DH leaving me - what job can I look at to earn as much as possible?

[changename875467]

Husband has told me he wants to separate. We have children, one of whom is a small baby.
Pre maternity leave I currently work part time, earning circa 12k/year for childcare reasons and obviously will need to change that when he leaves as he is the main earner, much higher than me but I can't see him being able to support us both living in our own homes.

What jobs could I look at that pay well? I have a first class degree from a good uni if it's relevant, and currently work in education but would probably look to move sectors.

What skills do you have? What was your degree in?

What's your childcare plan?

Merchant Banker? Barrister in a top law firm?

I immediately thought Estate Agent, especially if you're well presented and easy going with people.
If not, you could try accountancy.

Well He can’t just abdicate all his responsibilities and fuck off. What’s his plan in terms of shared childcare costs and maintenance? Housing for the children etc?

I think the average estate agents salary would shock you, it’s generally very low unless she is the owner.

Does he have life insurance? Hitman. Two birds… one bullet.

Exactly. Good on you for wanting to do this, but see a solicitor first. You can't expect to step straight into a well paid job.
Sorry this has happened to you!

I've a friend who did accountancy qualifications as a way to a reliably well-paid career post-divorce. She was able to study while working in related roles, so kept earning while getting qualified

I stayed in education purely for the hours. I'm doing HTLA at the moment and then I'm going to do my TT next year.
It's not my 'dream' job but it's what I know.

I also have a degree from a good uni but unless you also have experience, it's going to be tough just changing sectors.

Data Analysis bootcamp? the government fund bootcamps to get people into tech and data scientist type roles.

You might even out earn him! get a clean break agreement in case you do.

I'm sorry your going through this.

** Sorry, missed the bit which said you wanted a 'well paid' job. Ignore.😋

Get on a ladder in IT. Or Project management. Or both. Barriers to entry and progression are limited and easier to overcome than many other fields. There are a variety of skills that you can map into specific areas, too. It’s a broad diverse field and not all roles involve technical acumen.

What do you class as well paid?

depends whether you want to earn as much as possible right now or if you are prepared to have a year or so fallow to retrain into a higher earning career. The latter will certainly make you more in the long run but would be painful short term.

I think it depends on what sort of life you envisage for yourself.
Is picking up and dropping off at school really important to you?
Do you want to not work or work less in the summer holidays?
Do you want to work from home, or in an office?
Do you like working as part of a team?
Do you have any specialist knowledge?
Do you enjoy problem solving, talking to people, organisation, maths, caring, selling or being creative?
Basically you cannot make yourself do something you don't enjoy for money. I truly believe that. If I could I would become an accountant, work from home and earn more than I do now. But I'm not an accountant. I hate working on my own, I hate working from home.
You have to understand who you are, and what you enjoy.

If you have A level maths or the potential to do it, then coding has the best earning potential in a short time. But you've got to like the logical geekiness of code and find that fun.

PS you don't need to have done A level maths, but you shouldn't feel a sense of dread if someone told you it was essential.

Recruitment or sales

Teaching isn’t very highly paid, but not awful money, I think £28k starting, but you do get the holidays which if you don’t have family support could be very valuable, depending on your degree you could get a good bursary while you train. I’d only look at secondary though, primary teachers work crazy, crazy hours.

Have you ran the incomes through the calculations to see what estimated benefits and CMS you may be entitled to? What is the value of equity in the home? You will likely receive a higher portion of that. What about his and your pensions?

What sort of contact is he considering? 50/50?

I'm going to do secondary. I got a place this year on a course but I felt it would be too much with us moving. I'll do this HTLA job in secondary (23 K pro rata) and then hope to defer the course until next year.

OP if you've got a head for numerical concepts, tech is a good option as is accountancy. With accountancy, you can work as a book keeper when you're part qualified and earn reasonable money until you qualify. Otherwise, what about something to do with project management? What are your current skills and how can you repackage them to use in new jobs?

The other way to do this is to look for well-paid local job vacancies online e.g. indeed, linkedin, reed etc, and work backwards from the job advert to how you get into it, to find something you can do locally with suitable hours, as a long commute plus long hours is generally unmanageable as a single parent.

as a long commute plus long hours is generally unmanageable as a single parent.
because your working hours are dictated by childminder or nursery opening hours, unless you can afford a nanny which would require you to earn even more money.

It depends how much income you need and where you can work.

Technical marketing is reasonably well paid, often involves home working 4 days a week and if you have a good degree, you should find a post grad CIM qualification quite easy.

If you relate that to your Education sector experience, and look for work in a tech company selling into Education, you could do well pretty quickly. £80k within 3 years is not impossible

If you have the right type of skills, think about training for cyber security. I'm currently in the US and they are crying out for people to retrain - there's a shortage and I imagine that you will have job security for life and potentially job flexibility (guessing there, I must be honest). UK could be very similar.