You are on the Forbes Billionaire list with a Forbes
self-made score of 10 out of 10. So I do think that that I am
self-made, but I don't sort of begrudge the circumstance.
I think early adversity is probably a huge advantage.
You went to Harvard for undergrad.
Is it responsible for success or just a nice flex?
Yeah, this one's going to be a little controversial.
Mark Cuban business genius or overrated TV billionaire?
Oh man. OK, look, let's talk about the
facts. If you were starting from zero
today, what is the first real move that you'd make to build
wealth? The truth is that when you don't
have anything, can you find maneuvers and tactics for
yourself that aren't about capital?
Everybody has fear. We all have fear about
something, and So what do you do with it?
But when are we talking about love?
I think Fernando wants to set us up, really.
I mean, I will try. I will.
I will work really, really hard.
Let me ask you guys a Yeah, about love, how to very driven,
highly intelligent women. Does it?
Does it make it difficult to date?
You know what? Going back to your earlier
point. This is the Tiger Sisters
podcast where we talk about money, power and love.
We are #11 top business podcast on Spotify.
Today we talk about the truth about building wealth from
nothing. They say generational wealth is
the key to success, that you need a trust fund or a last name
that people recognize. But what if you could build a
billion dollar empire in one lifetime?
Today's guest didn't grow up with wealth.
He didn't have the elite connections.
By the end of this episode, you won't just know Fernando's wild
story. From crossing borders to
building a multibillion dollar empire, you'll walk away with
his top three rules for building and keeping generational wealth.
I'm Cherie. I'm Jean.
And I'm Fernando. And we're the Tiger sisters.
And I'm the tiger brother. Hey friends, it's Sheree and
Jean from Tiger Sisters. We need your help.
We just dropped our very first audience survey and it's
actually really important to us. Why?
Because we want to create the best content for you and
learning more about you helps us to do that.
It takes less than 5 minutes to fill out and as a thank you,
we're giving away $100.00 gift card at the end of the season to
1 listener who fills out the survey.
The link is in the video description, please fill it out.
Thank you for being a part of this with us.
Tiger Sisters is just getting started.
Fernando. I'm intense questions.
Questions. You are on the Forbes
Billionaire list with a Forbes self-made score of 10 out of 10,
which we looked up in Forbes. We actually looked at the like
footnotes. And that means you grew up poor
and overcame significant obstacles to build your fortune
completely on your own. There are very, very few people
who have the score of 10 out of 10.
Two of them are Oprah, George Soros and Fernando.
All right. Forbes reports that you have a
net worth of $2.8 billion and we got one of these.
Let's talk about love. Let's.
Talk about love. Now he wants to talk about Dad
wants to talk about that. Can you please introduce
yourself to the audience in your own words?
Well, I, I did grow up in pretty complex circumstances.
I, I grew up along the South Texas, northern Mexico border.
So I do think that, that I am self-made, but, but I don't sort
of begrudge the circumstance. I think they were, you know,
sort of a real advantage. And I think early adversity is
probably a huge advantage. I love that can.
You talk a little bit more about this view.
It sounds like it's a view that's turned into a value
that's really guided you to make the decisions that you've made
in your personal life and your business.
All of the, my view is that we live in a country where there
are no constraints to what you can achieve a simple idea.
Most of the constraints that people put on themselves are
self-made. This country has a massive
economy, a $30 trillion GDP economy.
And so there are places, pockets everywhere where wealth can be
created. And so if you want to do that,
and that's a, you know, a value or something that you are
interested in, there are an infinite, almost infinite number
of places to to generate wealth, But you have to have the stomach
for it. You have to believe in your
ability to do that. And then you also have to have
the ability to provide value for others.
So if you do something kind of the way you 2 do this, you're
disseminating information to young men and women about
pursuing business, a career, all of these things, they're
massively important to people's understanding of, of how to
pursue their goals. And so if you provide that
value, you get rewarded. If what you do doesn't provide
value to others in society, then you don't, you don't get
rewarded. It's sort of a very, very fair
system in my opinion. And I think that that underpins
my pursuit of business creation, is that if we can build
businesses with people with stamina that have the ability to
deal with adversity and that we can provide a value to to
society, then we'll be rewarded for it.
And we've done that, you know, a few times.
Fernando for for Senator, for President.
No, no, no, no, the opposite. We need we, no, what we need to
do is create, continue doing what we're doing.
And the, the, the political thing is way too complicated.
That's one thing that people, business people have not been
able to solve. It's how to deal with, with the,
with the political chaos of, of the last few years.
Yeah. Sharif for president.
Yeah, Sharif for president. Or at least, or at least the
governor. Yeah, why stop there?
Fernando? I I'd love to go back to the
beginning, some of your, your early stories.
Can you talk a little bit more about your earliest money
memory? Money and wealth was never sort
of important for material things.
It was important because it provided safety to my family.
And so I, I had a, you know, early days my, my father passed
away when I was about 12 years old.
And so the family, I was the only American citizen in, in the
family, I could speak English. I had these advantages.
I had these things, these tools that my the rest of my family
didn't have. Because you were the youngest.
Because I was the youngest of 6 and, and then the, the, the
others were, you know, 10 to 16 years older than I was.
