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Comment by soared | Hacker News Reader

Ignore 95% of comments here. Research your options for local support through the government and religion. Religion may be more helpful in your area, even if your beliefs don’t exactly align. There is housing, food, etc available to you but you’ll likely need a social worker for help find it.

https://switchpointcrc.org/ is local to you with food, shelter, etc.

More info from a gov source: https://sgcityutah.gov/business_detail_T18_R270.php

https://switchpointcrc.org/how-to-get-help/

The local access points to the coordinated entry system provide the assessment, information and referrals, and other resources to the person seeking housing.

Stop by or call for more information 948.N 1300 W. St. George, Utah 84770. 435-628-9310

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+1, definitely. Social workers are there for exactly your situation. There are generally state programs for housing, housing assistance, food, and health care, which they can help you locate. You paid for this previously with your taxes, take advantage of them now. They are probably also aware of other religious / independent options. They may be able to advise you on whether moving somewhere like SLC, which has local tech, might or might not provide more support.

Unfortunately, the tech market is not great right now, and I think remote freelance rates are fairly low right now. But, in your situation, you can probably offer very competitive rates while still building up some savings. Once you have some savings (six months to 1 year is usually the recommendation), it gives you a lot of margin of safety, and you can reduce your usage of the government assistance.

I’ll hijack this a little with a question. Why do you think you’re qualified to tell OP to ignore 95% of the comments? That’s a lot of ego to bring to something so important…especially when you give the most superficial advice.

Accurate in Utah, large Mormon population. My car broke down there one time and spent a few days hanging out with the locals - very nice people.

Probably because programmers aren't generally also social workers, who help people like this day in and day out, with essential local context. Source: my partner does social work, I'm a programmer, and I'm now aware of how little I know here.

Great, thanks. I would have valued your post more if you'd stated this. Unfortunately it just looked like you said "All these people are idiots and I'm right".

Those comments were written by two different accounts.

Not the person you're replying to, but I think most opinions here on what to do (including my own) won't bee that helpful. While there are some people who post on HN who have been where OP is now, there are not that many, and those of us here who are financially secure and have never been close to homelessness probably have no idea what we're talking about when it comes to finding stable housing after having lived in your car for a while.

I have helped people navigate government programs and the quality varies. The are often plagued with perverse incentives, abysmal administration, and ridiculous requirements. It can be worth trying, don't get me wrong, but the much better advice at this point for this person I really think is along the lines of finding better employment now that isn't freelance/gig-work to support a home and then building to what's next.

This.

And 211: https://211utah.org/, 888-826-9790. They also have chat and text capability. 211 is "the most comprehensive source of local resources and services in Utah."

OP, good luck.

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