Handyman
🔧Comes over and fixes small things: hangs shelves and lights, replaces taps and sockets, assembles furniture, adjusts windows. New addresses every day.
Prospects & pay
What the work is like
💼 Job market
🇺🇸 $60.8k a year on average · +4.2% jobs by 2035 · 148,700 openings a year
Maintenance & repair workers, general — US: Census ACS 2020–24 (full-time), BLS projections 2025–35
🇬🇧 £35.2k median a year · 37,000 jobs
Construction and building trades n.e.c. — UK: ONS ASHE 2025 (full-time)
🤖 AI & automation
AI matches jobs and suggests instructions, but drilling, hanging and fixing in someone's home is hands-on work.
Who it suits
Interests: 🔧 Making things by hand, ⚙️ Tech and engineering, 🏗️ Building and spaces.
Key strengths: manual dexterity, logic.
Where to study
- Vocational Building maintenance / construction vocational course (City & Guilds, community college)
- Course Self-employment through platforms (TaskRabbit, Checkatrade, MyBuilder)
Key school subjects (A-level / IB / AP): Physics, Maths, Business.
🧗 Not formally required, but building maintenance courses help. In the West electrical and gas work needs a qualification or licence, so many get one. Mostly self-employed, through platforms and reviews.
Things to know
🛢️ Dirt, noise, smells
Similar careers
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