In this report, I share how to retire in 36 months starting with no money.
I realize this sounds like a load of crap, and for most people, you are right. For most people watching this, it will not be possible. But they will fail for reasons other than what you are probably thinking. I know because I failed for years until I figured it out.
I want to admit which part of what I am saying is a load of crap. First, it took me a lot longer than 36 months to do this. Looking back, I know how to do it now. But it took me over 5 years of failure before I learned how to do it in 36 months. Now I know what not to do. That makes all the difference.
Second, I didn’t start with no money. I had money to throw at this problem the whole time. In fact, in 2015, I spent over $5,000 on courses and software trying to make money online. But I didn’t really start making money until last year.
Third, I am not really retired now. I am still traveling the world making videos about my favorite hobby–How to retire cheap in paradise and how to slow travel the world for cheap. But I am doing what I love now in retirement instead of being someone else’s bitch. So it feels better.
So, it would truly be a load of crap if I told you that I retired in 36 months starting with no money. I have no intention of doing that. It took me about 6 years, thousands of dollars in courses I am not presently using, and I am not sitting in a rocking chair, fishing, or playing golf every day. I am sorry, but those things bore me to death. I am traveling the world with a beautiful woman. That is what I call retirement.
Isn’t it time you decide what your retirement looks like and get after it?
So, it might be more accurate to say that I now know how to retire in 36 months starting with no money. But the truth is you probably don’t know how to retire in 36 months starting with now money. So what I know won’t help you if you follow the same path I did.
If you do what all the internet gurus tell you to do, as I did, you are going to need buckets of money and much more time to learn by trial and error. So what is the most important action I learned that finally made me successful?
So What Is It That Finally Made Me Successful?
An avalanche of useful information came pouring out of my head into my audience’s eyes and ears. To be successful, you have to share something from your life that you have learned from years of experience–experience from your working years, or experience from your personal life.
You see, I left the USA in 2007 and I have lived in or visited 67 countries. So I have an avalanche of useful information that pours out of my head into my YouTube videos and onto my webpage, VagabondBuddha.com. I pour an avalanche of the value of my personal experience into your life and that makes you keep coming back for more.
I know what you are thinking. Dan, I haven’t traveled the world for 14 years. I don’t have a runway model that retired at age 30 by my side. I won’t get as much attention as you do. How am I ever going to get a following as big as yours? I thought the same things before I started.
Let me explain why old me and you are wrong. Success online is not about tricks or gimmicks. People come back when you solve their problems. Success in the information business is about helping people solve problems.
You see, people search on the Internet to solve a specific problem. They don’t care who helps them at first. They just want the cheapest, quickest, and best solution right now. So they search on Google–How do I install a garbage disposal? How do I wax my car? What years did the Yankees win the world series?
How much are these coins worth that my grandfather left me? Can I start a daycare center in my home to make extra money? What is bitcoin? How do I lower my taxes legally? How do I get my dog to quit peeing on my carpet? How do I get my teenager to do their homework before they start playing online games? How do I lose weight? Can I learn Yoga at home?
You see, people don’t know anything about me when they first Google a problem they want to solve–What is the cost of living in Arequipa Peru? But suddenly, they find a video of me showing them everyday life and what I spend on rent and groceries while I am living in Arequipa Peru.
After they watch my first video, my other videos start popping up on the right side of their screen when they are on YouTube. It is only after watching 5 or 10 different of me walking around different countries in the world, as I talk about the cost of living, that they realize that I know something about retiring cheap in paradise.
They begin to trust me because they know I have actually been to all of these places. I show them what I am eating and what it costs. I show them where I am staying and what it costs. I show them how to get there and what it costs.
So I had to dump an avalanche of free information in their ears and eyes before they really started to trust my unique and important knowledge about–how to retire early for cheap.
So what I am saying is that you could take everything away from me, and I could retire again in 36 months starting with no money. I couldn’t honestly say that 5 years ago. But it is true now. Here is what I would do in a nutshell, starting with no money.
Starting With No Money
I would pick something that I know something about from my working years or from my personal life and I would start dumping an avalanche of free information online about it. I would pick a subject matter that I know something about. Something I want to study and learn more about.
