/biz/ - Business & Finance

Some info about me -
I'm a Full-Stack Developer working at one of the big tech companies for just about 13 months now. I received this job straight out of college, hence the low salary. I expect it to grow significantly two years from now when I have a total of three year's experience.
I'm not interested in waiting for a salary bump between now and then so in the meantime, I'd like to explore ways to increase my income.
I have zero expenses aside from a Monthly, non-consecutive 30-day bus ticket that costs €160. I tend to work from home a lot so a single ticket could last me two months.
All my hobbies are either online or involve sport. None of which cost me anything.
I'm pretty young (24) so I still live at home.
I planned on investing my savings by getting a mortgage and buying a house, renting out spare rooms to pay for it. Unfortunately, I don't qualify for a big mortgage because I'm restricted by how much I can borrow by the central bank limits in place. I cannot borrow more than 3.5 times my yearly salary. In other words, I need to be earning 100k annually to borrow 350k. This disqualifies any and all investments in properties/land.
I wanted to get into bonds / stocks / funds but the return is shit (4%), not worth the risk.
Interest rates at all banks are at 2% so I'm not earning anything from the cash sitting in my account, after banking fees.
I know there's no rush at my age but I feel I can gain and grow my savings by investing now. I just don't have the knowledge and I'm too much of a pussy when it comes to the risks involved.
What could I do in terms of (safe) investments and how could I earn additional income?
Note that I'm a single male living in Ireland. Not looking for a date or hookup, just thought it's worth noting in case there are options that involve partners/spouses.