How We Invest Our Money in Stocks, Bitcoin, Real Estate, and more. Part 1 | Ep. 189 | Business Podcast

Summary

Today Danielle and I discuss where I invest my money outside my business.

We cover my approach to stock market investing, crypto investing, my Bitcoin bet that I made in 2014 that has paid off big (and the lesson I learned from it), my real estate investing strategy and some alternative investing I do to add some diversity.

You can check out Part 2 of this series in Episode 194 where Danielle lays out how she invests her money in real estate, how she got started with less than $30,000 and how she manages the ten properties she now owns.

We want to help you make some money by investing!

Brandon uses Coinbase and you can make an instant $10 by buying or selling $100 or more of cryptocurrency on Coinbase when you use this link.


Tranparency and Disclaimer:
1) by using the link above we receive $10 for referring you to Coinbase.

2) we are not financial advisors and we are not offering advice, only sharing what we do with our investing. Our risk tolorance and knowledge is different than yours. Be sure to consult a professional before making any investment decisions based on what you hear in this episode.

Hello Friends,

Brandon:

Welcome to the Edge. Today we’re having coffee with Danielle and we are talking about how we invest the money we make from our business.

Brandon:

Sometimes we focus so much on making the money that we forget that once we make money we need to invest that money to make us more money. Today I’m going first. Usually we do a two part series where Danielle goes first, but somehow it worked out that I’m going first and we talk about how I invest in stocks, what I look for, how I got into crypto what I invest in crypto, Bitcoin your ethereum and some other things real estate and some alternative investments that have proved to outperform the market. In many cases for me, you’re going to enjoy this episode. You can take what I do and apply it to your investments and hopefully make some more money. Here we go. Having coffee with Daniel.

Brandon:

Welcome to the Edge podcast, your weekly playbook about the inner game of building a successful business, making you a happier, healthier and richer business owner and here’s your host, Brandon White. She is.

Brandon:

How are you?

Danielle:

Never better. I feel like I haven’t seen you in a minute.

Brandon:

It’s been two weeks.

Danielle:

I know you don’t have your glasses on.

Brandon:

Is that a new look?

Danielle:

Mm I like it.

Brandon:

But I mean you look great in glasses to appreciate it now.

Brandon:

I couldn’t find him.

Danielle:

I was, I was, I’m on dog duty this week.

Brandon:

I have g uh we did a shutdown this week but just running around, I can’t find my glasses ever since I had to go to that meeting, unexpected meeting that last week sort of been running hard.

Brandon:

How did everything go?

Brandon:

I’m here.

Brandon:

I survived.

Brandon:

It went sometimes I think and I think well the reason that I went is that sometimes you got to meet people in person I think and that was um it was very clear to me on monday that that might be the case and then I was in denial because I had other plans all week of course.

Danielle:

And then you know that gut that you got feeling and you say I just got to go I gotta go do this, that’s what happened.

Brandon:

And then you and I got then our schedule got screwed up because couldn’t do it in the morning on friday and then you had some emergency.

Brandon:

How’d that work out?

Brandon:

Um It was okay.

Brandon:

So we’re on a lot of like construction sites right now.

Brandon:

So we do like the post construction clean ups, right?

Brandon:

But we’re battling so many delays.

Brandon:

Um things happening.

Brandon:

Um Wait a minute am I talking about the right emergency?

Brandon:

We’ve got a lot the last week it was last friday when you and I were going to jump on it like 1:00 and you text me and you said something I have to do with a call because I was in Windsor.

Brandon:

So um yeah so basically so you’re gonna laugh at this, We were we were on this one side, they’re all semi’s uh this new um construction so it’s all semi detached homes and my crew was in there and in the bulkhead of the one of the one project um none of the plumbing was finished so all the water was coming through the ceiling and it just threw us off for a good seven hours because then we had to deal obviously would like carry on and the project site super and stuff like that.

Brandon:

So and then one of my managers were off last week so it was just you know it’s just a lot to deal with.

Danielle:

Oh yeah business happens.

Brandon:

It’s good for people to understand that.

Brandon:

I mean you know we just get caught up stuff happens, you gotta deal with it.

Brandon:

Yeah for sure it’s uh it’s it’s next level sometimes and like you said you know being honest it does happen all the time.

Danielle:

There’s good sides of business but then there’s a stressful time.

Danielle:

I think my most stressful thing last week was that Elon musk is now raiding my driving in order for me to get full self driving in my car And this son of a bit keep digging me for things that aren’t my fault it right now they released people who had 100 driving score which they must drive around the neighborhood.

Danielle:

Yeah and Those who have 99 got this release that gives you full self driving meaning I have the full, I have full quote unquote self driving.

Danielle:

This is pull out of your driveway it makes terror months ago does all that.

Danielle:

So they’re rating you now on this score as you drive which is sort of cool in that it’s probably made me a better driver.

Danielle:

But ironically it dings you for hard braking.

Danielle:

I’m trying to get this thing up here.

Danielle:

I think I’m on the wrong wifi network.

Brandon:

So hard braking Is apparently .3GS or something that it measures when you’re breaking.

Brandon:

Well why don’t when a car pulls in front of you that you can’t plan or the yellow light turns yellow.

Danielle:

Now you’ve got to make a decision normally in general because I’ve almost been killed running those lights.

Danielle:

I will stop but now I will go on it because you don’t want to slam on.

Brandon:

I don’t want to stand on my break so I’m not sure that their algorithm is working.

Danielle:

And then this collision I got dinged his spend I wanted this thing.

Brandon:

So my friend Sean who I ride bikes with all the time and lives here on the coast.

Brandon:

He had a 99, 2 weeks ago on Monday was going to be released on Friday so he just parked his car in the garage a week but I couldn’t do that.

Brandon:

So I drove it’s just been so I had not I had G and I had to go to pick up some um stuff for the dog.

Brandon:

Yeah dog medicine and Pacifica which is right down the coast and When I parked at the vet I had a 99 so I took a picture of it.

Brandon:

I sent it to my friend Sean he’s like park that son of a bit don’t drive it.

Brandon:

And then I had to drive home obviously I would have probably left it there if I could have and I drive home and the damn light turns yellow What am I going to do?

Brandon:

And now I got a 98 and then yesterday ding me we did a photo shoot for some pictures here in the studio And now and it gave me an 88 for so I don’t know Danielle that this that that this has been the most stressful part of my last few weeks getting this damn self, driving thing.

Brandon:

doing your driving test all over again.

Brandon:

It’s I mean it’s I mean maybe everybody should be getting raided on their drive score.

Brandon:

I mean some people say oh it’s monitoring me yeah 98 here it is 98 thank you.

Brandon:

You see that maybe yeah it’s kind of blurry but I get the gist of it so it it measures you on four forward collision warnings which is fair but I got a forward collision warning.

Brandon:

two trips to go to L.

Brandon:

A.

Brandon:

because some semi you know how they weave sometimes what was on self driving and the thing weaved and it gave me a forward and forward collision warnings.

Brandon:

Oh boy, they really is that when you get like too close to another vehicle.

Brandon:

No, we’ll get to that, that’s unsafe.

Brandon:

Following I’m bad for that.

Brandon:

I am honest.

Brandon:

I drive fast and I hate people being in my way, I’m just like I’m a full forward person.

Brandon:

So when people are in my way I am right on them until they move out of the way.

Brandon:

If you’re not going to drive fast and go speedy, speedy get out of the fast lane, that is my theory on that.

Brandon:

Well, I don’t disagree with you on that, but it it was in self driving.

Brandon:

The truck came over forward collision is basically it takes over and slams on the brakes because it thinks you’re going to hit something, but I wasn’t going to hit anything, I was right there, but that’s a big ding that are really doing hard braking.

Brandon:

So now I’m like feathering my breaking, I mean, yeah, that’s what I’m doing and I love this.

Brandon:

And the gas, an electric car isn’t like a normal car when you let off the gas, it stops going pretty much it doesn’t stop at a hard stop, but it’s going to stop you aggressive turning, which I found out I generally do accelerate out of a turn, it’s just a habit.

Danielle:

Oh no, I can’t do that, you can’t do that.

Brandon:

So I do that too and actually you want to know I can back that because when I was younger, I started writing CVS and the jet skis.

Brandon:

So you’re taught that if you’re going to crash or go out of control, you can’t put your foot off there, you can’t take your hand off the go because then you’re going to crash, you have no control, you have to keep acceleration on for the engine and the, the motor to control you.

Brandon:

So, I’ve never, ever been able to do a bend or a turn without accelerating.

