Son of undocumented immigrants from Guyana shares how he makes $150k a year working from home

A son of undocumented immigrant parents from Guyana, Terzel Ron grew up in a one-bedroom South Bronx apartment with three other siblings. However, through hard work, he now earns $150,000 a year. 

Ron, from the start, knew his route to success was to take his education seriously. For him, his ability to earn more depended on his level of education, according to CNBC Make It. This meant striving hard to obtain a scholarship to college.

He got a full academic scholarship to New York University in Manhattan, where his interest in media and on-air hosting led to a degree in TV production. Despite being on scholarship, Ron continued to do part-time jobs to generate extra income. 

“I never partied or had a social life in college, because I was always busy with three or four jobs,” he told CNBC Make It. “I took out a large meal plan, and it fell a bit out of the bounds of my scholarship. By the time I graduated, that tallied to a little under $10,000 in student loans,” he said.

After college, Ron landed a job as a production assistant with ViacomCBS in March 2019 after job-hunting for nine months. This gave him the opportunity to pay off $5,000 of his student loans while working there. In 2019, he left ViacomCBS after he was recruited by a large television network and moved to Los Angeles with his girlfriend to work as an associate producer.

He now makes under $110,000 per year from that job as well as about $40,000 per year from a second, part-time job as a production manager for a video chat app, which pays by the hour. Ron is now financially secure but still works seven days a week between both of his jobs, from 9 a.m. until about 11 p.m. on weekdays and 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. on weekends.

He invests nearly half of what he makes. CNBC Make It said the 25-year-old “has over $70,000 saved between investments and cash, with about two-thirds of that tied up in a variety of cryptocurrencies, including Ethereum.” Ron told the outlet that he realized that money was the way to always ensure stability in life so he never really wanted to spend it but to save it and grow it.

Growing up, he learned lessons on how to spend money. He went through his teenage years with a missing tooth in the front of his mouth until he was 18. To pay for his dental care, he had to work part-time jobs because his mother’s health insurance plan was limited and did not cover dental care.

Fast forward to 2022, Ron, who now lives in Los Angeles, is making more money than ever before and hopes to buy his first property later this year.