#277 - Ask A Millionaire (LIVE & FREE For Callers)

So you don't have to overthink it, you don't have to be super creative. But the most important Because you can't sell a secret. You have to definitely have something that's of value to them. What they'll be saying is what's in it for me, right? And the fastest way to get what's in it for them is to give them money. Financial independence

is so close to so many people. It's just like that. Let's just do the step and get the freedom today. Let's just do it now. Simple scales, complex fails. There's probably nothing stopping you from having financial freedom and independence with I'm Lloyd James Ross, seven-figure investor and entrepreneur, and I've helped thousands of business owners and professionals turn financial stress into success. If you're stuck in old money habits, overwhelmed by investing,

or unsure where to start, this is for you. I'll give you the mindset and strategies to take control, grow your wealth, and achieve financial freedom. It's time to make your money work for you. We are live! Welcome to our brand new, fun, exciting segment called the Wealth Hotline, where we take live calls from the public about a particular topic when it comes to their money, business, mindset, everything to do with their wealth building. So

I'm excited for this segment. It's the second time we've done this now. And each month we're coming here to do a live calls with people. Today we've got five lucky contendants that have, they've thrown their hat in the ring, so to speak, and they have questions for us. So super excited to help them today with whatever questions they have around their wealth. It's gonna be super exciting. We wanna make sure that we're educating them and we're helping them to, and coaching them to make their own

best decisions, all right? Let's get to the first person. This is going to be cool. So I'm going to hold my phone to the mic and make sure you can hear this, right? Let's go to the first caller. Let's do this. This is Caroline. Here we go. This is a bit of roulette because sometimes you don't know if they're going to answer. Caroline Lloyd, you got my Australian mobile, excellent. Yes, you're on the world hotline and I've got your Australian mobile Yes. I wouldn't be doing a very good job. No,

that's okay. I think you're doing a wonderful job of being easy to contact, so thank you. This is a fabulous opportunity, so I really appreciate it. The last time you put it out there, I was just reluctant only because I thought there might be other people more deserving or whatever, but this time having seen what you There you go. I love it. Thank you for throwing your hat. I'm excited for you to throw your hat. I'm trying to work out where I'm at regarding what to do with my

cash. I have a fear about putting all of this cash into investments given that I have still property, which is mortgage. So I'm looking, you did ask me when we last interacted and I've been in Newcastle, I'm in Newcastle, I'm sorting out What is your underlying like core question that you need answered? Like what is on your mind? What I think it's validating, I've sort of worked out one approach, it may not be the only one, but I've worked out one approach with my cash. Because

it's not a case of I can't hold on to cash. I'm worried about putting it in stocks and shares, not going up for Got it. Okay, so you're wanting to know how to deploy your cash to grow your wealth, yes? Yes. Okay, Some of that will be potentially buying my mother's apartment, Sure. We have all these options. So we have on the options for cash, we have do nothing and leave it in an account. We have put into a term deposit and get some returns. We have pay off debt. We have keep

properties and pay off debt. We have perhaps investing in some other assets So my question to you is, irrespective of the size of the cash, What is your overall objective? What do you want to achieve financially?

Well, it rolls into one, but it's in two parts. I'm in a situation now where if I use my money sensibly, I can be reasonably comfortable, but that intention is I'm not at the moment rich enough to be able to do whatever I want. But the nice thing about being reasonably comfortable is I can now create another business and involve other people without having so much concern about my security, It's working out the method for paying down some of these mortgages.

I've taken on board your comment about potentially Okay, so let's look at it like this. You've got, how At the moment, there may be some calls on it, but in the UK Pounds. Okay. Roughly, Okay. So let's say there's say 200K Aussie and there's about, so you probably got around 800K total or 700K Aussie. Yeah. Okay. So how much debt do you have in total off My UK properties, it's 500 and just looking at

Okay, so let me ask this question. How many properties do you Sure, so you got five total yeah five total Okay total properties how many total properties do you own and how Okay The Perfect. Wonderful. Excellent. So let me ask this question. What is preventing you from just paying off all the debt of those properties and having them all debt free and trying to work out what the best way of using

