I started my company in my late 30s, married with a kid. I'm sure everyone has a different strategy based on their circumstances, but this is what has worked for me:
1. Saved money through normal tech job and paid off obligations where possible, so expenses weren't too high and savings were good. So the risk of trying something on my own was manageable.
2. Left my tech job, but did consulting first for a few years. Easy to go back to a normal job if consulting doesn't work. Used savings to get through the initial period of figuring out how to do consulting. Really nice to have some kind of side income in this period - like teaching online courses or whatever fits into your skillset.
3. Built up money through consulting, but also built up contacts and partners in the target industry.
4. Pivoted from consulting over to the start-up in the same industry when the timing was right. Could have fallen back on consulting if the company failed. The nice part about consulting is you can split your time between paid work and your own work in whatever ratio you want, so you aren't ever jumping off a financial ledge.
It's not like this was some master plan. But it is how it worked out for me and we were thankfully relatively stable at each step.
As far as the company itself, my advice would be (1) Find really good partners you trust that are good at what you aren't good at. Being good at programming is maybe 20% of starting a tech company. (2) Don't up-end your life to start a solo side-hustle SaaS where you are convincing people to pay you $19.00 - find a real industry with real money to spend. Or alternately, keep a side hustle as a side job until it actually gets some traction.
1. Saved money through normal tech job and paid off obligations where possible, so expenses weren't too high and savings were good. So the risk of trying something on my own was manageable.
2. Left my tech job, but did consulting first for a few years. Easy to go back to a normal job if consulting doesn't work. Used savings to get through the initial period of figuring out how to do consulting. Really nice to have some kind of side income in this period - like teaching online courses or whatever fits into your skillset.
3. Built up money through consulting, but also built up contacts and partners in the target industry.
4. Pivoted from consulting over to the start-up in the same industry when the timing was right. Could have fallen back on consulting if the company failed. The nice part about consulting is you can split your time between paid work and your own work in whatever ratio you want, so you aren't ever jumping off a financial ledge.
It's not like this was some master plan. But it is how it worked out for me and we were thankfully relatively stable at each step.
As far as the company itself, my advice would be (1) Find really good partners you trust that are good at what you aren't good at. Being good at programming is maybe 20% of starting a tech company. (2) Don't up-end your life to start a solo side-hustle SaaS where you are convincing people to pay you $19.00 - find a real industry with real money to spend. Or alternately, keep a side hustle as a side job until it actually gets some traction.