Simon Squibb - Founder & Investor | From Homeless Teen to Serial Entrepreneur

When I look back at the 15-year-old me, my father had suddenly died of a heart attack, and three weeks later I was homeless. I had bad luck, but it taught me so many important things. I was forced to become an entrepreneur and I often described the moment 15 years old. The entrepreneur muscle woke up in my brain. It started telling me how to make money, how to survive in the wilderness. Simon Squibb is on a mission to make entrepreneurship accessible to everyone. As the founder of HelpBank, he aims to help 10 million people start their own business, not with gatekeeping, but by giving without expecting anything in return. If you're beginning and you haven't got a lot of money, but you want to get a reputation, helping someone for free can really pay dividends later. And if you're further up the system and you've made it, the best thing you can do is help others. The school system has been designed to produce a worker. Entrepreneurship isn't as hard as we're saying it is. Working for someone else is hard. Through his content, community and book, what's your dream? Simon challenges the way we define success and calls for a world where purpose beats profit and education empowers creators. Not just employees. This episode is about building a world where anyone with a dream gets a real chance to chase it. Success isn't how much money you have. Success is about having time freedom. When you're older, the only regret you'll ever have is what you didn't do. Not what you did do. So I've started plenty of businesses that failed. I'm proud of the failures and I learned a lot of things when I failed. If you want to succeed, don't take advice from people whose life you don't want. Only take advice from people whose life you actually want. Simon, what's your dream? Well, I ask that question every single day of other people. It's a great question because I think it can give you that open answer. I have one goal initially, which is to fix the education system, to give people financial literacy and knowledge about how money works, to give people the ability to have more choices and just get a job, to make sure people understand how sales works because everyone can sell. You can be an introvert on extrovert. If you can learn to sell, you can learn to be free and learn to not sell time. Understand that time, of course, is the most valuable thing we've got and I want to teach people that and I want the school system to teach people that so that their only option isn't just get a job. I think another part of my dream is to allow people to help each other easier, kind of get back to a more positive society where we just help each other not because we get paid, not because there's something in it for us, just because it's the right thing to do and if we do just help each other, if you know, the thousands of people that are listening to this podcast all helped one person say we could change their life and I kind of want to bring back and it is bring back a mindset of like we're in it together, you know, we're one tribe and we, you know, we have to help each other in any way we can and it can't always be a transaction. I think that's such a valid point. I feel like a lot of content outside of yours focuses on transaction, on win at all costs, on you trying extract as much value from the world and that's how you play the game and I think that I think that why your content is done so well is because it's a completely different message but still a positive outcome for everyone. Was that, I know that wasn't always a case with you. I mean, you went from being homeless at 15, you built an agency that you sold for millions. There's a, there's a long story and there's a lot of lived experience that helped you form that world view. I don't think when you were, you know, not doing so well at 15, you thought that the world was helping you out and giving, giving back to you probably felt actually quite stressed and and destitute at that point. So what was the, what was the inflection point out of all the success you've had that was most impactful or most helped form that world view that everybody can win? Well hindsight is a wonderful thing and when I look back at the 15 year old me and my father suddenly died of a heart attack and three weeks later I was homeless. So I, you know, I look back at that time of my life and of course it's a horrific experience to suddenly be out there in the world, have no family protection and be in that sort of situation. I think in a weird way, you know, bad luck and good luck are still luck and so I had bad luck but it taught me so many important things. That was one of the first kind of levels leveling up stages of my life where I couldn't get a job because I was too young and in England you need a special number to get a job, you need to put on the application forms and I didn't have this number because I wasn't old enough and equally I didn't have an address. So I couldn't get a job and I did try and I tried begging but I just couldn't, I just, I wasn't able to actually get people to give me money and they just thought I was a drug addict or something wrong with me. Maybe I wasn't very good at it, maybe it's the skill like anything else I didn't have and so I was forced to become an entrepreneur and I often described the moment at 15 years old the entrepreneur muscle woke up in my brain almost like it was dormant and it started talking to me, it started telling me how to make money, how to survive in the wilderness and that was a very important moment. I mean you asked what my pivotal moments were, that was definitely one and then I moved to Hong Kong at 23 years old. That was another pivotal moment for me because I realized and I'd heard about China and somehow China is this evil place that in the West personifies this kind of capitalism equals people are capitalist, people are communists and I met the people and I'm like these people love their children just like we do, they eat three meals a day, they love food, they want the best for their families just like we do and I culturally woke up and realized that we are just one one group of humans put into different places with different experiences but we all are the same at the end of the day with the same, we all want to feed our families and be able to eat well and be housed and not to worry that our family is going to get sick without care. So you know we're basically there now's another awakening moment for me and so and then when I sold my company and I was financially free I guess that was the final stage of my awakening where I'm like you know what I'm old enough now to realize that it's not red versus blue and it's not you versus me, it's us one plus one equals 11 and I think you know it took me 35 years until I wrote the book to kind of when I wrote the book I'm like actually what what do I want to teach in this book and it's the realization that everything in life tries to divide us politics, football teams, sports teams, everything my whole life was about who do you support, who do I support and I got to a stage where I'm like actually we're the same and best thing we can do is just help each other. I think it's even in business yes politics religion aside even in business there's such a scarcity mindset of if if someone else wins I can't win and I've never believed that I don't understand where that idea comes from. If that's the opposite I have discovered even when I've competed against companies there's some clients for example I passed to my competitors and that means that they then passed them to you for whatever reason you have conflict clients or you know you just don't have time to work on a particular project you know your competitors can be your friends and I just think that people don't realize this we're taught to fight each other and I don't know you know I don't want to get into conspiracy theories why but there's a lot money in place apart in it there's division equals having power over people but I've realized that that that is wrong and that we shouldn't give and take that's what we're taught give and take we shouldn't take we should give without take and if we live with give without take first of all we don't have resentment when we help people because that's often what causes people the most amount of pain you know I saw someone open the door for someone the other day and they didn't say thank you and they're well don't say thank you then and they're I'm just like well why did you bother opening the door of now you've caused yourself all that stress because that person didn't act the way you want them to act so expectation causes pain and so I think you know people people will be a lot happier if they live with give without take and not give it's interesting you know you see an extreme example of this is when people are trying to be altruistic or trying to give charity but they're only doing it so they can film it and post it on on social media for a quote we live in a very interesting world explain explain in like a business context the difference between like go into the weeds on give without take versus give intake like what does that actually mean for an entrepreneur who's thinking about starting something how do they think about I like that idea what does that mean when I launch my business and go out into the world well give give and take is very normally in our heads I'll help you if you help me but the point with that is every single time you do it someone has to do it to you so it's a transactional mindset in every part of your business life so if for example and I use myself as an example I had a creative agency called fluid which I would eventually sell to price waterhouse Cooper for a lot of money but in the early days of that business I did a lot of projects for clients for free and I did it not to get something back I did it because I wanted the experience because I wanted to understand how these businesses worked and I did it because I could help a lot of these companies and and some of those companies went on to be really successful and then started paying me but I didn't expect it and so I think free for example is a very powerful tool in business you know if you want to take out my philosophy instead of calling it give without take let's just call it help someone for free and don't expect anything back because if you do the word of mouth the amount of you know one person who loves you is going to be one of your best marketing tools then you know having ten clients paying you well great but that takes you know a reputation and so if you could help someone and then and then they promote you not because you asked them to but because they feel that they want to that's so powerful so I'd start with free in a business context and again people say well people don't pay they don't value it that has not been my experience people don't value it if it has no value but if you put value into free it has value so I think you know most of the time but if you're starting out you know give give give more you'll be surprised how much that brings you later if you're already successful I always think I never understand why you know super rich people sell courses because there's a part of you well you're already super rich they say the property people do this a lot I'm like oh I I'm right according to your bio and you made loads of money