And so I had this sort of golden ticket that was given to me,
right, to be an American citizen.
And, and so I could take the skills that I had and the
ability to be in the United States and create, you know,
income and, and that was important.
And so I had to kind of maximize that.
So, you know, when I was about 14 years old, I, I was a
translator. So there were American real
estate developers that wanted to build manufacturing plants in,
in Mexico and they needed, you know, help in translation
services, in navigating the environment.
And I was a kid, but I, but I could help him with that.
In one instance, the very first time that I made money, I just
got paid, you know, fees for translation services and it was,
you know, a few 100 bucks. But then I kind of realized that
what I was doing was more than translation.
I was actually giving developers the ability to execute their
business plan. And so I thought about it and I
said, well, I really ought to get more.
I did. I mean, maybe it was selfish or
maybe it was just I was trying to take care of my family.
You were like my value is higher than this hourly fee.
Yeah, my value is higher. And there was a very big moment
actually, my grandmother, who was an extraordinarily tough and
resilient woman. She had, she had widowed with
seven children at the age of 29. And she was a tough lady in that
part of the world. For her to run a farm, a ranch,
you as a woman with, you know, seven children, you had to be
extremely tough. And she, she was, she, she was
very well known as a, as a resilient and tough lady who
happened, my grandmother happened to be friends with a
Union Leader in, in, in, in our town.
And the developer that was building a facility, a
manufacturing plant, he needed permits like job permits.
And you have to get those job permits from, from, from the
union. And so I asked my grandma, I
said, Grandma, you, you're friends with the, with this
Union Leader, right? And she said, Oh yeah, that,
that, that man has been in love with me since I was 15 years
old. And, and so I, I said, well, can
you set up an appointment for me?
So of course I showed up at this union leaders office and it was
like out of a Godfather movie. I mean, dark room.
He was fidgeting with a gun. I mean, it was, it was, it was.
And I was, you know, 14 or 15 years old and their favorite.
Quote What was that? You come to me and they and my
daughter. Is kidding pretty much.
We love that we say it all. The time exactly.
And so, so I, I, I walk in. I, I, I, he asked me my
grandmother's name was on Paro. And he says, you're on Paro's
grandson, right? And I said, yes, he says, she
called me. I know what you want.
I know what you need, and I'll give it to you.
And I said, oh, well, well, thank you.
And, and he said, yeah, I'll do it because I've been in love
with your grandmother since she was, since I was 15.
And so he says that. And, and so, you know, he writes
down in a little napkin that this should be approved.
And then I go to another guy and then that person was the the his
underlying and facilitator. And so we had an approval for
jobs permits. And I went to the developer and
I said, hey, you know, you've been working on getting these
job permits for about a year. What would you pay to have
access to these job permits? And he said, well, you know, if
we could partner with this person, with them or, you know,
pay X amount, we would do it to get the building permits.
And I said, well, you know, I actually have the permits in my
possession and I I'll take that offer.
I'll take 5% equity in, in the building.
And, and he, you know, he, he agreed.
We signed it and we did that, you know, 5-4 or five more
times. And, and that was the first time
I ever owned anything. I was about 15 years old And,
and these buildings were not, you know, they were pretty
substantial facilities. They had leverage, they had
financing and everything. So, but I learned it.
And then I worked for that person for the next four or five
years, and I was a project manager and I was running real
estate development deals from his office.
And so I was running them effectively myself as the
coordinator and orchestra conductor of engineers and
architects and construction companies.
And that's why I learned the craft as a kid.
But I was making good money and that was important.
But it was important because I could, I support my mom and, and
the family. And that was sort of the, the
Seminole moment that, you know, that made me want to generate
wealth as a, as a protective measure, not so much for, you
know, buying things or whatever. It was really a, a sort of a
protective, protecting the family.
That was my 100% of my goal was to protect the family.
And Leon Capital was born. Yeah, technically.
On a napkin. Well, technically, you know,
Leon Capital wasn't signed into existence until like 2000, 2004,
yeah, 2004. Germination.
Yeah, You're right that the ideological germination was, was
was there because you're right. What happened was I later when I
was working at Goldman Sachs, you know, I, I said, you know, I
want to go back to Texas and do what I was doing before.
Like I was good at that. I got to get back and say, yes,
you're right. That, that it was always pulling
me to come back to Texas after being on at Goldman.
And I, you know, the, the idea was, had been built or was
inside of me and I just needed to get back to it.
So you're right that that that was the origin of who I was.
I mean, and that's something you you've talked about before.
You said company ownership is the most hidden secret in
American capitalism. What I mean by that is that I
think, you know, you can own a lot of things.
You can own ideas, you can own, you can own your time.
But the concept of an asset, they're never too young to own
an asset, right? And so I have AI have a nephew
who I told recently, he said, Uncle Fernando, like, what do I,
how do I start to create wealth? And I said, Hey, you know,
you're renting an apartment. Go go find a way to buy a town
home, a duplex and lease the second-half of it and use that
to pay off the mortgage for for the two sides and start with
that own an asset, you know, get financing, figure out how to own
an asset. And so I do think that asset
ownership, you know, that that asset, he will pay it off over,
you know, 15 year loan amortization and he'll own an
asset 15 years from now. But he's 21 And so he'll be 36
and he'll own an asset and he'll say, wow, like I, I, I, I built
something, I owned something and it was painful.