Well, that's what I'm, what I'm suggesting. So my question to you is though, if you've already got the properties that already producing income, you've already transacted them. What's preventing you just paying off the entire balance of the debt and have them all debt free or producing passive income to you. So Uh, Because I'm looking

at buying my sister's half of my mother's apartment. So Well, I'm getting valuations at the moment, but I guess is I may have to pay her eight or So is your objective to just accumulate properties The latter. I'm trying to put in some backup plans because things are not good

Sure. Okay. So you want to diversify your real estate holdings So what would prevent you from selling one of your properties over there and adding it to your cash and buying the Well, that's what I'm looking at at the moment, as well as paying down What's interesting, Caroline, about your situation with six properties with only 550 odd thousand pounds of debt on it with all your cash too, is that you have the ability now to have probably four of them. fully paid off and unencumbered if

you include the Australian one. So you can potentially sell two in UK and use the cash to buy the one here in Australia and you'd have to pay off the debts. But you have the opportunity now with your cash and your equity in your portfolio to actually own probably four of them outright. And so you're actually like a breath away from financial freedom. Like you're one decision away. And I think what happens to people is they get confused thinking they always have to invest in some other

asset class. Like, I have to invest in shares. I have to know everything about everything. I have to invest in gold. I have to invest in... You don't have to do everything and anything. You could just... Like, real estate's a very solid asset, particularly if you're looking at real estate in major Western countries, right? So there's probably nothing stopping you from having financial freedom and independence with just a paid-off property portfolio. Like,

I'm not arguing with you. It's just because I've spent a lot of my life having And at times you don't have someone to bounce ideas Therefore, having a backup, I can see that since two of my, or all my rental properties I hold in a limited company, they were bought with a director's loan so that all the income can for 10 or 20 years So the only other thing I was going to say is one of the benefits I've had from doing your course, apart from looking at things with a different hat, is because

the properties are owned by a company, I can own them up until I think I'm 80. I've got another 10 years before I'm forced to pay off mortgages. So I realized that I could, for example, for one of them, pay down 70. So I'd have the current repayment would be interest Yeah, but I think you're complicating it. I think you're complicating it. Like if the roles were reversed, I would, apart from this one you want to buy, you're just in a position where you can be debt

free off on six properties. Like it's one decision away. So I think it's like, that's why I asked at the very outset of the call, what's the objective? And a lot of people can get carried away with objectively just building empires for the sake of empire building without a real clear understanding of what they're trying to actually achieve with their life. So that's why, that's why the question is what kind of life do you want to live? Not how many properties do you

want? So it would be what if with one fell swoop, you could pay off pretty much all the debt of all the properties, perhaps tuck away a bit of extra cash for, for emergencies, et cetera. But all the income from those properties with no debt on them will provide you enough passive income to literally live a life of Riley around the world now. Today?

I'm not taking that on board yet. It's the latter bit. Is Well, if you had your home paid off and you had five properties debt-free producing income, how Well, that's what I'm just sort of net. I'm sort of working I haven't done it for the paid off. At the moment, let me just look at the table

Here's what I would suggest to you. Here's what I would suggest. I would suggest looking at how much passive net income, so net income means after costs of running the property, so the operating costs, how much net income after tax goes into your pocket on a weekly or monthly or annual basis without any debt on those properties? And if the answer is, well, actually, that's pretty much like a full-time salary, you're literally living like the 1% of the 1% of the 1% of the world. and

you can then start to really decide on how do you want to actually live your life. Now, that doesn't mean you have to stop working either, by the way. You can do both. You could have passive income coming in plus keep working, but you have a choice then to really work on what you want to work on. And I just, I don't think you need to complicate it

that much because you've done all the hard work already. Like to have a home paid off and potentially in a breath have five other property investments paid off producing passive income. You're in a seat that you're the envy of the world and your mindset might be stopping you from just making that decision because perhaps you're I hear you. I'm not going to throw anything back. I'm listening to you. This is why I don't do it. Sure. Yeah. This is why you called in. No, no, totally. Because