in property which is you know great so why not just pass that knowledge on to people then why do you need to charge a course fee and now most of the time it's because they're already really making money from the courses you know I think why not just help people make the world a better place if you're the only person who's rich very lonely and you will have a problem in society frankly we already have it it's coming it's close people who are struggling who can't make ends meet you know the rich are getting vilified so you know people do need to you know give back so if you're beginning and you haven't got a lot of money but you want to get a reputation helping someone for free can really pay dividends later and if you're further up the system and you've made it the best thing you can do is give back put the ladder back down and help others and that's what I mean by give about take don't have expectation don't give something with some expectation something back you know you mentioned something interesting you mentioned the rich are starting to get more vilified and fully agree and I actually think I was listening to a podcast I think it was dire of a CEO and they're mentioning that of course in the US rich very rich are vilified to a degree I think in the UK you probably see it even more and I notice it with people that are influential and popular have made money there's a lot of anger and animosity I'm assuming it's because life is very difficult for some people and that's where that anger comes from but I also think it actually ties into something that you speak about quite often which is our education system is failing us because I think that if the education system does not discuss ideas like entrepreneurship or ways to you know without sounding cliche break outside the matrix and figure out how to create freedom in your own life and if you're only working a nine to five and not so anything wrong with that but I think that a path to financial freedom is entrepreneurship and if the education system isn't teaching that and talking about that then I think a lot of people feel lost they look at people that are rich they look at people that are successful and they don't understand the path to get there and I think that that's the masses and I think that that creates that discord well I think it's also being weaponized by politicians so politicians want to get elected so what what's popular you know that that's vilify the rich so they know in England labor will almost look at the rich as well let's tax them well in England they they've done that and a thousand entrepreneurs millionaires have left England in the last six months and gone to Dubai and other markets so you know it's not the answer now it doesn't mean to say that the rich don't have their part to play in fixing the problems they definitely do and there's definitely definitely greed and there's definitely people that are you know power hungry and accumulating wealth for themselves but in my experience a lot of the wealthy people that I know are self-made I mean from the context I don't think self-made possible by the way everyone needs help to be successful but like they weren't they didn't inherit the money and they have built wealth but I think a problem is how can you distribute that wealth so most people you know they don't trust government and government is very wasteful there's a lot of interest payments now most of the money goes to interest payments the government's in debt so it's not getting to the people and and they're they're not efficient in their distribution of support for people so wealthy people avoid tax because they feel it's wasteful to pay tax to the government but then the other side of it is and again I've seen this firsthand a lot of wealthy people that I know are scared to do anything they're scared to help because it will never be enough and I have this a little bit so it would have been easier for me to just retire and just you know take it easy on my bow and go you know go around the world have a good time you know but I decided to step into the arena and help people and weirdly I get hate for it you know people people say I should be doing more or there's people saying I haven't given them enough you know there's there's just like and it's never ending and you do feel like well is there a point to helping because you just get vilified for helping and I think people that just keep quiet and spend their money on themselves and have a good holiday time and enjoy their life play golf every day they get kind of left alone so there's this thing I think where we need to little bit turn things upside down the best way I could explain this is like in charities we have this perception that people running charities shouldn't earn a lot of money and I think it's wrong I think people that are doing good should earn more money people that are helping society making society better producing things that make people's lives better should earn more money and those that are creating for example financial instruments that lend money to people that can't afford it to get them into debt and cause huge huge paying for people shouldn't be paid huge amounts of money like they are today they should be paid less because they're causing pain to people so I think there is a problem psychologically where you know it's almost like and I say this carefully I feel like sometimes you know the system is designed to divide us and it means that the wealthier scared to get involved and they want to keep their head down and keep out in a keep out of politics so there's no good politicians because all the good ones are scared to be in politics and on the other side you've got people that just don't understand how money works how the system works you know being frankly used to fund and support political systems that don't bring them value and so yeah there's a problem and I do think in my mind the only way to fix it is just be like kind to each other like what can you do it listeners today what can they do to help someone and what can you do to support someone's small business that's not going to cost you anything share on your stories like their post you know like every single day just think to yourself how can I help five people somehow without it cost me money I mean I have to give money like I do and I think if we all thought that the world would be a better place I think so too I've heard Mr. Beast speak about this often because he does a lot of videos where you know I'll put I think a well in a village or he was helping cure blindness with one of his videos and he couldn't believe the amount of hate that he was getting and and oh what's the agenda and why are you doing this and he's like there's a million videos that I could make that are not helping people that could just be fun and entertaining and I can make a lot of money doing that and he says the more you help people the more people look at you as a target and I think that yes help like saying okay go out into the world and be an altruistic good person and that's step one but when you have news cycles and political you know political parties sort of all conspiring against us to divide what is what is the answer like how do we fight back is it education I know you speak a lot about education is it revamping education is it being self-taught about business money finance does that help or is that irrelevant to fixing this the problem is so complex but I think it does start with this individual mindset which is stop thinking just about self start thinking about how you can help others and it could be small things and it could be holding door open for some without an expectation you can start there but I think literally like not what can I do for myself how can I get a house for myself how can I get money for me because it doesn't bring you happiness and it causes society pain when tribalism becomes individualism so but I genuinely do think that a lot of this starts in school now in England my son started schooled at three and the first thing in the school they teach this seat say to you is like oh hello his name is Aidan hello Aidan what will you do when you grow up right so so what that does that question instantly traps his little mind into like oh I don't know doctor lawyer and so he's got to pick something from a very young age and I think the the right question to ask is not what will you do when you go up but what problem will you solve when you go up because this opens your mind up and makes you realize all connected and so it's not about what you are going to do it's about how you're going to make the world a better place for everybody now it might not be that you come up there and then at three years old with the answer but your mind is open it's not trapped into this singular what are you going to do well how you know your life better but what are you going to do to make the world a better place and and my son is now seven and recently said to me he wants to help stop the big sick extinction which is interesting he's watching David Attica talk about it and and now he's thinking about how to help humanity and he's not talking about you know money and what he can get although that'll be a part of his life I just think it does start in school and again the school system has been deliberately designed let's be honest it's been designed to produce a worker Henry Ford and Carnegie said it this isn't a conspiracy theory they said it they want people to have enough of an education that they can buy a car and go on two holidays a year but they need him to come back on Monday at nine o'clock ranking the the handle in the factory right so so that the and the education system has not been updated for a hundred years we're still saying maps are not financial literacy mass can be done by a calculator you know like and so you know it's it's not a conspiracy theory it's it's actual historic fact this school system was not designed to help people think three it was designed to get people to sit down shut up where the same uniform turn up at nine do your job and not complain and when you go through that system you come out on the other side like you said you come out a worker and then when you come out a worker but you're a worker in a system that is candidly getting worse and worse and more difficult if you look at the the the system that our parents and our grandparents came out into they could still afford a house they could still afford a good quality of life so now I thought about this a lot the same amount of work and input as a nine to five worker for the majority of people is not giving us the same output the previous generations had and now we're stressed out and now because the system the school is not teaching us financial literacy is not teaching us how to invest is not teaching us really anything that's useful we have this huge gap of education and we don't know what to do and then I think that's where you start to see people getting mad at the rich because they're like you know I don't know how to get there but I wish I had that but I don't know how I don't know how to change my life I've only ever been sort of trained and brought up in one way now this is interesting because okay you want to you want to teach people financial literacy you want to teach people entrepreneurship so they can they can make money but then I know that you've you've spoken about this a few times and and