Brandon:

I know it’s just a it’s a, it’s a habit that I’ve had, I used to have a Porsche, 9 11 career and the engines in the back and the thing in a Porsche that’s counterintuitive, very much like a sea doo or a jet ski.

Brandon:

Is that when you go into that turn, if you let off the gas, your momentum pulls the back end of that car because it’s so heavy actually out from underneath you.

Brandon:

So you have to put the power on to lock the back wheels back to the ground and keep your momentum.

Brandon:

But anyway, I do it because it’s fun.

Brandon:

Okay, there’s like 50 excuses, but let’s just be on.

Brandon:

Why not?

Brandon:

I mean, the only one was have fun in the car unsafe following, which I have not figured out what the hell how this works because I put it on self driving with seven car distance, but here’s what happens, seven cars in front of you do not think that someone’s going to see the space and pull in front of you.

Brandon:

Of course, of course as I would, I’d be that, I’m sure you’re in your store brand then you get dinged and then there’s forced autopilot disengagement, which I have none.

Brandon:

I I don’t, I do pay attention to it when I’m driving.

Brandon:

So it’s not as if I’ve they have a a center that You have to touch the wheel.

Brandon:

You can’t just leave your hand off of the wheel for 10 minutes.

Brandon:

You’ve gotta, it’s gotta feel you on the wheel.

Brandon:

So I generally just rest my hand on the wheel.

Brandon:

I figured out a way that you could do that.

Brandon:

But yeah, so this damn thing Now if I can keep a 98, I have to bring you to the airport this morning Which would mean I have to go over the hill and if I can keep 98, I’m thinking 98 is next because they released 199 98, but you know, it just takes one jackalope get in front of you and yeah, I’m surprised they don’t tie.

Brandon:

It’s funny how we can maybe talk about this in a podcast one time and like you, you know, every company releases something and then like things just get better with the bugs and you know, all the little creases and stuff.

Brandon:

I’m surprised they haven’t put in like a piece of technology where they can like track like your dash cam to see if it’s somebody else’s fault for dinging you if that makes sense.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Danielle:

I think they need to adjust that algorithm.

Brandon:

They do my car my car is the is a 2018 X.

Brandon:

That I bought because my car on order wasn’t isn’t coming until next year.

Brandon:

The app says it’s coming in january.

Brandon:

I don’t know we’ll see but I wanted to have him with a truck.

Danielle:

What’s that?

Brandon:

Did you buy the Tesla truck?

Brandon:

We have an order on the Tesla truck.

Brandon:

Well let me let me say this but the Tesla truck just got delayed again two more years.

Brandon:

But for a year and a half my friend Sean is crazy about this thing.

Brandon:

So he hit return three times when they had the order to get in line.

Brandon:

So he has three orders and he said I could have won if if they come out with If the Tesla truck has a 500 mile range I’m going to get I’ll get rid of the X.

Danielle:

And get the truck.

Brandon:

But right now I haven’t done it now.

Brandon:

Well the one that I currently have has its charging right now.

Brandon:

It It has 283 miles okay or something there about the new X.

Danielle:

That I’m getting has 350 500 would just mean that driving around California on the coast to L.

Danielle:

A.

Danielle:

Or even maybe san Diego.

Brandon:

You could get, you could, you know, you would extend your range and not have to stop.

Brandon:

The truth of the matter is you stop to go to the bathroom.

Brandon:

Yeah, right.

Brandon:

I mean, you know, if you timed yourself, which I didn’t tie myself, but I was driving in my other car for a while, I probably stopped just two.

Brandon:

Get out and exercise 20 minutes to wash the windows, go to the bathroom, get a snack.

Brandon:

Right?

Danielle:

So if I, if I stop at a charger, but I mean, not to get off topic, but this has been the most stressful thing has just been weighing on me because I’m so competitive.

Brandon:

I want that damn, I want that damn self driving.

Brandon:

And I and my friend Sean has it and I went over to his house uh the other day and when a ride and it is the most incredible thing you’ve ever seen.

Brandon:

That’s pretty cool.

Danielle:

It drove through his neighborhood, his neighborhood has no markings, no center line, no white line on the right hand side.

Brandon:

It has trash in the, in the thing, it it a car was coming, it pulled over to the side, it let the car come.

Danielle:

I mean it’s it’s just it’s just, oh my God, yeah.

Danielle:

What?

Danielle:

You know, excited Benny there, He was whining, he’s whining.

Danielle:

He likes a lapdog.

Brandon:

You know, he’s like sniffing is I can do this, not on the screen.

Brandon:

Benny says, I want to treat you want to treat Yeah.

Brandon:

Look how excited.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

And yesterday I almost killed myself.

Brandon:

I’m probably glad I’m here.

Brandon:

I had, I had one of our Jack Russells in my hand.

Brandon:

I had two coffee cups from the, from the studio, which is just outside the house and I was walking up the steps, I turned around, I missed the step, I put my foot in the dog dish and I literally fell with the dog in my hand.

Brandon:

I don’t know how I did it.

Brandon:

I was falling, I put the dog on the ground so he didn’t get squished and then I, I fell and I’m so sore this morning and it’s on the, it’s on the ring cam.

Danielle:

I replayed it.

Brandon:

It’s pretty funny.

Brandon:

That’s funny.

Danielle:

I have one of those stories too.

Brandon:

With the ring cam um so about three years ago, Well I’ll tell you the story and then we’ll start asking you the questions that I have for you today.

Danielle:

Um It was about three years ago, I was getting some renovations done, um, at my place and they were delayed and it wasn’t even to do with Covid, they were just delayed and so at the time I had no water in my bathrooms Because they had shut the water off.

Brandon:

They were delayed and I really needed a shower.

Brandon:

So at the time I was only about 10 minutes away from my mom’s life.

Brandon:

So it was the middle of winter.

Brandon:

My mom lives in the middle of the country.

Brandon:

So she has a ring device on her place too.

Brandon:

So she has a driveway and then a walkway into the house.

Brandon:

So she has like a raised bungalow and uh, a big front porch on the front, like a front deck.

Brandon:

So I had my robe on and my flippers and I started my car, went into my car, grab my bag full of stuff.

Brandon:

Just have a quick shower at my mom’s, went to her place, got out of my car and it was like the middle of winter.

Brandon:

So it was pretty icy and I was walking and I slipped right like feet right underneath me.

Brandon:

But because I was going to have a shower, I didn’t have any clothes on underneath my robe.

Brandon:

So the video is literally, and I’m honestly, my mom probably still has this video and I, you just watch me fall and the robe just fell wide open.

Brandon:

And uh, yeah, so that was my was all scratched up and bruised on the back from the ice.

Danielle:

I mean after that I was fine.

Danielle:

You know, I was funny, we all left.

Brandon:

But yeah, that’s a, that’s an embarrassing rain device story.

Brandon:

I’d like to get the, I’d like to get a real of all these things from ring devices right.

Brandon:

Like when you should have like a, an instagram page where people can submit their embarrassing embarrassing things for Yeah, I try not to when I go into our sauna, which is outside?

Danielle:

It’s a barrel sauna, which is really cool.

Brandon:

I highly recommend anybody to get one.

Danielle:

I know it’s sort of a luxury, but it extends your life, it totally changes everything, but I usually sit in there with no clothes on and I usually, I started walking out and then I thought holy crap, I mean we’ve got, we’ve got cameras all over our house, just mainly for lights uh for the, for the dogs at night.

Brandon:

If there’s a mountain lion in the backyard or a coyote or something, could be, could be a possum er uh raccoon, we have so many wild animals, but and then I started thinking, man, if I walk naked past these cameras and somebody hacks this thing or God knows it’s going to the cloud, I don’t know who the hell is looking at this stuff.

Brandon:

Um so I started putting on a, I started wearing my towel and then when I get up to the deck and I’m so hot.

Brandon:

All right, I take it off to cool down and yeah, we should do a real ring cameras.

Brandon:

I’d love to see that.

Brandon:

Yeah, funny stories of people falling or something hilarious.

Brandon:

Yeah, So what do we were talking about?

Brandon:

How we invest our money we make today.

Brandon:

Yeah, yeah, and I wanted to um I have a few questions.

Brandon:

How do you have questions for me?

Brandon:

You never have questions like that.

Brandon:

No, I do.

Brandon:

I wanted to like keep it there because there’s different things obviously that we both are interested and we’ve talked about this before, right?

Brandon:

How there’s like you do the stocks and, and I like real estate and you know, so there’s different things that I think that this is going to be different than what we usually do because we both do different things on this one.

