Whether you’ve worked in an office before or you’ve seen television shows displaying characters who love their colleagues, this type of setting may certainly have some appeal to you. However, while you’re evaluating where you want to work, consider the financial works of working remotely.
Choose Where You Live
When you’re searching for a job in many fields, such as marketing, business, medicine and other, you’re unlikely to find too many opportunities in rural areas. In fact, you may need to move to a totally urban place to get the job that you desire.
Urban and popular suburban areas typically come with large price tags. You may find yourself living in a tiny apartment simply to spend most of your time at a job to pay for the miniature abode. This way you can choose the weather of where you live, move close to family, or to better school districts. Working remotely means that you could earn a nice salary while also enjoying a beautiful large home somewhere else without being confined to your job location. Theoretically, you can travel across the world as long as you have fast internet service.
Reduce Your Cost of Living
Right along with having a lower
price tag on a house or a lower rental price comes the benefit of a more
affordable cost of living. Popular places for commuters typically have higher
costs of living. The price between different cities with job prospects can also
be very different.
For example, your work is based out of Denver, Co. The median home cost is
$421,900. You get an opportunity to work remotely. Without getting a raise, if
you are able to move to another city say like Phoenix, AZ to escape the winters
you’ll find the median home cost is $229,300. So, even without a pay bump, you
can now buy almost twice the home, or live in a similar home with more
expendable income. In this scenario
you’d move and as long as you find fast wireless internet
providers in Phoenix, AZ you’ll be able to work
remotely online and reap the benefits of reducing your cost of living.
Cut Commuting Costs
Working outside of the home means
that you’ll have some sort of commute, and many people deal with outrageously
long commutes. They may spend over two hours in a car or on a train each day
simply to get to and from their jobs. You would also have to pay for train
tickets, gas for the car or tolls, depending upon which method of
transportation you needed to use. However, when you work from the comfort of
your own home office or den, your commute is the few steps it takes to walk
from your bedroom.
This means that you can spend more time relaxing, with family, working on
hobbies or even on higher education. Those 2 hours a day commuting become 10
hours a week that you could spend on furthering your skillsets, a degree, or on
side projects that have been sidelined.
Tax Deductions
Working remotely might also entitle you to some tax deductions. When it comes time to fill out your paperwork for the year, speak to your accountant about deductions that you can make. For example, if you are using your home internet to work, you can typically deduct the cost of that bill. You may very well find yourself owing less on your taxes or getting a larger return. If you use a computer for work you could use it as a tax deduction and even part of your mortgage that goes into a home office.
When you’re deciding on your next career move, you may have to make the decision between working remotely or commuting. Seriously consider the financial benefits associated with the former. There are many reasons that you should negotiate working remotely as a promotion if you cannot negotiate a higher raise. Ideally, you should be able to do both and open prospects to companies nationwide.
Kara Masterson is a freelance writer from West Jordan, Utah. She graduated from the University of Utah and enjoys writing and spending time with her dog, Max.
