This is How Much Alex Hormozi is Actually Worth

(upbeat music) - I have a friend who has done a bunch of business with Alex Hermosi and he said that Alex might be the smartest person who he's ever met, which I told Alex that. - I made my day. - So here's the thing, Alex Hermosi, he definitely knows how to make a lot of money. - We had taken 42 million in distributions before the sale. - And so you're 31 years old and you have something like $60 million in cash. - Yeah. - The question is though, does he know how to use it well enough to make him his happiest self? And just like the rest of us, he's still figuring it out. - The reason I'm really annoyed about it is 'cause like I actually made this mistake another time three years earlier. - I'm Sam Parr and this is Moneywise. The podcast where we get super deep and transparent on people's personal finances, typically people who are high net worth. And the reason why this episode is gonna be pretty cool is because Alex Hermosi is a very well known person. If you're watching this channel, you definitely have seen Alex before. The only difference is that on Moneywise, he's not necessarily gonna talk too much about business but his personal finances. Probably one of the only times that I've seen him do this. And so he's gonna talk about how spending for both business and personal has changed over the years. And he's also gonna reveal all of his numbers. And we're also gonna learn the main thing that has brought Alex a ton of fulfillment and it's not money. And by the way, this podcast, it's made for a very specific audience. It's made for people who are inside of my community, Hampton is my community that I started a couple of years ago. It's a private, highly vetted community for high net worth founders, people who have companies ranging from three, five million in revenue all the way up to hundreds of millions in revenue. And the reason why I started this podcast is because I've been able to see all types of amazing conversations about money, about growing companies that typically happen only behind closed doors. And I thought it would be awesome to just share all of this information. And that's what Moneywise is. And so if you're a founder that does at least three million in revenue and you love having these intimate sort of private conversations about money, about growing businesses and things like that, then check it out, joinhampton.com. (upbeat music) All right, let's get to it. Starting with what I'm sure you guys are all wondering. For a guy who talks so much about money, how much is Alex or Mosey actually worth? It really depends on if we're valuing liquid assets or what I would consider like very tradable assets. You know, like a real estate building, maybe it's up or down by a little bit, but you'll probably be within 10% of a guess, roughly speaking. So my like, my tradable assets are about 95 million. My equity in school is worth a lot. And I have other equities that are like that, that are liquid that aren't gonna have liquidity events for periods of time, but have third party events that have occurred that have given them values. And those are an excess of 100 million on that side. - So you think that on things that you can sell within 30 to 60 days, your net worth is 100. And if you had six to 12 months, you're gonna be in the 200 range. - Yeah, that's probably about right. And just to cover my FTC basis, I promise everything that I say here is not for purpose of guarantee your income. You have your own, my results vary. And those equity values vary every day. - Do you keep any public equities? Or I think I heard you say you keep mostly in cash. How's that broken down? And if it was a pie chart? - I probably have like 40-ish in equities. - Index? - Yeah, mostly. Yeah, just indexes. I think I've got like 25 or 30-ish in real estate. Then I've got probably five to seven in venture stuff. And so a lot more logo's there, but smaller check sizes. And then I'd probably say the rest of it is kind of like distributing in cash or cash equivalents. - And then the rest being acquisition.com equity value in school, equity value. - Yeah, that's the, yeah, that's stuff, yeah, for sure. And for all the nerds out there, there's another number that I'm sure you also want to know. - What type of lifting are you doing? - I've just been doing bodybuilding stuff. Which to me is just normal strength training. Like I just, I have my reps, I add weight every so often and keep doing that until eventually I can and then I start over again. - What do you think some of your maxes are at the moment? - Oh, I mean, I haven't done barbell lifts in years. - Just dumbbells? - Like dumbbells? Yeah, I only do dumbbells for overhead press. - Machines. - No, I'm saying like I'll do dumbbells, like shoulder press. I'll do shoulder press with dumbbells as my primary pressing move. So I do, I do hundreds for like 20. - That's a lot. - It's not just for show. - It's not just for show, mostly show, but every once in a while I have some go. - But before Alex was worth $200 million, he was actually a pretty awkward kid. - I didn't fit in well. I had like a handful of friends that I like did some of the social stuff with, but I didn't feel like I believed in meshed anywhere. But I was decent at sports. I had pretty good genetics for muscle. That's, I mean, that's always been the case. I was always, I was always pretty strong. - The Persian blood? - No, for real though. I was varsity wrestling, soccer, I was a goalie, and then I played tennis 'cause my dad wanted me to play tennis. - What did your parents do for work? - Most doctors. - And so was there a moment that you remember where you're like, I want to pursue making money? - Yeah, I always wanted to make money. It's just that making money was redefined because in Baltimore, being