Maybe, maybe he's got to live, you know, within his means and
save more. Maybe he can't go to the
restaurants and make sacrifices. But when he's older, he'll,
he'll be great. He'll be glad that he paid off
an asset. And so I think asset ownership,
company ownership is, is the way that you build wealth.
And I, I don't, I, I think it's a simple statement, but it's
hard to do. And, and you just got to find
the openings to figure out how how to get it for yourself.
Nobody's going to yeah, I can't give you like the, the story of
what it's going to be for, for anybody except for me, right?
But for others, they got to find their own entry point and and
and get figure out a way to get a piece, buy a stock, buy a
bond, buy a house, buy a duplex, buy something and then over time
make it grow. So early on in your career, you
invested in Chick-fil-A when the big guys thought we've done our
research. Yeah, we've done our research.
Didn't think about that one for a while.
Did. You.
I know. When the big guys thought it was
beneath them, what did you understand that other people
didn't see? And what's an industry you're
investing in now that others still overlook or possibly
underestimate? Oh, interesting.
OK, so first of all, the Chick-fil-A trade was not in the
company itself. It's that's a private company.
It's owned by a family. They, they, as much as any of us
would want to invest in Chick-fil-A, you can't.
It's owned a multi generational trust.
So that's not going anywhere. But what I did was I said, I
think this concept is massive and people love it and they have
this connection to it. You know, a large percentage of
people surveyed, they go to Chick-fil-A when you ask them if
it's fast food, we'll tell you it's not.
So it tells you, you know, the service, everything was built
with intentionality. And I wanted to participate in
in that business plan, but I couldn't.
So the way I couldn't invest in the company directly.
So what I decided to do was I had a piece of land, the very
first building that I built for Chick-fil-A, I owned a piece of
land in San Angelo, TX, small little town.
I had bought some, some land from a bank that had default
borrower had defaulted on a piece of land.
And I owned these sites all over the state of Texas and, and
Chick-fil-A really wanted that site.
And I said, well, I will, I'll build it for you.
I said no. And we, you know, we traded hard
for a while and they finally agreed and we built a building
that they leased. And my philosophy of that was to
say, well, if I can't invest in the company, but let's say that
Chick-fil-A was selling $2,000,000 of, of, of product of
chicken there and I was renting the building for $200,000 to
them per year. That means that for every, for
every 10 pieces of chicken that they sold, one of them was being
sold on my behalf because I owned $200,000 of rent as a
royalty on a top $2,000,000 sales figure.
So I effectively owned 110th of their total revenue production
at that site. And, and that was my way to be
in business with Chick-fil-A. And I did that with Starbucks
and I did that with many companies around the country.
711 I did. That was my philosophy about it
was if I could own the real estate, whoever leased it from
me was effectively my partner on some portion that came to me
through rent and that was just a philosophical view of it.
So Chick-fil-A and many of those companies, early days, you know,
it was a small deal, you know, giant real estate companies
didn't want to go mess with it. They're like, oh, that's beneath
me. But I was like, I'll do it and,
and I I'll do, I'll do whatever it takes.
So, so we did a lot of it and, and they were fantastic
partners. And many of those businesses
like like Raising Cane, 711, Chase Bank, CBS, all of these
businesses I built buildings for them and we had great
partnership with them on things that I see kind of that others
aren't particularly paying attention to.
So out of the real estate business, about nine years ago,
I Co founded a business called Krexi, which today is based here
in Los Angeles and today is the second largest purveyor of
commercial real estate data in the country.
And so early days, nine years ago, you know, somebody said,
hey, do you want to own this office building?
And do you want, you know, they offered it to me to buy it And I
got to thinking like, what is the opposite of an office
building? And I didn't like the office
building business. I never did any deals in it
because I thought the, the CapEx was too high.
I thought tenants would roll over too much.
So I, I found the cash flows unpredictable.
I didn't like it, but I liked, but I said I want to find the
opposite of it. So it was kind of a, you know,
sort of a mental game with myself and, and my myself and a
Co founder and a couple other people.
We thought about data as the the best commodity to try to own in
commercial real estate. And today we have about 5
million people on the site. We have hundreds of thousands of
subscribers and then we have a listing service where commercial
real estate is listed, you know, a la Zillow.
And, and then also we, we harness data, we synthesize it
and then we sell it as lease comps, as sales comps and
information that is really, really important to commercial
real estate professionals in order to make decisions about
selling a property, buying a property, leasing a property,
financing a property, things like that.
So we, we sell, you know, information and data to
appraisal district and, you know, city governments,
brokerage, real estate brokerage companies, things like, you
know, groups like that all over the country.
And it's become a huge company with about 600 employees roughly
based here in, in, in the LA area.
And it's a, it's a fantastic business, but we saw it way
earlier than many others. And, and it took a lot of, you
know, a lot of capital to, to stand it up and to, to fight
through the competitive landscape.
And there were massive. Semi monopolistic competitors
that were tough to engage and, and fight through and still
takes a lot of stamina to fight through that.
