How to get your time back
I lost a quarter-million dollars in the span of six months…
I read all the books.
I bought a few courses.
I attended the seminars.
When I bought my first investment
property I thought I had it all figured out.
Then I bought two more houses…
I was going to be a real estate tycoon.
I had a ten year plan for retirement.
And the money flowed in like clockwork.
…until it didn’t.
I had a hoarder renting one house.
The person lived in absolute filth, afraid
to go outside, and never did laundry.
In fact, this person tossed the dirty clothes into the basement…
For a year!
By the time the tenant skipped town
she had filled my basement, shin-deep
with clothes from various charitable groups.
210 trash bags later, I got all the filthy clothes out.
Meanwhile, across town. another tenant’s home
was raided for drug charges.
…and of course the long-term ‘good’ tenants in my
third house left in the middle of the night.
…all in the same six month period.
This happened to coincide with the crash of
2008 when many people couldn’t pay for their
homes… or their rent.
I was only making about $15/hour at the time and
had leveraged my houses to the max to help buy
the next one.
At one point I had seven mortgages.
It was a dirty house of cards, because
I listened to the money gurus talk about
how great debt was for creating wealth.
While real estate does work for plenty of
people, it’s not a passive investment like
they say on TV. You earn every penny with
real estate.
As creators, we’ve got to protect
our time. Time is the most sacred
thing we’ve got.
Wealth is measured in time.
The more wealth you have coming
in, the longer you can exist without
trading time for money.
In the next issue of The Renegade
Notebook, I want to share a powerful
wealth strategy with you.
This isn’t just a money strategy
either. It’s a framework for
decision-making and a daily work
practice too.
Here are just some of the tidbits you’ll
discover in the September issue:
How to build a creative income
flywheel (even if you don’t earn a lot now)
How to protect your practice against
financial ruin (in a simple, automated way)
The exact investments I use to
generate a steady stream of monthly
‘FU’ income (literally, without doing
any work after setting it up).
How to choose ‘dividend producing’
projects for your creative practice
(so you can jump the hamster wheel
and get your freedom back).
John D. Rockefeller’s key to
wealth (you can apply it to your
creative business without the need
to become an oil tycoon).
How to set up a ‘freedom account’
so that your working income multiplies
faster (giving you more
A little-known strategy to bring
more purpose, joy, and fulfillment
(with a small change to the work
you do currently).
The ‘full sketchbook’ strategy
for building a large body of work
through one simple change in
your habits (without the need to
work MORE).
A time-saving hack to to make
1,000 decisions in advance (so
you have more time to do the work
you love).
A sneaky but legal way to double-
dip your content writing, so you
can have someone else pay you
to grow your email list (without
spending a penny on ads).
The one type of product offering
every creative business should
have (especially if you want to
build a reliable income stream each
month.
An ancient battle strategy that
will help make you wealthy (even
if you only have 30 minutes a day)
-How to harness the power of
patience to make it almost
impossible not to become wealthy
(giving you not only more income
but more time in the process)
A zesty money-management hack
from one of my original mentors
from way back (which makes it
impossible to over-extend your
finances)
A personal buffer system to
keep you insulated against economic
downturn (without any fancy
investing knowledge required).
How to outperform some of the
smartest, fancy-suited investors
on the planet (without any stock
picking or exotic money schemes)
This is a framework I use on a daily
basis with my own life and business.
I’ve also implemented it with
family members and a nonprofit
I work with.
The hamster wheel doesn’t have to
own you. There’s another way to
get your freedom.
Take The Renegade Notebook
for a test drive.
This is my tool-of-the-month
club for creative professionals.
Inside I share a new, disappearing,
tactic, tool, mental model or
framework each month.
But they don’t repeat. Once the
current issue hits the newsstands
it’s gone.
The latest, thick ‘wealth’ issue goes
to (digital) print September 1st.
If you enroll in TRN before the cut-off
you’re guaranteed to get the framework
I share today.
The Renegade Notebook is my
tool-of-the-month club for
creative entrepreneurs.
It’s only $9 a month.
nd you’ll keep that grandfathered
rate, even when I increase enrollment
in the future (and I will).
We’ll see you inside.
That’s it for today.
In your service,
August “The Hamster Remover” Birch
P.S. The Renegade Notebook (TRN)
is my membership club for
creators who want MORE. This
isn’t a newsletter. Think of it like a
tool-of-the-month club for digital
entrepreneurs.
Each month (delivered on the first
of the month at 6:00 AM ET)
I’ll send you one map, mental model,
or framework to help you grow in one
of the three critical areas of:
WEALTH, WORK, and WISDOM.
It’s only $9 a month.
Plus, I give you $301 worth of
valuable products just for
saying ‘maybe.’
