I know this is gonna seem like an advertisement or something but please hear me out.
I quit working typical jobs back in 2020. My employers up until then had ranged from awful to okay at best. My very first job at 16 was at a shop that was shut down due to the owner stealing credit card info, next I was verbally abused by my employer, next got shut down due to accusations of the employees being transphobic (we definitely were not), and the last was at a local humane society where I just lost my faith in humanity. I started as a freelance writer and made that work until about a month ago. It was great until they started to try and micromanage me, an underpaid contract worker, so I quit. Now I just do gig work for UberEats, Instacart, Shipt, GrubHub etc and things are going great. I make just as much as I did as a freelance writer, without the micromanagement bullshit.
Since I am making a lower, less-steady income than I would with a traditional job though, I have been trying to find ways to build up a decent savings account, as I lost mine due to an unforseen illness last year. In searching for that great savings account, I discovered Chime.
I'm literally only sharing this because it can benefit people in three big ways:
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High Yield Savings account (right now, mine is at 1% interest growth on my savings, I started at 0.5%)
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Easily build credit. Chime offers a Credit Builder card that only uses money from your checking account, has no interest, and builds your credit decently fast. It's gotten mine up almost 40 points so far.
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This is the part I hate adding, but if you DO decide to use Chime, you can use my referral code and we will both get $100 once you receive a qualifying deposit (i.e. from an employer) of $200 or more.
My code is here, if anyone is interested: https://chime.com/r/savannabruce
Having the credit builder and high-yield savings account has significantly helped me to break away from shitty jobs and only do work I am comfortable doing right now. The savings account is helping me grow a security net in case my gig work falls through, and the credit builder is going to make it possible for me to find a cheaper place to rent once my lease is up in January. Instead of overdraft fees, they offer a feature called SpotMe, which covers $10 min of overdraft, and your friends can send you bonuses (mine is at $35 right now) and whatever you do overdraw is just taken out of your next deposit. It's a completely online bank too, you can deposit cash at Walgreens (literally any Walgreens), and it only takes like 5 mins to sign up. I had terrible credit when I signed up and it didn't matter at all. This bank is honestly a lifesaver for me, and even if you don't want to use my referral, I really just hope this helps out anyone else who needs some extra assistance.