several people that have been in the show have also echoed this if you do make a lot of money you're also not fulfilled because now you realize that money is in everything and there's a lot of things that people forget to focus on on the path to money so they do you know they do switch the mindset from nine to five worker to entrepreneur and then they go all in on entrepreneurship they forget about their health uh physical and mental they forget about their relationships they forget about everything else in their life and they wake up one day with this some of money because they sold their company and everything else has gone to shit so what would be your advice for some somebody that listen wants to be a little bit more aggressive wants to be a little bit more entrepreneurial wants to make some money but at the end of the day how do you structure your life so that you don't wake up when you're 50 or 60 and feel completely unfulfilled with money in the bank but everything else has gone well again it all starts with education doesn't it so I am 50 years old I have a lot of money in the bank but I think you know my life isn't perfect I'm fit but I could be fitter and at points in my career I have neglected my health but frankly let's be honest someone working for someone else has done the same that's just my life if I had to travel nonstop the three weeks to promote my book in January there was I just didn't have time to exercise so I think life's a bit like a wobbly stool you've got to go where you you know wobble to stay or float so for example this week I'll be exercising all week you know I'm catching up and I'm working less and so I'm still working because I'm always thinking as we do when we're entrepreneurs but but I think that this whole kind of image that entrepreneurship is this tough difficult thing is often perpetuated by entrepreneurs because the reality is it's harder to work for someone else especially over the long term you know I am 50 now I could stop work if I wanted I know people the same age as me they're lawyers and they're having to work even more hours to cover all the cost of lifestyle inflation so they haven't slowly built themselves out of work so they can be free they've slowly built themselves into a harder job started off at 25 there were lawyers glamorous the money's not bad they're free and single then they got married then they had kids then they got a mortgage then they got this then they got that and now they have it to work even more hours so I think entrepreneurship is we've got to stop peddling it's so hard I think I always say to entrepreneurs that complain to me about how hard it is I'm like oh I give all your equity to your staff then none of them want to do it if you did a survey of entrepreneurs and said oh I know entrepreneurship is really hard give all your equity to your staff then it's over isn't it that's the end of it people don't want to do it why because entrepreneurship isn't as hard as we're saying is now don't get me wrong working for someone else is hard you know going to the gym can be hard controlling what you eat is hard who said it was meant to be easy it's part of the excitement of life this challenge that we have and so I don't buy into the narrative that you know if you're going to be an entrepreneur you're necessarily going to be you know worn out and you know burn out and that that's not necessarily true of course you need to have discipline you need to know when to work hard and have your head down so I've just done for my book launch in January you need to say no to a few things for three or four days to recuperate you know but working for someone else you don't get to say yes or no someone else does so I would choose entrepreneurship every day of the week is much easier than working for someone else Lingoda is a partner of success story look I'll be real with you my French used to be solid I learned it in school I even had decent pronunciation but when I booked trip to France last year it was a total blank I could barely order a croissant without sounding like a tourist so I jumped into the Lingoda sprint challenge and man it changed everything I'd take live classes late at night after podcasting only five students max real teachers real conversations and then just two months I went from a bonjour to holding full conversations at a Paris cafe confidence unlocked now here's the 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vanta to manage risk and prove security in real time and don't miss this for a limited time only my listeners can get a thousand dollars off vanta that's real money back in your pocket visit vanta dot com slash scott right now before the software expires that is v-a-n-t-a dot com slash scott when somebody thinks about starting their own company and i don't disagree with you because i also very much kindred spirits so you know you're you're you're kind of preaching to the choir um but i know a lot of people in the audience they have a hard time especially so i'll tell you who's in the audience so there's people that are entrepreneurs that are already on board with your message people that have built in soul companies but there's a large group of people that are highly successful and they've been working in a company for 10 20 30 years and uh they feel unfulfilled and they're stressed that they haven't achieved what they could in life and entrepreneurship is probably something that has interested them but they've never taken the leap and they want to make a switch but there's so much responsibility they have kids they have mortgage they have spouse what do you recommend to those people should they take the jump should they do it and maybe find a way to de-risk it what are you doing i know a lot of these people and you know i'm live right now but i i g in tiktok a couple of thousand people listening on the live i i know all these people i know they're different profiles and and their problems and their issues this is here's the thing i mean again i don't want to repeat the education systems caused a problem for those people because the education system told you that the less whiskey thing in life is go to university get a good job and life will be good right it's a lie sold so you work by the hour because that's how big companies make money they you charge them by the hour and then they charge by the outcome now if by sheer persistence and effort and a bit of luck some of those people working in a company have managed to make some money most people in the middle class are trapped by the middle class system so in other words they've got enough that they're better than most but they haven't got enough to be free okay success isn't how much money you have success is about having time freedom to make choices that feel instinctively right for you so my advice to the people that are stuck in this middle class trap number one get your costume you know reduce your lifestyle so you're not trapped by it the car that you own actually owns you especially some finance and you're paying any sort of monthly amount every monthly amount you're paying is the company you're working for you're paying that monthly amount to you're working for them you're selling hours to pay them saying with a mortgage in a house most people are living a house way too big for them and they're trapped by this idea that a house will make them happy and that's caught them and and I think get your costume is probably the number one thing the second thing that people need to do is recognize that when you're older the only regret you'll ever have is what you didn't do not what you did do so I've started plenty of businesses that failed their good stories they make me interesting at dinner I'm proud of the failures and I learned a lot of things when I failed but I would not trade them for all my successes I think you need to have a sense of experience is more important than a steady reliable life right and I think people need to take risk and I think to take risk you need to get your costume so you don't become homeless right I thought you want to make sure but a lot of people have gone the other way they bought a house they can't really afford and stretch themselves they bought a car they can't really afford they've gone on to their credit cards and gone on holidays they can't really afford they bought clothes they can't really afford and now they're stuck in a job they don't love and they don't have the choice now if someone said to me I um I I would like my job I choose to do it and they're not doing it because they've got no financial choice then that I love but I see 99 percent of people I mean the job they hate and they've got no choice but to do that job because they're not in control of their finances you know you ask a lot of young entrepreneurs like what's your dream and I think that a lot of the people that I've watched your content absolutely love it and some people that you interview they have like a really good idea of what their dream is but this this group this cohort of people that we're speaking about I don't think they ask themselves that question regularly I think they just are again sort of golden handcuffs to their job their chain to this life and this lifestyle that they've created and I think that the question what's your dream is scary because it insinuates that there could be an alternative life that could be living that is actually fulfilling to them and that they've wasted so much time so when you first ask yourself the question what's your dream if you find yourself in the situation where you're trapped and your expenses are high you're going to go through these steps you're going to reduce your expenses you're going to be a little bit smarter about your money but where do they even start and and I mean like this is this has been like the theme with your content this is the name of the book that you just that you just launched and wrote but it's a very scary question for some people so where do they start when they ask themselves that question what's your dream is you know there's different concepts like icky guy and venn diagrams of what you're good at and what the world needs and all these different formulas for finding out your dream somebody's never asked themselves that question before where do they go well if we're talking about a 40 year old who doesn't know dream and they need to find it I would argue that they're caught in fight or flight and they're created part of their brain which was probably very active when they were five years old has slowly been squeezed out of them and they become very practical and they can't even think of their dream so the only way to activate your creative part of your brain and come up with your dream is to get out of that trap get out of fight or flight now you can do it two ways by working your way and financially reducing your costs or psychologically saying to yourself in some sort of like meditation I'm rich I've got all the money I need now what would I do and try to take yourself out of like oh I've got no money I've got to pay the bills at the end of the month I've got to pay the car finance I've got to pay the electricity bill that will not that part of your brain that fight or flight part of your brain will override everything you cannot think of your dream when you're caught in that so you've got to get out of it and you either do it but actually financially freeing