Brandon:

Um, so I think it’ll be a good, um, I don’t know, like divers segment to talk about and give people different opinions on different aspects of investment.

Brandon:

All right.

Brandon:

Do you want to go, do you have a list?

Brandon:

I don’t, I’m sure you have a list you want to list in my head.

Brandon:

Okay, so another reason I wanted to talk about this specifically with the difference between the two of us for you’ve obviously been doing things longer.

Brandon:

Like you’ve been in business longer than I have.

Brandon:

Um, So, you know, maybe we can start from the beginning kind of of your journey and like how long it may be took for you to invest.

Brandon:

Um, you know, how you learned about it because a big thing for me is I know so many people who have no idea about investing and they listen to their financial advisor and they do it in our recipes or they do certain things that the government isn’t maybe asking or mentioning, right.

Brandon:

So I just need to investment or the investment world is so diverse and there’s so many different things.

Brandon:

Um, you know, if it wasn’t for me going through what I did when I was younger and you know, when we were talking about my story and me researching like how to basically make money without working because I was maxed out on my time, I wouldn’t have even known or thought to get involved in real estate or stocks or whatever it could be.

Brandon:

Right.

Brandon:

So I just kinda wanna like, see your story, I guess from the get go and how you started investing, um, your money and when, and kind of like maybe our listeners are struggling with maybe the thought of it or maybe they’re thinking about it or maybe they haven’t hated, I don’t know.

Brandon:

So I figured I’ll just do a good thing to talk about today.

Brandon:

I think it is a good thing.

Brandon:

I got started one, my real estate exposure was from my father who had a commercial real estate company that built shopping centers and things like that.

Brandon:

And then did residential.

Brandon:

I grew up on the weekends driving around, which my dad did because it was, I think we liked it and it accomplished that we liked it and he was doing business was on the weekends, driving around in a CJ five jeep and looking at land and we would go to his malls and we would, there’s eat in vendors places and he would talk to them and that was really my exposure on the real estate and my exposure on stocks.

Brandon:

I don’t really remember specifically.

Brandon:

I think I just always liked business and in high school I was reading back then, believe it or not, we didn’t have the internet and at least in high school towards the end of high school we had quote unquote the internet, but it wasn’t What you would consider.

Brandon:

I graduated high school in 1990, I would look at the stocks and the papers and I was, oh, that sparked how I really learned about stocks.

Brandon:

Was this?

Danielle:

I was thinking about this inside that it’s funny that you uh funny that you ask me, my grandmother vera would always, we spend a lot of time with my grandmother.

Brandon:

I grew up with a single mom and she, and she would pick us up sometimes and whatnot.

Brandon:

But she always said that she was living, she would be living off her dividends from T.

Brandon:

Rowe price.

Danielle:

And I was always thinking to myself as a kid, I can remember right now sitting in her living room and she was telling us this and I I was thinking, so you get a check every month from the dividends off of your T Rowe price, which I didn’t really completely understand back then they didn’t have E.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

It was more stocks and mutual funds, but and I thought, wow, that seems like a a good thing, I was always trying to make money and that that’s I think that’s probably what sparked it and then I used to get bonds From my grandparents as gifts and I would ask but how does this work?

Brandon:

Well they say well to mature and it’ll be worth $100, sounds like $100, that’s a lot of money back then.

Brandon:

And that’s how I really got exposed.

Danielle:

And then I started trading stocks in high school.

Danielle:

I think that combination of all that investment type of exposure brought me to say well I could trade stocks and I did I and I read through business, read business magazines in the paper every day.

Danielle:

And then when I started my first company when I was in my early twenties, Mid 20 Middle 20s, I didn’t have a lot of money in the stock market was something that was happening and I traded, started trading stocks and my my partner at the time had been investing in stocks who was he was a little younger than me and in school and we started trading stocks and then he actually was trading a lot of options and then I traded, started trading options.

Danielle:

Then he told me that we could trade on margin which is effectively borrowing money that you don’t have but is secured by the investments that you make and possibly the cash you have or don’t have.

Danielle:

And I and I thought, wow, so we can do leverage and then I started trading options and then I started trading that money to fund our first company for anybody listening out there.

Danielle:

I not suggesting that you do that at all.

Danielle:

But then so we started doing and it worked.

Danielle:

I mean we made, you know, I think one year we made six figures that was a lot of money for us back then.

Danielle:

And you know, funded the company that funded us.

Danielle:

When I say funded the company, we actually did use company money for it.

Danielle:

But it funded that money really kept us going and gave us some sort of money to do it.

Danielle:

And then real estate where I really got interested, not interested, but where I got what I would consider a real education was that a gentleman was on our site at the time, I was running the social networking site first, an e commerce site for sport fishermen.

Danielle:

And And this is like, this is around 19, This is 98 99.

Danielle:

And I get an email from this guy and he said, hey, do you want to go fishing?

Brandon:

I didn’t, I’ve always wanted to go fishing.

Brandon:

So I meet this guy chris and we start fishing and over time I started fishing with him every friday.

Brandon:

Well it turns out that Chris had built a real estate, residential and commercial company and solid to Merrill Lynch by the time he was 35, he then Had a five year non compete, bought a ranch in Montana.

Danielle:

I think Montana colorado Montana comes back after his five year non compete and builds another real estate company, residential and commercial.

Danielle:

He then merges that with another, a group of regional real estate companies.

Brandon:

He was in Maryland, I think he did some stuff in Delaware as well and maybe Virginia, but I think it was Marilyn Delaware merges those takes it public and then Warren Buffett buys it, takes it private, it becomes Berkshire, Hathaway real estate or whatever it’s called now.

Brandon:

And he’s on the board with Warren Buffett and I’m fishing with chris every single friday all day.

Brandon:

Just me and him spending hours in the car.

Brandon:

We took trips, I mean, we went on trips together as well to Honduras and things like that and then that really, and then he gave me a spreadsheet, which I have to this day, that taught me how to, he’s like, look, I’ll teach you all this, can’t give it to everybody, but I’ll teach you this.

Brandon:

And it showed how real estate works on leverage and it’s very hard to make those returns without, uh, in another way, unless you’re going to borrow a margin, which just becomes really mean borrowing a margin and trading options is really risky.

Brandon:

The.

Brandon:

Uh, and then my exposure to everything else from venture capital to alternative investments to the stock market really came from another guy that I met in that first company and I’ll tell that short story quickly.

Brandon:

But we were raising money.

Brandon:

I had no idea how to raise money, bought a book.

Brandon:

Bill wrote a business plan and I sent it, I had read and I remember reading in the back of Time magazine or in the front, I’m sorry, in the front of Time magazine, Time magazine takes me a little bit, but there used to be one or two pages that was new and upcoming thing.

Brandon:

It was as if they were getting into tech and showing things.

Brandon:

And there was this article about jerry yang and David Filo who were the original founders of Yahoo and how they had raised this money from Sequoia Capital, which arguably is one of the, The best or top three venture firms in the world.

Brandon:

So I had, we got this book, I sent it out to Sequoia thinking, well they invest in, that, they’ll invest in us.

Brandon:

Well, that’s not how it works folks.

Danielle:

But, but theory, I started raising money from people and one of the guys that I was talking to an investor who was an alumni of my college, who I had contacted because there was an article that said, he was an investor in our alumni magazine.

Brandon:

And I reached out to him, he came back to me one day and he was considering investor and he said, hey, I had lunch with this guy, you should meet him.

Danielle:

He uses your website.

Brandon:

I respect your privacy.

Danielle:

I didn’t give them your information out of the bat, is it okay?

Brandon:

I think he was very, very nice guy.

Danielle:

He said, I think you should meet this guy.

Danielle:

Is it okay that I give him your email address?

Brandon:

I was like, sure, fine.

Danielle:

About four hours later.

Brandon:

Three hours later I get an email.

Danielle:

Hey, this is tom actually thomas men on our podcast.

Danielle:

Heat was a partner.

Danielle:

Uh, I’d say really the second wave partner at sequoia in the sense that there was, uh, Don valentine and I think pierre somebody else was in the early and then there were six partners.

Danielle:

Tom was one of them and they did the yahoo, the google and things like that.

Danielle:

And he sends me an email and he says, hey, I’m, this is tom McMurray, you might know me, I’m from this venture firm capital, uh, Sequoia Capital.

Danielle:

Um, I’d like to see you.

Danielle:

I heard about what you’re doing now if you’re a kid or a young man or a young person in your twenties and you receive an email from a guy that says, hey, I’m the partner.

Brandon:

This isn’t today daniel people in Silicon Valley.

