On Quora someone asked, “should answers be categorized by expert / non-expert?” My response: There is no such thing as an expert. First, a couple of anecdotes. In 1799, George Washington caught a cold. He was coughing and he had a fever. This was considered an emergency. The greatest American alive was sick! Blood was… Continue Reading
I have an amazing tool/app that makes my work 100x more productive. It’s called a phone. That sounds sarcastic. I’m not being sarcastic. It’s the truth. A lot of times people send me emails and then I forget about them or I never respond to them or I respond to them weeks later. I now… Continue Reading
$70 million was a lot of money for me at the time. And I couldn’t sleep at night until I gave back every dollar to the people who gave it to me. I was running the sort of fund where people gave me money and then I invested it in other funds. The only problem… Continue Reading
In 2002 I was driving to a hedge fund manager’s house to hopefully raise money from him. I was two hours late. This was pre-GPS and I had no cell phone. I was totally lost. If you’ve never driven around Connecticut you need to know one thing: all the roads are parallel and they all… Continue Reading
My first night in my first apartment I woke up with cockroaches everywhere. I went to the bathroom and the entire floor was swarming with them. I panicked and screamed because I was a little baby and never saw this before. I should’ve just called Terminix michigan to get rid of the pests, but I… Continue Reading
Time is not money. All the slick guys in their suits, peppering their lingo with “time is money!” Hurry! Money! It’s not true. I feel bad for them. Cheapening their time like that. I know this because I’m the master at losing money. I have very clever ways of making my money explode into dust.… Continue Reading
I just this second got an email: The title was: “No Money Down!” I even launched a daily podcast yesterday called “Ask Altucher.” The first question someone sent in for my podcast was “Should I buy a home now?”
Imagine you have a 17,000 square foot mansion and your movies have grossed over $2 billion and you are probably worth close to $50 million. Now imagine you sell the house and give it all away and move into a trailer in a mobile home park. I was talking to movie director Tom Shadyac and… Continue Reading
Many people have said to me in the past month, “I’m going to buy a home.” Or, “What do you think of the idea of me buying a home?” I like the second batch of people. They are my friends and it seems like they are sincerely asking for my advice. And I’m going to… Continue Reading
It’s really humiliating to ask for money from people. When I was a venture capitalist I hated everyone who asked me for money. And I hated my partners who pretended like they had the ability to make important life or death decisions over people. All we really wanted to do was make a lot of… Continue Reading
Are you satisfied with your life? Do you go to work knowing you could do better? Knowing there are unique talents in you that could make you great, the best in the world? This post is about achieving mastery. But also why it’s ok to not get mastery in the traditional sense. You can define… Continue Reading
It’s really humiliating to ask for money from people. When I was a venture capitalist I hated everyone who asked me for money. And I hated my partners who pretended like they had the ability to make important life or death decisions over people. All we really wanted to do was make a lot of… Continue Reading
I stopped going to classes. I had a scholarship that paid all my living expenses ($1200/month) so I didn’t want to quit (ugh, and get a job?). So I stayed a student but I failed every class I took for three semesters in a row. Finally Merrick Furst the Dean, wrote me a note that… Continue Reading
I had no furniture, I was 20 lbs overweight, no job, depleting bank account, owed the IRS, out of shape, I drank every night, I was separated but not divorced, two kids, depressed and maybe suicidal, and finally, I secretly wanted to be a standup comic. I also didn’t like being alone. I am the… Continue Reading
I was a daytrader for many years and it almost killed me. I made money by making profits on my own money and also taking a percentage of the profits for the people I traded for. I traded up to $40 or $50 million a day at my peak. I did this from 2001 to… Continue Reading