I said you can start with no money, right? Yes, I did. Just pick up your smartphone, hit record, and start talking about something you know something about. In the first 50 videos, nobody is going to see you anyway, so don’t be a perfectionist. Just hit record and start talking.
Hi, my name is Joe and I spent 30 years selling wine to restaurants and liquor stores and I am going to teach you all about wine. People think that by paying more for wine, they are getting better quality and taste. But I am here to tell you that isn’t always true.
Starting with no money, Joe can record and upload 3 videos per week, Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday about the wines of the world. Eventually, 6, 12, or 18 months later, after about 100 videos or more, people may start to watch Joes’ videos about wine. But Joe needs to monitor which of his videos get the most views and make more videos like that.
Eventually, if Joe pays attention to what his audience wants, and pays attention to what other successful wine YouTubers are doing, and if Joe incorporates similar ideas into his videos, with his unique perspective, with his unique and quirky personality, Joe is likely to get a steady audience.
When I was new, I used to think, why would anybody watch me. There are hundreds of YouTubers sharing travel videos. Most of them are young and beautiful. Why would anyone ever watch me? I was right at first. They didn’t watch me for the first year. But eventually, they watched me.
What I learned was that people want to watch someone like them. If someone that is old and a little quirky is able to travel the world and live cheaply, maybe they can. If someone like them is able to find a beautiful person like Qiang, maybe they can.
So my age is actually an asset, not a liability. People trust people like themselves. Old people like me don’t want to watch a 25-year-old man traveling the world. They don’t identify with someone 30 years younger than them. They want to watch themselves living their dreams. They want to see what is possible for someone like them. Someone with a few bumps and bruises that hasn’t had the easy life.
So, if Joe is able to attract a wine-drinking audience of 1000 subscribers and 4000 hours of watched videos per year, YouTube will allow Joe to monetize his channel. Joe will start making money when YouTube puts advertisers on his channel. If that happens, we can say that Joe started with just his smartphone and now he is getting paid. That means he started with no money, just a smartphone.
Sadly, this is where most YouTubers stop. They are happy with an extra few hundred or a few thousand dollars per month. So they just keep slowly increasing their audience size and along with their YouTube monetization income.
But the problem is, if Joe grows slowly as I did, he will only be making a few hundred dollars per month after a year or so. That is not enough to retire. Remember, you want to retire in 36 months starting with no money.
But that is okay. Joe now has authority in the wine drinkers domain. Joe now has an audience that follows him. Google found a few wine producers that advertise on his channel. Joe now has the most important part of a successful online business. Joe has a stream of eyes and ears listening to his information about the wines of the world.
So what does Joe need to do next to increase the possibility that he will be able to retire in 36 months?
Capture Email Addresses of Your Audience
Joe’s has a steady stream of people that like to watch his videos and learn about wine. But Joe can’t contact his audience directly. All Joe can do is post videos on YouTube and hope his audience watches. It is time for Joe to capture the emails of his loyal audience of YouTube subscribers.
Joe needs his audience’s email addresses. That way, he can send emails directly to his audience and he won’t be so dependent on YouTube suggesting his newest videos over on the right. Once Joe has their emails, he can email them videos he posted that week.
To get email addresses, Joe will offer a free eBook about wine or a free video series about wine to anyone that gives him their email address. Joe would then offer the free eBook or video course in every video he makes. Every video would offer a link to sign up for the free content in return for their email address.
People will be excited to be get the free content because they have been watching Joe for months and they are curious about this more exclusive content. For example, I offer people my free eBook in return for their email address: How I Fired My Boss and Traveled the World for 14+ Years (link provided as an example).
Once Joe has their email, he can offer coupons for wine discounts, wine tasting courses, and other wine-related products to his audience. He would establish a relationship with other businesses that would pay him if his audience used the coupons in their online wine store.
Now Joe has two sources of income. He is being paid for people that advertise on his YouTube videos and he is being paid when his audience buys things from Joe or other businesses that Joe associates with. This is called affiliate marketing.
What else can Joe do to make more money? Next, I will explain one of the fastest-growing, most successful businesses in the world.