So yeah, that's one of the things that we saw and that I
think we, you know, we, we helped build and, and it's a
massive business and I'm really proud of the work we've done
there. I think that's so cool because I
think it's such a good example of your business intuition
because you came from the world of real estate.
Like that's what you knew, like hard capital, assets, all the
stuff, but you were like, what is a business that I want to get
into that I know enough about that I have a competitive edge.
And so you're like data, I want to get into that business.
And they're like, how can I do it through real estate?
I think that is. So there's like, there's
definitely a lesson there because I think a lot of people
are trying to transition what they do and they're like, how
can I possibly, you know, get into or like even myself?
When I worked, I started off working at Goldman and I thought
I was going to work in finance my whole life.
And then after two years, I was like, yeah, yeah.
And I was like, I want to work in consumer tech.
How do I work in consumer tech? It's like you find you find the.
Entry point. The entry point, yeah.
But I will say that I think part of the lesson too, for me at
least, was real estate was comfortable, but but technology
and engineering and software development was not.
I was really like I, I had a discomfort and a little bit of a
fear. I can talk about it now in the
moment, I probably didn't internalize the fear that I
really had. And so I think that to me, the
lesson in many respects is everybody has fear.
We all have fear about something, right?
Something that we don't understand or don't know.
And So what do you do with it, Do you?
I think about it and I say, OK, well, let me let me understand
my fear. Let me then compartmentalize it
and then leverage it so I can adapt around it.
But you got to leverage it. If you are afraid to leverage
that fear, then then you don't go anywhere.
I think you get stuck. And so to me, it was always
about putting it in a box and saying, let's go, right, like,
let's, let's move against that thing and lean into the to the
whatever's causing you a discomfort.
But you got to recognize it, be a little bit self aware and
fight through it. And I don't, I don't, I think a
lot of people don't want to do that, but you, you should want
to do it. That's how you adapt and evolve
and progress in your life journey.
Is leveraging it almost like using that fear as a motivation?
Or how do you leverage it practically?
I mean, yes, yeah, I think leveraging it as motivation, but
I think also there's like a like a almost like a resentment or an
anger that you have against a certain weakness.
It's like, you know what, I know it's there and screw it, I'm
going to go and fight it directly, like head on and and
who does that? Like it's tough to do and and it
yeah, it's so, so yes, I think it's, it's, it's leveraging it,
it's modifying it, but it's also having a certain resentment that
makes that fuels you. So do you want it or not?
And, and I think the people that that succeed are willing to to
go right at it and fight it with a little bit of a little bit of
anger or resentment or whatever you want to call it.
But it's not a soft feeling. It is an aggressive feeling.
I think that's the difference. And I would say embrace it,
yeah. Interesting, I'm having so many
associations right now. Like I feel like there needs to
be a superhero track theme song, like going on in the background
as you're saying this because it kind of reminds me of like
Batman or like Batman Begins or like The Dark Knight or.
Yes. Where like I see Fernando, I see
it in you in the way that you're talking about it.
It's really powerful as you're just saying it.
I'm like, you know, absorbing everything, but also kind of
just like witnessing kind of how you how you work and how your
brain works and kind of some I'm just it's really admirable that
I'm just like kind of seeing the power right now.
And it feels like The Dark Knight when he's like, you know,
you know, training. Training.
Yeah, it's kind. Of I think it is training.
You know, your mind needs to train, right?
Like, yeah, like if you've got a soft spot in your body and you
physically train for it, it's no different with the brain.
The brain says, oh, no, not there, no, that's where you go.
And and that's not, not a natural state.
It's not a comfortable thing. If you're comfortable, you're
not doing it right. Like it's got to be, it's got to
be you. Like it's suffering through it.
I do believe that. And I think it's really hard to
do on a self-awareness basis. It doesn't come naturally.
You've got to train for it for. Sure.
A question for you, maybe I don't know if this will kind of
push you to think a little bit more about the opposite side of
that. It's like I talk to myself with
a lot of harshness in a good way though, like I push myself and
I'm like, you can do like do it, like go for it.
Is there a softness I I wonder is there a voice in your head
that also embraces like the softer, kinder side of.
Motivation. I think so because it depends on
why are you doing it? Like why?
Why are you pursuing that? Is it all about you?
It was never about me in, in the things I tried to accomplish.
It was about our family. And and so there were, you know,
five siblings and now I have, you know, four children.
These things matter in the context of, of our family.
And this is a philosophy of, of, of survival, of pursuit, of
improvement. And so I, I think, yeah, if you,
it depends on who you're doing it for, right?
If you, you know, I, I, I bet in your relationship between you 2,
I bet that there is a, a feeling of accountability of not wanting
to let each other down, of wanting to pursue together in
that journey. So it's not about entirely about
you. It's about both of you and about
your family and, and, and you know, a certain gratitude that
you have for your parents in the effort they put to send you to,
you know, good schools and to and to provide an environment
like you are a function of those feelings, right?
You can't, you can't move those. So I do think that having a
cause for others and for yourself and for, you know, a
company is massively inspiring. And I, I look at our companies
and I bet AI don't know how to quantify this, but a substantial
part of my motivation to build a business is that the people that
are there, I want them to have good lives.
I want to be supportive of their professional development.
