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I went from 0 to $38,000, then back to nothing. Here is my story

P3HSB

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I joined this forum a few years ago back in 2014 when i was 23 years old. (now 25 y/o) . Prior to that, I was still taking classes at a community college. I took business classes in hopes it would prepare me to start a business but it only taught me how to be an employee "in" a business.

While i was taking classes, I worked online and made money through Amazon Mechanical Turk. I did not have a job back then, even though I should of applied for some part time job. Unfortunately at the time, I didn't know the process of how to apply for a job or create a resume.

I spent 5 years in community college absolutely lost, confused and broken. I was introverted. Also factor in the fact that I lived with an emotionally abusive mom who tore me into pieces which caused a lot of shame, guilt, low self-esteem, depression and anxiety inside of me. I had zero friends and zero network. Social media like Facebook, Instagram only made me feel like sh*t. I felt like I wasn't doing anything with my life while everyone else was having fun or doing well. Parents are living on welfare and struggling from paycheck to paycheck. The chances of succeeding in these circumstance seemed very slim.

When I was making money through Amazon Mechanical Turk, the money was slow and it took a majority of my time. Some days, I would only make 0.40 cents. Other days, I would work from 9AM to 5PM and make $10 a day. When good hits were available, I would make $30.00 a day. My best day was around $160. I eventually got a "Master Qualification" which allowed me to do better paying hits which cut the amount of time I spent and raised my pay slightly. If you would have seen the amount of work I put in, chances are you would of quit already or say this is not worth it. For me, I didn't quit. Why should I? There was nothing else better to do at the time anyways. I would of probably been playing games if I did. So while other people had part time jobs while going to college, I was grinding away on Turk. The most awesome part was I was free! While other were working a part time job, I was able to make money from home and set my own schedule. Despite my work hours being 24/7, I had the ability to make money whenever I felt like it. It didn't matter if it was 5AM in the morning or 9PM at night, hits were available and I had the opportunity to make money.

Fast forward a bit, I found out about Swagbucks (Refferal Link)/ Swagbucks (Non referral link). If you don't know what Swagbucks is, it essentially rewards members with free gift cards and cash for the everyday things they already do online. Since I was on the computer 24/7 anyways, I though this would be a great alternative to another source of income. Here is what I did. How to reddit link. At this point the money was pretty decent, at least from my perspective lol.

Then I found out about the Fastlane Forum. Here I learned how to resell on Craigslist. Two threads that really help me were A Hustler's Guide To Buying And Selling Anything (Part 1) and
A Hustler's Guide To Buying And Selling Anything (Part 2). In this thread, I flipped a bicycle which earned me a profit of $60. I was ecstatic. A forum member said if you can sell 1 you can sell 100. So that is what I did. I started selling everything you can think of. Bicycles, mini refrigerators, toys, games, textbooks, shoes etc. Then I started to also sell things around the house. So now I was selling a mixture of stuff I bought for resell and my own stuff. The money was great, I had a wad of cash at home and my parents was shocked of how fast I made the money. It got to the point I needed an excel sheet to keep track of all the sales. It was great.

Around this point, I finished my AS in Business Administration. I also just got around finishing reading The Millionaire Fastlane. I had nothing to lose at this point. It was either continue school or go all in on "business". So I choose the business route. At this time, I was also learning how to trade foreign currency.

So I took the money I made from Amazon Mechanical Turk and dumped it into a brokerage account. I put in $2000. After a lot of trial and error, I started to become profitable. I used software such as myfxbook.com and excel sheets to track my progress. Slow and steady, I started making $30.00 here, $60.00 there. Seeing my progressive growth, I decided to inject another $2000. Eventually I ended up putting in a total of $9000. Making money started to seem a bit easier. Instead of spending my entire day Turking, now I would wake up in the morning and literally make $120 in a day. I set stops and limit orders so all the work was done automatically.