Digital Information Business: Create Memberships and Courses
Joe could offer memberships to his eBook library. People could join Joe’s eBook membership and download eBooks about various wines around the world. Joe’s eBooks could be about the best wines each year, comparing various wines, comparing wines from regions of the world, and recognizing various nuances in the flavors of Joe’s favorite wines.
Joe could also offer live courses on wine tasting to his audience. Joe could arrange to have a wine company ship wine pairings once a month, and Joe could have an online wine tasting course where the audience opens, tastes, and compares certain wines in each tasting session.
Joe could charge for access to the course and the online wine distributor he is associated with could pay him a small percentage of the wines shipped to course members. Joe would not need to warehouse wines. The wine distributor would drop ship the wines directly to Joe’s members.
So Joe started with nothing and has slowly built this business. But Joe is just in the information business. He may offer wines from third parties but he is not really a wine seller so he needs no inventory. Joe is in the information business. Joe has turned what he loves into a retirement income.
The beauty of the digital information business is that it has no geographical boundaries. There is no physical products inventory, no shipping or delivery costs, no employees, no office or phone, you can interact with people via email. People just download your eBooks, watch videos, join courses and podcasts, and download digital information.
But this business is not limited to just wine and travel. This information business model can be in any subject matter domain that you know something about–coin collecting, raising kids, house renovations, flipping houses, muscle cars, politics, how to pick up women or men, how to do it yourself, bitcoin, options trading, stocks, bonds, how to start a home business, how to make extra money in retirement, etc.
But I suggest you pick a topic that you find fascinating, that you know something about, and that you love. Because that will come through in your videos. You will be pushing a boulder uphill for a few years so you better pick something you want to learn everything about and share with others every day.
If you search online, you will learn that the digital information business is currently over 300 billion dollars per year, growing at over 20% per year. Most courses that teach how to start a digital information business start at around $1000 USD or more. But I offer my course for free to my existing paid members. It is just a bonus. My way of thanking them for making all of my retirement dreams come true.
Is This Really Possible?
I will let you decide that. But if you look at my business, I have all of these components. I have an eBook membership. My eBook library teaches people where they can retire cheap in paradise all over the world.
My retire cheap in paradise membership is important because you need to keep your expenses low while you give your business time to grow. You can retire cheap sooner if you can get your living expenses as low as possible.
My eBook library teaches people about international banking, how to avoid mistakes made by other international retirees, how to avoid crime, how to find love in foreign countries, and the best countries to find love. How to maximize social security, how to slow travel around the world, and hundreds of other trips and tricks I have learned traveling the world for the last 14 years. These are not theoretical reports. I have experienced almost everything I share while traveling the world.
Additionally, as discussed, I offer a free eBook on all of my Youtube videos, How I Fired My Boss and Traveled The World for 14+ Years. That is how I get my audience’s email address.
I recently shared a video about how I made $6500 last month with my hobby business. Watch that video if you would like to see the internal workings of my business along with how fast and slow it has grown over the last 36 months.
So, in conclusion, if you took everything away from me, I believe I would be able to build this or a similar business in 36 months, starting with no money. I can’t guarantee it will work for you. But wouldn’t it be great if it did? Imagine the freedom you would have if you could be anywhere in the world, with a stream of income following you all over the world?
The truth is, most people will not follow the course as I teach it. They will need to reinvent the wheel and make all the same mistakes I did before they are successful. But I wouldn’t need to spin my wheels like that again. I would just follow the model with no extra time or wasted steps.
In conclusion, the people that watch my videos and have become paid members of my retire cheap in paradise eBook membership have made all of my dreams come true. All I do now is travel the world and share what I learn in my eBooks and videos.
So, as a way of thanking my paid subscribers, I have created a course that teaches how I set all of this up. I am including the course as a bonus to my paid subscribers. So if you are a paid subscriber, you can take the course now as a bonus, at no extra charge.
Here is a link to the course: The Hobby Income Course.
If you are not presently a paid subscriber, you can join today and the course is included as a bonus. I am not saying this is fast or easy. In fact, just the opposite. This might be the hardest thing you have ever done in your life. But what would it mean for you if you were able to make this happen in your life? Thanks for listening to my story, how to retire in 36 months starting with no money.
This is Dan of Vagabond Awake, the YouTube channel for VagabondBuddha.com. The world is your home. What time will you be home for dinner?