Z Reddit Mentions | ChartExchange

So way back when I was a kid long before any drug addict and alcoholic could become a landscaper. I used to walk around the neighborhood with a shovel asking if any of the neighbors wanted their driveway dug out for like 20 bucks. If they said yes, I would make 20 bucks 20 minutes shoveling the driveway as fast as I could. An extra five dollars for their walkway leading up to the front door that nobody ever uses anymore except for delivery people.
From that winter, showing off ambition that I wanted Work I would get their phone numbers so I didn’t have to physically walk to their house and all the way up their driveway to knock on their door to ask if they wanted their driveway shoveled, I would use that to ask in the spring if they needed any help cleaning the sand and salt off the edge of their property Which would lead to more work, hatching or raking hard their yard for the spring cleanup. That led into cutting their grass, which inevitably led to weeding the yard, that led to more planting, and it just kept growing and growing into more work and then some neighbors would tell others, etc.
I always got better luck working with the senior citizens because they simply couldn’t do the work anymore. They were far too old and the weather affects them very much so. They had very little energy compared to our younger selves and so it was a lot easier to get a yes off of an older person who needed help versus a younger person in their mid 20s or 40s
At that time I was blowing my money on Dragon Ball Z action figures until I was about 14 1/2, and then I swish gears and started saving my money for a vehicle. By 16 years old, I had a vehicle before I had a license or a permit to drive.
Looking back, I wish that I had someone to guide me into getting silver and gold at that time because of the price difference and how valuable that is. I wish I had the Internet to have asked information, but we had libraries as the Internet was still working out a few bugs for its earlier years.
But for real, if you can show that you are smart with machinery, that you are safe with their property, and you are responsible in that you can show up on time every week as scheduled, and make it easy for them to say yes… You’re in.
And then once you’re in, you can ask for trade. You can slowly overtime hint and let them know you’re starting a coin collection. I wish I could tell you how many times people rolled their eyes at me when I said I was building an action figure collection. I don’t think that would’ve happened if I told them I was building coins. More people are interested in coins. Especially the elderly people who had fought in multiple wars at that time, they understood the value of US currency and so on and so forth.
So go ask your parents to help you introduce you to your neighbors who might have some work if they know any. If not get out there with a shovel or a rake, depending on the season and go offer your services. If you can, if you have a cell phone, if your parents say it’s OK and it’s safe, Give him your cell phone number so they can hit you up for work. When I was a kid, we just gave them our phone number which rang to the house. So there was no chance of having creepy people do creepy stuff because it would ring to a house and anyone could pick up and deal with that person. It’s a little different nowadays, you might have to tread carefully in this department, but figure it out in a safe way that doesn’t put you at any harms risk. (Again, you should be talking mainly to senior citizens who can’t do anything because they’re frail and old. And are more likely to say yes to snow shoveling and yardwork to a kid teenager versus a drug addict drunk adult driving commercial trucks smelling like booze at 10:30 AM.)
Anyway, I hope that helps, other people suggested paper routes, but I didn’t want to do that cause I lived in a mountain farm community and the hills out here would’ve killed me with a sack of papers over my shoulder. Yardwork was always calm and quiet with the exception of the mowers and blowers. Raking, weeding, Sweeping trimming, lots of quiet work. And then, if you’re good with them, they’ll have you clean the inside of their house. This will give you an insight as to what kind of person they were. I worked for an old man who had a small radio station inside of his room much like how we have computer stations inside our rooms. This guy got down on the ham Radio and would talk to people on the radio like we’re doing here on the Internet. If people are getting to the point where they wanna start clearing their house, you might have first dibs on some of the things they want to get rid of. They might offer them to you first. Never happened with me when I was younger, but I did help with a few spring, clean out, bringing stuff to the edge of the driveway for the trash. If I asked for any of the stuff, I’m sure I would’ve been able to get it, but I didn’t think of it, and I was living with Family at the time and wasn’t sure if I could take stuff home from other peoples houses if it was for free.
Anyway, I hope that helps. Be a good person, be kind and be calm and speak up because they’re old and hard of hearing. But kindness will get you far, especially with the elderly because they see that a lot of people today over the last hundred years I’ve been getting more and more rude and disgusting.