Around the time my trading career was taking off, I found my first job in manual labor. The pay was $11/hr. The first couple of months was amazing. I thought to myself, why didn't I get a job sooner. The work was easy and it would help me fund all of my business ventures. While a lot of people would complain that manual labor job sucks, I felt blessed. I went from making 0.40 cents a day, to making $600-700 bucks in two week and it was consistent. Life started to get better. I saved every dime as I knew this job wouldn't last and it didn't.

With this job money, I took it and dumped it into WealthFront (referral Link) /Wealthfront (Non referral.) Wealthfront is an automatic way of building a diversified investment portfolio with little to no work at all. So I put in a total of $6000. The returns are amazing so far and it is making me money passively. WealthFront buys a mixtures of U.S stocks, bonds, foreign stocks, emerging markets, dividend growth stocks and natural resources. Most are ETF security such as VTI, SCHF, VEA, VWO, VIG, XLE, MUB. All you have to do is set a risk score from 1 being low risk to 10 being the riskiest. If you set it low, you will have more bonds than stock and if you set it high you will have more stocks than bonds.

So while I was doing all this, I still wasn't done. I was hungry. I found a thread on the Fastlane Forum called [AMA] Importing & wholesaling for resale on eBay. I started importing things from China and reselling them. It was an absolute struggle but eventually I found some good products that sold. Now I have products that sell 1-3 every week. However, the profit margins are terrible. I was only making around $5.00 profit per unit.

I also started a youtube channel and started investing into index funds. With all that being said, the journey was an absolute rocky one. But guess what? I got a glimpse of the Fastlane! I remember one particular day. It went something like this.

I woke up around 5 A.M to check my trades. Everything was going according to plan. I was about to bank $100 in profit before the day even started. I checked my Wealthfront, index funds and I was up a couple of hundreds there. I set my swagbucks on automatic and I would go back to sleep till around 7A.M. As I wake up, profits are already booked for the trades. Limit orders are hit. Wham! A voice in my head said "do I even need to go to my job today". Then my phone buzzed. I received an email of some guy wanting to meetup and buy a bike from me. Instantly that was another $120 in my pocket. Ebay sales were rolling in 1-2. I quickly packed the orders before I left for work. I drove to the post office and dropped off the packages. Then I went straight to work. That day, I received a paycheck for around $700 from my job. This was the best feeling ever. Money was rolling in from all directions!! I was on top of the world!

Then in 2017 it all came to an end. I was burnt physically and mentally. I was laid off from my manual labor job. Instantly my consistent stream of money disappeared. To make matters worst, my brokerage FXCM was banned from the U.S. Link here. Ebay sales dwindled after 4th quarter ended. Craigslist sales stopped as I fell off. And physically my body was deteriorating. At age 25, I had wrist pain, lower back pain, neck pain everything you can think of. My body was done. Depression, anxiety and low-self esteem set back in.

Luckily, I saved almost every single dollar I earned. I knew that each dollar was a freedom unit and I needed every single one of them to fight for me. I had zero social life so I didn't go out much. Because of my non social life existence, I manage to save about $38,000. No vacations, no toys, no cars, no fancy cloths, no expensive dinners, just straight saved cash.

Fast forward to the present, I just finish reading Unscripted. As I was at the absolute bottom of my career, this book couldn't have come at a better time. Absolutely unbelievable book. I didn't think @MJ DeMarco could of surprised me anymore, but he did. I was still living in many of the bullshit hyper realities. Now with new sense of purpose and invigorated soul my new goal was not to buy a brand new Lamborghini, but to buy my freedom. Freedom to say "F*ck YOU". Freedom to have control. Freedom to live unscripted . To leave a legacy. To create value in the world.

With that being said be on the look out for my new progress thread.

To be continue........
 
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Roli

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I joined this forum a few years ago back in 2014 when i was 23 years old. (now 25 y/o) . Prior to that, I was still taking classes at a community college. I took business classes in hopes it would prepare me to start a business but it only taught me how to be an employee "in" a business.

While i was taking classes, I worked online and made money through Amazon Mechanical Turk. I did not have a job back then, even though I should of applied for some part time job. Unfortunately at the time, I didn't know the process of how to apply for a job or create a resume.