a doctor was rich. Like that's considered like you've made it. - What like $250,000 a year or something? - Honestly, it's like when I grew up, I didn't, like they don't really talk to me. Like for me at least, like no one really talked about how much money they made. I thought $100,000 a year was a lot, and so that was actually my first goal of income, was $100,000 a year. So if you'd asked me in high school, what do you want to do is six figures a year. But it was only one of them at the college, and then I went pre-med, and then I met all these other guys like New York money that it was like, I learned about like private equity investment banking, management consulting. I was like, whole, and like these kids had money. I was like, what is going on? And that's when I like my world kind of opened up. - I think that's the value of college. - Yeah, I think the opportunity and the network that you build, it's just really the biggest thing is the opportunity, like the expansion of what you see as possible. And I don't know what this, like you can say it, you can follow people on social media, but until you see somebody in front of you, just like offered a buy building because they get turned down from the club. You're like, what is this? There's a girl who wasn't getting let in 'cause she was underage rightfully so to a club, and then she just says, put it on my black card, and they were like, this isn't how this works, and she was really drunk, and she was like, my dad will buy the building, whatever, like just put it on the card. And I just just like, I don't even know what's happening right now. I was like, how can this level of wealth exist? And it just, it shaped a lot of just like, how much more was out there. Were you a partier in Nashville? 'Cause Nashville's an easy place to go off the edge. - It is an easy place to party. Yeah, no, I was fraternity president. So of an SEC college, so yeah, we partied like hard. - But you don't know. I mean, you're pretty straight edge now. I mean, you only care about one or two things, it seems like you care about work in your wife. What changed in college, you think, that was like, I'm gonna be laser focused on one or two things. I'll give you the short story. So my freshman year, I came in and had made a pretty bad reputation for myself in high school. And so I said, you know, college is gonna be like my new virgin ground. I can, you know, create a new name for myself and then with it. - What was the reputation? - I kind of slept around a lot in high school. And just like, yeah, just, I didn't have a good reputation. And so I was like, okay, I wanna not do that again. And then went to college and was like, oh my God, this is like high school, but 20 times as big. And then just went absolutely nuts. And I was at a one something for all the classes I was in. And my dad, being the father that he is a Middle Eastern, you know, like, it was just like, oh, you don't need to go to Vanderbilt if you're gonna do this. (laughs) You can just do this here for free. And so he said, if you don't pick this up, he's like, I'm taking you out. From that moment, which is fall break of freshman year, I didn't go out once and I studied for everything and pulled my GPA up to a three, I think it was a three two for the semester. So I got an A on every single assignment from that point forward. And then right after that, I pledged. And that was when I learned that you could just study ahead for things. (laughs) And then it just became, I would always do nine to nine was my shift, I'd be in the library from nine a.m. to nine p.m. with the only exclusion of going to the gym or going to the cafeteria. And that was my schedule. And so I still partied though. The party realistically, I would love to say it's because I had some new virtues that happened, but honestly, I think it's just because hangovers become worse. (upbeat music) Alex is already a pretty famous guy. And so you're likely expecting the gym launch story, which has been talked about a ton on different podcasts. But what you might not know about him is that before he started gym launch, he actually had a really interesting way of getting into entrepreneurship. (upbeat music) - I did two years of management consulting and then, well, then it was four years of me running the gyms. And then I went to gym learning. What did you do consulting? - It was defense contracting, DC. - That's crazy to me that you have that life, by the way. - Space cyber intelligence, baby. - That's just crazy to me. I do not, it's really challenging for me to picture you doing that. (laughing) - Yeah, it was a ride. Our whole job was like, okay, well, all these different sources of intelligence cost this much. There's all this overlap. Is there a way that we can make this, can we make getting bad guys more cost effective? (laughing) But yeah, anyway, those, some of the stuff I've worked on. When you were doing those two years, were you thinking, this is a stepping stone or were you thinking, I gotta get out here and get rich? - Interestingly, it wasn't I gotta get out here and get rich. It was, I gotta get out of here, period. And so me leaving that job, I was actually very miserable. And I don't blame the job. I think it was just me at the time. But like, I was very miserable. And for me, it felt like a rock top moment. 