“They’re LIARS!” Steve Hamilton Exposes Fake Influencers, Ferrari Fraud, & Getting Sued

20:03Graham Stephan:so many cars like this? It drives me crazy that there's always three to five in service. Like I I can't stand how often we have to maintain and fix them. Um, people constantly ask to, to drive them, which again is part of our mission, but like every day, like I got, I got a kid from California saying, Hey, can I borrow a car for prom? And like, he's serious. And I'm like, I can't ship you a Bugatti to California for you to go to prom. Like there's, there's weirdly unrealistic expectations and in my heart, like I want to help these people, but like there's 20 of those a day, especially around dance season.

20:35So it kind of puts you on this podium for everyone to see you. And then I think more people kind of come to you as a source for money. What's the most generous thing you've done with your cars? The first thing that came to mind is when that lady T-boned the McLaren Senna. She had a really lousy car. It was a sub$5 ,000 car. And I knew that her insurance would probably give her, or my insurance would probably give her a$2 ,000 check for whatever the value was. So I just went and bought her a car. I went and bought her a brand new$40 ,000 Hyundai. Wow. That's my thing is, and I'm not going to go into like specifics, but my thing is kind of buying people cars.

21:10I've bought probably 20 plus cars for people in my family and my friend group. And, um, that's since that's what we do, like I love cars. I think that's the way that I like to show my love for those that, that need it. What's your favorite car to buy for somebody? The Lexus NX. I've bought several of those. Like it's just like this perfect size SUV and Lexus has such good UIX, such good driving experience. I don't have one now, but I've always loved Lexus. And I think that's such a great car. And they were, they used to be like five years ago, they were like 37 grand. So it's like this SUV Lexus that was almost fully loaded just from factory for sub 40.

21:45What's your least favorite car you've ever owned? There's a few, but I mean, definitely my Koenigsegg Regera. Christian and I, we had a meeting at Car Week. It was just me, Tommy, Christian, and his son. And I think we went from 0 % to like 10%, which we're certainly not where we were before, but I just, that car, I, if I could go back and we made a really funny short form about it and me doing like an interstellar thing, like if I could go back, I was warned by everybody not to buy that car. And I'm like, I'm like, how bad could this, how bad could a car be? Like I've, I've had everything at this point, but it was in the shop almost.

22:16It's the entirety of my ownership. So what were the cover to cover ownership costs, financials, and just general like experience owning a Koenigsegg? So Koenigsegg did help me along the way, but like, I don't care how much you help me if my car's bricked 22 out of 24 months, like I I appreciate it, but it doesn't matter if you're paying for my car to be serviced for three months and then I get it back for three days and it has to go back in the shop. Like, thanks, but no thanks. But I probably came out of pocket another 200 grand on top of that. And then I took a$500 ,000 loss selling it. So 700 grand.

22:45The current owner of the Koenigsegg, what's their experience like? I saw it in California. I don't know who owns it, but I know that it sat in the dealer for a while, I think, getting serviced and fixed, whatever. and I guess it did fine on a rally out there and maybe they put a few hundred miles on it which I was shocked because I didn't I didn't even abuse that thing I drove it gently because I'm like I want to get 50 miles out of this so it doesn't break why do you keep breaking I've talked about the Koenigsegg a lot and I'm trying not to like crap on the guys I had a good productive conversation with Christian but I think the first maybe 25 percent of them just were very prototype like like they released essentially a prototype to the public and they had wiring demons they had just all kinds of issues and uh one little fray and like a wire can can be impossible for them to detect they can keep fixing things that they think cause it but they're not the root cause so it just keeps shorting out other things and and that was kind of the problem with mine was there were things like window motors that just kept breaking and i don't know if that was because of some freighter issue but like there were also other constant things that just broke and broke and broke and broke but i think at the core of the issue i think was like the wiring harness the general wiring i I'm told was very sloppy and bad early on.

23:53And that's like the vertebrae, the nervous system of the car. So if that's bad, what can you expect from a vehicle? Which car do you drive the least out of all of your cars? I always have to look at them. I mean, the NSX there, I haven't driven it once. You haven't driven it once? Not since we rebuilt it. I drove it when I bought it, but it was not wide-bodied, twin-turboed, air ride. So I have yet to drive it. I just don't like jdm cars they're not my thing how come you haven't driven it now though how long has it been like operational um six months not you're not curious it's one of those cars where you buy it for the channel this like i was talking with matt armstrong and he said that he said it perfectly like don't buy a car because you think it'll perform well like just buy something that you enjoy and and it'll show your passion will show through it and it should perform well for you on the channel like that was that was a a channel investment and like it's not our it's not like what our demographic wants to see.

