legal residence.
Hairdressing is a ridiculously qualified job in the UK, I have no idea what you're talking about. People go to vocational school to learn it.
Er how do you get past "meldung" then. When I last had the pleasure of experiencing the dutch job market, the Vreemdelingenpolitie (lit. foreigner police) and the myriad other amptenare (term of affection for govt officals) made it impossible to not have a verified, permanent address.
I think I misunderstood that from your original post. Do you mean you are squatting someone else property? If that's the case, I feel sorry for myself spending all this time writing these responses...
>For example, become a hairdresser.
>I wouldn't hire you if you looked homeless...You don't look homeless because you're showering as a squatter? I wish I hadn't given you any advice at all.
Empathy is not a constrained resources. It's one of the only things humans can generate in infinite supply, and that's worth taking advantage of.
Also, it seems to me OP was not saying they can't get benefits in the UK because the system is too complicated. They said the system was complicated before summarizing the complexity by explaining that without work they will lose benefits, and they are concerned they won't be able to find work. It seems disingenuous to me to read into that as OP saying they can't figure out how to get benefits.
I didn't suggest that. I did suggest that he/she works for a hairdresser. (probably doing errands around).
> I wouldn't hire you if you looked homeless
Not for a customer facing job. For some businesses, that would destroy the business. That's why I suggest that he/she starts with jobs that do not care too much about your current status.
> Empathy is not a constrained resources.
I have a hard time giving empathy to someone who doesn't have it. By squatting other people property, you might be risking putting these people out of their homes (maybe they are looking to rent it and are paying a mortgage/loan).
Not all properties are hold by rich people and closed to make people on the streets. Some of these are by normal hardworking people and that's all they have (or maybe less if they are borrowing money).
Can confirm. It is actually a very technical and regulated field, despite what many people think - myself included before i met my wife.
For instance, you need to know the risks of all the chemicals used, and infection vectors, etc. etc. and prove that you know it all in a licensing exam (both written and practical).
(Source: Married to a licensed hairdresser)
I feel you're really underestimating the extent to which being visibly trans is a barrier in finding dignified employment. Perhaps the most maddening thing is that people don't hire you not because they, themselves, have anything against visibly trans people, rather it's because they are afraid of what others might think. And yet, even as everyone knows very well what "people might say", it is at the same time extremely difficult to covince cis people (i.e. not trans) that being visibly trans is an important factor in being out of work. It's a cruel catch-22 situation. The same people who would never hire you because you look visibly trans would never accept that you have trouble finding work because you look visibly trans.
I'm guessing that the OP ommitted any information about being trans from their original post above either because they expected that people would either think the OP was playing the victim card or they would just think there's some other reason, that has nothing to do with being trans, that the OP can't find decent work.
But I'm inclined to believe that this is, in fact, the primary reason. That's from my own experience and that of my many trans friends.
To the OP- just hang in there, please. Things will get better. And don't go back to the UK. It's now a fascist, racist little shithole with a majority that delights in crushing vulnerable people.
Pick a topic that is not very difficult, but not trivial. Let's say "categorization of data" - you wouldn't believe how many companies need that with the latest ML hype. Create a static page with a bit of bio - native english, whatever you know about tech, + talk about categorization, give some examples, etc. Github Pages is free, so that should work. Same on Linkedin and whatever is used in NL. Go to Upwork, Fiver, etc. and apply to all jobs related to this - include your bio, static website, your "examples". Here is an example kind of post, but there should be plenty - https://www.upwork.com/job/Startup-Database-Data-Entry-and-C....
If you can, try to do the above for more topics to increase your chances, from the top of my mind:
- Find websites that do some kind of aggregation but can benefit from manual work - aggregators for jobs, rentals, products, etc. and offer your help.
- Teach english online
- Review product descriptions
- Find leads based on keywords
The key part of that is "families", single people don't get nearly as much support.
I would suggest to look for organisations that support you while dealing with the paper stuff but from a quick glance this might be useful (at least health insurance, monthly money, maybe access to some kind of paid training program that fit's your needs).
I'd strongly disagree with this. If you can code, you are wasting your time doing any other kind of work. Do whatever it takes to land a job. Lie about your living situation. Spend all day at the library practicing Leet Code. The amount of time you spend trying to land a job will more than be made up by the salary delta of tech vs. menial labor.
The most important thing they can do is ANYTHING that gets them into a stable living situation.
If they can quickly find a tech job, that's great of course; otherwise find anything that provides the necessary stability to make further sound moves from. It's dangerously easily to get trapped in homelessness for extended periods of time as it breaks people down and they can't get back out.