I spent 5 years in community college absolutely lost, confused and broken. I was introverted. Also factor in the fact that I lived with an emotionally abusive mom who tore me into pieces which caused a lot of shame, guilt, low self-esteem, depression and anxiety inside of me. I had zero friends and zero network. Social media like Facebook, Instagram only made me feel like sh*t. I felt like I wasn't doing anything with my life while everyone else was having fun or doing well. Parents are living on welfare and struggling from paycheck to paycheck. The chances of succeeding in these circumstance seemed very slim.

When I was making money through Amazon Mechanical Turk, the money was slow and it took a majority of my time. Some days, I would only make 0.40 cents. Other days, I would work from 9AM to 5PM and make $10 a day. When good hits were available, I would make $30.00 a day. My best day was around $160. I eventually got a "Master Qualification" which allowed me to do better paying hits which cut the amount of time I spent and raised my pay slightly. If you would have seen the amount of work I put in, chances are you would of quit already or say this is not worth it. For me, I didn't quit. Why should I? There was nothing else better to do at the time anyways. I would of probably been playing games if I did. So while other people had part time jobs while going to college, I was grinding away on Turk. The most awesome part was I was free! While other were working a part time job, I was able to make money from home and set my own schedule. Despite my work hours being 24/7, I had the ability to make money whenever I felt like it. It didn't matter if it was 5AM in the morning or 9PM at night, hits were available and I had the opportunity to make money.

Fast forward a bit, I found out about Swagbucks (Refferal Link)/ Swagbucks (Non referral link). If you don't know what Swagbucks is, it essentially rewards members with free gift cards and cash for the everyday things they already do online. Since I was on the computer 24/7 anyways, I though this would be a great alternative to another source of income. Here is what I did. How to reddit link. At this point the money was pretty decent, at least from my perspective lol.

Then I found out about the Fastlane Forum. Here I learned how to resell on Craigslist. Two threads that really help me were A Hustler's Guide To Buying And Selling Anything (Part 1) and
A Hustler's Guide To Buying And Selling Anything (Part 2). In this thread, I flipped a bicycle which earned me a profit of $60. I was ecstatic. A forum member said if you can sell 1 you can sell 100. So that is what I did. I started selling everything you can think of. Bicycles, mini refrigerators, toys, games, textbooks, shoes etc. Then I started to also sell things around the house. So now I was selling a mixture of stuff I bought for resell and my own stuff. The money was great, I had a wad of cash at home and my parents was shocked of how fast I made the money. It got to the point I needed an excel sheet to keep track of all the sales. It was great.

Around this point, I finished my AS in Business Administration. I also just got around finishing reading The Millionaire Fastlane. I had nothing to lose at this point. It was either continue school or go all in on "business". So I choose the business route. At this time, I was also learning how to trade foreign currency.

So I took the money I made from Amazon Mechanical Turk and dumped it into a brokerage account. I put in $2000. After a lot of trial and error, I started to become profitable. I used software such as myfxbook.com and excel sheets to track my progress. Slow and steady, I started making $30.00 here, $60.00 there. Seeing my progressive growth, I decided to inject another $2000. Eventually I ended up putting in a total of $9000. Making money started to seem a bit easier. Instead of spending my entire day Turking, now I would wake up in the morning and literally make $120 in a day. I set stops and limit orders so all the work was done automatically.

Around the time my trading career was taking off, I found my first job in manual labor. The pay was $11/hr. The first couple of months was amazing. I thought to myself, why didn't I get a job sooner. The work was easy and it would help me fund all of my business ventures. While a lot of people would complain that manual labor job sucks, I felt blessed. I went from making 0.40 cents a day, to making $600-700 bucks in two week and it was consistent. Life started to get better. I saved every dime as I knew this job wouldn't last and it didn't.

With this job money, I took it and dumped it into WealthFront (referral Link) /Wealthfront (Non referral.) Wealthfront is an automatic way of building a diversified investment portfolio with little to no work at all. So I put in a total of $6000. The returns are amazing so far and it is making me money passively. WealthFront buys a mixtures of U.S stocks, bonds, foreign stocks, emerging markets, dividend growth stocks and natural resources. Most are ETF security such as VTI, SCHF, VEA, VWO, VIG, XLE, MUB. All you have to do is set a risk score from 1 being low risk to 10 being the riskiest. If you set it low, you will have more bonds than stock and if you set it high you will have more stocks than bonds.