people sometimes call into me or talk to me and say, oh, Lloyd doesn't like property. Of course, property is an effective asset. It produces cashflow, grows in value of time. I just don't like overpriced property. Like anyone and I also don't like big mortgage debt and like I don't I like optionality So I just think about your situation think god, you've got all these properties. You've paid the transaction costs already. They're already in place They're already producing income. You've got this

cash. I mean you eliminate the debt You've got no debt on a fully risk for like, you know, there's no debt risk no financial risk and then you've just got You're passive income tricking and you've got multiple doors. So you've got multiple properties. So it fortifies the income, it's diversified across multiple properties. You don't have any home mortgage debt and you're at an age where you can keep working and have both. And I really do think that your decision to

where to deploy the cash, it doesn't have to be complex. right? It's just where's the most, where's probably the most obvious place to deploy it to get the life you want. And if, if I know where that is, and if I were your, your age and where you're at with everything, I think you're just so close to having financial freedom. So I would say to you this, to finish the call, look at the amount

of income you can make with debt free properties. And Make the decision of where to deploy the cash based on what is the safest, fastest, most effective route to getting passive income for the rest of your life. And take the path you understand. You don't have to play in games you don't understand just because. And

if the income is not enough, then keep working until it is enough. But I would argue that if you can't live a nice life on no mortgage debt and five paid off property investments, then perhaps you just need to bring your lifestyle. Yeah, it'll be a lot. And I think you're there. So I would say to you, go check out the numbers. And then when you get to the number, shoot me a DM on Instagram, whatever it is, and just

Okay. Home mortgage, 1.97% interest. So really to pay that off when I've got another two years at that rate. Secondly, what I learnt from you is I could pay 18 down on a property and invest 40. And in 10 years, when I have to redeem the mortgage, I can come out with 8% interest at 102,000. So, you know, I can pay less down if I use some of the investment strategy, as long as it works. That's why I'm being careful and trying to Well, it just means you've got to learn a whole new landscape. That's

all it's all. And, and, and what's very tricky at the moment is how do you deploy large amounts of cash into any market? See, when you, when you pay off debt with cash, it's an guaranteed riskless investment. Because paying off debt, your return on investment is the debt. You don't have to pay the cost of the debt, right? So it's an absolute guaranteed return when you pay off debt. Whereas when you're going into, say, the markets, you've got to remember that it's a very richly valued market. And

it's tricky to deploy half a million pounds, whatever it is, into that. Because what if the market goes sideways for 10 years, collapses? The best way to invest in alternative assets or even stocks, if you've got lump sums, is to actually dollar cost average You could. I don't know if you have to because the entire objective of investing is to get enough passive income to just not work again, as

far as I'm concerned. So you're just so close to that. Now, if you happen to, for example, have 1.95% of your mortgage, you don't want to put your money there because it's not a high return on investment of the debt. Perhaps even a high interest account of some sort would be better at 5% because it's better than a mortgage of 1.9%. So just something that's that it doesn't have to be risky, but something that's going to compound more than 1.9% would

be fairly appropriate. But once that term expires and the interest rates trigger back up, you will want to pay the debt off because the interest rate will be higher. So I think just optionality

Got it? So I can't say to you, Caroline, go and put your money in this stock or that if I can't give you the financial advice. But what I can say is, I don't think it has to be risk assets. I don't think it has to be complex. I don't think it has to be anything but probably pay off the high interest debt as soon as possible and sit on the cash in a high interest term sort of account for a while until the other mortgage kicks up a gear and then pay it off. Or you could just pay it all off

now and just get it over with and live your life. You know, I just think it's that close. So here's my suggestion. One, figure out the amount per year coming in from the debt-free properties. Okay. And then once you do it, send it to me on Instagram. I want to see what it is. Okay. That's your task. Cool. All right. No worries. There you go. Interesting, isn't it? Keep things simple. Simple scales, complex fails. You don't always have to... God, financial independence is so close to

so many people. It's just like that. Let's just do the step and get the freedom today. Let's just do it now. It's almost like people are afraid of that sometimes, which is normal, because it's like, oh my God, I actually have the thing I really wanted all this time, freedom. Oh my God, I'm scared now. What do we do? Because it's a very unknown area, right? So, I mean, so cool to see Carolyn. She's so close to freedom. She's there already. I mean, it's pretty simple