Put another way, it’s easy to reach too high and then feel depressed or hopeless because you can’t achieve it. It’s much better to walk up the steps one at a time.
I'm not sure if you tried being homeless for 1 or 2 days, but I can't imagine you'll be able to pass an interview if you slept in the church door last night and had nothing for dinner.
> Do whatever it takes to land a job.
That's what I'm suggesting and unless there is someone or some community that will bail you out for 3-4 months to get your affairs in order, you'll have to start from rock bottom.
I spent a year homeless on the streets of San Francisco due to my mental health and the atrocious safety net we have in the US. Eventually, my mental health improved, and I met an extremely generous person who was also in tech and helped me tremendously by giving me an old laptop of his and introducing me to the owner of an agency he used to work at. They didn’t have any work for me right away, but eventually I got a 6 week contract that paid $12k. Since I was a contractor, all of this money was available to me immediately (I could worry about taxes later), and I was able to get back on my feet and find a job soon after.
Obviously my situation involved a bit of luck, but I do believe that as long as you have access to a computer, this is possible. The important things to remember are that your skills are valuable. Do not sell yourself short because of your current situation. And things will get better. I know you’re living through a hell very few people can understand, but if you’re fortunate enough to be intelligent and skilled, you have a very good chance of coming out of this. Most homeless people don’t have this benefit.
Seems like you had a bad experience at a church or maybe you've never been in one and you're judging them based on the media you view.
Either way, not a good reason to make wide blanket statements like that.
Making blanket statements after one or even a handful of experiences doesn't help anyone and can be said about things also not relating to churches as well.
A late family member of mine in the OP's approximate situation was taken advantage of by a local church, which gives me pause when people say going to one for help is a bulletproof-good idea.
I'm sorry for not providing context right away, the original statement on it's own was too broad.
It is, however, unfortunately not universal. I recently tried to drop off some extra Christmas toys I had mistakenly ordered on Amazon to a local Catholic church and they absolutely refused to take them and distribute to a needy family. I was floored.
For the last ~9 years, I've helped run a homeless shelter based out of a church in London, UK. We often get offered donations of clothes and unfortunately we have to turn them down unless we know of guests who need those specific items (e.g. men's 32-34" waist trousers or a pair of size 10 shoes). This is because otherwise we find that very few items get taken and we don't have space to store them, so it just means we have to take them to a charity shop anyway.
Please don't be upset by your offering not being accepted - it can be hard to find the right place to use it and, if the organization is run by volunteers (as the one above is), they might not have the time to manage this.
Incidentally, other shelters operate very differently from ours, and some definitely do accept clothing donations.
Certain flavors of US churches look like this, too.
I live in an area that's heavily dominated by protestants, so my experience is mostly with them, I don't know how that's for catholic areas. The Netherlands are famously protestant as well, might be similar.
There are churches, however, where many of the people are there because they genuinely believe it, and they think that they have very good reason to believe it (and they aren't afraid of engaging with atheists who think otherwise), and they try to live out what they believe in real life. If you find a church like that, it feels and acts completely different.
In orthodox churches and especially monasteries it is essentially mandatory to give you a place to sleep while doing some work for them until you get back on your feet.
It also used to be customary for people in villages and towns to always accept a traveler for the night, but not anymore, unfortunately.
Orthodox monasteries larger than a skete are obliged to provide hospitality, but the prevailing interpretation is that this hospitality is limited to three days, and then it is the abbot's call to let you stay further or ask you to leave.
OP: If you can, do go there. I am not at all religious, and you don't have to, but this is a solid place to start.
It really feels like you have a good understanding of many tech out there. I'm a bit surprised a profile like yours post this.It feels like you could easily pick up any entry level dev job? HN would always surprise me.
If I were you, I'd show up in every tech meetups I could find.Talk with people, and offer free (paid?) advices for subject you feel comfortable with. After few weeks, I think you could get a bit of money for consulting or even a job offer.
Don't underestimate the extreme prejudice in tech hiring. Everyone's looking out for "red flags" and excuses to turn down a candidate. It's especially bad if you don't have either 1) recent, relevant education, or 2) recent, relevant industry experience. Open source participation might save you but not as often as you'd think, if only because few people have time for substantial open source projects and if you have non-substantial contributions, that's rarely enough to overcome the prejudice.
Add any other things that work against you, for example lack of employment, ugly face, awkward speech or shy presence, yeah a lot of companies are just going to think you're a loser, or at least not the talented individual they need. Those who can afford to train people (= hire for entry level positions) are usually larger companies that siphon fresh grads and interns, and they seem to have enough supply that they don't need to look for people on the streets.