Like I don't want them. I mean, I feel like I'm
obligated and I am accountable. And so we need to go row in that
direction and make that company, that business, our initiative
work. And so I don't know that I think
it depends on who the softer side to your on your question is
about the people around you. Who are you doing it for and
why? If it's I don't, I suspect that
if you're entirely self-centered, you probably
don't have the leadership and the charisma to motivate others
to come with you in building something.
If you're just self absorbed and you don't have this softer side
to, to ask others to come with you, how do you scale?
You have to be, you have to be. I mean, I'm sure there's plenty
of people that control great technologies that can just be
total jerks and don't care about anybody but themselves because
our technology is great. But I think for the most part,
for mere mortals like, like, like us, I think you your
ability to inspire and motivate others is what gives you
operating leverage and allows you to go forward, forward.
So I do think there is definitely a softer site I love.
That I think it's very cool, like listening to you speak, it
makes a lot of sense in understanding that your original
motivation was to provide for your family.
And now it almost sounds like you view your company as like
your broader family now. And so it's just like scaling up
that same, that same like desire from a young age and now you're
just doing it on a much bigger scale.
Yeah, I, I think so. I think there's a lot of people
that have worked with me for 15 or 20 years that are
extraordinarily important in my life.
And those people, you know, I know their families and I know
what they've done to sacrifice time and effort and, you know,
the, the toughness that they've exemplified to build a business.
And how could you not be reciprocal?
So you. Yeah.
So I think every, every business that we've built, there are men
and women that have sacrificed time and, and, and there are,
you know, other things in their life in order to build those
businesses. So you have to be, I think, I
think it's, it's the right thing to, to be reciprocal in, in
having their back. Yeah.
Fernando, we're going to go through some more tactics and
advice. So if you were starting from
zero today, what is the first real move that you'd make to
build wealth? The truth is that when you don't
have anything, what you really, if you don't have capital or
resources, right? Like you have to figure out how
to to get some. I know that sounds kind of
basic, but it's true. Can you find maneuvers and
tactics for yourself that aren't about capital?
Because if you say, well, I don't have capital, I don't know
how to get it, and then a night so I can't do anything.
Well, then you're stuck. So it's I don't have capital,
but I'm going to find a way creatively to accomplish
something through an idea, a tactic, some kind of insight,
persuasion, charisma, whatever. Right.
Like salesman strip, whatever it takes and you're going to find a
way to maneuver around the opportunity and find value and
extract it. That that is something that
anybody can do. There are no handbooks for it.
There are no manuals for it, but you've got to develop it for
yourself. And then it'll manifest itself
as value creation that you are able to at some point extract.
And so for instance, when I, you know, when I first started my
career in, in Dallas building subdivisions, the first ones was
a piece of land and I didn't have the ability to buy that
piece of land and build a subdivision.
So I had to go and talk to a landowner and say, Hey, I have
this idea for building this land into a subdivision.
And I'm going to sell these lots to home builders.
And, and I'm going to, you know, these are my, my, this is my,
my, my numbers, my, my expectations.
Would you like to be a partner in this?
And they would contribute it into a partnership.
Or sometimes I would have an option to buy the land and then
go get entitlements or zoning changes from the city.
And I could go do that through persuasion.
I could convince the city to let me, you know, change it from an
agricultural use to a residential use.
And then that made the value of the land more valuable.
And therefore I could get financing and limit the amount
of capital that I needed. But I think that early days my,
my instincts were about how do I build value?
OK, so this piece of land, I'm going to option it.
And if I change the zoning, it's more valuable.
The option contract was a piece of paper.
And then I had to convince engineers to do the work without
me paying them. They're like, but you're 24, why
am I listening to you? I'm like, come on, man, let's do
this together. And, and then it's like, I'll
take you hunting or whatever I did.
I took these guys hunting when they, they did some work for me
and and they made good the money.
I, I ultimately I paid them because I was able to execute on
this, on this project. But I don't know like that that
isn't a economic thing. It's not a capital constraint.
It was just like getting people to agree with you and follow
you. And so I think often times it's
about a little bit of tactical creativity and, and finding
people that want to advocate for you.
That person, by the way, that that put that land into a
partnership with me. His name is Harold Pullman.
And he, he was like in his early 80s And he, he actually told me,
he said that piece of land can't be developed.
I started, I, I, he had come back from World War 2 and had
built homes for GIS and this was a little extra piece of land
that he said was unbuildable. And I said, what do you have to
lose then if it's not buildable, let me give it a shot.
And he said you'll never be able to do it.
And, and I went and I convinced the Army Corps of Engineers and
the city and we, we designed around some of the problems.
And it took me a year and, and all of it came together.
And he was shocked. He's like, you know, I tried
doing that for 40 years and I couldn't do it.
But, but, but you did. And, and so kudos to you.
And so there are things that you can do with work and sweat
equity that don't require having, you know, capital day
one. So I would say focus on
creativity, persuasion, salesmanship.
Building something out of nothing is damn hard.
But you, there are everybody who has built something out of
nothing has done it. So, so so give it your shot.
It actually listening to your story reminds you, reminds me of
kind of like our beginning for Tiger Sisters because when we
first conceptualized Tiger Sisters, we were like, actually
we want to build Tiger Sisters as a reality TV show.