So while I was doing all this, I still wasn't done. I was hungry. I found a thread on the Fastlane Forum called [AMA] Importing & wholesaling for resale on eBay. I started importing things from China and reselling them. It was an absolute struggle but eventually I found some good products that sold. Now I have products that sell 1-3 every week. However, the profit margins are terrible. I was only making around $5.00 profit per unit.

I also started a youtube channel and started investing into index funds. With all that being said, the journey was an absolute rocky one. But guess what? I got a glimpse of the Fastlane! I remember one particular day. It went something like this.

I woke up around 5 A.M to check my trades. Everything was going according to plan. I was about to bank $100 in profit before the day even started. I checked my Wealthfront, index funds and I was up a couple of hundreds there. I set my swagbucks on automatic and I would go back to sleep till around 7A.M. As I wake up, profits are already booked for the trades. Limit orders are hit. Wham! A voice in my head said "do I even need to go to my job today". Then my phone buzzed. I received an email of some guy wanting to meetup and buy a bike from me. Instantly that was another $120 in my pocket. Ebay sales were rolling in 1-2. I quickly packed the orders before I left for work. I drove to the post office and dropped off the packages. Then I went straight to work. That day, I received a paycheck for around $700 from my job. This was the best feeling ever. Money was rolling in from all directions!! I was on top of the world!

Then in 2017 it all came to an end. I was burnt physically and mentally. I was laid off from my manual labor job. Instantly my consistent stream of money disappeared. To make matters worst, my brokerage FXCM was banned from the U.S. Link here. Ebay sales dwindled after 4th quarter ended. Craigslist sales stopped as I fell off. And physically my body was deteriorating. At age 25, I had wrist pain, lower back pain, neck pain everything you can think of. My body was done. Depression, anxiety and low-self esteem set back in.

Luckily, I saved almost every single dollar I earned. I knew that each dollar was a freedom unit and I needed every single one of them to fight for me. I had zero social life so I didn't go out much. Because of my non social life existence, I manage to save about $38,000. No vacations, no toys, no cars, no fancy cloths, no expensive dinners, just straight saved cash.

Fast forward to the present, I just finish reading Unscripted. As I was at the absolute bottom of my career, this book couldn't have come at a better time. Absolutely unbelievable book. I didn't think @MJ DeMarco could of surprised me anymore, but he did. I was still living in many of the bullshit hyper realities. Now with new sense of purpose and invigorated soul my new goal was not to buy a brand new Lamborghini, but to buy my freedom. Freedom to say "F*ck YOU". Freedom to have control. Freedom to live unscripted . To leave a legacy. To create value in the world.

With that being said be on the look out for my new progress thread.

To be continue........

OK, so you haven't nothing, just no current income, that's not so bad the fact that you've saved well is your cushion, I think you just need some wise choices going forwards and you can grow that money tree.

Also I would recommend reading Mindset by Dr. Carol Dweck as it will help you past some of your self esteem issues. You are an incredible worker, and I don't believe you give yourself enough credit for it. So if you haven't already, c&p that into Amazon and get it now.

Just one question, I checked out HITS, and am I missing something? Will people really do an hour's work for $0.60? That seems insane, I must be missing something right?
 

P3HSB

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OK, so you haven't nothing, just no current income

Correct. I still was able to maintain $38,000, I just lost all of my major income sources. I am currently searching for a job. I don't care what it is, as long as it pays for survival. I just need to turn off my ego and not be to picky on what job it is.

that's not so bad the fact that you've saved well is your cushion

Yeah, its not bad. But its still nothing to live on comfortably.

Also I would recommend reading Mindset by Dr. Carol Dweck as it will help you past some of your self esteem issues.

I will check this out! Thanks for the recommendation.