yourself or getting your brain into a relaxed state to allow you to figure out what your dream could be now if you fall into another camp where you actually know your dream you're lucky enough to know your dream just fucking do it and do it before you have regret because regret is the worst thing you can ever have in life do not have regret you just have to do it jump go do it now give yourself you know if you've got kids and stuff you know give yourself a one way prepare the ship but go because you will not be living for long go for it now worst is it's an experience and the good news is if you've got a good job now you can get a good job later you know go for it take a year try and you'll be shocked how far you can get in a year give yourself that time and at least if you try and you fail you at least won't have regret how do you know if it's the right dream though how do you know it's around the right path and this is you know Kevin O'Leary speaks about this a lot right you know when when a business idea is bad you have to take it behind the barn and shoot it and a lot of people don't shoot their business ideas quickly enough and they keep on pursuing this dream they have when it's no longer serving them and I think that that's a fear that people have too what if I make the wrong decision what if my dream there's no market for it how do you think through that or maybe you're a believer that any dream if you stick with it long enough you can make it a reality so I think you're talking about failure here you're talking about the fear of failure yeah that's that's really what you're talking about and so because let's say you think you know your dream and you go out there and execute it and one of two things happen either it doesn't work and that's that's just business life sometimes ideas don't work or it's not actually your dream so I had that by the way I started a gardening company at 15 years old that wasn't my dream but I did need money and luckily I forced myself to start a business and I discovered that I like marketing not gardening by trying stuff now this is why I think it's so important to fix the education system because the younger you are the easier this is no doubt okay if you're young like I was 15 when I started my first company I can start a gardening company waste a year and go that's not my dream right so the younger you start the more chance you have of like figuring out what it is that your dream is right so I asked my three-year-old what problem do you want to solve it took him four years to even have a comprehension have any sort of answer now it might be that his real dream is not to stop the sick extinction right but at least he's thinking if you start thinking about that maybe who along the way discover his real dream if that isn't actually his real dream right you've got to start young now if you're starting older I hope you at least know what you like doing and what you don't like doing that's a good place to start so if you like fishing try to go into a business that involves fishing you know at least then the worst-case scenario if it's not solving the world's biggest problems you're doing something you love every day and that is success yeah it's so true I think that also I'm a big believer I fall into the camp of if you take action if you have if you have something you love if you take action I'm a big believer if you find a way to stay with it for a long enough period of time you will find a way to become some version of successful at it I mean you have to be smart you have to learn from your failures you have to I mean the resources that we have access to now are unlimited podcasts books YouTube videos but if you stay with something for a long enough period of time you'll find a way to be successful at it I think that the the the the the X factor and even like you know you mentioned like when you were 15 you you you had no interest in gardening and that was like a in theory if you did that for 20 years you'd find a way to become successful at it you'd find a way to make money you'd find a way to build teams around you you'd find a way to scale so I think that a lot of this is also not jumping into something and assuming that it's going to happen in the next two to three months finding a way to give yourself some runway and some time and I think you know it's cliche and people don't like me saying this but you know it's not about filling a market gap it's about doing something you enjoy because follow through is 99% of the reason most people are successful they just kept going you know and I started a creative agency in Hong Kong you know in China there was probably about 15,000 companies doing exactly the same as what I was doing and the reason I became successful at it is because when I enjoyed it and too I followed through you know I got it on the financial crisis after financial crisis and problem economically again and again again we pushed through and you know we were just there at the finish line and so a lot of time you know that's why I say if you're doing something you love and people hate me saying this for some reason you're like no you should pick a business where you're filling a market gap or yeah sure if you want to make a quick buck and you hope that you can sell the company and all that but if you actually want to build something you love you will win if you do and that's what that that's the secret sauce it's just that simple you know and if you do like fishing go build a business in fishing you know you like to keep going when it gets tough because you enjoy it simple what why do you think people hate and get angry when you say that is it because like I don't understand like it just makes it makes a lot of sense if you can find something you love because when the motivation runs out by the way when the motivation runs out that that you need to get started when that runs out you need something else to pull you through all the difficult things that are going to inevitably happen when you're an entrepreneur and I think passion is a huge piece of that but I don't know why people get so angry um I think you know what I think about the people that are actually getting angry about it sometimes it's a combination of things um it's they didn't do that so they've got a life that doesn't involve doing what they love and then maybe they've made money so I'm not saying you can't make money not doing what you love I'm saying why not combine the two so a lot of us have survival bias right and I'm a victim of this like I survived thanks to entrepreneurship so I believe in all my heart that that's the thing that people need to learn I happen to think I'm right and it's got nothing to do with survival bias but we all have that I think a lot of people they have a life where they maybe did build a business that was in a niche and it was about making money and they did it again I say a lot of people in the property business like this but if you actually dig a little deep they've had three divorces and they're not really that happy and they've done something for 20 years but they don't enjoy it and they've done it because they make money and it's fundamentally made them more miserable again I know a lot of people like this so but they have that like well no survival bias they're like no I built a business and I don't like this business but I've made money out of it and yeah I have to overcharge nurses for rent you know but so what I make money you know like so you don't need to do something you love just so I think there's definitely survival bias problem that's one type of hate that I get I think the other type of hate is really a combination of ignorance and lack of action on their side so a lot of the time people don't they don't think that their hobbies can be businesses they've actually come to believe what they've been brainwashed that these are just hobbies and you can't make money out of it someone said to me I want to be a dog walker how am I gonna make money out of that then I'm like well how much money do you need to make each month like what is it what is lifestyle business and what is a job you know like actually you can do a dog walking business you can do a dog grooming business you can do a dog product business to the people you were once dog walking for like you know what type of lifestyle do you want in that business and if you like walking I promise you I could come out of a business model for it so people don't think that their hobbies can be businesses because they're getting they're not taught business in school people don't put business models around their hobbies and so they just think it's bullshit but it's just just ignorance it's it's lack of education around how business works so their default is to say that's not possible how am I gonna make money I like playing I like watching Netflix someone said to me the other day in a comment how am I gonna make money out of that I'm like well there needs to be a Netflix review channel like what's good on Netflix because every time I go on Netflix I don't know what to watch and if it was a good YouTube channel telling me what was good and why I'd listen to it you know and they're like oh yeah I could do that I guess yeah yeah you like to sit around watching Netflix and here's a business model for you you know and I just just think it's because again school system doesn't teach you to do what you love what it does is exactly the opposite school system says right you're not very good at history you need to double down on that you've got a D in biology you need to do more with biology and add to the real words completely the opposite right so I do not care about accounts and finance so what do I do I hire a great accountant in every company I start I can read the numbers I don't I don't want to be bothered by them I want to make sure we're collecting the money and we've got I haven't got a cash flow problem of course but I don't want to be bothered with that stuff now I could go and spend five years learning accounts like the school system told me or I can just hire someone that loves all that stuff and so I think that's the thing school system again is at fault because it says learn what you're not good at and then learning becomes painful and then you you get put off learning yeah I think that you have to be so careful about the influences is around yourself with because I don't think we realize how much resentment people have because they've built their life a certain way and they try and impose that resentment on you and I think that that's where a lot of the bad advice comes from I think that and it's not even that this bad advice is meant to be malicious but I think that if you think about parents parents are coming from a place of we want to protect you because we only know how to live a certain way and also I think there's a little bit of not explicit they'll never say it but I think that if they saw say they work a nine to five and they have the most influence on you especially when you're younger they want you to succeed but I think there's a little bit of resentment in their mind that they weren't able to live this life that has so much financial freedom or so much time freedom and I think that that hurts I think it hurts sometimes to see people do better than you and not everybody thinks like that obviously but I think enough people do that you have to be very careful who you who you