'Cause like, I made, very good money and still lived in like, I lived in like 1200 bucks a month, so I was like making way more than I needed. - How much were you making? - I think I was making 60 a year, but it was really lumpy because it was this very small firm, and so I lived on nothing, and then I would just get these like $20,000 checks. I think the last year I made more, but like I think starting out, I think it was 50 or 60 out of college. And mind you, this is 20, you know, whatever, how many years ago. And then it's a very random thing happen, but basically like, it was a super small private firm, they would spin up and spin down contractors as they got jobs. We were sub under Booz Allen, and basically at the very end, I essentially worked for no paycheck for like six months, very weird. And then right at the end, I got two checks for one for 20 and one for 30, and that was like 50 grand, and that was basically enough for me to start whatever I wanted to start. - Yeah, and it's kind of like four savings, because you're like, oh shit, I gotta live off 20, and then so you have a $20,000 of your budget or lifestyle, and then you're like, oh hell yeah, bonus, I just got 30k, I'm worth 30k. - I'm rich. - 30k, yeah. - I think there's something too, what you just said though, because like I've actually lived without paycheck for like many, many years of my life. - Me too. - Yeah, you did too. Like when I had my gyms, I lived for multiple years without taking a paycheck, and I didn't take a paycheck, you know, like for a period of time with the consulting thing. So like I've always lived not just like kind of within my means, but like so dramatically below my means. I still probably deal with this, but like I have a decent amount of anxiety around overspending, because I think like the worst mistake you can make is like, it's 'cause it's so like, it's just consumption. I guess it's kind of feels like a lack of self-regulation, and that's why I don't like it. Like, so I mean, exactly. - I have the exact same fear. - And when broke, yeah, I went to a million dollars here when broke, I'd be like, that's horrible. - So you were roughly 22, 23, 24, when you left the contractor, and then you did the gyms, and then gym launch, so that gets us to what age, to like 30? So I exited gym launch at 31. - And how much money do you think you made between the ages of 23 and 31? - Yeah, so I basically made almost no money for like the four years of the gym because I just kept opening new locations with the cash. So like from personal income standpoint, I was making almost nothing. Then I sold the gyms in aggregate for I think $80,000, and so I probably had something like a hundred grand it saved up after all the gyms, because I sold them. - After what age? - 26. - So you're 26 with 80 grand? - Yeah, right around there. And then I started the turnaround business we were flying around, and that kinda worked, didn't work, I lost the money twice, 'cause the 80 grand that I got from selling, I then put into that partnership that failed. I think I've told it talked about it before. - Yeah, and you got robbed. - So then I was back down to zero again, at 26 after having the gyms, and then did the, started doing the launches, that started making a little bit of money there, and then once we switched the licensing model, that's when it really took off. And so when I was 27, I took home three million in income, and like the audience how wild this was, it's like I literally was looking at bankruptcy attorneys 12 months earlier, and they made $3 million in profit, like in six months, 'cause it was the back six of that next year, so it was just insane. It was absolutely absurd. - How much profit and revenue did the company do when you were 27? - I think we did six, eight, and three. Six, eight, top line, I think I did three in bottom line. Got it, so you had no very little cap-ax or no cap-ax, so you just scraped it. - It was just me, okay. - Yeah, I mean, Layland, I just got married, and it was like me, her, and I, and assistant, we were doing like 300, 400 grand a month in the very beginning, and I was like, this is nuts. (laughing) - So, almost overnight. - Yeah, no, I mean, very much almost overnight. And so then at the end of that year, I think I still remember some of the numbers, but it was like, we did, as I was turning around, like flying out business to the licensing one, like it was during that month or two period, I transitioned. - And the license meaning like, that's gym launch, that's like the playbook to make your. - Yeah, that's the one that really worked, yeah. So, 120, 180, and then I think we did 320, and then 480, and then I think we cracked 700 the next month, and then we hit a million the next month, and then I think we finished the year at either a million or a million two, run rate. - Profit per month. - That was revenue, that was revenue. - And that was still three people? I think near the end of the year, we added more people, but the very beginning when it was just us, like that first three months or so, that was that. But yeah, so we finished the year 6, 8, 3, the next year we did 25.9 million top line. It's 15.9 million in bottom line. I think it might have been 26, and we're the exact number, but it was 26-ish top line, and then 15.9 million in bottom line in the second year. The year after that, we did 37 million top line, and I think I did 13 and a half bottom line. I put a ton of cash into starting the supplement company, prestige labs, and so that took a lot of my bottom line away. And then the next year was COVID, and the e-bidator for the next two years is under NDA, but I did 31 million top line in the year of COVID, and then the next year we sold. - And then you sold it, and so at 31 years old, we had taken 42 million in distributions from Jim Launch before the sale. And so you're 31 years old, and you have something like $60 million in cash. - That was less than that because it taxes, because we had 40-ish, and then whatever. 