Teaching can be an expensive racket. In addition to maintaining your number one instrument (your voice), you also take on the responsibility of caring for a secondary instrument in a piano or keyboard. There is the age-old question of whether it’s better to maintain a home studio or rent an additional space. Regardless of that choice (even if you’re looking to teach), you’ll also want to factor in the expense of a home office. We consulted two active voice teachers and revisited one of our favorite freelancing divas for this month’s $50 Week.
Defining Your Space
“One of the best things I can tell you about this is that, at the end of the day, this is a tax write-off as far as working space at home. And that is a very big plus about this,” says teacher and coach Anthony Manoli (who counts Sondra Radvanovsky among his students).
Paper-thin apartment walls, cramped spaces, and living further afield from your students may make renting a studio space a preferable—not to mention cost-effective—option. Like home office expenses, rental fees are also a tax write-off (you may want to save your receipts for any cabs to and from the space as well). “From my experience, my teachers actually were all in a home. I never went to a studio, and so I just sort of followed suit,” explains Astoria-based teacher Nicole Tori. “But . . . one student in particular hates coming here because it’s far. So what she does is she rents a room, but it’s on her dime. She makes all the arrangements, and I just show up.”
Her outpost in Queens means Tori charges a lower fee than many of her Manhattan counterparts. If you’re similarly placed, students may be willing to pay the extra few dollars to cover the cost of a rehearsal space if it means they still pay $60 for an hour-long lesson (and for those of you looking for a teacher, this is also a great tactic for finding a reasonably priced teacher or coach). If you’re looking to stay entirely out of the home, look into spaces like New York’s Ripley-Grier Studios (a room roughly 10’ x 10’ runs from $14 to $25 an hour).
Get Keyed Up
If you don’t already have a piano (or at the very least an excellent keyboard), you may find an unlikely treasure in an estate sale, on craigslist, or on eBay. When Manoli realized that he was filling his old piano with money that wouldn’t yield a return on his investment, he flirted with the idea of investing in one that would appreciate in value.
His tuner and rebuilder Tali Mahanor suggested a Steinway—and when Manoli scoffed, Mahanor told him he could find one on eBay. Despite more scoffing, Manoli wound up with a 1914 vintage Steinway for $9,100—a steal compared to what many retailers in New York would charge. The repairs cost extra, but he still saved at least $10,000 in comparison.
“[Tali] said, ‘Here’s what you ask: Write an e-mail to the tuner and ask the following questions. And if this meets your requirement, I don’t care what shape it’s in, get it here,’” recounts Manoli, who inquired after the instrument’s water, fire, and smoke damage. “She oversaw the rebuilding with her own people and, believe it or not, I sold the old piano on eBay. . . . It was a very cost-conscious move.”
Working with a skilled rebuilder can turn dross into gold; Manoli notes, however, that Mahanor has also saved him in the long run by going over the preventative measures any teacher can take to save on tuning fees. “[She] gave me a lecture day one about my instrument, about how to keep where you’re working at the proper humidity, not keep it near a heater—and this would prolong the life of that piano, that you wouldn’t be needing tunings as often as many of them do,” says Manoli, who notes that maintaining a home operation also means that teachers can maintain a high-quality instrument.
“Take, for instance, a studio. The lights go off, the heat goes off, the heat goes on, the radiator sometimes sits too close to the piano, and the humidity of the room is precariously low,” continues Manoli. “This kills an instrument. And you’re finding that you’re always having it tuned . . . [I] have humidifiers in the room, about eight to 10 feet away from a heating element—which I hardly even turn on, anyhow. So I can keep the instrument maintained pretty well to about one tuning a year.”
Play to Your Strengths
While Manoli’s students regularly trod the boards at the Met, Tori has found that her strengths as a teacher lie elsewhere— though they are no less profitable. “I can teach more advanced singers, but I seem to have great success with beginning singers who are dancers or actors, who haven’t had much singing experience,” she explains.
When looking for new students, it’s helpful to be honest with yourself about which ones are right for you. Take the old marketing principle of segmentation—targeting and positioning when it comes to placing ads, distributing flyers, or making introductions—and don’t forget that the all-powerful tactic, word-of-mouth, is free. Seek out potential clients where they go, be it rehearsal studios, student lounges, or community choirs. If you sink money into just one piece of promotion, make it a functioning website. Even necessities like business cards can be had for a song on websites like OvernightPrints.com (prices start at less than $2).
Websites like Overnight Prints, along with 1800Postcards. com and PrintRunner.com, also offer an alternative to fl yers with contact slips (which can get easily lost). “The one piece of swag I admit to being gaga over is the printed postcard,” writes career guru Michelle Goodman in her book, My So-Called Freelance Life. “I love giving them away at promo events, and I love it when illustrators, photographers, and clothing designers snail mail me postcards announcing a new product or show.”
Know What to Keep in Short Supply
Goodman may be piqued by postcards; in her book, however, she is also conservative about what supplies are necessary to keep a home office running. “Like me, you might be tempted to . . . grab your wallet and outfit yourself to the gills: $500 espresso machine, $1,500 Aeron chair, $15,000 garage-to-office conversion,” she writes in Chapter 4 of the same book. “Don’t. Trust me, eventually the debt catches up with you and it will suck. Hard.” As Goodman goes on to write, however, don’t let the horror stories of pre-recession Wall Street execs buying $1,000 trash cans deter you from setting up a bare-bones office.
Even if you’re not a teacher, a home office is something you should have. And with Targets and Ikeas so ubiquitous that there are outposts in even the Big Box-phobic New York City, craigslist and eBay rife with offices selling off old filing cabinets and printers (unsurprisingly, they have more than just Steinways), and organizations like Freecycle.org helping to unload furniture and the like gratis, you’ve got no excuse when it comes to outfitting your home office on the cheap. Be practical—and don’t be afraid to make multiple trips if it means you don’t end up going on a spree that (like Goodman) leaves you with a lifetime supply of Post-it Notes.
And as for the $500 espresso machine, consider this the one time we’ll advise Starbucks as a cheaper alternative.
