HELP!
I'm a financial mess. I'm 47, single, I live in Austin Texas (which costs WAY too much for rent/food/everything), but my brain (and my pocketbook) suggest that it's getting time to move. I previously lived in Chicago for more than 20 years, owned a way-too-expensive and underwater condo - but had a nice mid-life crisis and gave the keys back to the bank and ran away. Currently I'm an orthopedic physical therapist, but sadly insurance reimbursement these days means we PTs make very little money in relation to our student debt (this is a somewhat new -last 5 years- development).
I have family here, which is why I came to Austin (a little psychological salve, really). But I'm ready to move on if I can swing it.
I make about 80k a year before taxes, but I owe so many people so much money it's insane. I have about 80k in student loan debt (I went to PT school in my mid-30s), i owe my mom 9k on her credit card and my brother 7k for helping me get out of Chicago. I have a 10 year old car, but my job here in Austin involves driving literally all over central TX, so I've put nearly 40k miles on it in the last year. I have super crappy credit. I mean SH!##Y credit.
I've applied for (and will probably get) a teaching job that I can do remotely, as well as several other side gigs one can do as a PT to bring in extra income (ie see patients on the side for cash). This won't happen until the summer.
I also have a friend with a super bushy mustache who I'm helping find some property in CO - where I can live for free! (my FI dream is to live in a yurt on a mountainside, watch rivers go by, ride my mountain bike, go on long hikes and play with my dog)
Here are my options (so far):
a) keep doing what I'm doing, SLOWLY getting out from this mess but sheesh i'm ready to kill someone it's taking so damned long with COL prices this high!!!
b) bide my time until the remote professor position comes through (summer ish), but stay in my high-rent town with family nearby (I like my job, i have a 6 yo niece who I adore, etc) and just try to make as much money as humanly possible for now;
c) bide my time until the remote professor position comes through, and until my friend finds land in CO, then get a cheapish travel trailer to live in rent- and relatively expense-free while working remotely with only occasional commutes to Austin for in-person teaching duties (1-2x/month). This would involve getting a trailer/outfitting a van/etc etc in order to live there (she only wants property, not buildings). Looking at a tiny teardrop trailer that my current vehicle could pull and leaving it on her land. I would need lots of phone data/internet as an expense in order to be able to work, but otherwise not much else bill-wise (well, my debt...)
d) screw all of that, get a travel PT job right now (that pays WAY more than I'll ever make), let them send me somewhere cheaper to live (but my credit is so bad...getting a new place to live could be tough) and move on from there.
Which is the more mustachian thing to do?
Ultimate goal is FI (obviously...), and to live cheaply in the mountains in a yurt or something, write a novel, maybe see some patients or do some research every now and then........
HELP!