0.6 on that's 24-ish, and then we got 31 million in cash for the sale, because we kept a third of the company. So we sold two thirds, all cash, for 31, and then we paid 20% on that. So what are those 22 plus 24 or five, whatever, somewhere in there? We're like 45, 50 million. What did you say? - 60. - Okay, yeah, so that's what it was. - Yeah. - Were you spending a lot? - No, not at that time. I had a house in Austin that we bought for $1.8 million in cash and that house, we sold for $4.2, 36 months later. So I was cool. - What neighborhood were you in? - Spanish jokes. - Yeah, time that one nicely. - Yeah, yeah, worked out really well. That was BKV, but we didn't really increase our spending. Not really. Like, I don't have a fear of running out of money anymore. Like, that's not really been a thing anymore for a minute. But I was like, I'd say, took like three years to like start learning how to spend money. Well. - When you're 31, you're sold 32 years old, you've worth 45 million liquid. What do you think your monthly expenses was over under six figures a month? - So I think it was under. I think it was under at that point. I think it's probably around that now. - 100,000. - Yeah, probably. It's probably around that. It might be more. - I'm just so happy to ask you. I may be the worst guest from this perspective. Like, I don't even have log-ins to my bank account. I have no idea. I check like our assets like once a year. - Real quick, today's episode is sponsored by Ocean's Talent. If you're trying to hide our great EA or ops person right now, you're looking at 80 to $100,000 sometimes more. And I know a lot of founders have tried to go the remote route before and gotten burned. Sometimes they get ghosted, the work sloppy, you end up redoing everything yourself. I've heard the stories before and I've even personally lived them. Ocean's Talent is completely different. They prevent every single candidate with thorough skills assessments. So whoever they match you with is ready to go on day one. And it's not just EA's. They do marketing ops, finance, HR sales, even AI workflows. I've hired people personally through Ocean's Talent and I'm blown away by the quality of work they produce. Sam Parr has his personal assistant through oceans and he describes her like this. She runs my life. I couldn't live without her. I have total trust in her and I don't trust anyone. That's the bar they set. So if you're a founder drowning and stuff a great hire should be handling, check out Ocean's Talent at oceanstalent.com/moneywise. That's oceanstalent.com/moneywise. - My deal happened when I was 31. So we were both about the same age. So it was like, we went from like, it felt like hand in mouth. Like I frankly felt poor to not being poor and it made me still very fearful for a long time. - Interesting observation on the feeling poor thing. I think it depends on the type of business that you sell. So like I felt poorer after I sold the company than before. - Because you lost your cash flow. - Exactly. Whereas if you have like a software company or you don't have a business that has cash flow and has more enterprise values kind of the play. Your company was a sell on cash flow and you had a lot of cash flow. So yeah, you cut off the fire hose. - Yeah, I don't think I'll do that again. And then all I thought was like, well shoot, now I gotta take this cash and go buy that amount of cash flow. And I was like, well shit, it's gonna be hard for me to buy that amount of cash flow with the money that I've got. And then I was like shoot, from there that's where our acquisition not come started. I was like, okay, let's see if I can figure out some sort of deals where I put some cash in and some work in and figure things out. And then at the same time started making content. And so that was kind of the trajectory from there. - That's such an interesting insight. I was gonna ask you about that because when I made my money, I go and I'm gonna invest this 80, 20 in stocks and bonds. And I'm just gonna assume that it's fake and I'm just never gonna, whatever it's gone. And I'll build another company. And so my whole stick was how do I start from scratch and just do this build another company again? And except this time it actually makes cash flow. - Your perspective was I have cash flow. Now I gotta use this to go buy some more. It's the difference between cap gains and cash flow strategy kind of. And that's like interesting. It was in your blood to have that cash flow. - I love cash flow. I feel very bad unless I have a huge amount of cash flow. It's an observation I've had of myself. Like I really, really like cash flow. - So your business or to your personal account? - Both. - Yes. - Are you taking distributions from me? Mac was ushered.com now, or are you? - Yeah. - Okay, so you're taking distributions? - Yeah. I take distributions, you know, outside of whatever we need to like reinvest in the business, if we need to do that, obviously we're gonna leave that in, but I take distributions on top of that. - When Alex says that he jumped into something right away immediately to get that cash flowing again, he means immediately. - It was the next day. - And what was the vision? - I wanted to basically say, okay, well, I started that company with no foresight, no plan and no money and just skill. And I was like, well, what if I had foresight, a plan, money and skill? And I was like, maybe I could come up with a better business model if I did it on purpose rather than on accident. But no, acquisition.com was, okay, what would it look like to have for forever business? You know, I looked at the people who were significantly wealthier, they'd been doing the same thing for a long period of time. I was like, okay, so long period of time is a constant. So it has to be something that I can do for an extended period. It has to have leverage. We have to create supply demand inequities. And so I was like, how do I do that? And I was like, okay, well, and that's basically where building a personal brand came from was like, I'm not gonna beat Warren Buffett or some of