stuff. But hey, paying off debt at a time when debt is quite getting more expensive as well, in many cases from what it was, it's a pretty good return, right? Like, last time I checked, you can't go broke with no debt. Okay, let's do another one. Let's go Kirstie now. We'll give her a call here. See if I can copy. So these will typically go for 10 minutes. That one was a bit longer. That was a bit more protracted, but let's go for Kirstie here. Let's

see if she answers. Just quickly, if you're ready to take control of your finances but feel stuck on where to start, I have a solution. My book, Money Buys Happiness, simplifies investing and wealth building with practical steps to help you achieve financial peace. Get your copy via the link in the show notes and let's get your money working for you. Now back to the episode. Here we go. I wonder what the question's gonna be here. Kirstie I'm trying to do quiet naptime sort

Oh no. Wonderful. Excellent. Put Marvelous. So we're on the Wealth Hotline and so On my mind was how to bring value, I guess, as like, I'm not exactly a fresh startup, but I do pet for keepsakes. And I'm like, how do I bring that as a value perspective to someone like yourself or a person of influence to get the word out there about the Yeah, as in like family pet passes and they keep a bit of fur and I can set them So when the pet passes away, you give keepsakes. Okay, that's

Excellent. So the question is how do you build a brand around it

What I would really like to do is to reach out to people to obviously build endorsement and awareness about the brand. At the moment, locally is where I've started with it, is to go and approach vet clinics to then get referrals for their clients. I'm like, okay, I need to think bigger than that and more outside of the box than that. How can I approach famous people, for want of a better word? Yeah, to sort of build my brand awareness but also to give back to them because

I donít want to just go, ìOh look, this is a cool thing. Would So how many do you sell products? Do you sell a specific amount Theyíre very sporadic. Some months could Ideal customer is probably dog owners or horse owners. Horse owners are helpful because they're large animals and they're very hard to, you know, cremate. Okay, cool. So they're the specific animals that people become attached to the most, like a family member? Okay, cool. So how do you get your keepsakes in front

of more people? So I think it's a matter of, you're already kind of doing it with the vets, but a couple of things I would do. Firstly, I would be blogging and posting on Instagram every single day. You're Okay. So I'd be doing, I'd be aiming for at least two posts a day. Yep. And what I would be doing too is I would be, I'd be learning the ins and outs of Instagram and I would be, uh, I'd be doing a different variety of content, but more often than not, it's just

documenting your journey with your business. Okay. So don't have to overthink it. You don't have to be super creative, but the most important thing is people know you exist because you can't sell a secret. And

so the idea of the Instagram would be over time you would want to be doing like collaborative, like shareable content with the vets via their own Instagram account so that it's going to their audience. So if I think about all the partnerships you want to create, you'd want to create partnerships with people like pet angels who come and collect your pet when it passes away. And pet angels have their own keepsakes, but at the same time, you could definitely partner

with them for things they don't provide. And, and there's more than just pet angels that would do that service. So it's those services, it's definitely vets, but you could specifically partner with the type of vet that has a large Instagram following and database. And what you'd want to do is you'd want to incentivize them. So you either pay for placement or you give them certain things for their audience that they value. So you don't, so, so you actually like

Right. I thought it was hitting a bit of a wall. I'm like, I don't want to just cold message without a Obviously, it's got a purpose for me, but for someone else, what are they getting out of it? Yeah, so you can cold message and how you would do it would be, you would start with $200 per referral in the top message in a DM. So they know they're going to get paid for whatever it is they're about to look at and read. And you can literally just start the sentence with that. And then you could, you

could just DM them and say, Hey, this is, I have keepsakes. I'm looking to collaborate. I'm open to paying for collaboration and shout outs and, and, and cross-pollination of audiences. Is this something you're open to? Would you be open to, I do this. I'm looking to build my business. I want to work with local vets. You caught my attention because of these reasons. Would you be open to a collaboration? That's a win-win outcome. Because

people aren't going to be closed off to a win-win outcome. They're going to be open to it, right? No one's going to say, no, I'm not interested in a win-win outcome. But when it comes to yet, when they say, yeah, I'm open, you have to definitely have something that's of value to them. Because what's of value to you is their audience. And so what they'll be saying is what's in it for me, right? And the fastest way to get what's in it for them is to give them money. That's

the five, like, I'll just give you money. Right. So you got to, you could start there. And as you start to evolve this and have more conversations, um, you may want to actually then decide, well, actually I've got this in it for you. So there'll be other things you can provide that that might not be money, but at the outset, it's going to be money and what you'd want. Yeah, totally. And so you can literally DM every vet that's in Australia on Instagram.