24:49And I thought it would be and it was just a mistake and I just don't want to drive it. How much have you put into it? We had some help, but probably like 50 grand. It wasn't horrible. What are you going to do with it? It's been up for sale for like four months. That's a very unique car. What are you listing it for? 120 right now. What's the lowest you would take? Maybe 110. It has a lot. I mean, it's worth every penny of that. There's none of these that exist with a Liberty Walk slammed. Does that add value? I feel like people right now just want stock cars. By and large, when you do stuff like that, I don't think it adds value.

25:18I think you typically spend 50 to 100 and you get 80 % of that if you're lucky, right? So not really. No. It probably hurt me. I just can't believe you haven't driven it once. It's been here for six months. No desire. Zero desire. And that's when I sell stuff. Like when I'm looking at a car and I'm like, I haven't driven that for a month and I have no desire to drive it, then it's time for it to go.

25:37Graham Stephan:That's also interesting. I just noticed you have no Ferraris in here. I have one. You have the one FF. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, it's the GTC, which replaced the GTC for Lusso. uh i think ferrari is like a different culture of of people and i don't mean that in a bad way i just think that like a ferrari owner is different from everything else like they're very like distinguished people this is not every ferrari owner but like typically when i think of it and when i what i see out there is they're distinguished they'll play that game with ferrari and go buy 20 cars so they can get ferrari's next hyper series they will attend all the rallies and it's just like not very counter my personality.

26:14We used to have, I had a Bugatti Chiron SS that I sold. I'm selling my Remac. Like we're getting rid of boring cars and it's crazy to say that like a Remac, the quickest car in the world is boring or the Bugatti, the highest top speed in the world. But they are, they're like, they're too refined. They're too comfortable. They're too quiet. I like loud cars like the Hennessy Venom. It's just, it sounds like a 60s muscle car. It's loud, insane, fast, bold colored. Huge spoiler. It's so aggressive.

26:46Bro, this thing doesn't add defrost. Woo! Oh, there's fire. Like, that's the future of the collection. I mean, it wasn't even two years ago last time we spoke, and I asked you if you could keep one single car aside from daily drivers, which one would it be? And you're like, eh, probably the Bugatti Chiron SS. And now here we are, and you've sold the car. Why did you sell the car? It was boring, but I also needed cash to build a big project that we're doing. So we're building a big car condo community in Florida, right in central Florida near Windermere. And that's going to be where I live in the future for the majority of the year.

27:20And I'm looking around at trying to find somewhere for my cars to be stored. And there's nothing. I'm like, I'm trying to find this crappy 5 ,000 square foot industrial building. I don't care how old it is, how dingy it is. And there's nothing. And I'm like, man, if I could just find land and build something like... I could probably make some pretty good money on this and solve a big problem within the community. And I think that's how a lot of my other business ideas and ventures came along, was just solving a problem for myself. And so we were lucky and blessed enough to find some land. One of the parcels wasn't even for sale.

27:50We just went and met with some very eccentric sellers, talked him into it. Had a bunch of come to God meetings with the attorney when it almost fell apart last minute. Ended up closing in Denmark because we got a clear to close. And I'm like, I'm not going to let this deal slip out of my hands. I will go find some followers that will helped me meet. They met me at the embassy, helped me sign and notarize documents and we got it done. So I have the land. I have the whole project that I'm going to present to the city. They seemed very warm about the idea. I just need to get their thumbs up and then we break ground and build this community.

28:17So what exactly is the idea? Well, the first problem was that there just is no place to store cars down there, right? That's the biggest problem. The second problem is that the vast majority of car condos in the world are like, are ugly. Like this community, I actually think is actually one of the top tier ones, but it's, there's no real greenery. When you get behind that gate there's no vegetation no plants it's all just asphalt the buildings are tan they look like they look like storage units they don't look like car condos so and then they don't have a great club element like they built some goofy five o 'clock tower that's like 1930s theme that's very fancy and bougie and nobody ever uses it so i'm like i want to build something that has nature trails a boardwalk a lot of vegetation that's beautiful i want to build a clubhouse that's that's private welcoming though and has a pool and uh and then have a strong sense of community and and make the car condos like the exteriors look like i took inspiration from coda uh it's the circuit of the americas in austin they have beautiful exterior on their car condos and so taking a lot of inspiration from that but trying to make it even better than that so just elevating the experience we're kind of calling it a country club for cars basically do you have to apply to like buy one of the places like do you have to match the demographic yeah i mean you have to have enough income like these will be probably around a million dollars a unit and it's uh it's windermere reserve.com is where you can go sign up and i have this is the only the second time i've really publicly talked about it other than our video and i have 250 um like emails of interest and i have maybe 70 to 80 condos that we're going to do so i'm really pumped about how much interest has come i love the idea you know what they're building them now in vegas what in henderson

29:55Graham Stephan:these car condos and they're selling for anywhere from 600 grand on the low end to about one and a half on the high depending on the square footage they're just like this it's like open at the bottom with a little loft and you can like spec it out yeah i think it's a huge opportunity and people love them because you're not building a house with like multiple bathrooms a full-blown kitchen all these appliances bedrooms it's like it's a warehouse with a loft it's really easy to construct and car people just are so excited for it and the loft can have like we'll have kitchenettes in our loft. We'll actually put ovens and, but it's not full blown crazy kitchen.