And like, we want to bring people along and like have them
like learn these business lessons through this reality TV
show where we would, you know, work with all these different
startups or different companies. And then as we made kind of like
our pitch and we started like bringing to different people,
first of all, we were like, oh wow, Hollywood is like 5
different strikes going on. Not a good time, not.
Actually the worst time in history to bring reality TV to.
Yeah, to life. And then the second thing was we
were like, oh, you know what this actually is going to
create. It requires a lot of capital and
also a lot of sort of like ingrained systems and
relationships are required to to bring something to life in the
Hollywood. System in the traditional.
In the traditional to get. It on a streaming.
Service, yeah. And so we were like, OK, what
can we do that we actually build it on our, our own terms and we
can still achieve the goals that we want, which is bringing sort
of like education to people in a fun, digestible way.
And we're like, let's do a podcast because the barriers to
entry are pretty much nothing, almost nothing.
And we started out in our Home Office, actually at the kitchen
table. Literally in our kitchen, our
dining room table which is very small with these crappy
microphones with a camera that was $400.00.
Like do not watch our earlier episodes because they are not
well produced the way that they are now.
Here information is good. Yeah, the information.
Is good, but you know, we were great.
We were iterating on it constantly.
But if there are obstacles, it's to your story and your point.
It's like, how do you go around it or over it, under it?
But don't let something like that stop you.
We heard a lot of no's in the beginning.
We mourned our reality TV show concept for about 3 days and
we're like we need a pivot. What do we do to actually bring
this to the life the way that we want to?
But it's that concept of taking what you know and like creating
some sort of value without having the capital behind it.
Like you don't need to have capital in order to begin.
Yeah, No, I I totally agree. I mean, I think there are
countless examples of of that situation, that kind of
situation. I think there is a little bit of
like self-awareness too, of just saying, hey, like, for instance,
the brand, like Tiger Sisters, the concept, right?
Like this was like, hey, we know who we are and we think this
will resonate with the public. And then you're authentic,
right? And, and then then
fundamentally, that's what people are responding to, just
like Mr. Pullman was responding to my authenticity.
You know, your viewers are responding to saying, Hey, these
two women are, you know, strong and smart and they're building a
set of ideas that we can rally behind and, and, and understand
and, and the content is valuable to me.
So I think ultimately, by the way, the, the that last part,
it's valuable to me is has to be there.
You can have all the, the dreams, but if it's, if your
viewers find it valuable, then you have something that's
important. Ultimately, I built homes in
that subdivision that were valuable to those people that
lived there and they went and, and built a family there.
They built home equity, they built net worth through home
ownership and that was valuable to, to those groups of people
and to society. So ultimately that last part has
to be there. Otherwise you just, you can't,
you can't fake it, right? That has to that has to permeate
through your through your work. Yeah, I really love that.
It's like so fundamental, but just the idea of like build
something of value. So many people start up
founders, I think, forget about that.
Now they're like, let me just build something.
I wanna do something in AI, I wanna build something AI, blah,
blah, blah. It's like, OK, but is it
valuable to people? Are you building something of
value? Or for instance, the other thing
that is done a lot, not just in Venture, but it's what valuation
can I get? And then that is just a bunch of
group think where somebody says I think it's very valuable and
they're all in the same little bubble.
And then when it goes out to people that are going to consume
that good or service, it turns out that people don't value it.
The only people that valued it were the ones, you know, giving
it a valuation of X or Y. And then the consumers of that
good or service said, you know what, I kind of, it doesn't
really give me anything. And so it and then that that
valuation bubble bursts and it happens all the time too.
So fundamentally a group of people deriving value of time or
or anything through that good or service is the only way you get
rewarded in capitalism. It's fair, it's fair.
It's very, very fair. I've always thought capitalism
is this, you know, interesting, this philosophy that
fundamentally has fairness at its value.
And not everybody agrees with me on that, I think, but, but I do
think that if you give people, you may not like the person that
created that technology or that idea, but why do people consume
it? Because they derive value from
it. So it's a it has to permeate
that, otherwise things breakdown, often very quickly
too. It's kind of a hot take that
capitalism is is fair, yeah. Should we wrap up with one one
last? But when are we talking about
love? What would you have?
Do you have some advice for us? Do you have some advice?
Well, actually do. You want to talk?
About love, I don't know. I think Fernando wants to set us
up, really. I mean, I will try, I will.
I will work really really hard on I guess.
Let me ask you guys a. Question.
About love, OK, how how do, how do very driven, highly
intelligent women, how how do you find the way to sort of
properly interact with, with members of the opposite sex?
How do you, how do you, how do you do that when you're, when
you're so driven? Does it?
Does it make it difficult to date?
You know, someone asked me this exact question yesterday too.
Really. Yeah, over Instagram, there's a
lot of noise and it's actually interesting.
You know what, going back to your earlier point about
credentials blinding you, I think that's where it can be
tough as dating as like a very ambitious women.
So women we like, you know, going to Business School and
like, this is it. I'm going to find, you know, my
partner for life, you know, in my class, all this stuff.