And DM them on LinkedIn too. I don't know if Vets might be on LinkedIn as well. But they're definitely going to have Instagram accounts for their own business. They're probably maybe going to have Facebook account, but Instagram is easier to get in touch with them. And possibly LinkedIn, right? And But you don't have to be there and physical in person to give you Fine. So it can be everywhere because a Zoom call is as good as a meeting. But referral partnerships is

one form of marketing. What you want to look at from your Instagram is you want to probably find a couple of reels that work well. So when you're putting content out, watch for the content that really hits home to get a lot of followers. And those that work well, all you would probably want to do in the first instance is start paying and hit the blue button that says boost and boost for followers

for that particular reel that you did. And as people are coming in and following you, you want to hit the follow back button and then you want to actually have a conversation with them in the DMs. Got it? So yeah. So, and one of the things you can do is like, you can also follow the pet accessory pages. because all your perfect Potentially pet food, depending on what kind of pet food it is. Dogs obviously

is one that you want to go for. And if you just went and And so you can actually like, you can start to DM and follow some of those key customers, particularly ones that have, you know, a few hundred friends on their Instagram. And you can start to have conversations with your customer. Right. And they'll find your page and so forth. Now, when their dog passes, they might see you, but what will happen is you'll start to attract that followership to

your Instagram account. And then as you start to boost more of your stuff and advertise your product range, you can very much like you can select your audience. And what you will want to do is have a specific reel for one product that is your best selling product and have a link for them to actually go and buy it. So you could do a reel that's selling your best keepsake and have an ad that's crafted to hit an audience where they've just lost a

dog. And you can literally pop up in front of their feed with that ad and either have it click a link to go buy your thing or click follow to follow here. And you can have a conversation in the DMs. But paid ad

strategies to a specific audience targeted for a specific time for a specific thing. is the power of paid traffic, and you need to harness it. But at the same time, you're building your Instagram account organically, you're looking at what works, you're testing different content, and then one that hits, do an ad around it, pay the money to target your audience, get them to come in, buy your keepsakes. And that's probably the fastest way to build customer acquisition. Meanwhile,

Yeah. I guess I targeted that mostly because they would be They're referral partners. So they will send you consistent, hopefully over time, consistent customers. But you can also target people who literally have just lost their pet today in You just put an Instagram ad together. If you go to Udemy, have you heard of Udemy? Udemy, U-D-E-M-Y. Go in there, get a course for cheap on how to craft an Instagram ad. Watch it, then go craft an Instagram ad to your perfect audience, to

your best keepsake and see if you can make a sale. Yeah.

Right. Beyond that, there's things about you can do with your landing page, where they're going, et cetera, et cetera. There's more to it than just that. But with, try just with Udemy, craft the ad on your Instagram and But there's lots to it, right? There's branding over time, content you've got to put out each day, do your referral partnerships with your vet, but at the same time, do a small paid strategy. But the most important thing is that you have to understand that this is going

That's just how it is. Got Totally. Yeah, absolutely. So go do that. Yeah, absolutely. Just stay with it. Go and keep testing these things. Also, last bit, find an account that's already marketing keepsakes like yours, perhaps in a different country like the United States, and model exactly what they're doing. Clone them. How they post, you post. Model their ads. Model their organic feeds. Ask them questions. Model their whole setup. Model

their landing page. Funnel hack them. Instagram hack them. Literally just model them as close as you can. That's probably one of the best things you can Bloody marvelous. Thank you for calling to the Wealth Hotline. It's been awesome chatting with you, Kirstie, and good luck, and you're going to smash it. Thanks so much, Lloyd. Bye-bye. There you go. Pretty tricky one, that one, because there's so much to Building