30:29It's, it's the light version. Right. And then a little seating area. And we're hoping to do third story bedrooms so that people can stay overnight. And then the designer even suggested like above the third story to have a balcony or like a seating area up top, like a rooftop patio. And I'm like, that would be phenomenal. That's a pretty minimum cost option. So we're, we're trying to make these as big and amazing as possible. And you know, that's, that's something that when I moved down there. That's a community I want to be a part of. That's the goal. It's something that I'm excited to go to and enjoy with other people.

31:00So what changed with the Chiron in the last year and a half and now? There's a point where like you also just get all the content. Like a lot of these cars are bought because A, I enjoy it, but B, we need to create a content machine out of them. And we kind of did everything that we could with that. Same with the Remak. The Remak just beats everything. So like those two cars, it's just, there's not much more you can do. And then I just stopped driving it because there's more fun, loud, raw cars in here to drive. So it just sat here. And then I realized, gee, it's been a month since I've driven the Bugatti.

31:28I should probably go drive it. Like, that's why I'm, I'm going to drive it. It's because it's sat for a month, not because I want to drive it. So it's just the psyche of my brain. Like I, there, there are some things that like, I'm a lifer with like my wife, of course, my kids, like I will always be endeared, love, be with them. but then some things I can just lose interest in immediately and move on to the next thing. Is there a single car that you have been a lifelong like endear of it? Running the podcast is honestly an absolute blast between filming with guests, travel, YouTube strategy. It is all super fun.

32:03But there is one thing that I cannot stand, and that is back-end paperwork. No joke, if I have to even touch anything related to payroll taxes or benefits, it just puts me in an awful mood, which is exactly why we use today's sponsor, Gusto.

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33:21Graham Stephan:Again, that is three months of free payroll at gusto.com slash I-C-E-D. One more time, gusto.com slash I-C-E-D, or just click the link down below in the description. Now, running a business can be one of the most rewarding things that you end up doing, but it can also be extremely stressful. There's always millions of things to do, but you can't possibly do them all yourself. And that's why we're so excited to be partnering with Upwork. Upwork is where businesses find highly skilled freelance professionals for specialized work from software development and AI implementation to marketing, design, and business operations.

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34:36Graham Stephan:over 170 ,000 freelancers on the platform hold five-star ratings. So you're hiring someone with a verified track record. So to get started, visit upwork.com right now and post your job for free. That is upwork.com to connect with top talent ready to help your business grow. UPWORK.com. Once again, upwork.com or just click the link down below in the description. Is there a single car that you have been a lifelong like endear of it? Yeah, my Chevelle. I've had that since my kids were tiny and it's been through four engines. I just I love my 67 Chevelle. I think I'll my McLaren 765 LT and my Hennessy Venom.

35:13I think those are cars that I will have forever because they're so special to me. I have such special relationships with with either ownership or with local dealers. And they're just such thrilling and exciting cars.

35:23Graham Stephan:What's a car that you can't believe how expensive it's gotten? 75 % of all of the hypercars right now. But I would say the 918 is 5 to 6 million for the YSAC. Like I sold mine for two a year and a half ago, the LaFerrari. That one's insane to me. So they alleged that they produced 900 of these cars. But realistically, if you go to certain websites, there's 1 ,100 to 1 ,200 production. Like I haven't verified this. I've only just went and seen. Well, I mean, I've visually verified it, but I can't go and physically verify the VINs on the cars. But like, in my opinion, the website tells a story that the Italians lie about production numbers.

35:56on really Ferrari was one, Pagani was one. And, uh, and there are probably others, but those were two big ones and they're producing 1200 LaFerraris. They were like around 2 million, I think to start. And those are, those are seven or$8 million now for a LaFerrari. And it's just crazy to me when there's over a thousand of these, how, how is that even possible? Like it's a fun car, but it's just insane to me that they're going for that much money.