these, you know, super smart, whatever's I trying to play with public equities. That's not gonna be my game, right? And so I was like, I have to have a different game. So I have to have people who want to do deals with me where I can add unique value to a business. And so I don't need to be exceptional at picking them. I can just be exceptional at doing what I'm good at and then getting better returns on capital from that perspective. - It's pretty interesting that you said at 31, when you just had a sale, the next day, you already had a vision and a plan. I think that like, for example, for me, and I know a lot of people, like it's like, well, I want downtime or it's like, I don't know if I entirely, I wasn't intentional about reflecting on what did I learn, what did I not learn, what am I gonna avoid, what am I not going to avoid? Am I just gonna fall back into this lizard brain where I just follow my instinct versus following like the rules of the game that I said I was gonna play by. Do you know what I mean? - Yeah. So I'm a fairly large advocate for it. If you are gonna sell a company, know what you're gonna do next. I think some people don't like that. That's just my two cents. Because I've just, it feels very binary. Like I see some guys just like, devolve into nothingness and then like, drink themselves to death and just like, have like, be really depressed and like, aimless. Some people were like, well, you gotta go through the desert to get to the other side. I don't know if that's a requirement. I think we could put a narrative on that. Narrative on that after the fact. But for me, I, the year leading into the sale, I had done two deals that had done really well. Privately, it gets just the capital we had, you know, just 'cause we had money before the deal. And this had done really well. And they just like didn't take any time. It was really a lot of stress and I was like, man. - You bought a company or you bought a part of a company or something like that? - Yeah, yeah, I had a minority deal. I'd also done a bunch of like, I don't talk as publicly about this stuff. But like, I'd done a handful of lending deals that had done really well. I actually really love lending. I don't talk about it much, but like, I have yet to lose money on lending. - So lending means what, like a person who knew me. - For like a hard money deal. Yeah, somebody says, "Hey, I need $3 million in two days." And if you can get it to me, I'll give you a 5% of month. And I'm gonna hold it for three months. And I'm like, okay. And I'm like, well, what's it collateralized against? They're like the whole building. I'm like, okay, well, how much is the building worth 10? And it's like, well, how much do you need three? I'm like, all right. So I mean, the downside is that I have to take ownership of the building if they don't do it, but then some of them will shoot. I'd happily buy a building for $3 million if I can get it for 10. You know, sorry. - You gotta go use those muscles and like intimidate someone everyone's at a wallet. - Yeah, right. So like, I had a handful of deals that all went really well with that. So that was cool. And I was like, this is crazy. I was like, the amount, like, I didn't have to do anything. I talk about, I mean, one YouTube video about a deal that I did where I got 100 grand a month in interest for someone holding my cash for like 90 days and then give it back. And I was like, this was so chill. (laughing) I was like, how do I do more of this? And so that's what kind of got me into it. I think I was doing some of the neighborhood of like, two, three, maybe 400, I don't pin me down to it, but somewhere in the neighborhood of like, call it three or 400 thousand dollars a month near the end of the gym lunch days from like other stuff. And I was like, okay, this is kind of cool. Like this, you know, I, I, this. - Wait, so you were making two to three million dollars of income from other. - Yeah. - Yeah, other, yeah. - And the other was investing. - Yeah. - Yeah, active though to be fair. Like, you know, I mean, I was looking at deals. I was, you know, talking to business owners, I was helping them out, things like that. And so I did that for the year leading into the sale, which is what made me feel more okay about the sale. And then I was like, well, if I actually put all my attention to this rather than like, tiny bits of my attention, this would probably do well. And I think the reason I was really willing to start the next day is that the year of the sale, we basically like took that year as the year off. 'Cause it was the back end of COVID and we had already had an executive team in place that was running the company. And it was growing and making money again, 'cause COVID was kind of we're on the back half, right? And Layla and I decided we didn't want to be an Austin during the COVID stuff. And so we just started doing one way tickets from city to city to city for the whole year of 2021. And so we would spend, you know, one week, two week, three weeks in a city and we just leave when we felt like leaving. And that was actually like really fun. And so I didn't work that much for me during that year. It was also very depressed year for me because I didn't work that much. And so that was when I realized that like, I am the problem. You know, when I have lots of work going on, I can be like, man, there's a lot going on. I've got some stress. And then when I don't have stress, I'm like, man, there's nothing going on. Like this is stressful. And so I'm like, the constant is me. (laughs) Like I have dissatisfaction in independent of condition. Anyways, I was like, okay, well, I like the game. The game is what I, like that was when I realized, at least for me, my life motto just became like, basically just working hard because I felt my most satisfied