listen to and who influences you I think I think a lot of the time parents they don't know what they don't know so they will give advice the truth is if you want to succeed don't take advice from people whose life you don't want if you take advice from your parents look at their life and say do you want it do you want it do you want to be paying a mortgage into your 65 and working a job you hate for your whole life only take advice from people whose life you actually want and I know I would say this is true of me and of any influencer out there if you want me you know have a criminal record with a tag on you and be chased by you know a certain government all the time then follow certain influencers of ice you know if you've got to look at the life that that person has created based on what they're telling you is what they tell themselves and therefore that's their life like I am married 23 years if you want to get with a lot of women don't listen to me you know if that's your objective then don't listen to me you know and and and I do think that you've got to look at the people giving you advice and say right is that life I want because you have their life if you follow their advice yeah and I don't think people put a lot a lot of stock into that they just follow the loudest they follow the loudest person on social media and then they then they're surprised when their life starts to turn into exactly what that person said it would exactly yeah when you bet on people because I know that you invest your own money and you've invested in and I don't even like hundreds I don't even know how many companies invested in 81 businesses 81 businesses and you've spoken to hundreds and hundreds of entrepreneurs when you look at the traits the the personality traits that will in your mind make somebody a winner in pursuing their dreams it's good to have a dream but I think that there has to be a personality along with it that is going to allow them to execute against the steps that will be required to tell them achieve their dream what are the personality traits the commonalities amongst the people that win so there's probably three things that make a successful founder in my opinion that I invest in the one that's not talked about much is of course coachability so it's someone that can listen and learn and take criticism that I love criticism I like I like feedback how can I be better so I started on my social media journey five years ago now I have 14 million followers and 400 million views a month I've got quite good at content but when I started out I will permanently ask for criticism I even do it now how can I be better how can my YouTube videos be better how can my education content be better I think it's a coachability the second element that I look for is fun you know like when you invest in someone you're you're basically getting married and so you know I've been invested in one company now nine years so every month for nine years I've spoken to the founder and I think I think this is something people need to recognize when they're getting into business with someone as well you know is it going to be fun business is meant to be fun and then I think the final thing you know and about repeating over and over again the same thing is like the people that are really successful take it personally you know in business that they don't take it personally big mistake you know the most successful people take it very personally I am not going to stop until I have fixed the education system even if I've died I've made a whole load of content for when I'm dead to keep this going I it's not going to stop and so I think when you you know I'm going to help that 15 year old me that that felt pain when they left school and didn't have help the education system hadn't given me the tools to live in the real world I will not stop until this problem is solved even if it means I have to arm up my competition to do it and I think that that's the that's the trait that I'm going to call it tonacity if you like I'm going to call it passion or purpose but you know if people have a dream then you cannot stop them and if it's rooted in pain that gives you purpose then people do not stop and and many businesses I've been involved in have failed but those founders haven't stopped and the ones that have failed and stopped the ones that never really felt pain and never really cared about the purpose how that's I agree with you and I've had this conversation with several people how does somebody and this is why I think that people that hit rock bottom or have a chip on their shoulder actually if they can get out of that shitty circumstance can become great entrepreneurs but for somebody that did not have a very very difficult life moment what's the what's the wisdom to them they're like I don't know how to feel pain towards the problem that I'm solving I just think it's a good problem and I'm a workhorse and I'm going to give all like I'm going to give my all to it but how do you get them to feel that pain so that they can keep going I think pain is a gift and those that haven't had pain and therefore found purpose I I know there's a lot of people like that first of all would say it's a disadvantage and I'm glad I've had pain it's made me successful and it's made me more important than success define whatever that is for yourself but for me it's like time freedom I think it's made me feel alive and so the pain I had when I'm 15 years old has given me this life I've got today than where I you know bounce out of bed in the morning like let's go let's solve this problem but if you haven't got that if you haven't got that pain first of all there is an argument that you know lucky you in a way but what I would say is maybe you can tap into someone else's pain and find purpose in their pain so for example I have 29 people that help me with this platform so it's not just me with a camera like people think I have 29 people full time helping me and all of them care about the problem that I'm trying to solve now do they have the same sense of pain no do they care about the problem we're solving yes does that make them super motivated and super happy to be involved in this mission yes so they've tapped into my pain and made it their pain and that is a hack I love that I absolutely love that and I think that just I mean there's we we've been speaking a lot about you know education systems and entrepreneur mindset ideas a lot of a lot of wisdom about hiring the right people and not just hiring people that want a job for a job but hiring people that are on the same mission and just as driven as you and actually one of my favorite ideas around hiring is you actually can hire people not only that are mission driven and aligned but people that at a different point in their life could be entrepreneurial but maybe it's just not their time to be entrepreneurial and if you find that person who could be an entrepreneur but isn't interested in right now you bring them into your company plus they're aligned with that pain in that mission that's like the A-player superstar that's going to take you to the next level and we can do a whole podcast on hiring but I love that well hiring is very simple people always tell me one of the biggest problems they have in business is managing people and I tell something that I want to be true from hardcore experience that you don't need to manage people you need to manage purpose if you get purpose clear then people will manage themselves and you hire around purpose so I find people that aren't brilliant at say social media but they care about the purpose so much they get good at social media like some of the most successful athletes were not the best athletes at the beginning they were just focused so I think you know you want to hire people that care about your purpose and then they don't need managing the other thing about is and what you're talking about there sometimes it's the entrepreneur right it's the person inside the company this like for example I had a business partner in fluid and she's a graphic designer and when I met her if you'd asked her what are you she would say a creative she would say she's a designer right she would not describe herself as an entrepreneur and so I was the entrepreneur that partnered with her in that business but honestly once she she had equity and the way she worked she cared about the problem we were solving she cared about the work so she became an entrepreneur she was already one but I helped her realize she was one and equity helped she become an entrepreneur owning a part of the company and then the way you work the way you care about the problem as if it's your own makes you an entrepreneur so it's not for you know I'm an extrovert I'm a marketing guy so you know I'm the one type of entrepreneurship there's eight different types but everybody listening to this is one type of entrepreneur and yes it might be that your accountant is not seeing themselves as an entrepreneur but if they come into the company and they get equity and they work like you do you're a big fan of giving equity I'm assuming yeah that's how outside of giving equity I mean we can talk about strategies for that to do a properly investing properly cliff period just to make sure that you're not giving equity the people don't take it seriously but outside of giving equity strategically in the business outside of aligning the purpose what would be one last idea that you can think of I know you've given a lot but one last idea you can think of just around getting people to buy into what your vision is when you're hiring them what's the question you ask to know that if they actually care about what you're doing well this again three elements right so just to recap definitely you want to have the same mission you want to care about the same problem that's very that's very important right if if you don't have that you will have problems because they won't if they don't care about the problem your business is solving they won't go through the hard times with you it's really important and so I think it's hard to you know you can't really separate these things as different points so it's important and I think giving people equity giving people ownership it's not a good idea it's a must it's a must you cannot expect people to care about the business the way you do if they don't have the upside that you do it's not right it's stupid short term thinking give people equity and the final thing I think that you know the three things there so you know equity and purpose and then the final thing that you must do in my opinion is understand your alignment on moral code and so are you the same when it comes to ethics and so I've learned this the hard way I've I've had business partners that I thought were ethical and they then they weren't right so you have to test for moral code alignment what is that person willing to do that you're not willing to do what is their rule of life and what is your rule of life and I'll give you an example when I was younger like maybe 25 26 years old I had a financial problem in the business and I was speaking to Helen my business partner at the time and I said to her we have enough money in the bank to pay us as founders and cover our bills but we're going to have to delay paying our stuff and Helen said something to me that that that was right and I was wrong she said Simon we have to pay our