a business. But you can't sell a secret. So I think a lot of people don't realize you've got to document what you're doing on social media. It's the biggest notice board in the world. And you can't sell a secret. You've got to be on there. You've got to be documenting, paid traffic, referral partners, bit by bit, each day, each day, each day. Yeah, what are the comments? We've got comments. Come on. Come on the comments. Here we go. G'day. How are you going? Get a bloke up your mouth. We run a

home dog room biz. Both of us work full time. Cool revenues. Wow. Wow. That's so good. Revenue five to six K a week. Current expense is $300 a week. That is so good. Looking at a shop, $800 a week rent. How do we judge if this movie is financially viable and sustainable? That's a really good question. Get a bloke up here. Home, dog grooming, biz, both work full-time. I'm assuming you're working full-time on the business. So you're making five to six grand a week on $300 a week. So my question is

why, why, why do you need a shop? And if the answer to that question is because we want to separate our business from our home, we feel like we can charge more if we have a place, we can find efficiencies by having a workplace, etc. If that's the case, then you've got to understand, is the 800 a week, is the juice worth the squeeze? And does the 800 a

week eliminate the 300 a week, or is it 800 plus 300, so it's 1100? Looking at the margins of the business, the business can easily – I don't understand the other cost but it looks like it's only 300 bucks. So you're probably netting 5 grand a week. You can easily afford a shop for 800 a week. You can. But you've got to make sure what's the objective. Is it just so you can say you've got a place of residence or is it actually going to create efficiencies

that are worth more than 800 a week? So if you can earn more than 800 a week, you can either put your prices up, you can build efficiencies, you can leverage more, you can build better, like whatever it is, it's got to be worth more than 800 a week. Otherwise, stay where you are, right? So judge it like that. Would the juice be worth the squeeze? But from all accounts of what you give me here in the comments, the business can handle it. Does that make sense? And it's

also tax deduction. Anyway, that's a cool question. You can't sell the secrets of teaming, create partnerships. This must be Alicia. This is my amazing wife. This is why you got to marry well. That's the best advice I can give you on money. Marry well. Think about it for them. She's on there. All right, that's it. Cool. That was a fun one. We got a little time left here. We got time for one more, huh? Two more. Okay, let's go. What do we got? Next person. That

was a fun one with Kirstie. Go, Kirstie. That's awesome. Okay, let's call Mark here. Your call has been forwarded to voicemail. The person you're trying to reach is not available. Same. At the tone, please record your Joseph, Lloyd, you're on the Wealth Hotline, my friend. Anyway, we've phoned you. You may have been held up. So just leaving you a voice message to say, hey, perhaps next month, if you're free, we can jump on again.

But shoot me a text back when you get this, and I'll talk to you soon. Bye. That'll be it today for our Wealth Hotline. We've done three good questions there. The other two guys, they're incapacitated at this present time. So that's what happens if you do it at lunchtime. Everyone's at work, right? So anyway, look, here's what we do. With the new Wealth Hotline, this is how it works. Every month, I

send out a little invitation to our Telegram channel. That's LloydsTelegram.com. Also, if you follow me on Instagram, there's an Instagram broadcast channel there you can follow. I put it in there as well. And then potentially to specific people back on our database and in our Facebook group, which is Money Buys Happiness. So if you want to call in for a call about anything related to wealth, obviously you heard some business stuff there, some money stuff, investing stuff, whatever it

is, you're welcome to call in. We just do this once a month for an hour a month. All right. And each call typically goes for 10 minutes. You're welcome to ask the question. So if you see that go out, you can actually call in and hive high value calls, right? That can change the future for you. So I hope that makes sense. Hope you've enjoyed it. And thanks for leaving the comments. It's great to get some interaction there in

the comments. If you've got any questions or other comments, pop them below. I'll come and reply to them. And I look forward to doing this again, live next month. The Wealth Hotline, let's go. See you soon. Thanks for listening to Money Grows on Trees. If you enjoyed the episode, leave a five-star review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and subscribe to

us on YouTube so you never miss an episode. And if you're serious about building wealth, make sure to check out the links in the show notes and follow me on all social media platforms, at LloydJamesRoss for