You are an incredible worker, and I don't believe you give yourself enough credit for it.

Thank you. I don't think i give myself enough credit as well. I get depressed on myself and wonder why I can't do more. I won't still stop till I create a business that hits over the $10,000 mark. That is when I know its real. Then I can pat myself on the back.

Just one question, I checked out HITS, and am I missing something? Will people really do an hour's work for $0.60? That seems insane, I must be missing something right?

Nope! That the reality of it. But lucky for me, I found a forum where people post all of the best hits with decent pay/time for the effort. Then once you get the master qualification, things start to get a tad bit better. I also had a bunch of add-ons and scripts which made my Mturk journey much easier.
 
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Imgal

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Hugely impressed by your story... particularly how forward thinking you were in making sure you had a cushion of money. It sounds like you have a wealth of experience and even it takes a while to get a job (though I doubt you'll allow that to happen), you have the tenacity and skills to find a way to make money in between.

One thing to remember is we all have highs and lows... even those with the strongest of mindsets struggle once in a while. It's just whether we allow that to end up pulling us deeper or motivation to take us to new heights.

You've got this, and having been in a similar situation, if you ever need someone to reach out, if only to offload on a tough day you've got an ear here!
 

joury

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With this job money, I took it and dumped it into WealthFront (referral Link) /Wealthfront (Non referral.) Wealthfront is an automatic way of building a diversified investment portfolio with little to no work at all. So I put in a total of $6000. The returns are amazing so far and it is making me money passively. WealthFront buys a mixtures of U.S stocks, bonds, foreign stocks, emerging markets, dividend growth stocks and natural resources. Most are ETF security such as VTI, SCHF, VEA, VWO, VIG, XLE, MUB. All you have to do is set a risk score from 1 being low risk to 10 being the riskiest. If you set it low, you will have more bonds than stock and if you set it high you will have more stocks than bonds.

You put about $6000 in, doesn't that have a bit of income for you?

Edit : Nevermind, just saw your broker went banned, you plan on investing by wealthfront again?
 

Roli

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Correct. I still was able to maintain $38,000, I just lost all of my major income sources. I am currently searching for a job. I don't care what it is, as long as it pays for survival. I just need to turn off my ego and not be to picky on what job it is.
Listen, whatever makes you happy. However from what I've read here, I would say to scour this forum and really put your mind to what you want to do next. Make it some kind of business or self-employed move. I say this because of a few things:

1. You have the capacity to save and not spend excessively, a rare quality these days.
2. You also have the ability to put your mind to something and work at it till it pays off for you. Ergo it is better to dedicate that hard work to YOURSELF and not somebody else, you deserve this.
3. I don't believe you have a runaway ego, in fact, you are extremely level headed and need an ego boost. I think running your own hustle, for the good of yourself, will give you that and more.
4. You've read TMF so you know that a job sucks and you have already shown that you have the potential to be more than an employee.

Yeah, its not bad. But its still nothing to live on comfortably.

Not forever, but long enough to find something worthwhile to do.

I will check this out! Thanks for the recommendation.

Please, please, please do. I hope you've at least ordered it by the time you read my reply. I can't stress how much it will help your mindset.

Thank you. I don't think i give myself enough credit as well. I get depressed on myself and wonder why I can't do more.

I won't still stop till I create a business that hits over the $10,000 mark. That is when I know its real. Then I can pat myself on the back.

This is all linked to the fixed mindset that your parents have put you into, again Mindset will help shed you of these illusions.


Nope! That the reality of it. But lucky for me, I found a forum where people post all of the best hits with decent pay/time for the effort. Then once you get the master qualification, things start to get a tad bit better. I also had a bunch of add-ons and scripts which made my Mturk journey much easier.

Wow, I can't even use a service like that for my benefit, I'd feel like I was taking advantage of slave labour. Anyway, you've moved on from that, you have grown and all your hard work is coming to fruition.

Just as @Imgal says above, please feel free to DM me anytime you're feeling low for a pep talk other mail or even Skype, we're in different time zones but we can arrange something.

