How much is enough?

Which outcome would you rather have? Please humor me and help me to figure out what really makes sense for me.

1. Stable job in a LCOL city, running the family business and taking 1M personal income. You have control of your schedule, golf when you want, and spend as much time as you want with your family.

2. You are in the PE world in a LCOL city, trying to build a roll-up vehicle in a specific niche. You are taking 250-500k personal earnings but have a chance at a 50M outcome if the platform scales and exits. Your lifestyle is hectic, you have less free time, but you are building something that is yours. While you are taking significant risk, you have a shot at lottery ticket upside.

3. You go the NYC PE route, you manage to make partner and are pulling 4-5M cash a year with massive carry checks coming in (let's assume it actually pays out). You are absolutely grinding and rarely have time for your family or kids.

8 Comments
 

Just wanted to get perspectives from people that are older to see if what I am striving for is worth it or if I should work in my family business.

 

The fact that Option 1 is actually something you have access to and you’re considering NOT doing it in favor of some bullshit hardo fantasy is a slap to the face of all us morons that got into this field because they came from nothing and needed to make money. Jesus Christ I hate this forum.

 

Are you presenting options you actually have available to you? If so, Option 1 is a no brainer unless you're incredibly ambitious in the business world and have no other interests outside of work. I think for most people Option 1 would be a salary significantly lower, so weighing these choices is more difficult due to more trade offs.

just read it
 

Yes these options are available to me. Really trying to weigh options 1 and 2 moreso. I like the idea of building a rollup but feel like I am underestimating the difficulty. I am also not overly ambitious.

Really just wanted to get people’s thoughts on what truly is enough because I have kind of been desensitized due to being around highly successful people in college and growing up.

 

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