I was reading this thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16798887) as I'm in a vaguely similar position... numbers aren't the same but relatively speaking it's the same situation. I've recently quit a high-paying job to co-found a startup.

In short, we weren't happy doing what we were doing - too much management BS, had drifted away from doing the real tech stuff, so when an opportunity presented, so we did it.

We've no doubt made a ton of mistakes already... we by no means either have financial security yet (mortgages/young kids and are in an expensive location.)

We're currently bootstrapping by contracting (pretty much the old job without any of the fluff) until we have enough in the bank that we can 'do it properly' (i.e. paying the bills 80% of the time, 20% of the time spent on building our own stuff which will hopefully in time become the business.) and can fall-back on savings if we need to.

To the point: in the comments of that thread, someone said:

"... [you're] starting a business completely the wrong way, you never use your own money. This is what investors are for..."

We're fairly well known in our area (non-US financial centre) so when news of us leaving the old company got around, we had a fair number of suitors - pretty much just offering us a ton of money to go and do something... anything. There is only a small tech/investor thing going on here but there is a strong desire and decent government backing.

Ultimately we decided we didn't want to be owned by a fund and have to report to shareholders so early on. That's what we were doing in the old place. Our preference was to wait until we had a tangible thing that we could take to these investors and get them to back that rather than them effectively buying us.

So... are we doing it wrong way as the comment suggests? Should we take the investment, ditch the contract work and pile in to the startup, and protect our own savings?