Can't wait to hear your progress thread when you are kicking a$$ in your next venture! :cool::thumbsup::fistbump:
 
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luniac

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you got crazy hustle man, but it also sounds like you got tekel syndrome.
polygamist-opportunists who opportunity hop.

like the book says:
A weak business commitment commits you to weak assets. Weak assets do not accelerate wealth.

out of all the things that made you money, which one can u build on while adhering to CENTS?
maybe that should be your focus?
 
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AgainstAllOdds

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Amazing post. @P3HSB - you're on the perfect track. Now you just have to transition into running your own business.

Take a look at importing product. Maybe get @Walter Hay's book if you're having trouble getting started.

Or look at real estate. You obviously have no problem doing manual labor and the less glamorous stuff, so real estate could be perfect for you. There's a few threads on this forum about buying places. Consider buying a place, fixing it up, cash flowing.
 

G-Man

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Great story rep ++

You have crazy hustle man. I would forget about the wealthfront and fx trading for now. If you add the money you have to your epic hustle, you'll be able to exploit opportunities that you can actually control.
 
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Chazmania

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You've been forging process - it's just that simple. Nothing is wasted. Find what was working and what you learned and roll it into the next phase. Great story.
 

Omerroz

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I think you've done the best you can
You learned a lot and fell
like everybody
You are in the real world.
If there is anything new please update
 

P3HSB

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You put about $6000 in, doesn't that have a bit of income for you?

yes it does, unrealized gains and dividends.

Edit : Nevermind, just saw your broker went banned, you plan on investing by wealthfront again?

The brokerage that I was using that was banned from the U.S is FXCM.

Breaking: CFTC Levies $7m Fine on FXCM, Forced to Quit US Market | Finance Magnates

Nothing wrong with Wealthfront. I am still currently using it.
 
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Argue

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Phenomenal story! You got the heart of a lion, you just don't give up.

Somewhere around your posts, you mention that you have $38,000. Take 10% and invest it in FBA.
These are some of my suggestions. I believe you have what it takes to be successful, selling on amazon.

P.S. I'm not sure if you know who DJ Khaled is, but "they" don't want you to win. So what you have to do is win. :D
 
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MJ DeMarco

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Marked NOTABLE.

I see a ton of hustle.

I have no doubt you'll succeed -- you just need to channel your effort into the proper venue.

Also glad to see that you got a taste of AUTONOMY -- the metric that marks 50% of your happiness quotient.
 

Lucid Tech

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First off, great story of tenacity and grit. If you keep up this attitude you are absolutely on the path to success.

Now time for some tough love, and I don't mean this in a bad way. It's important to try a few things to see where you will get traction but I see a lot of dabbling in different things. Are you sure you are giving any of them the proper attention they deserve?

From a quick glance you've dabbled in the following areas:
  • Craigslist flipping
  • FX trading
  • Amazon Mechanical Turk
  • Importing and listing on eBay
  • manual labor
  • Affiliate links (several in your post)
  • Swagbucks
  • Starting a YouTube channel

I don't know about Turk or Swagbucks, but many people have become millionaires by focusing on just one of those the other things you've listed. If you aren't truly focusing on any of them (because you have so many things going on at once) it's not overly surprising when any one of them disappears.

I would highly recommend reading this post on the forum: Notable! - No Dabble Zone

Pick one thing that you can truly focus on, give it all your effort, and you'll see more success than jumping around.

You've done a great job of staying outside of debt and minimizing expenses. Now it's time to boost your income.

Best of luck. Now go get it!
 
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P3HSB

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You've got this, and having been in a similar situation, if you ever need someone to reach out, if only to offload on a tough day you've got an ear here!

Thank you for your support! :smile2: We are all in this together! let get it!

you got crazy hustle man, but it also sounds like you got tekel syndrome.
polygamist-opportunists who opportunity hop.

The thing was I actually thought I could make a career out of it. That is why I went super hard on on each platform. I was naive at the time.Then one opportunity came after another where deploying capital made it easier and faster to make more money. So it only made sense to add another platform or income stream.

out of all the things that made you money, which one can u build on while adhering to CENTS?
maybe that should be your focus?

