Do You Want To Live Off Of Steemit?
I'm not here to tell you that you'll never be able to live off of Steemit... But I'm here to give you some straight up facts. You should probably give up on that dream, because your chances are slim to none. That being said though, it is possibly, but you should probably focus on earning something extra instead of a full time income.
Even well-known and established Steemians with a reputation score of 70+ have given up their dreams of living off of Steemit as their only income. Well-known authors who've been lucky enough to get superb support and great rewards on each of their publications. They might not have given up on Steemit or the blockchain, but if these people have jobs, you should probably not think about leaving yours.
It's true that some people might be able to live off a paycheck of $100 or $200 per month. But the reality is that many people could barely pay their electrical bill with $100.
This is how much I need for 1 month.
- Rent: ~$500
- Electrical bill: ~$90
- Phone bill: ~$25
- Internet bill: ~$50
- Food & other groceries: ~$400
There you have it. That covers the basics. ~$1065 per month. On top of that, I need clothes and some extra money to go see a movie or whatever. I need money for all these extra things on top of the things I've listed above. I also need a bus card so I can take the bus and I need to buy books for school and whatever. So, the bus card should be listed above too, (~45). Any how, I need about $1100 per month, to cover the basics. To get roof over my head and to afford food.
So let's take a look at my income. I am a full time student nowadays. I was a full time freelancer for several years until I became a student earlier this year. I have a student loan, so I get exactly 10444 SEK each month. That's $1193 US Dollars per month, which gives me about $90 each month, to put on any of the extra things I want or need.
- My savings account is collecting dust.
That being said, for each cent I'm able to earn here on Steemit, I'm able to give myself something extra. A pair of shoes, a shirt or perhaps a decent meal on a not-so-fancy restaurant. But, I don't want to cash out everything I earn, because I believe we have a wonderful opportunity in many different aspects to change our lives with the use of Steemit. Financially is only one of the aspects, so I need to grow.
And even though I barely break even each month, I'm delegating 100% of my steem power to others because I live and breathe the pay-it-forward mindset. I do it because I personally believe it's for a good cause. I believe it's for the greater good and I'm okay with "sacrificing" myself a little bit along the way. That being said, when Steem and/or SBD hits $5 or $10, it's a different story. - That gives me the opportunity to make 5-10x more than today...
Imagine if Steem or SBD would reach $20 or even $50...
I wouldn't even think about dropping school or to quit my job before I had about 100,000 Steem and the price of Steem would stabilize and sit at ~$3. - And that's why I know that my chances are slim to none.
I haven't been outside of Sweden in about 18 years or so and I would love to travel. I would love to be one of the famous travel-bloggers we have on Steemit who makes more on 1 article than I do in a month. I would love to be one of those authors who continuously hits the trending pages... But the truth is, I can't afford it and I'm okay with that.
I'd rather focus on building our community and minimize the gap between the different classes on Steemit right now, and maybe, in the future, I'll be one of the authors who can travel the world using the money I've earned on my articles.
- But I'd never hold my breath meanwhile I wait.
I think everyone secretly wants to live of steemit but we can't all be successful bloggers unfortunately (unless it hits $50 lol)
That is so true. I just hope that people in general truly understands it, because it seems that a bunch of people are living in some sort of fantasy world right now.
I actually did the math in one of my posts, you would need 88.888 STEEM at the current price to be able to live off of inflation with inflation at 8% and spending 1k bucks per month!
But yeah, i see your point, it's hard to make a living off of steemit, especially now during a bear market, but who knows, maybe you will be able to do it in some years!
To me Steemit is a hobby, i'm still taking my degree and that will be my main focus and main source of income! If i happen to have extra from both sources i can just invest it or buy stuff for myself!
That's cool, thanks for sharing some real numbers. Steemit should be considered a hobby if you're not an investor. Well, that's my opinion anyways. If you're starting to focus on the money you'd easily lose motivation... And if you do, even the extra bucks will get more difficult to get.
@hitmeasap, For a long time if there is no increase in the future then how will it stay??