when I had nothing left to give, like when I left it all on the field. And that's when I felt the best about me. And so I wanted to just get started on something a big chunky problem as soon as I could. And so that's where I started the next day. (upbeat music) Now, on the investing side, Alex being able to shift into that and make it work for him, that does not mean that it's easy. We've talked about that a ton on the show, the difference between investing and building a company and how they require very different skill sets. And so in my opinion, something I've talked about a ton, is that if you're building a business and you're making money, in my opinion, it's best to stick to a very simple allocation, just something like an index fund. Assuming that you're gonna be good at investing because you were good at business and making money in the first place, I think it just means you're really naive. And again, I say this a lot, but it's important. And it's crucial to acknowledge the amount of luck needed to start and eventually sell a company and make a lot of money. Alex, by the way, has thought about this a ton as well. - You know the stats on this? - No. - I looked it up. So there's 32 and a half million small businesses in the US, or sorry, just businesses in the US. Last year, it was 8600, had a private equity transaction or institutional level transaction. And so that's 2.6 out of 10,000. Like social media makes it appear so much more common or prevalent. Like if you had a lottery ticket, like every one of the business owners who starts a business is like, I'd like to sell someday, or maybe, I hear it a lot. So I'll just say like many business owners say, I'd like to sell someday. But if you knew your chances were 2.6 out of 10,000 or one out of 3,000, it's like, shit, that's not that common. - And the numbers are actually worse than that because if you include private equity or something, that doesn't mean that the owner's actually getting the money. Or sorry, if you include VC or institutional, because there's, I know so many people that have raised tens, hundreds of millions of dollars and they have some type of exit, but because of the numbers, it didn't work out. They walk away with their salary. So it's even lower than that. How would people sell their business and they're happy with the amount of money that they received? Tell you a company involves so much luck. And so that's why I think it's a bad thing to plan on. - Yeah, it's, there's so much timing. And the thing is, is that businesses are inherently volatile. Like most businesses are volatile. And you have to appear as though you're incredibly stable for like a 12 month period of time. And you want your revenue to just like keep slowly taking up and your gross margins to continue maintain. Like all these things that like, while you're actually running your business, like you care about, you're like, I don't care if this month is higher or last, like you just, you're just looking on a much longer time horizon. And so you're willing to make moves. But like that's why that year that we basically took off, I took it off because I was like, I can't mess with anything. I can't try anything new. I can't show that I'm the one who's doing anything. So I purposely step back so that they can't be like, oh, this is key man. Like, I take it myself out of the ads. I take it myself out of the delivery. And I take it myself out of the operations day today. And so the only thing we gave ourselves as a constraint for the sale was, we have to be able to manage the company with one executive hour per week. So we do one meeting with the execs. That was the entirety of our time on the company. And then the rest of the time, Laylon, I kind of like, talked about what we wanted to do next. We still own the business, but we were in the sale process. And, but we couldn't start anything new because if the sale doesn't go through, then you're like, I don't want two businesses. Like, that's not a good idea, which is why like the day after it was when we started it. It's like, okay, the check cleared. We're in. Let's go. Now, just to refresh you, Alex says that he's worth around $200 million. If he was given about a year to liquidate all of his non-liquid assets. If he had to come up with a lot of money right away in a few months, he says that he's worth around $100 million. So let's find out how much of that money he's spending and what he's spending on. - I know what I spend. I spend around 40 or 50 grand a month. You seem like you spend more than triple my amount. - That's probably right. - You think? - Yeah, that's probably right. - Do you think that you'd be less happy going down to five and 10,000? - No, me personally. - Like you wouldn't care. You're okay being a caveman. - Me, I'm fine. Honestly, like, I could have a backpack and a credit card. Like I need very little, but the life that we've built has stuff in it. And so I kind of see it as like, almost like there's two extremes. It's like you're either gonna build like a complete minute. minimalist lifestyle where you just need nothing and you can just kinda go wherever you want, whatever you want, which is like a purely freedom based. Or the other side, it's like you're going to change your environment around you. So rather than I'm gonna move myself to change my environment, I'm gonna change my environment and stay where I'm at. It's like, I kinda see them as like two sides of the same coin. One just costs a lot more, more than the other. I would say that my life right now, it's like, I have this very large headquarters, we have a campus 'cause we have both the building cross the street as well. And like we're kind of building out acquisition.com. So home base, like the whole bottom floor of this is a 4,000 square foot gym that has, you know, half