I am going to be starting a new E-commerce business focus on creating value and legacy
 
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P3HSB

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Amazing post. @P3HSB - you're on the perfect track. Now you just have to transition into running your own business.

Take a look at importing product. Maybe get @Walter Hay's book if you're having trouble getting started.

Or look at real estate. You obviously have no problem doing manual labor and the less glamorous stuff, so real estate could be perfect for you. There's a few threads on this forum about buying places. Consider buying a place, fixing it up, cash flowing.

Hey @AgainstAllOdds, I been importing on a small scale already. I have read Walter Hay's entire thread and read his book. Right now the only problem is selling B2C with retail arbitrage is leaving me with very low profit margins. That is why I am now considering focusing on product development so I can have margins that I can live on.

And for real estate, that is something I would love to get in. But for now, I am not well capitalized enough for it. Instead, I will be purchasing REIT very soon, that way I can make money from the dividends and not worry about all the other shenanigan
 

P3HSB

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Great story rep ++

You have crazy hustle man. I would forget about the wealthfront and fx trading for now. If you add the money you have to your epic hustle, you'll be able to exploit opportunities that you can actually control.

WealthFront is totally passive, so I can just leave that running. For FXtrading, I really love it. If it wasn't for FXCM getting banned from the U.S, I would of continue doing it. So I will put this off for now. However, If I was to go back, I would try Online Trading & FX for Business | OANDA
 
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P3HSB

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You've been forging process - it's just that simple. Nothing is wasted. Find what was working and what you learned and roll it into the next phase. Great story.

Dude, you are so F*cken right man! Little did I know, I was setting myself up and everything was the process.

Pick one thing that you can truly focus on, give it all your effort, and you'll see more success than jumping around.

All this was part of the journey

Check out this video, couldn't have said it better, gives me goosebumps watching it, because I know I will make it very soon.... I feel it

 
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P3HSB

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Phenomenal story! You got the heart of a lion, you just don't give up.

Somewhere around your posts, you mention that you have $38,000. Take 10% and invest it in FBA.
These are some of my suggestions. I believe you have what it takes to be successful, selling on amazon.

P.S. I'm not sure if you know who DJ Khaled is, but "they" don't want you to win. So what you have to do is win. :D

I already checked out all of those threads. Dropshipping and FBA is not a viable option for me because I would lack control and it would cut into my margins. I prefer to built my own store, my own products, my own sales channel, then after all of the infrastructures are built I can disseminate all of the products on to these third party channels to increase revenue without giving control.
 

P3HSB

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Marked NOTABLE.

I see a ton of hustle.

I have no doubt you'll succeed -- you just need to channel your effort into the proper venue.

Also glad to see that you got a taste of AUTONOMY -- the metric that marks 50% of your happiness quotient.

Thanks @MJ DeMarco. You are right. My new focus will be channeled towards digital product systems and product systems as mentioned in Unscripted .
 
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Walter Hay

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So while I was doing all this, I still wasn't done. I was hungry. I found a thread on the Fastlane Forum called [AMA] Importing & wholesaling for resale on eBay. I started importing things from China and reselling them. It was an absolute struggle but eventually I found some good products that sold. Now I have products that sell 1-3 every week. However, the profit margins are terrible. I was only making around $5.00 profit per unit.
If you can't make a higher profit than that, you are probably buying from the wrong place, and not using the right approach. It might pay you to have a look at my thread:
GOLD Sharing my lifetime experience in export/import. Product sourcing specialist.

Walter
 

DamienRoche

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And physically my body was deteriorating. At age 25, I had wrist pain, lower back pain, neck pain everything you can think of. My body was done.

..many great lessons in this post, but I think this is one of the most important. We don't just have limited time, we have limited health, and we will not stop ageing. What is the use in aspiring to buying your freedom while losing it all to bad health because of what you put yourself through to get there?