In short, very few companies are willing to take chances with someone who hasn't made it through the filters already, unless they see something exceptional. And the entry level filters are heavily biased in favor of students, and against unemployed people.
The local Golang meetup has a "20 seconds for anyone to say anything" spot. If someone turned up there and said "I know Go and I'm looking for a job, but I'm homeless can anyone help?" then I'm damn sure someone would.
For smaller companies (< 50 people) and agencies though? Not my experience at all. They don't pay as well and they aren't as organized, you might not get sponsored trips to conferences, hackathons or you decide how much vacation days you want, but certification and resume gaps aren't that much of an issue in IT for them, because it's very much a sellers' market at the moment (that is: has been in the past decade, but I'll wager that it's going to be the same in the next 5 to 10 years).
Homelessness is another beast, as might mental health issues be, but degrees don't matter nearly as much in the real world as they do in the corporate world.
The demand for developers is fierce here, for sure, so it is very much a seller's market. But like I said, medium-large companies are siphoning off all the fresh blood (and no, you don't need a degree, but being a student in a relevant discipline makes all the difference!).
Small companies with productive experts don't want to waste time & money on training juniors and taking chances with them. The rest of the small companies are pretty much on shoestring budget (most of them serving local niches in our small market, or playing startup with government funds which are comparable to unemployment benefits, barely enough to cover rent and food) and a bad hire could genuinely topple many of them.
Sure, that does leave a handful of small companies that will take chances out of desperation, but I think they're a dying breed -- think the kind of shops that maintain some legacy doodles written in php and visual basic. Their services are slowly getting subsumed by the larger companies.
The meme on local boards is that yeah, there's a huge demand for seniors with 5+ years of experience, at junior salaries. :-)
I'm pretty much seeing the same thing in my network; plenty of people are working at small-medium companies that could use more bodies, but at the same time everyone's saying they wouldn't hire juniors (sometimes phrased as "we would hire juniors with relevant experience"). Similar story at my (very small) company..
Use those get some immediate money and start building up confidence and accomplishments that you can use on your resume/cv.
After doing that for a while apply for a full-time role with your updated resume showing multiple successful small projects from freelance roles.
For the immediate term, I would recommend looking for an easy brainless job that would bring in some money while being easy to quit, so that you can look for coding work. A bar, cafe, pizza shop, whatever. Ideally somewhere where squat-friendly people work. It sounds like it could be good for you to be around other people, so I would personally do that instead of Upwork.
Coding work - I would suggest seeing if any small NGOs, charities or companies need some help. Don't necessarily wait for job adverts - just get in touch directly with a warm intro and a nice cv. In my experience they are often in a total state of chaos when it comes to their tech, and having someone who can straighten things out is incredibly valuable to them. The pay's not necessarily great, but it's meaningful and you'll get to employ a wide range of skills and be your own boss.
It's unclear what you mean by being 'dead in a few months'. Can I suggest that if you are contemplating suicide you reach out for help on that immediately, ok?
If that's what op means, then op is. OP's attempting to fulfill their basic needs to remove the temptation. Listening to someone who will say "please don't kill yourself, your problems can be coped with" doesn't help. Talking to someone who will say "so these are the specific things to help your problems, and I will walk with you to help get you there". But that's the job of a social worker, not a suicide prevention hotline.
tbf-rnd.life/contact/
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22443438
There is professional help you can get for free from charitable organizations that will not only help you find a residence but also advise/help you with government agencies and help you get any welfare you may be entitled to, law enforcement (if needed) or jobs.
Use this help and don't try to do it alone; most people who try on their own fail, while the success rates for people taking help are a lot, lot better. Especially considering that you seem to have more or less exhausted the help your friends/family can provide, to no avail.
I was once told by somebody working for such an organization, that in Germany the success rates to at least stop homelessness is near 100% for all "reasonably sane", "reasonably sober" and "reasonably cooperative" people if they accepted help from such an organization, and I'd guess it will be not that different in the Netherlands.
E.g. this seems to give a good overview: https://dutchreview.com/expat/housing/if-youre-homeless-in-t...
Do you have an email address to reach you?
https://www.legerdesheils.nl/
https://www.legerdesheils.nl/mcr
I spent about three and a half years in NL, which was five years ago. I worked in Arnhem doing electrical testing. I lived in Nijmegen for two years. I definitely found it friendlier and living in a smaller city a lot easier on my mental health, not to mention financially easier. I found Rotterdam to be a bit of a concrete jungle.
In the immediate term, you have shelter right now, which is extremely important. Use that while you find more secure shelter.
I'm just so gutted I'm living on the other side of the world, or I'd help you in a more personal way.