Welcome to the 259 of you luminous newbies this week. No time for nonsense, if you havenāt subbed, where you at?
Have you seen the movie In Time?
Itās a future where time is money and if you have enough benjamins you can simply live forever. We follow JT who works non-stop with rarely more than a dayās worth of life left on his clock. Then he rams right into a wealthy woman with all the time in the world, who of course, is wasting it all.
While the movie is no theatrical genius, the premise is interesting. The poor are on literal death timers, working to stay alive and the wealthy can liaise and leisure all they want.
What does this have to do with us and our pursuit of thinking and cash flowing?
I have three questions for you:
Do you rent your time for money?
Does that mean you have to do something you donāt love?
Do others steal your time?
Real talk, no one loves anything they do always. āLife is sufferingā as the Buddha says. But I can promise you one thing, there are a whole legion of us who love what they do most of the time. But to achieve it is a battle every single day.
Letās talk about thieves first.
I always thought they looked like thisā¦
At least if Iām going to get jumped I want them to look more like Jason Statham and less like Jason Calacanis. Have a google and a chuckle if you donāt know those two.
But these days the thieves that steal from ALL of us look likeā¦
Iām almost embarrassed.
These two donāt appear as though they could steal a ball from a 5-year-old.
And, Iām not even talking about how addictive their platforms are, been there watched the Social Dilemma and wrote about it.
What Iām talking about is how little they value your time.
Advertising is how they make money, and you are their money maker.
Letās take Facebook:
Facebook advertising costs vary wildly1, but letās say around $0.50 to $2.00 per click. Most people spend 30 seconds to 3 minutes on the items they click on. Research also says it can take about 23 minutes2 to refocus on a task when you switch. My lord, does that give anyone else massive anxiety to hear? So what Facebook is saying is that your 26 minutes on the high end, is worth about two quarters.
Think about it this way: if we say each time you click you lose about 20 minutes. That means that Facebook thinks your hour is worth $1.50-$6.
Imagine if that was minimum wage?
Now to be fair, itās not just good ole Zuck stealing from you.
How much does it cost to put an ad on TV/Streaming?
The average costs for a 30-second ad can be $5-$10 per 1,000 impressions (CPM). Whatās CPM?
Let me break it down. Impressions mean an ad shows up on your screen and you see it. Thatās one impression, it takes a second letās say.
For each CPM, you get 1,000 human seconds:
1000 human seconds equals 16.67 minutes (1000/60 seconds in a minute)
$5-10 / 16.67 minutes = .29-59 cents
So TV/Streaming services think a human minute is worth about .29-.59 cents.
Times those numbers by 60 and a human hour is worth $17-35
That doesnāt even include the actual cost of buying things you donāt need
Let me ask you this.. what work would you be WILLING to do for $17 an hour? I hope as you progress, not very much.
So the question: why are you giving it away for so little?
My prediction: Ads Will Be A Future Tax on the Poor
Think about the last time you watched cable tv.
They had more ads than the back of a taxi cab in NY when you canāt shut off the insufferable card reader. I literally canāt do it anymore. Thatās why Spotify, Pandora, Netflix charge subscribers instead of using ads. Ads are an assault on our time.
Itās not fair, it just is.
Humans with means are realizing the cost of distraction. They will increasingly pay money to avoid it.
Who will be left as the ad moneymakers to suck from? Those who canāt afford it.
Alright, thatās kinda depressing, how do we fix it?
Letās Circle Back to Time⦠How to Get More of It
The reason we donāt have a daily email at CT is Who the F has time to read all these daily newsletters? Let alone us to write them. We are doers, not viewers.
I launched Contrarian Cashflow for this reason.
I donāt like to have to rent my time for money.
I like to work as I love the work.
I want more people to know that feeling.
I remember the first job I had where I sat every day and watched the clock run out. The hands would move slower as the day progressed until I was absolutely sure I might die waiting for 4:59 to change over.
Iāve almost forgotten that feeling itās been so long since I have traded something I loathed for a moment of my time.
The goal is we find you more ways to diversify your income.
The problem is, where all the cash flowing assets these days?
The stock market is on fire, bitcoin is bonkers, fake coins rallying, bond yields all-time lows, and the Fed is doing thisā¦
Secrets to Cashflow Creation:
It took me decades to get passive income and I have been literally āworking in moneyā (aka finance) for 12+ years. So it is OK to be starting and ok to be crushing. Itās all just a journey.
The first step is to realize the truth, the wealthy do not generate their majority of income from working for a living. Their money works for them.
Only 19% of the income by families making $10 million+ came from wages.3
Money Does Their Work for Them
The purpose of investing is to make your money work for you so that it generates cash regularly in addition to your labor.