But I think also dating at that level, I want to make sure the
person that I'm dating is supportive of my dreams, goals
and ambitions. I think that can be tough when I
have a lot of them. We have a lot of them and
someone who's not afraid of that, who will support me along
the way. And also I think there's a lot
of noise because at that level, I think the people that we're
dating are also very successful. And it's a balance.
And so they have dreams too. And so making it all
complimentary is not not an easy Rubik's Cube.
And making sure that you know there is no ego when it comes to
love. That part I think is really
hard. And seeing deeply into their
heart, if you can. You know what?
You know what's interesting is is when I first, so I sold a
bunch of assets in like 2007 and then you know when 2008 is.
Nicely done. Well, it.
Was a little bit lucky, but, but, but in 2008, you know, I
got back into it and the first few deals that I did, I
struggled and I had a lot of problems and I was really,
really down and I almost gave up.
And my, my wife, we were like very recently married.
She said, she's like, you know, shake it off, get back up and
go, go find your place. And I was like, no, you know,
I'm just going to go, I'm going to get a job somewhere and, and,
and not be an entrepreneur anymore.
And, and she said, look, if you do that, I don't think this is
going to, we're going to do, we're going to last.
And I said, why? She said, well, you're going to
drive me crazy because you have to be an entrepreneur.
You're never, you're never going to be like, you know, inside an
organization and like be a good employee.
You're going to be a pain in my ass.
So please go out there and go build a piece of real estate or
go do something, but go, go, go get back up and do it.
And and she was doing it a little bit to like, you know,
protect her own self from me being, you know, around the
house too much. But it was interesting that she
knew me, you know, and, and was really like, she actually
believed in me, but she also was pushing me harder than I was
pushing myself, which didn't happen a lot.
But in a moment of vulnerability when I was down and like
psychologically I was vulnerable, she was like, no,
we're doing this. Get back up.
And just like, you know, in your corner in a boxing match and
you're kind of getting, you know, punched around and she's
like, no, get back in there and go fight.
And, and so I do think that that in, in in a relationship, you
have to have a person that that sees you even in your most
vulnerable state and, and compels you to, to keep going.
She knew you deeply. And we, we had only been dating
for a couple of years before we got married.
And so, yeah, she did kind of know my essence quickly.
I think it's also, it's very funny you asked that question
because I was telling you earlier, I was at a Bachelorette
this weekend and it was 10 HBS girls and we actually were
talking about this. We were doing a little bit of
like not accounting, but we were like talking through all of our
friends were like actually a good number of our friends are
the breadwinners within their family unit.
And it's a lot of people are like, you know, I didn't think
it was going to turn out this way.
And it's not like my husband is not, you know, or my partner is
not incredibly talented or like successful and done right, but
they're the the breadwinners and they are receiving a lot of
support from their partners. And one of my girlfriends was
like, you know, I thought it was.
And she's like, I always thought it was so important to have a
partner who was, you know, the same sort of credentials, like
Ivy League undergrad, you know, MBA, like all this stuff.
And she's like, I actually realized that that wasn't what
was most important to me. It was like having someone who
loves me and understands me deeply and we support each
other. And so I think that's.
I don't know. Yeah.
That's massive. I mean, I think that's that's a
big chunk of it. I think, you know, there's, in
my case in particular, my, my wife really was able to interact
with my family too. And that was super important for
me because they were so foundational as a part of my
life. And so that was an important
thing. And she she took it on as a as
as part of her identity And and that was, you know, super
important to me. So yeah, I mean, I think, I
think the supportive element has to be there.
You cannot both, you know, move forward without a supportive
element. Money, power and love.
Yeah, there we go. Hit them all the trifecta.
Thank you for bringing us back to, you know, we almost forgot
for a second. Thank you for bringing us back
to love. Yeah, I never thought I'd be
talking about love. Never.
I have never gone down this rabbit hole.
But but it yeah, it's good. It's a little cathartic.
Yeah, and it's also mixing the hard with the soft as a holistic
person. It's the spice of life.
It is of life, the juice of life.
OK, so we have a section called Rapid Fire where we're going to
hear your hottest takes if things are overrated or
underrated. And yeah, this is going to be
super fast and really fun. So those are the 2 answers
overrated or underrated? Well, they kind of depend for
each one, but. It's so that's the concept.
But yeah, you can start, Yeah, you kind of start with that and
then explain. Yes.
All right. Explainer.
Behind that, yeah, OK. I like this.
Yeah. OK.
First one, Fernando. OK, Mark Cuban business genius
or overrated TV billionaires? Oh, man.
OK, look, let's talk about the facts.
Yeah, broadcast.com was sold to Yahoo and Yahoo wrote down the
value of broadcast.com to 0 within about a year or a year
and a half. So that wasn't a good one.
You know, the, the idea of, I don't know, I, I, I don't know
what kind of investments are done on Shark Tank, but it seems
to me that they're mainly consumer products and, and, and
not extremely scalable businesses.
And so maybe, maybe I, I would take the under on that.
I like that. I like that.
OK, so Harvard, you went to Harvard for undergrad?
Is it responsible for success or just a nice flex?
Are elite schools stepping stones or status signals?
Oh yeah, this one's going to be a little controversial, but I
actually think that the idea of a flex and A and a name that
comes with your background may often blind you to blind spots
that are, that are painful lessons later.