Brandon:

They basically renamed all the associate partners because entrepreneurs learned that they didn’t want to take meetings with associates.

Brandon:

So now, so now the word partner means something very different than it did back back then.

Brandon:

It was a real partner.

Brandon:

Managing partner is what it’s called.

Brandon:

And um, he said, yeah, so you’re sitting there.

Brandon:

I’m in my house in eastern, small little house, which I’m not complaining.

Brandon:

I had a great time.

Brandon:

And, and it was a great little house.

Brandon:

We still have that my mom was in it.

Brandon:

And, and if you get that email, you’re like, yeah, this isn’t real right.

Brandon:

I mean, this is, so my reply was, hey, thanks so much.

Brandon:

It’s really great to meet you virtually.

Brandon:

Here’s my address.

Brandon:

Come see me.

Brandon:

And he said, he replied, he said, we’ll see you tomorrow then.

Brandon:

And so I said, okay.

Brandon:

And you like still weren’t even thinking that it was real.

Brandon:

So, I mean, I’m like, all right.

Brandon:

Some guy from, from the west coast, I’m on the east coast and eastern Maryland, a town of 14,000 people in the eastern shore of Maryland.

Brandon:

Not the tech mecca, let’s just say the waterfowl, the waterfowl, uh huh mecca of, of probably the world, but not, not the tech capital.

Brandon:

So next morning, get a knock on the door And he, I was like, hey, he’s like, hey, how you doing?

Brandon:

Uh, I said, do you want to go to the office?

Brandon:

He’s like, yeah, let’s go to the office.

Brandon:

I said, come on upstairs.

Brandon:

He sort of looked at me, comes upstairs to the spare bedroom.

Brandon:

That spare bedroom that we had turned into an office probably was 88 by 88 by 10 and small house.

Brandon:

And he looked at me and he said, is this all you have.

Brandon:

I was like, hey look man, I’m really sorry if you came looking for something crazy.

Brandon:

My partner has a spare bedroom down down the other down the road we can visit.

Brandon:

But yeah, like this is it.

Brandon:

I’m sorry.

Brandon:

And I was apology.

Brandon:

I was apologizing like, oh my God, this guy had driven, he had moved to the east coast and he had, he had been retired.

Brandon:

He had just retired.

Brandon:

And I was like, God, he drove all the way over here.

Brandon:

It’s 90 miles.

Brandon:

I feel bad.

Brandon:

He said calm down kid, this is how we found Cisco.

Brandon:

And they did, they found Cisco in the living room that the husband and wife who are now divorced.

Brandon:

But we’re building routers in their living room and Sequoia found them there and was the only private investor in Cisco ever.

Brandon:

That’s another story.

Brandon:

But so we, he’s like calm down man, We go to lunch, we do the business plan on the back of a placemat.

Brandon:

We, I said, hey, do you want to go fishing?

Brandon:

I mean I was running fishing, you want to go fishing.

Brandon:

He was like, yeah, let’s go fishing.

Brandon:

So I hooked up the boat.

Brandon:

We went fishing and we caught a ton of fish on the way home.

Brandon:

He said, how much money do you have in your business account?

Brandon:

And he had said, when I said, hey, this is all we have, he said my, the reason I’m asking is mainly because you sound bigger.

Brandon:

I called your number, you have a what?

Brandon:

A phone tree or whatever you wanna call it.

Brandon:

And we did, we had it all rigged up.

Brandon:

We looked big.

Brandon:

I mean we looked bigger than the two people that we were the, and we go fishing and have a good time on the way home.

Brandon:

He says how much money you have in your account and said, I don’t know how much we have today.

Brandon:

I said we Trade stocks.

Brandon:

So sometimes we have 7000 and sometimes we have 20, sometimes we might have 30, sometimes we might have three, I don’t know.

Brandon:

And he said, What?

Brandon:

Uh, like you trade stocks.

Brandon:

I said, well we trade stocks.

Brandon:

I said, we do sell things, we have some money, but we’re not making enough money yet.

Brandon:

So we trade stocks.

Brandon:

He shook his head sort of and he’s doing something over there.

Brandon:

I’m pulling a boat so I gotta pay attention.

Brandon:

Didn’t have self driving.

Brandon:

Tesla rating me on my, on my driving trends back then.

Brandon:

And I had a dodge Durango, which I loved and he hands me a check And he said Let’s go, I was $50,000 on a handshake.

Brandon:

And that was how I started my relationship with tom since then.

Brandon:

Um, we become the closest of friends.

Brandon:

I mean in many ways he’s a little bit older.

Brandon:

Not he’s not quite old enough to be my dad but he could be viewed that way.

Brandon:

But he is and he taught me, I mean and I spent an enormous amount of time with him and still do the all about investing in stocks and uh when you get access to see what what would be considered the ultra wealthy and how they invest in it, you start to see those strategies, you get a competitive advantage.

Brandon:

And you know, I learned all that.

Brandon:

He back then I read inc magazine like as a bible entrepreneur magazine, I looked really like to think it’s a little bit higher next level than an entrepreneur magazine.

Brandon:

But I had been reading those in the he he really started teaching me and him and chris and a bunch of other people of course uh you know aside from my mom and and everybody else, but I’m saying outside of that where I really got my education was all around these people and they’d say hey you got, you need to be reading this magazine, you need to be looking at this and it’s easy over dinner to say hey well what is the strategy, how are you investing?

Brandon:

How does that work?

Brandon:

And the stock market for me was always one of those things that I was just exposed to and you can I felt like you could make a lot of money one way or the other.

Brandon:

And the important thing I think about where we are today in the at least in the U.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

Economy probably the world economy since the stock markets in the United States really you know dr what what is going on in the world is with the with the inflation that we have.

Brandon:

The only asset class that has ever really been able to keep up with with inflation outside of cash and bonds is stocks.

Brandon:

So um Yeah and that’s why I started doing, I invest most of my, I mean I have a diversified portfolio.

Brandon:

I still invest in startups.

Brandon:

If you follow the rules, you invest 5-7% of your money in alternative investments, so to speak, meaning higher risk venture capital startups, things like that are invest in art I think.

Brandon:

You know I mean Yeah, I mean not traditional art in the sense I don’t have a van Gogh, but I have a collector’s surfboard that was Several $1,000.

Brandon:

That this only going to go up.

Brandon:

Um You know I have Lionel trains that really my dad had bought but collected them and I have some other collector small things like that.

Brandon:

But I learned art because the vets managed a family office for two decades now and I learned from watching what her boss did that who’s ultra wealthy usually if you have a family office is that they’re making millions in art.

Brandon:

That’s crazy.

Brandon:

I mean and the returns are pretty ridiculous.

Brandon:

So I started seeing, I was like oh well we can buy smart to why wouldn’t you do that?

Brandon:

And that’s you know, I as I’m telling you this story, I think about what if you remember that movie trading places and the chauffeur made all his money because he listened to the guys in the back what they were trading and then he just bought that and traded and in many ways I just been able to be a fly on the wall in these situations which I’m really grateful for to learn how to do that.

Brandon:

And recently I started building most of my money has been put into E.

Danielle:

T.

Brandon:

S generally because you can do that and let it sit.

Brandon:

I don’t day trade as much anymore at all.

Brandon:

Um I think ETFS are Where the returns are pretty good.

Brandon:

I mean right now the etfs that invest in our returned 24 The 28% this year, which is not bad, but I did start creating a portfolio to get back into stocks because I figured well I used to make a lot of money in stocks and beat the market and you know, anybody tell us to beat the market, you should be skeptical.

Brandon:

So I decided that I was gonna say can I really beat the market.

Brandon:

So I built this portfolio that was called wealth builders portfolio but it’s now called edge because someone recently told me that there is a wealth builders portfolio which I only, I only made up in the instant to have a name.

Brandon:

But now I have the the edge growth, the edge growth, what do I call it?

Brandon:

The edge growth portfolio.

Brandon:

And we’ll take a look right now.

Brandon:

I started it on april 20th.

Brandon:

I started on April 20.

Brandon:

I use yahoo, yahoo to keep track of it.

Brandon:

I have vanguard in e trade and Border House, but if we look at this portfolio and like I said, I want to be fully full disclaimer anybody who tells you they can beat the market, you know, you should be really skeptical of.

Brandon:

Um But The numbers don’t lie are not investing on April 20.

Brandon:

And if we look at the chart the market, the S and P.

Brandon:

Has done uh since I started investing, I’m not saying year to date, I’m saying since I started investing in in using this strategy portfolio, It has returned 11.67% as of today.

Brandon:

And this edge high growth portfolio has returned 25.62.