people first we have to and I'm like well we have to pay ourselves first you know put your own mask on this is the bullshit I told myself she was like no we have an obligation to those people Simon we hired them they rely on us we have to pay them first and so I resisted but then I did what she said and I I improved in moral code and she was right and so we paid those people and we didn't have any money to pay our own rent food for ourselves nothing for about three weeks and then suddenly the business got paid it was what it was June we managed to get back on top and it was all fine and thank god I listened to Helen because if I'd broken that trust like I have employed people for the last 35 years I have never missed the first of the month payment to anybody ever and millions of people will probably end up listening to this podcast no one can ever say I didn't pay them when I said I would right and that's thanks to Helen okay it's it's you so not moral code yeah moral code alignment with the people you work with is critical because those if you don't do it right they they can corrupt you your business and your life yeah that's that's enormous and I think that if you find somebody in the company that is not aligned with your moral code get rid of them as soon as possible if if if you've made an accidental hire I think that that is key because that you're talking about founder down if you hire somebody that doesn't have the same moral code as you that is like a virus they can spread within the company totally yeah and that is also the same if they don't really believe in your purpose if they ended to believe in your purpose as they slowly chip away internally we're like oh this purpose is shit they mess with everybody they mess with everybody in the company and then all the people that are truly aligned they start to they start to see it well if that shit is allowed what am I doing here yeah well this is they're either gonna lower their standards or they're gonna this is the virus of what we call seven and eights right the virus of seven and eight so you know you've got ten ten play eight and nine's tens these are people that you know just brilliant they're happy you're happy you've got ones and twos within and and they're not happy they know they're not enjoying it you know you know it's not right it's easy to everyone make a decision to leave or quit or be fired but the seven and eights are the tricky ones where they you know that you think they could be better they could stick they care at some time they tend to care you've got to watch out for those because your nine's and tens leave if seven and eights stay pro lawn is a success story partner now long weeks and busy weekends can leave everybody feeling depressed and tired we work nonstop and that's why I love pro lawns five day fasting mimicking diet I absolutely love this company let me 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and speaking of opportunities they put together the CFO's guide to AI and machine learning and net suite dot com slash scott clary this is the playbook for understanding how to use AI for your business the guide is free that is net suite dot com slash scott clary yeah i just went i you know i don't want to go into a huge uh you know completely pivot one thing that i wanted to ask you a while back and i know you have an opinion on it and i was curious why you have this opinion on it you speak a lot about um property ownership as like uh well you you speak a lot about wealth building in general but you have views on property ownership and i'm just curious what are your view because anybody listens to this is entrepreneurial cares about investing and uh homes crypto stocks uh they want to become angels whatever they want to find a way to put their money once they make a little bit of it um but i don't think that you think that to my understanding that property is the best investment compared to some other assets so you speak a lot about property and real estate people why do you bring these up repeatedly about property investment and ownership of homes and is it a good investment vehicle in your opinion or not and if not for the person who has a little bit of money who is ambitious who wants to figure out how to invest uh what do you push them towards so this is a very big nerve you're touching with me on this one i know i don't understand why but i want to know because i have a lot to say on the subject and it's a cancer in the system of life for humans and i'm pretty worried about it and so it is a different take on the property business to most but i think if people understood the full context of what i'm trying to say here there'd be even property owners on my side and i can give you a download i i i don't want to go too hardcore i don't know if you want me to go hardcore i can go hardcore on it it's up to you um but i'd like it if you did okay it's a smart audience go forward okay so there's different elements around the property business that we need to understand right let's start with a very basics if you are living in a property at this moment you own the property you own it most people 99% of people have a mortgage okay so that's there's just hyperfetically say you own it but you actually don't by the way if you go look at the paperwork the bank owner they've let you the mind to buy it it's there's until you pay the loan back okay and so you know just just keep in mind if if you know if if you're super rich people think you're buying property actually if you look at the nuance of it if you're super rich and you can buy 400 properties it's too much for you to manage it's too much work you put it into the stock market it would be even it would be easy it's very liquid put it in put it out but easy right property is not that liquid and it is a lot of maintenance so what actually happens is rich people give the money to the bank the bank is the intermediary to then lend you the money right so and let's just be honest let's try and agree on a few important things before I ran on about this right banks are not there to help you make money right they're there to make money out of you that is their objective and there's nothing wrong with that but that is their objective so they lend you the money because they know they can make money out of you first of all and this depends on different countries and different places and different people are going to have different opinions on where they are right now on how this plays out but in the majority of cases if the bank lend you the money to buy property first of all you'll get to end up paying two or three times more for that property by the end of the 30 year term so the property you're paying for price for now you're paying a lot more for it based on compound interest over time right so you're paying two or three times more for that house than you're paying for it on the day that you buy it in addition and we're just I'm going to break down the different property models all right so if anyone starts going on at me about how this much money to be made and property and just break down the models if you're buying a property to live in it technically in accounts terms it's classed as a liability not an asset if you ask people the property you own is it an asset or liability the dumb money says it's an asset they don't understand how money works it's not an asset it's a liability why primarily because it costs you money every month and doesn't give you money so it's not an asset now people will say well if I sell it I'll make two hundred thousand dollars I'm like sell it then but people can't all won't because they've got a deposit vested in it the mortgage company will have penalties if you try by the way which gives you a little indication as to where this system is loaded against people right they don't want you to pay back the loan right so you have a liability that you are having to maintain and the people that have lent you the money have got a guaranteed payment and a large percentage of people will default so they claim that back plus they've sold your house for three times the value and you haven't even realized it and then you were locked in for the next 30 years to pay that amount of money then as you abort that house 99% of people get stuck in that location where they bought that house and then they take all their savings and they put it into that house so instead of investing in a business that can generate you income or investing in a business that teaches you skills to allow you to make more money later people get stuck in a house that for the rest of their life they're going to have lifestyle inflation get a bigger house they're going to die in that house right and the only argument that then people make is okay yeah sure I'm going to pay three times more for it I'm going to get stuck in the location and not go with the opportunity is yes I I'm going to spend money on that house every month some shape or form fine but at the end of it I'll be able to leave it to my kids I'm like okay if your house is not in a trust and you die and you've got two kids that's based it on UK law it's very similar around the world but it's based on UK law 48% of that house goes in inheritance tax back to the government so then you've got two kids they get a roughly 20% of that house value in their pocket now they can only afford the deposit to pay the same fucking house you just spent 30 years paying off now those two kids can't even afford the house you had to sell so they could pay the inheritance tax that you worked your whole life to pay for it's ignorance people are stupid they have not been taught this so they think owning a home is the holy grail to a better life it's not so that that's one part that that that's home ownership which is the large bulk of the property market and by the way it causes huge inflation when people buy these houses and they think they're making money on paper but in reality costs of life have gone up to match so if they sold that house and had to go and rent all that money they're making will be sucked up by the cost they'd have to live right so no one wins in that scenario except the people that lend you the money all right now let's talk another part of the property market that people love to talk about which is buy a house and rent it out okay and this is like let's call this the only argument I could give to this is wealth preservation right so you you you have some money this is all the way off to the middle class structure you have a bit of money and you buy a house and now you hope that it goes up fingers crossed and then you get rent to try and at least cover the mortgage right great but you've still got something a fracture in your mind where you have to manage this thing yeah so a little bit of your brain is being taken up having to manage it that bit of the brain that could have been building something that actually makes you money or teaches you something now you've got to worry about like changing the locks in the front door if washing machine here and there fixing a fence that fell down or making sure that you're following the laws so the tenant gets what they you know really a splinter in your mind taking your time away let's just put that to one side because a lot of people won't even recognize that as a problem and you say right now I own a property now in England there's a house in shortage which is zone one that