I personally think that both steem and sbd will increase a bit in price over the next few weeks. Also, the currencies have more or less "stabilized", even though it's at a lower value than what we would've hoped for. I don't believe we will ever see $100+ values on any of the currencies we have today, and honestly speaking, I think it's pretty useless to have 2 currencies even though I can understand and appreciate the intentions.
SMT's and all the other cool changes we're about to see, can be a major breaking point for Steemit and our currencies. If all goes well, we'll see the price go up... If not, I think Steemit is pretty much doomed to sit at $1 for the rest of its life because people seem to be tired of hearing empty promises.
That being said though, I'm totally okay with ~$1 prices, because it's still ~$1 more than I've ever earned from Facebook, Twitter or any other social media out there. But I obviously hope we'll see Steem become the new BTC in terms of value.
Yeah It's still in beta admittedly, this is just a hobby for me. Haha there's no way I could live off what I get from posting. Maybe one day the site can get a few million active users and things will be a little more popping around here.
Yeah, that would've been awesome. A few million Steemians from all over the world. The value of steem would be sky-high!
When Steem passes $100, you might want to re-visit this post. 😉
Haha yeah... It would be amazing to see Steem or SBD reach $100, but I think it's highly unlikely as it is today. Like I wrote in another comment above:
I am a stay-at-home-wife (two years and counting) so I am very fortunate to have a husband who works his job (70+ hours a week right now). When I discovered steemit just over a year ago, I planned on using it as a way to contribute later to our retirement and, hopefully one day 5-10 years from now, to buy our forever piece of property to retire to.
I had no grandiose plans of making it rich here... but to utilize the crypto world as a means to add to what we already have in our savings account, towards our Golden Years and maybe for some fun later in life.
I think that's a solid plan and approach to Steemit. You're definitely in this for the long haul when you mention things like "5-10 years", and I think it's an awesome gameplan.
Just imagine how cool it would be to see Steem at $100 5-10 years from now when you've been able to harvest a ton of Steem during that time... :)
Oh trust me.. I have daydreams about steem hitting all-time highs just as we're about to find that 20-acres further north.
In fact, it is not uncommon to also experience a situation where even though we have tried as much as possible, but whose name expenditure remains larger than income.
Boom! Reality check people.
Yeah, I think it's sad to see so many people out there who seems to live in a fantasy world. There are no unicorns or treasure chests at the end of the rainbow.
Like you, I'm hoping it all goes up in price, but for now, making money is secondary for me here. You know, one of the reasons we left Vancouver was because it was so expensive to live there. The average rent downtown for a one bedroom is a good $2500 Canadian dollars. Isn't that nuts??
That's crazy! My rent is decent, but I live in a very small apartment. I hate our 34% taxes we have though... That's killing my entire salary.
It is crazy! That's for a really small place too! But our taxes aren't as high as yours; they're high, but not that high :)
it's close to impossible to live out of steemit (at least for mere normal person). The only time was when sbd reached 10$ but we knew that during that time something was going wrong. If again reaches a price like that or among 10-50$ (which is impossible in my opinion) and steem as you say stay stable at 3$ then we can
Yeah. I would love to see Steem at $10 again. I wouldn't mind if it stayed at it forever, but I'd be satisfied if it could stay like that for a few weeks. :D
yes just to take a huge amount away and then don't care for what else lies ahead. You will have some good earnings that way
I´ve always looked at Steemit has a great chance to pay my degree. What I mean by that is: I´m putting my time and effort in the platform to then wait for the increase in the price and recover all the money I invested in my education.
I´m from Portugal and here you can live with $600 a month, but you will have to make some gymnastic to pass the month, and I know that because my parents have that problem. I would say that to live comfortably here you need at least $1500 a month, which is achievable for the bigger people on Steemit, but incredibly hard, if not impossible for the majority of us!
It's doable to earn 100 Steem/sbd in a month though... So imagine if Steem was valued $10. That would help a lot! :)
Of course, as I mentioned if you are already established on the platform with a good amount of SP you can live of Steemit for some time (maybe not forever), but for now +95% of people depend on the rise of the price to be able to make some money.
Let´s be real, no one likes to see their "job" wage to be dependent of price fluctuations. But I think everybody here would love to make this their job. (at least a part-time :D)