Brandon:

So I’m outperforming the market by what, 10, 13 14% 13%.

Brandon:

That’s very cool.

Brandon:

That’s the story.

Brandon:

So in summary stocks, real estate, art and startups, I will and my own business is quite frankly that I think is the best strategy that I’ve come up with is fund these things yourself.

Brandon:

So that sometimes it’s good to have investors for sure.

Brandon:

But uh if you’re gonna in the beginning, I really feel like you should, you should invest your own money.

Brandon:

The other thing that I will tell you in real estate, I’ve done some different things in the sense of when we bought this house here in Half Moon Bay, they had a water permit, they offered me a water permit apparently in our county or in our, on the coast.

Brandon:

There’s only a limited amount of water permits which means and it’s all because you can’t build here on the coast.

Brandon:

It’s very hard to build on the coast.

Brandon:

I mean it would be shocking when you come here, I think you’ll be shocked That or anybody and anybody who’s been here is that on the other side of the Santa Cruz Mountains from us which is seven miles over the past.

Brandon:

It’s a major city in San Francisco is about 25 minutes from here.

Brandon:

But I live in a completely rural area.

Danielle:

I mean it’s completely rural.

Brandon:

There’s I mean we have horses, cowboys riding their horse to Trace Amigos restaurant to get dinner.

Brandon:

Yeah, there’s a super neat so but to finish the story I didn’t know it as much at the time but I had asked and they said do you want the water permit with your house?

Brandon:

Our house actually has a well and I want, I like, well I want to be on the well and I don’t get charged for water and yada yada yada and I don’t like chlorine in the water, it really affects your cells and things like that.

Brandon:

But the so we have our own filtration not chlorine and everything on here and I was like yeah so they offered me for 7500 bucks and I figured well I’ll buy this thing, maybe it’s worth something, maybe we build something or a lot doesn’t have it.

Brandon:

And that is now worth 95 to $110,000.

Brandon:

Which you know is a ridiculously good return and eight years.

Brandon:

Uh and then I’ll add crypto.

Brandon:

So I will I do I would put that in my 7% if it’s seven or five of alternative investments.

Brandon:

But I bought Bitcoin seven years ago.

Brandon:

So some of the Bitcoin actually got for free because if I took a quiz or I referred someone they would give Bitcoin for free back then.

Brandon:

Uh And then I bought the rest of my Bitcoin at $400 and I think today it’s at 62,000.

Brandon:

So uh yeah uh actually we we can talk about crypto go ahead.

Brandon:

So that’s my story.

Brandon:

Yeah I don’t know how that sounds but that’s that’s really how I invest my money and I’m religious about investing it, if we if you do your financials or have someone like you do and a good solid accountant who’s not just an accountant but a finance person and you can predict your cash flow and you can, and you can get your business to a profitable place.

Brandon:

I mean in the early days, as you know, you got to reinvest in yourself, but eventually you want to get to a place where it’s throwing off cash.

Brandon:

I am religious about getting that money out of the company and into the market or whatever I’m doing so that it starts earning money.

Brandon:

We can talk about tax strategies another day, but which are probably the same but slightly different in Canada United States, but they’re very similar in that way, but I’m religious about it Danielle, I, I will move that money and take it out and have a plan and it’s not, I don’t guess.

Brandon:

Yeah, strategic.

Brandon:

So that’s very cool.

Brandon:

Well, I mean obviously there’s so many things that obviously you’re doing different in your story with a lot different than, you know, how you got into certain things.

Brandon:

Um, and mine is very minimal.

Brandon:

Obviously I’m, I’m younger, right?

Brandon:

So, you know, getting into certain things, um, it’s just experience or when you first get introduced to it, but back to crypto, were you and maybe I can just genuinely ask this question because a lot of people that I speak to, even if they are very big investors or they are very experienced investors you have on one hand, people that are so in love with crypto and on the other hand, so skeptical about it.

Brandon:

So what are your thoughts on that?

Brandon:

I mean obviously you’re not skeptical because you’re involved.

Brandon:

But were you um have you like, of course I’m skeptical, but I’m a, my background if you really break it down as a technology guy.

Brandon:

I mean I’ve been, I was on the Internet in 1996.

Brandon:

I mean I had a site on the internet 1996.

Brandon:

There was a lot of skeptical people back then that thought that the internet wasn’t going to be a thing.

Brandon:

I mean A.

Brandon:

O.

Brandon:

L.

Brandon:

They thought was the internet back then.

Brandon:

I mean we had the we did have the internet, but truthfully a well people thought that AOL was the internet and I think I’ve always had a tendency to be and in some cases to be candid, I’ve been too far ahead of the curb some of the companies that I did failed because I still think they’re a good idea.

Brandon:

In fact, I still own the U.

Brandon:

R.

Brandon:

L.

Brandon:

And some of them, I still have the actual inc they were just ahead of their time.

Brandon:

So there’s a risk there.

Brandon:

Mhm.

Brandon:

I would say so.

Brandon:

I’m skeptical.

Brandon:

I was absolutely skeptical.

Brandon:

I just used the analogy of this, I’ve definitely failed way more then I’ve been successful but the successes outweigh what I lost in that in that sense in general.

Brandon:

And what I mean by that is is that the fishing social network inciting e commerce site was way ahead of its time because when I first said, hey, we’re going to put a magazine on the internet, They actually called it the vertical portal back then where I was going to sell fishing tackle on the internet people or like No 1’s gonna talk about fishing and, and you’re not gonna sell crap, we’re going to go to the tackle shop and obviously that’s not the truth and you might want to get into it.

Brandon:

But I went through some bumps there right where that company went out of business and buy back and all that sort of stuff.

Brandon:

But I think on these things I’ve always found like, so here’s the story.

Brandon:

What I didn’t tell you is is that I also invested in dutch coin.

Brandon:

And I think I’m at, I think I did 30, I think I’m in at 37 cents of training 25.

Brandon:

Now.

Brandon:

Did I buy as much of it as I did Bitcoin?

Brandon:

Uh, no.

Brandon:

Do I own your ethereum?

Brandon:

Yeah, I think your ethereum could go to a Bitcoin price.

Brandon:

But going back to your question, of course, I’m skeptical.

Brandon:

But what I, what I do, I think this is an important point is I invest that money with the idea that it is gone right.

Brandon:

And if you expect anything from it well, and I can afford to lose it, if you cannot afford to lose it, you should not invest because I put that money in an asset class.

Brandon:

That’s your alternative investment and you just need to understand that you could lose that whole amount of money and you need the get it in your head.

Brandon:

So did I think that as an internet person there have been many attempts at quote unquote cryptocurrencies.

Brandon:

The interesting part about these current Kryptos is that they’re using Blockchain which is really a public record of the transaction which is hard two.

Brandon:

There’s not one central person controlling that database which diversifies the risk.

Brandon:

I liked that idea.

Brandon:

I like the idea that we’re going to have a Cryptocurrency.

Brandon:

A guy that I actually worked for the venture firm Bill Mountain who invented the credit card swiping machine uh verifone and TNS networks which I think he built and sold and then bought back and then start again.

Brandon:

Um I work for the venture firm him and it was a very small firm but really cool guy.

Brandon:

He had use $30 million dollars of his own money to invest.

Brandon:

He was original investor in AOL as well but he invested in ah God you have to go back.

Brandon:

But it was a digital coin And it was a digital coin.

Brandon:

On small transactions.

Brandon:

It was designed for small transactions which has been tried several times on the Internet with no success mainly.

Brandon:

I don’t want to go off into that psychology of small prices.

Brandon:

You actually labor around more around the 99 cent song that you would buy than you do about The $99.

Brandon:

Sure it’s just the way that psychology works but for the human brain works.

Brandon:

They so I is a long story to your answer but for the listeners to explain how I think about it is I said there’s this thing called Bitcoin.

Brandon:

It’s going to be a digital currency.

Brandon:

It doesn’t have a central database for one person to control, it doesn’t have a Fed federal reserve here in United States to control so to speak or like china where china pegged their currency and totally manipulates it.

Brandon:

Candidly not candidly.

Brandon:

I think that everybody hopefully knows that by this point.

Brandon:

I mean they, I mean and it’s not a secret, they say they do it, they they pegged that and I was like well this, this sounds cool and a lot of geeks of whom I associate, we’re getting excited about it, you know whatever seven years ago and I like, I just load up on this crap and when it’s when it’s free to take some quizzes or to refer a friend which I would refer, you know event and five other close people um that was easy and then when it was a few $100 you know you could afford to put a few $1000 into it and now it’s worth $63,000.