house in 2014 sold for 750,000 pounds last week 2025 11 years later it's up for sale at 625,000 pounds it lost money and no one ever wants to talk about these houses that lose money it's like the only people want to talk about is like when they catch a big fish they don't want to talk about the big fish they don't talk about the little fish they count or no fish they call this house is lost money sent to have London shortage two bridge and flat it's gone down in value so someone bought that in 2014 and now they they lose money when they sell it all right so let's just remove the fantasy that every house you buy is going to go up in value of course that's not true but let's just assume it is true right there's just assume you bought a house it's gone up in value the thing is this this model is exactly the reason monopoly was invented by a very clever woman who wanted to highlight originally she designed two monopolies one the monopoly game we all know today where we play around in one winner at the end right and she wanted to show what happens when you make property a thing that is a basic human need is a basic human need somewhere to stay that safe and warm basic human need into a business and what happens is eventually like monopoly there's only one winner right and it won't be you it will be black rock it won't you your kids are going to suffer because you taken this house and made it a business the original design of monopoly they had a second board where the land was owned by the community tribalism and people could live without fear of being homeless right community driven tribalism how we used to live so land can't be owned by a business for yield because what ends up happening again I'll use English as an example I know it's the same in America but using English as an example there are nurses in this country who cannot afford to pay for rent and they cannot afford to buy house their own food stamps and they cannot earn more money so so you bought a house and you're getting maximum yield out of it while the person who probably saved your life in the emergency ward tonight cannot even pay their rent because some property developer is getting 8% out of it now I'm not saying you can't make money out of it I'm saying this is a moral code problem we cannot make property a business we have to understand it's a basic human need like electricity water water should not be a business right electricity was designed as a business now we're trapped by it right huge electricity bills huge water bills huge costs of living that are basic needs and by the way if you just look at the stats this is not conspiracy theory just look at the stats in 1999 in England there was 20,000 homeless people in 2025 there's over 350,000 and and this is caused by making property a business so for me it's not about can you make money in property maybe not guaranteed let's be clear it's not guaranteed maybe but is the really the way you want to live first of all if you do the property business you learn nothing you do not have any compound skills fit a kitchen in a in a new house change the lock charge a nurse too much for rent all right it's not a business we shouldn't call it a property business right the best it can be is storage of value but even then most successfully financially successful people don't need to buy a house to make a yield it's an inefficient way to make a yield so it's that you know I can go on but that's the basics yeah listen I um I don't disagree with you I think that the living should be you should be guaranteed it's easy to agree with that idea it's harder to figure out how you reinvent a system that has so much money behind it like blackrock is buying single family home like the machine is enormous so this is taking the conversation in an entirely different direction which I actually really appreciate because I've never really had this conversation on the show before but I don't have an easy answer if you're gonna ask me okay Scott do you agree with what I just said yeah there's a moral there's a moral obligation for people to have housing and be able to eat but what's the answer that's the complicated I think I think the answer starts with education you know it starts with like we understand that this is what's happening right so if you're rich and you're buying property this is this is the problem you are adding to and if the middle class is buying property this is the problem you're adding to and you're not putting money back into the real world economy when you invest in a business that business then buys products buys supplies hires people money goes back into the economy but when you invest in property it sits in that asset right it's not real world economy value and so again once the majority of people are educated then we can change behavior okay and I'm a capitalist the problem is on a simplistic level when people first hear this they think I'm a socialist no I'm not a socialist I'm saying if you want a policeman to protect you and you want a nurse to save your life and you want a firefighter to come and put the fire out in the houses you own then one you need to even pay them more or provide free housing or housing they can afford you cannot have your cake and eat it so so pick a lane you want no police because we can't afford them no fibergate because they can't afford to live and no nurse because they can't afford to even pay an in England they're paying for their parking for God's sake I mean they can't even afford to park if you don't want these people helping you then carry on buying houses if you want them to help you then we better start making houses for these people now that can come from property developers fine maybe that's one way they do it or it can come back to like government infrastructure the problem is the system that used to fix this was government they're all in debt now they're bored so much money to get elected every four years there's so much borrowed money that the interest payment alone is where all the money goes so there's no spare money to build houses and at one point in England anyway the conservative government sold all the public housing off so that so that then they made everyone homeowners and made everyone a bit richer at that moment but they caused a huge problem in society later because now no one can afford a home that needs it that's on a lower salary like nurses fibergrade and police and so so look I mean you know I have a basic answer which is we should build more social housing I also have yeah and there are countries that there's countries that do it better by the way there are like the thing about I mean especially in the US and certain states taxes are very high same in the UK I mean I'm actually originally Canadian so very similar to the UK our tax bracket but the taxes to your point are going to interest they're not going to the social programs there are countries that are better at social programs than UK Canada and the US for sure that I think do subsidize housing more but I know that some countries it's I mean what you're dealing with in the UK I didn't realize it was that bad at all well look I mean I think that this is a problem that we should at least be able to talk about again I get a lot of this messaging because a lot of people are like no properties asset value people get rich joining property I'm like okay I didn't say you couldn't make money out of it I'm saying it's morally right thing to do right now when you see so many people suffering so many people homeless and a large proportion of the reason they're in that pain is because housing is so expensive everywhere in the world yeah if somebody wants to be and I also love that idea of if you are going to make money do it through giving value not just extracting value from the world give value to the world so I think that everybody can get on board with that message and I think that if people understood different again it's almost like real estate and property seems to be what everybody defaults to as an investment probably because the banks are encouraging you to do it it seems like the government to some degree is even encouraging you to do it and I don't think that people see a lot of other options they see other options is very high risk even though you make a good point that property is very high risk as well so when somebody's thinking about investing where do you recommend they start if not property well I mean investing as a general rule for me is about value that you can put back into the system and hopefully yes of course bring that money back to you so you can keep putting value back into the system so that's why I love investing in businesses because if I invest in a company they create real-world income they I invest in a company that that that makes rocket ships they're hiring people they're buying materials they're they're producing something that goes back into the economy and then that business should then become an income stream which then bring that money back to you to allow you to do the same again right so but I think everyone will have a different like reason for investing if you if you want to make a lot of money that's your main objective then I think the best investment you can make is in a business of your own because you're in control of what happens if you put money into the stock market which I am not an expert in so you know I don't I don't advise people to invest in the stock market but I totally get why people do it but you're investing in someone else doing the work and hoping they don't fuck up so if you got right test let today you better hope that Elon Musk doesn't do a tweet that noise everybody you know you're basically putting all your faith in someone else why don't you put faith in yourself now if you you've already made money from your own business like I've made money from my own businesses so now I'm investing in actually my own business again help bank but I'm also investing in other people's dreams and that allows me to give them money for them to then go spend that money making their businesses work which brings the money back in so that that that will world of economic investment not only pays me well sometimes I lose money some businesses don't work but at least that money went into the economy you know even the business fails there's still people got paid people spend money on whatever it was the business was trying to do computers and all these things you know we put money into the real world economy so even the business fails that money went back into the system right and whereas you know you buy a property it doesn't go anywhere sits there yeah do you think that just you know that message that invest in yourself invest in in building a business becoming an entrepreneur do you feel that anybody can become an entrepreneur everybody can be coming up an entrepreneur a hundred percent I don't know I don't know what this kind of everyone can go work for someone right people can't get a job okay all right some people get fired overnight and they lose their job their business collapses you know of course anyone can be an entrepreneur of course like we're we're incredibly smart beings like it's I just it blows my mind that there's even a question that we actually ask ourselves I think the real question we're asking is what type of entrepreneur are you okay stop some not everyone wants to be Elon Musk not not everyone wants to work