Or as my friend Olman said, āMy money makes more money than I do.ā
Scenario one: Exec w/ $300k salary
Beth is a doctor, she makes $300k a year. Sheās in the top 1% of earners. She saves 10% as most Americans do.4 She invests in the stock market, owns her home, and lives her life.
vs
Scenario two: Exec w/ $100k salary
Jen is a marketing exec, she makes $100k a year. Sheās still in the top 1% of earners. She invests in the stock market, owns her home and lives her life. With a twist. She takes her earnings from being an exec, invests in buying small businesses that cash flow (w/ an SBA loan), then buys a duplex where she lives in one part of it and rents out the other to cover her monthly mortgage, and also built some online products on the side to sell and market online.
Who would you rather be?
a highly paid executive earning $300,000 from a company
or Jen earning $100,000 at your job plus collecting another $200,000 in real estate rents, dividends on stock holdings, consulting fees, info products, bizās etc.?
IMHO the latter is in a far safer place and much more likely to survive recessions or bear markets. Itās called diversification of income.
The difference between the wealthy and you?
They Work on Projects that Pay Dividends for 25+ Years, Not a Single Paycheck
4 Steps to Generating Assets & Cash Flow:
Alright Codie we get the what, not get to the how. It really depends where youāre at. I created CCF for those who are ready to start deploying, deep dives monthly into cash flowing ideas, for those who are foundational start here:
Know there is a Game. You just took the first step, you are learning. I didnāt start learning about income streams until I was 30. I earned lots and lots of 000ās from my W2 and made NOTHING passively. Which also meant I had no write-offs. Youāre welcome government. So wherever you are, youāre doing good fam.
Learn the Game. Time to get your library card. Does anyone still use those? Quick stat: 85% of the 1% read two or more self-improvement books per month.5 Read: Rich Dad Poor Dad, Wealth Canāt Wait, Google compound interest, have some fun learning about margin loans, sign up for Contrarian Cashflow, and go back and read all the blogs at CT and Unconventional Acquisitions.
Get the Gear to Play the Game. Start paying yourself before you spend. Take 10-20% of all you earn and put it in savings. Keep upping that. Dominate your job, ask for a raise, get on commission. Optimize your salary to start having enough to invest it. If you havenāt read Your Money or Your Life (itās aggressive AF but take some nuggets from it).
Get in the Game. I try to add one new revenue stream, or double one current revenue stream, every quarter. Itās ok if one isnāt doing as well because Iām diversified. This is the key. So get out your calendar and start taking 20min a day to think about your financial freedom.
Some of my latest revenue streams and asset classes:
Modular Housing - Airbnb it w/ someone else managing all
Contrarian Cashflow - Subscription product (does require active work)
Created a Community - Content creation (1 hr a week call)
Invested in Cannabis - Long-term play (best return thus far since 2014 for me)
Land for Campers - Buy and have someone else do all management
Course - Create once and sell passively
What do you want covered or to dig into that we havenāt yet?
Lastly, remember why youāre doing all thisā¦
So you can die with a bunch of dead presidents in your bank account? NO.
So you can build something worth building. So your time is your own. So you can leave a legacy. Or maybe because money is a tool and if you donāt use it someone else will, and you might not like what they use it for.
Question Everything & Stop Wasting Time,
Codie
P.S. Contrarian Cashflow: Your Monetary Ticket:
If you havenāt joined yet, 10 more days until founding membership goes bye-bye.
This month at CCF is all about funds.
Why? Because I'm getting inundated with questions about fund! Youāve SEEN the billions raised now you want to RAISE the billions. Or at least you want to understand the game of using other peopleās money for wealth creation.
Letās be frank, not everyone should go out and become a financial steward of othersā capital. BUT - 61% of all Americans own funds,6 you should probably understand how the economics work.
Thereās a lot to cover when it comes to funds but the main thing is...theyāre changing. In the past it was suits, ties, and briefcases for the guys who managed these suckers, now, itās democratizing.
This Month on Contrarian Cashflow Weāll Highlight:
A gent who raised a $50M fund with government grants
A lady who raised $300M fund with a roadshow
A gent who raised $3.5M on Twitter in 30 days
If you have questions you want me to ask throw them in comments:
https://www.oberlo.com/blog/facebook-advertising-cost#:~:text=Facebook%20advertising%20costs%20can%20vary,campaigns%20and%20go%20from%20there
https://www.themuse.com/advice/this-is-nuts-it-takes-nearly-30-minutes-to-refocus-after-you-get-distracted
https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/power/wealth.html
https://www.johnhancockinsurance.com/all-articles/financial-fitness/how-much-average-american-saving-every-age.html#:~:text=Between%20ages%2035%20to%2044,loans%20or%20credit%20card%20payments.
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/332372
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2020/03/25/more-than-half-of-u-s-households-have-some-investment-in-the-stock-market/
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Codie love the blog as do my Investing Ireland group. We'd love to have you speak at our live (virtual these days!) conference in April if you might consider it. Ed (Smart Money - thesmartmoneyseries.com)
Hey Codie: great article as always. Problem with Mr. Zuckerbergs place is there is a lot of educational content there too. I'd delete it ASAP if that weren't so.
One question for you: when are we puny brains and big brains (you and others) gonna talk taxes? That takes away both money and time. You thinkin' about doing that on CCF?