Brandon:

So you can do the math pretty quickly, it coins that up.

Brandon:

And but does coins going to, I don’t think that’s going to be worth crap.

Brandon:

Um Your ethereum I own some other ones.

Brandon:

So I think that here’s the other thing I’ll say ah two people out there listening who based on your question.

Brandon:

Maybe not skeptical or not understand it.

Brandon:

I think that the one I think Bitcoin is the winner.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

Because it’s kind of like the first one though.

Brandon:

Right?

Brandon:

It’s exactly.

Brandon:

Well, here’s the analogy.

Brandon:

I used to be a domain name trader.

Brandon:

I don’t know if you knew that.

Brandon:

But uh yeah I called, I called, I called go daddy support the other day and the lady said I got to ask you a question.

Brandon:

I was like okay.

Brandon:

She said what the hell do you do?

Brandon:

I said well why would you ask that?

Brandon:

She said, well I looked at your, I’m looking at your accounts.

Brandon:

I need some help.

Brandon:

And she said you have 300 domain names.

Brandon:

And and I said 300 domain names.

Brandon:

That’s not a lot.

Brandon:

And she said, what do you mean?

Brandon:

That’s not a lot.

Brandon:

I said, well I used to be a domain name trader.

Brandon:

I used to have, you know, 3000 domain names.

Brandon:

Um But I would I would say it’s now the analogy it’s not it’s not apples apples but it’s close in this sense of recognition.

Brandon:

Is that to this day there’s still a lot of T.

Brandon:

L.

Brandon:

D.

Brandon:

Top level domain names.

Brandon:

There’s dot co there’s dot Io which is popular now.

Brandon:

There’s dot net, there’s dot org.

Brandon:

I mean there’s not everything dot X Y z literally have one of those.

Brandon:

But which one do you which one do we all want?

Brandon:

Still we want dot com because dot com was the first and I saw this when I was training domain names, when the new T l d s would come out, people would say, well we got to get every single one of these.

Brandon:

This thing is going to be a gold mine dot this dot that.

Brandon:

And I said, I think you could make some money in the initial hype, but long term dot com domain names as an asset class.

Brandon:

I call it cyber real estate are worth more money and I think that’s what we’re going to see what Bitcoin.

Brandon:

Bitcoin is, what people recognize.

Brandon:

I mean I’m not over Bitcoin, I don’t mean to say that, but Bitcoin isn’t new to me, but Bitcoin sort of new to my mom.

Brandon:

Bitcoin’s new to a lot of business people that aren’t in tech.

Brandon:

So for me I’m like, yeah, well somebody said to me, well you’re rich off a Bitcoin And I was like, yeah, I’m rich off a Bitcoin but it’s not new to me, right?

Brandon:

It’s so and I will for you know the next question if I were listening to this podcast would ask would be, well, should I buy it and I bought, I don’t know whether you should buy it or not.

Brandon:

I think you have to look at how much money you have, how much money you’re willing to lose and all that stuff.

Brandon:

But I bought it 62,000 the other day and I bought your ethereum.

Brandon:

I forget where it’s at 42:00 or something like that.

Brandon:

So I’m still buying it.

Brandon:

Um, when I, when I see a dip, but I will say this, I should say this too.

Brandon:

My strategy of investing is not, I’m not a flipper.

Brandon:

I did, I did flip domain names but in investing in what I’m talking about, I’m not flipping it.

Brandon:

I wasn’t buying, I’m a holder, I’m a uh, 10 year.

Brandon:

I mean I’m a little older than you in that sense, but you know, I’m still 15, 20 years, which puts me at, You know, if you’re a 20 year horizon, I don’t care if I tell you to buy X, Y Z E T F or stock, You’re going to buy it whether it’s up or down because in 20 years the bed is that way.

Danielle:

So I want to, I just want to be clear that I’m not trading Bitcoin on a daily basis.

Brandon:

I have thought about it because I need a new bike and so you know, I’m decent at day trading, I lost money, but I’ve made more money than I’ve lost.

Brandon:

But I think that for crypto and crypto is going to be a way to store money, but you know is it people say well is it real well is the US dollar really real.

Brandon:

I mean yeah you can get a piece of paper or the Canadian dollar or whatever it’s called.

Brandon:

You know is it real?

Brandon:

I don’t it’s a piece of paper.

Brandon:

I mean it’s all about it’s a digit in your bank account.

Brandon:

You know is your bank account real?

Brandon:

Right?

Brandon:

I don’t know.

Brandon:

The difference is your bank account generally stays the same but your bank account you could lose money.

Brandon:

I mean if you’re trying to put your money in a bank In the United States or F.

Brandon:

D.

Brandon:

I.

Brandon:

C.

Brandon:

I think insured up to $250,000 now.

Danielle:

So if you put $1 million $250,000 has even done that.

Danielle:

And I think you know I don’t want to get off on this topic but you’re giving an awful lot of control of the government.

Danielle:

Right?

Danielle:

Yeah the government.

Brandon:

I mean how many countries do we know where cuba happened?

Brandon:

All these people they took their money.

Brandon:

I mean I’m not saying that that’s going to happen in the United States Canada or you know one of the one of the stronger but it could I’m just saying I guess I’m just saying I guess what I’m trying to communicate is yeah that people say is crypto real and I just am saying is your bank account real right?

Brandon:

It’s not like we all have a vault with that amount of coin in it.

Brandon:

The only thing that has that is gold and I own gold.

Brandon:

I do own gold that is back By I think Goldman Sachs one and I own one other that is literally has gold in a vault in England and one other place that backs that stock.

Brandon:

But other than that we don’t we don’t we don’t have we don’t you know I don’t I don’t have anything that is backing my bank account.

Brandon:

So that would be my answer.

Brandon:

I think that crypto is definitely here to stay I think Bitcoin is the winter long term.

Brandon:

It doesn’t mean that a lot of things are being built on your ethereum.

Brandon:

I think your ethereum as a return probably you can make more money at this point though.

Brandon:

I someone said to me the other day Daniel, I I think I need to start investing in crypto and my answer was okay.

Brandon:

I would have the thought process of what can I invest in that’s going to have the biggest return because for for Bitcoin to get 100 my return is off the chart.

Brandon:

It’s something like 43 million% or something because so In order to get 100% return on your Bitcoin It’s going to have to go to 120.

Brandon:

Could you buy 23 and me which went public recently and get Uh you know a three bagger 4 bagger five bagger faster and I think that’s what you have to think about now if you’re like, oh I just want to earn some crypto because I think it’s cool and I want to store some money as a a wealth savings thing then certainly.

Brandon:

But it’s definitely volatile as as you see, I mean Ellen makes or not, well Ellen did make some tweets that change the price.

Brandon:

You know it’s it’s still it’s still volatile.

Brandon:

Um but there’s only a limited amount of it and it’s almost all mind I think in four or five years it will all be mind.

Brandon:

So there will be a limited a mountain.

Brandon:

That’s it.

Brandon:

It was a lot.

Brandon:

What do you think?

Brandon:

No, I think it’s good information because like I don’t, I’m not a tech person and you’ve known this about me since day one and I I referenced it all the time.

Brandon:

Um I haven’t spent the time to learn and dedicate time to learn about Bitcoin crypto, things like that.

Brandon:

So I always like hearing other people’s opinions on their successes or thoughts on crypto.

Brandon:

Bitcoin, things like that.

Brandon:

Um People ask me do I regret not getting involved.

Brandon:

Not really because I have other means of investment.

Brandon:

It’s just, it’s like another thing to just add to the portfolio, right?

Danielle:

So I would just like to hear other people’s opinions on their success with it, especially since they’ve been doing it since day one, you know when you bought it at $400 a coin.

Brandon:

I mean in hindsight everybody.

Brandon:

Yeah I mean the answer.

Brandon:

I mean that question I want to go off people like oh daniel, did you regret it?

Brandon:

Well of course I Regret would be a hard word.

Brandon:

But do I wish I invested.

Brandon:

Of course I do.

Brandon:

Look it’s worth $60,000, right?

Brandon:

Like You’re going to put you know 10K.

Brandon:

Into it back.

Brandon:

Then I would have God knows how much you’d be rich.

Brandon:

I mean, so you know, I actually dawned on me the other day I was in the shower.

Brandon:

I just don’t because it’s been so long.

Brandon:

I don’t think about it.

Brandon:

I was like man, someone could be like oh your crypto millionaire.

Brandon:

Well I don’t want that tag.

Brandon:

But um you know I I think yeah, I mean so my advice on that sort of stuff.