as hard as me I think some people could have a lifestyle business I think there's absolutely nothing wrong with that I think entrepreneurship is just a framework to monetize ideally what you love doing you know and if you love doing it ironically most of the time you end up making money right it's amazing isn't it yeah it's hundred percent it's not that complicated and now some people don't realize that entrepreneurs like Helen I was mentioning earlier she was a graphic designer she didn't think she was an entrepreneur she thought she was creative all I did was put an equity structure around her so that her work ended up having value in equity so all anyone needs to do is understand how it equity works and how business modeling works put it behind them and they can be an entrepreneur and it doesn't matter if you're a painter you're an entrepreneur if you're an actor you're an entrepreneur you know and some of these actors now are proving they're entrepreneurs why they gone from acting to like Bible clubs and you know like it if you want if you're sports athlete you're an entrepreneur put a business model around your life get sponsors like Michael Jordan did you know Bill brands own products you know like it's it's insane to me that people think that there's some that can be entrepreneurs that some that can't there isn't there's some people that understand business structure and some that don't and in my opinion the score system is deliberately not giving it to people that's the that's the only difference but they they capable of being entrepreneurs they should be entrepreneurs I want to I want to finish with just a few um rapid fire questions to pull it some last bits of wisdom um you've given over a lot but before before we close this out I want to just drop all the links uh social everything so the people can connect with you so I mean uh what's your dream that's your book obviously that's sort of the theme of all your content but that's your book they can go get it anywhere they get books um if you have a specific link I'll put everything in the show notes I think you actually have it on your website as well as well I was looking on your dream uh I'm not UK I think or what's your dream perfect I'll get that set send the links over anything you want in the show notes uh obviously um if people want to follow you is it just at uh for signing school right it on all channels just check that it's verified because there's a lot of fake accounts around it of course of course anywhere else or anything else that you wanted to just bring up so that the audience knows um that we didn't talk about uh help bank obviously that's another initiative you're working on what else yeah I'll just say if anyone wants to help someone and have a better life just go and help bank.com for four minutes each day and make a difference for four minutes to yourself you help someone you get oxytocin and you'll feel happier so I'd love I'd love more people to go and help bank and be happier helping people and also go on there and ask for help so that that's that's that's important to me because it scales it beyond me helping people there's I can only help on average two people a day I tried to help two people per day and I've done that for the last five years but there's millions of people out there that need help and if all the listeners to your broadcast all went and help someone on help bank today we can make a huge difference so that's important to me and yeah by the book if you can I'm using the proceeds to fund people's dreams and I hope hope the book will bring some value to your listeners that would be amazing I think that's it it will it will thank you um okay I want to go through just a couple rapid fires just to pull it some last sort of words of wisdom from you um and thank you for taking the time I really appreciate you I hope I hope that uh I know everybody's watching on tick talk too I hope they enjoyed but uh I would I would okay so one thing that I like to understand because obviously not everything has been easy but obviously you know you look at where you're at right now and and people like oh you know great entrepreneur built a massive brand huge social following what is one risk that you took that was absolutely terrifying at the time but paid off getting married I love it yeah I actually think your partner in life you know um is probably the one of the most important moments and I don't think people spend enough time again understanding that person's moral code are you going to have fun the purpose driven um I think I just got super lucky to find the right person who lets me dream lets me take risk trust me backs me up and I think you know it's a big risk when you're young though to you know dedicate yourself to one person for the rest of your life you know it's very scary but uh I think it's probably the reason I'm successful is having the right person behind me and it doesn't have to be your partner like my in my case it's my wife I think it's it's it's someone that's kind of got your back you know like take a risk investing people someone that's gonna know be there for you and support you and I think that's the biggest risk I took I just said yeah all right we'll get married I think she asked me I don't work though I agree with you completely like having the having the right person at home if if you have that person you know exactly what we're talking about if you don't please find that person or find a group of people if you're finding them yeah invest it's a good investment and so yeah I mean it could just be a co-founder I'm talking relationship it could be the right co-founder you just need no one can do on their own you know but this is again score a toll sit down and do the exam on your own no people that win win in teams and so you know it's it's saturday at five o'clock I'm doing this podcast with you you know I've got my partner supporting me she's not like where are you supposed to be making the barbecue and do you know it was like he's working I support him this is what he wants to do so you know and that's important I couldn't do it without that because we just got to it was saying yes what would be one one lesson that you learned that was useful but you would not wish this lesson on anyone else because it was probably a little bit traumatic pain is good pain gives you purpose I wish pain for everybody and it's but I say that to your point I also don't want people to have pain in a weird twist you know good luck and bad luck are both luck so if you have bad luck it can turn into good luck equally by the way you could have good luck the turns into bad luck in lottery ruin it winners have good luck and they often end up a nightmare later right so I think you should lean into bad luck and realize it can be a superpower if you frame it right you've spoken about hacking your luck before what is the easiest idea that somebody can understand so that they can hack their luck be born in the right location I'm kind of joking you know luck I know I'm trying to figure out where you're going with this well you know 2% of your life is predetermined by where you're born so that is one you know people say the harder I work the luckier I get like where you were born how hard did you work in the womb you know like people say that like you know you you worked hard in the womb to make sure you're born in a country that allows you to say what you want to say you know I think I think the you know so but only 2% of your luck is that type of luck 98% of your life is luck that is hackable when it's basically three elements one is the more risk you take the luckier you get every time you take a risk you increase your chances of luck people don't take enough risk so they they they are fearful of risk the second element of that is like learning to embrace fear so fear is an asset so fear used to be like a lion's coming towards us we feel it and it makes one faster think differently we we survive we beat a lion strong and faster than us we can beat them when we feel fear fear is an asset you're meant to feel fear lean into it and then the third element is like basically know your destination too many people are running around in circles and they're not going somewhere and if you know your destination the chances of luck 10x because you know where you're going you know what you need you know you need to ask of the things you need to get there you know you have a road map you have a plan and so you know you can increase your chances of luck dramatically if you just you know leaning to fear take risk and know your destination for yourself what was the highest personal price that you paid for your success well I mean personal price is a difficult one I think I've got a great life today and I have near zero regrets I've gone for everything it's a beautiful answer that's a good answer if you want to be yeah but I know I'm trying to be you know real and I would say you know I left England when I was 24 23 24 years old and I left a lot of friendships behind so I think that's one of the things you know you can and I'm frankly I'm glad I did because I went and lived in a different place and I made new friends and I think sometimes you can get stuck in the past and you can get stuck with friends you went to school with who aren't necessarily going to help you become the person you want to become but I I missed those school friendships you know like those chats about when you were five and what it was like so I have actually since I moved back to England we kindled a lot of those relationships but I think that that's quite hard and that's quite a tough thing to do and I think that sometimes I'm like well you know would I have deeper friendships if I'd stayed in England with those people in my hometown and you know that that is a strange not regret but it's a strange vibe where you're like it's definitely some sacrifice to go and experience the world and try things I mean anyone that's gone and left their family and lived overseas would know what I mean it's hard but you have to do it I think you have to have that experience especially seeing the world you have to see the world and to truly understand the opportunities I think so too and I think that there's nothing wrong I mean it is hard but I think that uh listen you're not you're not abandoning people you do have to you do have to figure out what life you want and if the people that are surrounding you at that point in your life are they gonna help you get there I think that is important like the clichés are true about you know you are the some of the five people you spend the most time with like these these things are true I like I have good friends and I have like listen they have great careers they're back where I was born and nothing wrong with any of it but my life would be dramatically different yeah if I had if I had chosen to stick around yeah and and not you know make some of the moves that I've made last last question and I and again you've given so much but I like to ask this through the lens of um out of all the things you've learned in your life you can only pass on one piece of wisdom to your children so assume the most important thing that you've ever learned because that's all that they can learn from you in this theoretical question what would that what would that piece of wisdom be and why that you want to pass on the purpose of life is a life with purpose