So you have to be really careful with letting that take up too
much of your identity. And and so you got to, you got
to manage it. I don't think, I think, you
know, some harm can be done from embracing brand identities like
that. Brands are information
shortcuts, right? And Harvard is an information
shortcut just like any other. It's like Apple and, and every,
every brand out there. So do you, do you, you know,
fall into it? Do you embrace it fully?
And then what, what kind of implications does that have for
your scrappiness and your resolve and going forward?
Does it slow you down a little bit?
I love that phrase. It's information shortcut
because we actually do use it that way.
We've talked about this a lot where sometimes we feel like
it's very cringe that we're also there.
We're always like, oh, Harvard and Stanford, like blah, blah,
blah. And we sometimes we're like, oh,
do we over rely on that? But it's an information
shortcut. It's basically just a way for us
to be like, hey, like we're not just talking out of our asses.
We're actually, yeah, legitimate.
And This is why you should, you know, tune into what we have.
To say, you know, my, one of the reasons my, my daughter asked me
like is it important dad to get into a good school?
And I said, look, it's important in so much as it shows the
discipline of you trying to achieve something and getting it
done. So I think that's important.
And so you, you don't want to be passive and you want to pursue
your dreams. And if some of that is a great
university, then go for it. No, no, no judgement.
But but, but then, you know, once you're out there fighting,
like did Mr. Pullman really care about my Harvard degree?
Probably not. Like he was like, Hey, can you
get it done or not? And so ultimately it's got to be
you got to execute. And, and so, you know, if that's
a crutch, does it slow you down? That's just a it's a question
and, and, and I pose it for for everybody to.
Be for reflection for. Deflection, yeah.
Crypto. Is it a legitimate long term
play or glorified casino? Oh.
Man, you got me. That is so fun.
That's a tough one. You're, you're, you've been like
hacking my emails or something, 'cause I'm serious.
OK, so let's see, let's see. Number one is I used to see in
other countries and I grew up around, you know, straddling two
different countries. And so in Mexico you would see
currency devaluations every time a president left.
So you would see like the the treasury rated reserves decrease
and therefore the currency of of the country suffering value.
Crypto is a great way to store wealth against that kind of
thing. So in the United States, not so
much because you know, the dollar is a reserve currency,
but if you live in Angola, if you live in Africa, in certain
African countries, in certain parts of Latin America where you
have hyperinflation and dysfunctional governments, would
you want to have crypto? And I think, I think I would
lean towards, yes, I believe in crypto.
There is a lot of regulatory framework that is immature and
needs to be built. I think there are, for obvious
reasons, elements of crypto that are shady and difficult to
navigate. And so I think you got to be
careful. I've invested in crypto and I
did very well, but I would say that there was very little
fundamentals around it. I think, you know, I got lucky
and, and I took my wins and, and ran with it.
But, but I don't, I don't, I wouldn't know how to invest in
it at a fundamental level. I think it would, it would be
difficult for me to do that. I wouldn't go as far as would in
a Charlie Munger set, which was that it was, you know, dog shit.
But but it but it but it you know, but I think there is a use
for it in certain, you know, contexts, but I think you have
to tread very, very lightly on crypto.
OK. So crypto better than dog shit
according to Fernando. You've heard it here now.
That's what Munger said. I think I wouldn't go.
All the way over there. I wouldn't put that as a
headline. But yeah, those guys were old
school or our old school. But but I think there is a place
for it in some contexts. I think if you went to, I mean,
if you see the devaluations that happen in some countries, there
are people in Nigeria, I think I have a friend that runs a, a, a
crypto exchange company and he says many of the customers are
Latin America, Africa, Asia. So you find those people have,
you know, derive value from buying those stores of wealth.
And so if they're deriving value, then who are we to, to
say that, that, that, that there's something wrong with it?
So that wouldn't go as far as Charlie did.
That's a very practical. It's a very, very practical,
very like. International.
Capitalism, very International, very.
Yeah. I could imagine it's it'd be
really useful for like remittances too now that I think
about it. Yeah, I think it has been been
used in remittances good and bad, right?
That's the catch. And so like in in many topics
like this, it's not black or white and and it is a whole
bunch of Gray and crypto and we'll see, we'll see where how
it evolves for sure. It's not going anywhere.
I don't think. I think if you thought, if you
thought crypto was dead, you know, two or three years ago
whenever we had that bubble burst, I don't think that that's
the case right now. Fernando, thank you so much for
being here with us and giving us the real talk on money, power
and love. And we always say we want to be
the Internet's Big Sisters and career mentors and that we wish
we had. And that's really what we got
with you today. So thank you for being here and
for being, you know, the Internet Big Brother like kind
of family that we've built together with Tiger's sister.
I love it. I love it.
I'm happy to. I'm happy to have been a guest
because I think you guys are disseminating and proselytizing
great ideas that that people can benefit from.
So if you got value from this conversation, if it made you
laugh or kind of like think deeply or question what you've
been taught, take a second to follow, like and subscribe.
And please rate US five stars on Spotify and Apple Podcasts and
also send this to a friend who would enjoy it.
We'll see you next time on Tiger Sisters.
Bye.