Brandon:

I’m not giving advice.

Brandon:

I don’t want to give any daniel and I are not financial advisers, you should talk to your financial advisor, you should talk to someone who’s licensed person, we are not licensed, We’re talking about what we do personally.

Brandon:

Uh I’m not giving advice.

Brandon:

I will tell you that what I do is that I take chances on things that are up and coming or that could be a whim and go away.

Brandon:

It’s like N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

Which we probably have a lot of time to talk maybe in the next episode uh next week we can talk about what you do and and I want to hear all about that because I know you’re a little real real estate queen is um is we can also talk about N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

But it’s like N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

R.

Brandon:

N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

Is going to be worth it maybe.

Brandon:

Right?

Brandon:

Maybe it should you can you dabble on it?

Brandon:

Sure.

Brandon:

Is it risky?

Brandon:

I think here’s the risk the risk is when I got into Bitcoin, I didn’t get into it on a quote unquote win.

Brandon:

I I understood it.

Danielle:

I mean, I I fundamentally understood what was happening why you’re a tech guy.

Brandon:

Well, right, so anybody listening, I don’t recommend that you that you just buy.

Brandon:

And as I was talking, I was thinking in my head, I don’t recommend that you just buy in N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

Because you could buy a piece of crap N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

Because now there’s a bunch of, I don’t know, uh I don’t know, grifters selling, hey Danielle, I’ve got this N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

It’s my T shirt, It’s a digital image of you and me on this podcast.

Brandon:

I mean we probably could sell that.

Brandon:

Is that a good N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

Investment?

Brandon:

It probably could be, but you know, is it the right one.

Brandon:

So I think that’s and I think N.

Brandon:

F.

Brandon:

T.

Brandon:

S.

Brandon:

Are different because they’re they’re more they’re art more than they are a Bitcoin.

Brandon:

So I think anybody I think for me Bitcoin safe it’s the first thing I buy, I do buy your earthy.

Brandon:

Um I do by some other things do, I think it’s going to go up.

Brandon:

I wouldn’t have bought it at $62,000 if I didn’t think it was going to go up.

Brandon:

Um am I putting that money now that I would have invested in Bitcoin into some stocks that have gone up?

Brandon:

I mean I have stocks that since April 20 are up 130%.

Brandon:

Like that’s a better investment of that, of that money.

Brandon:

So I think that’s where you where you have to look at, right?

Brandon:

And I mean you’re kind of like a higher risk investor.

Brandon:

I mean everybody has like their comfort levels and what kind of investor they want to be, whether it’s you know low risk or high risk and you know even you just doing startups, you know that technically could be even even high risk as well, right?

Brandon:

Like you you like the new things like Bitcoin or whatever is new.

Brandon:

So you know, startups are kind of in that same category, right?

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

I like the I mean I will tell you as as you build a business that throws off cash, you start to like to the business that throws off cash.

Brandon:

I still do like the high risk stuff what I like about the high risk is is that absolutely the odds are against you in that sense.

Brandon:

You absolutely can fail.

Brandon:

But I’ve lived I’m not that old but I’ve lived long enough to know that you can hit this if you keep getting up to bat, you’re going to hit the ball.

Brandon:

I mean unless you absolutely suck and we should talk about this.

Brandon:

Well here’s the thing, here’s uh we can talk about this another day.

Brandon:

I’m actually gonna try to get this guy on the show, but there’s been a study and you I know you mentor people and do all this and there’s this idea out there that you can learn from your mistakes.

Brandon:

Well it’s actually been shown that entrepreneurs do not learn from their mistakes, right?

Brandon:

Keep going.

Brandon:

Well, ironically they they don’t.

Brandon:

For me and I was reflecting on this because G.

Brandon:

And E.

Brandon:

Were going through and planning the next 12 months of the newsletter at the print newsletter.

Brandon:

And I think I spend maybe more than would be required.

Brandon:

But I spent a lot of time on introspection and really trying to learn from my mistakes.

Brandon:

And it’s really hard to do that because you you you I mean you’ve been through all sorts of things in your life besides business that we’ve talked about.

Brandon:

It’s really hard when you get down to it to work on yourself over.

Brandon:

I mean it literally requires you becoming naked with yourself and facing all of your insecurities.

Brandon:

All the things you suck at.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

Your weaknesses, right?

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Danielle:

I don’t know if their weaknesses.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

I mean weaknesses, so to speak or or *** in your armor that that I don’t know if it’s a weakness because I hate to say that because somebody is, you know, but what you’re not quite as good at and facing that and and and after you face it, you’re probably going to get pissed and then you’ve got to accept it, right?

Brandon:

That’s really freaking hard.

Brandon:

Uh Yeah, it’s true.

Brandon:

Like it’s 100% sure.

Danielle:

I’m like I totally residue if you like you said like we all do personal development, right?

Brandon:

We all um you know, work on those things.

Brandon:

But it’s it’s really hard.

Brandon:

Like like you said, we don’t really learn from those mistakes.

Brandon:

It’s hard because we’re just like, oh, you know, that was just that one time we’ll do it again and fail again.

Brandon:

You know what I mean?

Brandon:

And you do that in your life and that I think where the mistakes and my experience happened, not mistakes but where it goes off track is is that you go do the personal development whether that’s with a group or you know, whatever that is some speaker or some guru or whatever it is and you feel really good and you’re jacked up and you’re motivated.

Brandon:

But that’s not the real work.

Brandon:

The real work comes 12 months after you’ve been to that and you’re doing the work every day, um, we’re a little bit off track on investing.

Brandon:

But these are good thoughts.

Brandon:

So this is good for thought.

Brandon:

But, but it’s the same thing on investing candidly.

Brandon:

The studies show that, um, you have to, you have to learn from your mistakes.

Brandon:

There’s a, there’s a study that I wrote about, I think two issues ago that Fidelity fund, I think whoever peter lunch, I think that was Fidelity probably they’d kill me if it’s not.

Brandon:

But here’s an interesting thing.

Brandon:

The Their number one fund, I think Peter Lynch has out was one of the only people, you know, out of a handful that have outperformed the market.

Brandon:

I think he outperformed the market don’t quote me.

Brandon:

But something like 28 times out of 30 years that he did it and it beat the stock market by a significant amount.

Brandon:

But here’s an interesting here’s an interesting statistic about investors in that fund, most of the investors in that fund lost money.

Brandon:

Well, and here’s why, because when the market went down, they sold and then when the market started coming back up and they thought they were, I’m doing air quotes for listeners timing the market okay.

Brandon:

Weren’t timing the market and they lost and they were moving the money in and out.

Brandon:

And the mistake is is that you cannot do that, You have to write it down and write it up.

Brandon:

And if you’re, if you’re retiring and you need the money at 67, your money shouldn’t be in something that risky.

Brandon:

It should be in something your portfolio changes unless unless you’re still making money, you can’t do that.

Brandon:

So when we talk about learning from mistakes and what you, it’s just disciplined.

Brandon:

So I think that, you know, I’m I’m saying that off the cuff, like, okay listeners, it’s just discipline, we’ll talk to you next week.

Danielle:

Um It’s hard, but you gotta do, you gotta do that work and I’ve spent a lot of time and still do reflecting on that and really I’m hard on myself beating myself up.

Danielle:

Some people would say, well we don’t think that’s true.

Danielle:

Brandon, you’re awfully confident and uh have a really close friend, Carson, and he said you’re you’re the, you’re the most confident person.

Brandon:

You’re off the chart confident and that’s because I have to be that confident to outweigh all the doubt.

Brandon:

Yeah and all the work.

Brandon:

I mean that that’s what it takes.

Brandon:

You gotta you gotta do what you think you can’t do.

Danielle:

But it’s like that quote when they say fake it till you make it right.

Danielle:

Like honestly sometimes you do, and well you’ll understand this.

Brandon:

Like even just down to, you know, like the company side of things, like putting investing way out there um and off of that topic.

Brandon:

But even just down to the company, like you have to be confident for the rest of your company company.

Brandon:

Even when she’s not going right.

Brandon:

You know what I mean?

Brandon:

Like you just have to be confident and even fake it if you have to until it’s until it’s dealt with.

Brandon:

Yeah because they people looked at you for that.

Brandon:

So I think next week weekend, I want to hear all about your, I think how many how many will this will be a teaser.

Brandon:

How Many Do You Have?

Brandon:

12 Real Estate Investments?

Brandon:

Yeah and then you know just like new bills um that are coming up.

Brandon:

Actually my girlfriend and I kelly just went in on one together just like a fun little like friends thing to do.

