I was in a similar position a while ago. I knew that I wanted to change direction and move into a career where the longer I did it the more experienced I would become and more in demand (hopefully). I also wanted to become self employed. I dismissed most trades (not the most practical of people) and eventually settled on Pest Control as my new career. The following factors swung it for me:
1 – I find it genuinely fascinating and enjoy the variety and working with customers directly
2 – The training is accessible and not stupidly expensive. Plus, once qualified you can start trading straight away. In some trades this isn’t necessarily the case and you will need to start on the bottom rung to build up your skills base further.
3 – Start up costs as a sole trader are actually quite small (about £4k for me including training and I had my first customer within a few days of my website going live)
4 – It is a developing industry with lots of changes to come in the future
5 – I have local competition but as long as I’m better than them in the quality of service I provide I will get customers and I know how to be better (I like to think)
6 – The earning potential is decent (apparently, I’ve been going less than a year so still growing the business)
7 – There is the potential to add on other things to my business such as site clearances and rubbish removal services (again quite cheap to set up)
8 – The margins for a lot of the work I do can be very very attractive
These factors are obviously quite specific to me and my situation at the time I decided to retrain but you may want to think along similar lines. Oh yes, I was on the wrong side of 30 when I made the jump to a new job 🙂
Find something you really enjoy and can see yourself doing and wanting to get better at.