a million dollars of equipment in it. And like, I do that 'cause it's awesome. But at the same time, if all that gym equipment disappeared, I'd be bummed 'cause I do like having my gym, but like I would be fine. - Do you get nervous about, like do you think that your company now is at a place where it's a machine and it's gonna work, or do you still have fear of running out? - I don't have fear of running out. I don't have any fear of not being able to make money or provide for myself. - I still get nervous spending money on things. So like, we got a new apartment in the city. And like I was like, damn, this couch is 8,000. And this is like 4,000. Like I'd rather have the $4,000 wood or get the $8,000 wood like at a huge discount. Like that's a lot of money for a couch. Do you still have those conversations? - I think that we have to make, like for myself, like I have to be very clear about what the objective of the money is. And so it's like, am I buying this house because I wanna get a good investment? Or am I buying this house because it's a house that I want to enjoy? And if I'm buying the house because I wanna enjoy it, then I should just get the fucking house. And if I'm buying an investment, then I should just make it a really good investment. And this residential thing is probably not gonna be it. I think where I've gotten in trouble and I've done it more times than once, which is why it's very frustrating for me, is that I try and say, can I have it all? Can I have the house that I really love and also get it to be an amazing investment? And the answer's just no. - When have you tried to do that? - I just did it and I feel so dumb about it. So Leila wanted this house and she's been looking at the houses for a while. And I hadn't seen any of them because like, she didn't like any of them that much. But we went to the house and she liked it and she was like, let's make an offer. So I was like, okay. So the house was listed for 25 million. They got cut to 20. And so then I was like, well, all for 15. And like, we'll see. 'Cause the owner had had some hard time, somebody died, whatever. And so I was like, maybe we can get it for a good deal. Now this house was like, by far the most expensive one of the neighborhood, because the person who owned it, it was like their retirement house. It was like the house that they wanted to build was like their final home. So they didn't care about the expenses. And so I think they put like 18 million into the house. So getting it 50, like they're losing money on this, right? Anyways, I put it off from 15. They came back and they were like 15.5. And I was like 50. Well, they said, you know, 17. And I came up and said 15.25. And then, and they came down to, and then they came down to 16. And then I was gonna put the next offer in. I let it expire 'cause I was like, let's let them sweat for a little bit, you know? And then somebody else came in and just made it offer and they didn't let me counter. So you lost your place. They just closed on the house. And I was like, fuck, because Layla has very unique taste. And so like how many houses in Vegas are called 15 to 20 plus million dollar homes. There's like 15, you know what I mean? And then like of those, like if you're buying a 400,000 house, there's literally another house that's just like that. That's also a value, you just haven't seen it, right? If you're buying it at 20 million dollar house, and this is like boohoo, anybody who's listening is like, you know, screw you Alex, like must be tough. But like she wanted a very specific thing and we had it and it would have been great. It was in the right spot. It had everything. I was just being cheap and I regret that. I regret that. And so now we're back to, you know? - That's interesting because you are such this like introspective framework thinking person. And that's like a pretty dumb mistake that you made. Like, that mistake seems beneath you. That's not a mistake. - I appreciate it. - Do you know what I mean? Like we're talking to huge numbers, but particularly for a home, it's like, my wife really wants it and I can afford it. - Yeah. - I got to move quickly. - So the only defense I have is that one, I didn't expect that anyone would just not give me an ability to counter. So there was no other buyers at the table. So that's-- - Well, that's because real estate's stupid. Like that and like the auction process is stupid. But you should have known that I would think where it's just like, I found it and like, I should just, like when you negotiate, are you the type of guy that leaves things as a win-win for everyone? Like I wouldn't pay you as a guy who tries to get the best of every deal. Like you're like, - No. - I can't leave meat on the bone for all of us. - No, and I don't. I think honestly it was just like, in my mind, it's like I hadn't even seen other houses. I was like, we've only seen one house. But I didn't think about houses meeting all these criteria. I just figured all houses at 20 million bucks all had all these things and like, that's not the case. And so I kind of had a lot less urgency around this particular house versus others. There's just a lot of like, it was kind of doing on the side. I was doing, a bunch of stuff was going on in the business and I just like, I just wasn't paying attention. But yeah, it was a mistake. And so like I talk about, I mean, this is the nature of the content I make. So like, here's this dumb thing I did. And here's how I'll try not to repeat that mistake again. The reason I'm really annoyed about it is 'cause like I actually made this mistake another time earlier, probably two years earlier, three years earlier, where Leila, we walked into this really nice condo. Same thing, guy was like really sick, spent all his money on it and it was beautiful. And