Brandon:

And um I was actually going to chime in on that when we were talking about um not being not doing something unless you can afford to lose it right?

Brandon:

And uh so that was just like a fun little one that and if we make some money out of it then great if we don’t.

Brandon:

I mean you know it’s just like it’s just a fun little thing that we did.

Brandon:

Um But yeah so that’ll be a fun topic to talk about.

Brandon:

This real estate.

Brandon:

I love real estate.

Brandon:

I just I know real estate.

Danielle:

I don’t know stocks and that’s why I chose to stick with real estate.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

I want to hear your strategy because I remember when we first talked, you said uh you said something to me, you’re like yeah I’m going to have $12 million $20 million 25 and eight.

Brandon:

It seems like a good strategy.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

And then and then just another thing that we can actually talk about to next week on my side is the private investing side of things.

Brandon:

I remember you and I were talking a little bit about that before and I think um I think that’s a good thing to talk about something that we’ve done I’ve done for a while.

Brandon:

Um Not many people know about it but I I enjoy it thoroughly so but it’s to do with real estate as well, right?

Brandon:

So I think that’s just that whole section of of investment and maybe now I have to double a bit quiet buyer.

Brandon:

Beware.

Brandon:

Yeah I like I said you know like yes we can we can be confident for the sake of being confident.

Brandon:

But I would need to spend some time learning and researching Bitcoin and feeling confident in my decision of spending $62,000 on a Bitcoin.

Brandon:

Well you don’t have to spend the other thing.

Brandon:

You don’t have to buy a whole Bitcoin.

Brandon:

Oh okay.

Danielle:

That’s how little I know.

Danielle:

I don’t know.

Brandon:

Yeah you do not have to buy a whole Bitcoin.

Brandon:

You can buy point, You can buy $10 a Bitcoin and then you would own .000019 whatever.

Brandon:

So you do not have to buy a whole Bitcoin you don’t have that information, you don’t have to buy a whole any crypto.

Brandon:

I don’t think there’s any crypto that there’s a us dollar backed coin.

Brandon:

You do have to buy a dollar because it’s a it’s a dollar.

Brandon:

Maybe.

Brandon:

Maybe.

Brandon:

Maybe you don’t even have to do that.

Brandon:

I’ve just seen that in my account when I have, I have Bitcoin cash and I have us coin.

Brandon:

I don’t know.

Brandon:

I have to look.

Brandon:

Maybe I’ll report back next week.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

But it’s, I’m glad we caught up.

Brandon:

Yeah, me too.

Brandon:

Me too.

Brandon:

It’s been, it feels like forever, but it’s only been two weeks.

Brandon:

So it’s a good thing.

Brandon:

So next week we will talk about how Danielle investor money in real estate, private investing and some other things.

Brandon:

Mhm.

Brandon:

Looking forward to it.

Brandon:

We’ll have a good weekend.

Brandon:

You feel are you are you doing anything from this weekend?

Brandon:

Are you going on any crazy trip?

Brandon:

Just ride my bike.

Danielle:

And I got, I got a lot of work.

Brandon:

We just did the shutdown this week, going over the plans for next year for the edge and the newsletter and podcast episodes.

Brandon:

As you’ve been accepting Calendar invites and I have, I have some actual work to do.

Brandon:

So it’s really nice.

Brandon:

It’s 68 here in Sunny.

Brandon:

I’m probably gonna Take the cat to the vet later.

Brandon:

But uh going to ride my bike probably 40 miles today and then Well, yeah, well, if we can connect, maybe we’ll hit a pellet on together.

Brandon:

How’s the pelton going for you?

Brandon:

Awesome.

Brandon:

Absolutely love it.

Brandon:

Obviously I couldn’t hit.

Brandon:

So I actually was laughing with my girlfriend.

Danielle:

I was saying that every hotel should have Saletan as I was.

Danielle:

Yeah, but not the one I was staying at the Windsor so I was freaking out trying to find like a pallet on jim or just something that I can get it.

Brandon:

So yeah, but I, I didn’t, it wasn’t, I couldn’t do it.

Brandon:

So I didn’t ride like friday saturday or sunday, which was bad, but I’m good now we’re back on it.

Brandon:

But my mom actually have to tell you she um has always kind of struggled on like a good fitness routine for herself.

Brandon:

She’s never really been able to stick to it.

Brandon:

So I was like, mom get yourself a peloton and just like, don’t even worry about like the output or the resistance.

Brandon:

Like even if you just cycle like just do the ride and just do your cadence and she is stuck with it now for, so she got her his last Wednesday and she has done it every day every morning and has stuck with it.

Brandon:

So I’m really proud of her.

Brandon:

So yeah, that’s awesome.

Brandon:

Yeah, they’re really good.

Danielle:

They’re hard.

Brandon:

I told you we were trying to catch up last weekend, but honestly I did a interval ride either on saturday or sunday, I forget and it’s just, I was spent.

Brandon:

I was totally, totally spent.

Brandon:

But what are you doing this weekend?

Brandon:

You look dressed up today.

Brandon:

I mean my office, this is my home office here.

Brandon:

So um, and this is just my actual personal office.

Brandon:

Benny enough and then behind me through this wall outside there’s another room and then there’s the hallway, there’s a bathroom or why are you in the office on friday?

Brandon:

You’re normally not in the office on friday because my house is getting painted today.

Brandon:

Why?

Brandon:

Yeah, So my, that’s why Danny is here because yeah, Danny enough, the upstairs of my house, bathroom, bedrooms, office all of that is getting painted.

Brandon:

So what are you doing this weekend working?

Brandon:

We have many, many projects on the go.

Brandon:

So I will be kind of in and hovering and dealing with some of those.

Brandon:

So I will probably be here tomorrow sunday afternoon, I’ll be here.

Brandon:

Um, so that’s gonna be my weekend.

Brandon:

This time of year is crazy for us.

Brandon:

Like we, I mean it’s always crazy for us at this time of year.

Brandon:

I mean like under the air with projects like construction projects are crazy.

Brandon:

Everybody on our residential sides goes insane because it’s almost christmas right?

Brandon:

So everybody wants extra stuff.

Brandon:

And then this time of year we also do um an initiative called operation sparkle.

Brandon:

So we basically utilize the mass of our clients on all divisions, construction, residential and commercial and we offer discounted services in return of donations of toys for like different county toy drive.

Brandon:

So we like lashed.

Brandon:

No, not last year because of Covid the year before.

Brandon:

We feel like three u haul trucks.

Danielle:

We filled three Lincoln navigators the year before.

Danielle:

Um, and then any fun.

Danielle:

So say you were a residential client for example, in your services regularly $500.

Brandon:

We offer 15% off of that in donation.

Brandon:

Like a new of donation.

Brandon:

So then I match all of that.

Danielle:

So if we, for example, Give total discount of $10,000 from November 15 until December 15, I then also match that and we buy even more toys.

Danielle:

So, um, so it’s, it’s very busy because then we have a pink christmas tree here in our office and we have all the toys there and yeah, it’s a good time.

Danielle:

It’s fun.

Brandon:

Well that’s awesome.

Brandon:

Crazy.

Brandon:

Mm hmm.

Brandon:

That’s what I’m going to do.

Danielle:

And I want to put my christmas tree up.

Danielle:

Oh God, why?

Danielle:

It’s not thanksgiving yet?

Brandon:

It is thanksgiving over here.

Danielle:

Well, it’s not for me.

Danielle:

It’s not, I don’t even want to think about that.

Danielle:

What is your thanksgiving next weekend or the weekend After?

Brandon:

I think the weekend after.

Danielle:

I think, I don’t know, 3rd Thursday in November, so not next week, maybe the week after that.

Brandon:

I can’t believe it’s thanksgiving already.

Brandon:

I can’t believe it’s almost christmas, it’s like a month and a half away.

Brandon:

Not even, I don’t even want to think about it.

Brandon:

I love christmas and the christmas elf.

Brandon:

I love christmas.

Brandon:

Yeah, so that’s not.

Danielle:

So um I guess we will touch base next week and we’ll talk about more things and we’ll talk about your investing.

Brandon:

Yeah.

Brandon:

Cool.

Danielle:

Alright, well see you online.

Brandon:

Sounds good.

Danielle:

Have a good weekend.

Brandon:

Bye everyone.

Brandon:

Thanks for being generous with your time and joining us for this episode of the edge before you go.

Brandon:

A quick question, are you the type of person who wants to get 100% out of your time?

Brandon:

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Brandon:

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Brandon:

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Danielle:

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Brandon:

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Brandon:

Again, that’s e g e newsletter dot com

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