How Much to Budget for Rent?
Ok, so I have an offer for an internship with a UMM private equity fund paying around 10k base rate for 40 hours and then paying 1.5x for overtime hours. However, as I am a very forward-looking kinda person I'm thinking about how to budget myself and plan for rent during this stint. It's in NYC and I'm really only seeing good apartment/room deals from the range of $1800-2500. That's a big pill for me to swallow, but I accept that NYC rent is at a massive premium. I'm also in a bit of a budget mystery right now:
My question is whether I can expect to actually work overtime hours in PE (versus IB which obviously works interns overtime) and whether I can expect hours around ~60 per week and to be paid around that amount. This would help clarify a lot of the budgeting I'm trying to do right now. Conversely, should my budget be highly conservative and expect to only earn $10k for the whole stint? Budgeting around a 2k/month apartment with other assumed travel+transport+food+entertainment expenses effectively means no savings on the 10k rate.
Anyone who's been paid by hour with overtime/been paid by hour with overtime in private equity, what was your experience like? How much did you expect to make during your stint and how did you budget it? Any clarification and advice would be appreciated!
Congrats on the internship. I’m unfortunately not in a position to answer the hours question but I think this is a very fair question to ask your future employer. I think you should shoot a message to whoever gave you the job offer and tell them you are preparing for your summer in NYC and ask them. I wouldn’t do it until closer to the summer (it is too soon to be looking for an apartment). Also, I would anticipate that the market will change between now and next summer, not only because of the uncertain economic environment but also because real estate rentals can be really seasonal with a lot of places changing over during the summer months. This can impact both availability and pricing.
It will completely depend on the firm - some places will have interns shut down their laptops at 5 so they don’t need to pay them overtime, others might have an unspoken “don’t report overtime hours” culture. Some might have you working 60-80 hours a week regularly and making a ton of money.
If you aren’t comfortable reaching out to the firm, hit up a former intern to get a sense (and frame it more as questions about internship rather than pay)
Mind PMing the firm?
I would budget assuming you work no overtime, that way you know at the very least what you're working with on a consistent basis. I'm a bit more conservative when it comes to budgeting, so I'm bias when it comes to this type of situation. The same way i budget my personal finances without accounting for my bonus
Ha I’m on the other extreme I budget based on next 5 years’ projected income (permanent income hypothesis would be even more aggressive)
Can't comment on your overtime question, but $2k for rent in New York for a few months isn't crazy. Assuming you find a roommate and are in a decent location I think that's completely fine/normal. If you said you found a nice 1 bedroom in Hudson Yards and were thinking of paying $4k+, I'd say that's too much. On the other end of the spectrum, if you said you found a place with 3 others guys in Jersey for $900/month, I'd say that you're likely doing yourself a disservice from a commute and social perspective.
Rent in NY is terrible, it's just a fact of life. If you're young, don't mind having roommates, and are making a good finance salary, somewhere in the ~2-2.5k range should give you a good combo of a nice place to live, while also allowing you to save some money.
Also, I just read your post again, are you talking about $10k/month or $10k over the course of the summer? If the latter, then you're really not getting paid much, but I'm not sure there's much you can do besides assume that they pay you that little because they expect to pay a lot of overtime. Either way, as Compbanker said, worth asking HR as you get a little closer. As other have said, some firms actually keep you close to the 40 hours, others don't mind paying the overtime.
Is this internship for summer 2023? If so, I'd recommend doing NYU Summer Housing.
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