they were like, we want this. And it was way above the other units. I was like, I don't wanna get the award for the guy who spent the most money in this building on a unit. And so I went back and forth, I put a low ball off and then they ended up closing with somebody else and I was like fine. But then after that happened, I was like, shit, now I'm back on the market again. And so it took another like 18 months for a penthouse to come up. And so then a penthouse came up and Leila walked in and she was like, I want this one. And then this time because the other thing had just happened, I just looked at the guy and I was like, just get it. I don't care, just get it. And we won the award for the most expensive condo sold in the building, right? Which didn't feel good at the time. But then a billionaire came in next door and bought the comp unit for like a million and a half above what I did. And it was three months later. So I felt like a little bit better about it. But that one, I'm so happy about that one 'cause I love the kind that we're in. But she wanted to have more space which is what started this whole house thing. So yes, I make mistakes, you know what I mean? Of course. - It's funny, I like hearing you talk about what you're fucking up because I admire you and it's always fun to see people who you like and admire, like screw up because you're like, okay, thank God they're human and it's okay that I fuck up. - I got time. - What are you frustrated? In the last couple months, what are you frustrated with in terms of your own lifestyle, your mindset, your leadership abilities? What's like one thing where you're like, this year I'm trying to solve or I'm trying to grow to become this type of person? - I wanna be in a better mood regardless of circumstance. I'd say that I've had enough ups and downs to realize that I've been probably about equally satisfied and dissatisfied at all points in my life. And I think thinking about that has just been like very real proof that me changing my circumstances changes very little about my subjective well being. And so I have this refrain that I come back to in my head over and over again, which is like, I'm the problem. I've had 10 executive assistants. I haven't had any of them work out. What's the common thread between me and them? It's them, obviously. I'm kidding. - I agree with you. - And so it's like, yeah, it's me, right? And then same thing with, you know, I've had good seasons in bed. Like I've had times when I had lots of money in no work. I've had times when I've had no money in lots of work. I've had lots of work in lots of money. And I'm about as satisfied at each of these circumstances. And so I wanna get better at that. I wanna be in a better mood. (upbeat music) At the very beginning of the episode, I told you there was gonna be one thing that made Alex much, much happier, truly happy, not including, of course, his wife and family. And that thing, it's not money. But it did come from money. - I think going from like potential to some level of realization definitely makes you feel a little bit better. Like I mean, despite what everyone says, like I do think, I mean to your point of like, if you can spend money, money can relieve you of pain. And I think that that is for sure useful. I think a lot of it is just making you feel, are like for me, like making me feel less crazy. It's like, I heard Patrick McDavid say this and I actually really liked it. He said, you know, they were like, "What changed before and after the sale of the company?" He said, "It felt good to know that I was right all along." And I think that, I think very confirming is the right perspective. 'Cause like, you know, I could talk about business, but if I had, you know, bank account that I might, it might not be that good at, right? And so, if you like, want to be skilled in an endeavor and you have no proof, it's a little bit tougher. It's a little bit more, like you're, you know, baking on delusion and baking. And the thing is, is you might very well be right. It just like takes longer for the world to recognize that. And for you, even to have the proof that you're not just dreaming it up. So, I would say that's probably the biggest difference between when I was in my 20s and now is, I have evidence now. ♪ I swear you've had gold ♪ ♪ I've been running for ♪ ♪ Honey, back up, open, one, two, three, four, five ♪ All right, that's a wrap on this conversation with Alex. And if there's one thing that I think you need to take from it, let it be this. Alex is an incredibly smart guy, who I think has a lot of things figured out. And if he had to go back to zero and start over, I'm confident he would end up in the same place again. But still, he has struggled with what it actually means to have this much money and how to let it make his life better and not take over. Like Alex, I'm sure you're gonna make a ton of mistakes. We all do. But you can make fewer mistakes if you surround yourself with people who have already been through it all, who have been there, done that, and are willing to talk openly about their wins and their screw ups. And that's why I built my company, Hampton. It's a community where we talk all about this stuff. We do most of the conversations in real life once a month. And so if you're the founder of a company that does at least three million in revenue and want to be part of a private and again highly vetted community, I vet everyone, where these types of conversations, these real conversations happen every single day, check it out, joinhampton.com. Also, if you wanna podcast like this, this one, like money wise. Check out the company that produces it. I love giving them shout outs in this pod because I love the unproduct. It's called lowershreat, lowershreat.co. All right, see you next time. (upbeat music)