I saw another post on the forum recently about a 6-figure business with 3/4 hours a week. I understand there is a genuine need for grind (especially in the beginning), but it would be wise to, as in that post suggested, delegate as soon as possible. You could have hired someone to find these products and pretty much handle almost every part of the process, which would have, in turn, freed you up to do less laborious stuff, and more higher level strategising (scaling operations, for e.g.).

Good luck this time round, man! Don't get stuck in the trenches when you can buy an army!
 

HUSTLIN HEATHEN

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So I took the money I made from Amazon Mechanical Turk and dumped it into a brokerage account. I put in $2000. After a lot of trial and error, I started to become profitable. I used software such as myfxbook.com and excel sheets to track my progress. Slow and steady, I started making $30.00 here, $60.00 there. Seeing my progressive growth, I decided to inject another $2000. Eventually I ended up putting in a total of $9000. Making money started to seem a bit easier. Instead of spending my entire day Turking, now I would wake up in the morning and literally make $120 in a day. I set stops and limit orders so all the work was done automatically.

Around the time my trading career was taking off, I found my first job in manual labor. The pay was $11/hr. The first couple of months was amazing. I thought to myself, why didn't I get a job sooner.

LMAO I remember my first week Turking as a total noob....STOKED as hell to make at least $40 a week, til I found out about scripts and batch requesters. Now it's the least I make in a day. And I can actually pay my damn bills!

You seem like a pretty intuitive, self-made investor with substantial passive income experience. I hope to get there myself someday. Been Turking since end of July / early August with almost $5k in earnings. You mentioned waking up to $120 a day with your brokerage account funded by your $2k Mturk earnings....I sure as hell could use some of that right now! What was the net profit you generated from that specific brokerage account?
 
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Private Witt

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What a story! I really like the OPs writing style.
 

FierceRacoon

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So I put in a total of $6000. The returns are amazing so far and it is making me money passively. WealthFront buys a mixtures of U.S stocks, bonds, foreign stocks, emerging markets, dividend growth stocks and natural resources.

That is, so far. Until the end of the cycle. When the next depression happens, you will lose all you've made.
I've just looked at Betterment from Jan, 1, 2008 through Jan, 1, 2019 (Wealthfront was not around).
Betterment (100% stock, the most risky) increased +72.6%. Betterment 0% stock increased +3.6%.
In contract, S&P increased from 1378 to 2607, or +89%. It is true that from 2004-2019 Betterment has made more money than the S&P, but it's just a different part of the cycle.

I've looked into the roboadvisors, and in my impression, their primary goal is to get maximum deposits. This is where the war is won, as it may cost banks as much as $500 to acquire a new checking account customer. As far as the investment strategy is concerned, the average person is not very sophisticated, so it doesn't matter what you offer... so long as it looks okay, people will buy.

As far as the "lower risk" option, given that we are in an interest-rate growing environment, do you really want to invest in a bonds ETF? I am not saying I am a better investor, I am not, just that you have to be skeptical about their claims.

Don't think that Wealthfront or Betterment have some amazing investment strategy that will outperform the market. If they had, everyone would be investing with them. What they have is a commoditized version for sheep like me and you, who don't want to think.
 

AppMan

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38K is enough to start online business , you are lucky no high fixed expenses for you , so you can have the freedom of trying. now that 38K might get consumed quickly if someone doesnt have income, so act fast and start your research to find good product ( or supplier ) to sell online .
 
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karakoram

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Yes, FXCM was banned. I question the credibility of any of the FX "brokers", as they typically bucket trades (which is often why FX gets banned for US based customers). Retail traders do not get to participate in the true FX interbank markets - that's a false story the FX brokers sell to retail traders.

So, if you were successful trading FX with FXCM, you are beating 90% plus, of the traders on FXCM. Possibly you might know how to trade profitably and consistently.

My question is this: why not open an account with a US licensed/regulated futures broker and trade currency futures?

Its the same thing as FX as far as price patterns go, but with lower trading costs than FX. If you are worried about the leverage, they have micro versions of the majors.

I would also argue that if you know how to profit consistently from price patterns, you could trade other futures markets and get better diversification than any stock based funds can give you. Corn tends not to move with gold and cotton, etc.
 

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