Do I Need To Be Talked Out Of This?

[dr_pretentious]

A friend has suggested that we might start a tutoring business together. She's got the math and science chops, and an almost-finished dissertation in an Ed.D. program, so we could be full-service shop. With the right office space in, say, Highland Park, I wouldn't have to drive all over the place to make house calls. Highland Park is full of grad students who are used be being paid starvation wages to tutor at the university, and the university budget cuts are leaving some of those folks with no way to pay the rent at all, so it would be easy to cherry pick experienced hourly employees at a significantly better wage than they're used to getting. Highland Park is also full of prosperous parents who are ambitious for their children, parents who are falling all over themselves trying to find a way to fill the gap between what the schools can do and what their kids need.

Could it possibly take more time to run a tutoring business in one spot than I'm currently spending driving from client household to client household? Am I delusional to think this could be a good plan?

Anyhow, S and I aren't going to do anything rash about this. She's waiting to find out if the university will reappoint her on a budget line with health insurance, which she should know around April, and I'm still neck-deep in the March Writer's Weekend event. Oh, and I expect to be significantly under the weather for at least another week. Meanwhile there are plenty of brass tacks questions to investigate. How much does a square foot of non-storefront office space a block off the main drag in Highland Park cost per month? What kind of insurance do you need for a business that involves having other people's minor children on premises without their parents? That kind of thing.

Comments

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

I would love to pick your brain about this stuff. My recollection is that your work arrangement was flexible enough to allow you to spend a lot of time with your mom while she was ill, and the flexibility to trade off who has the helm at work when family demands spike is one of the things S and I find attractive about the idea of going into business together. Is that flexibility real, or is it just an illusion of greener grass?

Flexibility

[(Anonymous)]

As a small service-oriented business owner I can tell you that the flexibility is real but it comes at a price.

The up-side is that sick-leave and family leave (and vacation time) are all at your own discretion and as short or as long as you deem necessary. The down-side is that you are not getting a paycheck while you are gone unless you have enough employees to keep the office running. And as a business owner you are typically the last person to get a "paycheck". First you have to pay the business and your employees (if you have any), and then if there is enough money you can pay yourself; it's one of the key points that gets hidden in the phrase, "Most new businesses lose money for the first two to three years". A good resource for planning a new business is SCORE (Service Core of Retired Executives). They can offer you a personal mentor, a business resource library, and classes for everything from how to write a business plan to basic bookkeeping. They can also often help you work your way through the various licensing/permitting processes that are usually a combination of local, state, and federal bureaucracies revolving around different business types.

Starting your own business can be an adventure or a slog depending on your personality and preparedness level, so as you and your friend explore your idea take your Selves into account. As the gentleman above asked... how much time do you want to spend teaching and how much of your time do you want to spend managing your business?