36:21Graham Stephan:What about the new Ferrari EV that just sold for 40 million dollars yeah that that i my gut says that that was just a guy that had 40 million dollars that he was going to donate anyway and it helped him get some positive news and some some clout and he was going to do it whatever that car was that was going through he was going to bid 40 million dollars i i hate the the new ev though like i already didn't really like ferrari and seeing that thing that's that's ugly and i had the sf90 recently and it's it's like the most soulless that was probably top three for least favorite cars yeah like i hated it it too many gadgets and gizmos isn't what jeremy just bought jeremy just bought that like it's such a day ago he posted the video we'll put it up here him pulling the uh thing off the car showing it when you look at the numbers of like zero to 60 yeah it's really fast it's got a lot it looks cool so is a model s you can go get a model s plaid used for 45 000 and it'll smoke that like if that's if you want fast like just go get a tesla if you want like i think the the uh the dynamic of the the hyper and supercar is turning very much analog now because they're getting beat like the corvette just beat every car that exists and it's 250 000 like in america we just built this hybrid car that nothing can compete with.

37:40Like why even go for speed records at this point? Why, why be Bugatti? Why, what matters if you can get beat by a car a 10th or a 15th of your price? Now, now they're figuring out, okay, we have to be, we have to be different. How can we, how can we get that like ultra rich segment and it's becoming analog? Yeah. Hennessy Blackbird just came out and it's 800 horsepower, naturally aspirated motor, nothing digital in it. Gated six speed transmission. That's, I think that's the wave of the future with cars.

38:07Graham Stephan:So don't you think that's one of the reasons why some of the older cars have spiked so much in value is purely because the new ones are kind of not as good? Yeah, like the Aventador went crazy because the Revolta is hybrid. Yeah. But the problem is what happens when they all start saying, okay, we're not going to do hybrid anymore. We're going to do that. What happens to all those cars that spiked because manufacturers started shifting to hybrid? Like Lamborghini is going to potentially revert back to, I was talking more about hypercar manufacturers when I said analog, but like the supercar manufacturers are going to follow.

38:37they have to differentiate themselves again they're going to get beat by every other car out there too so i think that they they may revert back to naturally aspirated wouldn't they just

38:44Graham Stephan:do what porsche is doing and just offer both like if you want the six speed gated it's going to be x amount more like you overpay now and they could upsell that and even the hennessy blackbird does offer like an automatic they offer a slightly less analog experience with their automatic transmission but like john was he's like well if you want to order that is like well we don't expect a lot of them. Like if you want to be that guy, you can order it. So I think even some of the new real analog ones are going to be, even the Pagani Utopia was like, I was shocked. That one was announced like three years ago, four years ago.

39:12And they offered the six speed manual transmission and a hypercar at that time too. So maybe that was kind of the beginning of that happening and Pagani got on it super early. So what cars do you think are undervalued? Bugatti Veyron by far. There's still one five to one, seven million dollars for the 06 to 08. And I don't see how that car is like that car did break top speed record held it for a long time and it's a i think it cost them four million dollars to build each of those cars and they were selling them for two at the time um they are a little bit to maintain but there's enough of them out there where i think people have figured out how to how to get it done bugatti offers it uh offers an extended warranty for i think 250 that'll cover it for four years i'd have to check the numbers in that but it's a criminally underrated car that they built i mean i told you they built 1200 of those la ferrari's they built, I think, 350 or 400 of the Veyrons, and they're 1.5 million.

39:59It's shocking to me that they're that cheap. What should they be selling for? Five. If everything else is where they're at, the Veyron's starting price should be$5 million. I think it's criminally underrated. And then you have the SVJs that are another criminally overrated car, where those are a million and a half, and they built a thousand plus of those. It's just, I don't understand the market.

40:17Graham Stephan:Let's say someone has$1.5 million to invest, and they have a choice between the S &P 500 or it's the top-notch Bugatti. Yeah. What would you recommend? It depends. Are they strictly looking for a financial investment or haven where they're going to park that Veyron, they're not going to drive it, they don't care about the enjoyment of it? Then I might say actually Veyron is the move. Like legit, go buy, if you have$15 million, go buy 10 Veyrons, let them sit in your garage. I think you're going to come out far more ahead in three to five years with that. If you're going to drive it, then there's mileage that's going to hurt value a little bit.

40:53you're going to have to maintain it. If you buy it to drive it, you're also maybe going to get bored of it. There's more thrilling cars for that much money. So strictly as an investment, yeah, that might be your best. How many miles? Walk us through, in your opinion, what would be the best investment Bugatti? You have to get into their convertible model or their Veyron SS. Those have already kind of went up in value. I think they're north of three, but just like with any other car, the most special variants seem to be the one that increased the most. The 918 Y-Sox seemed to go a lot higher. If there's some goofy Enzo that's a yellow instead of the super common red, that one garners 50 % more.

41:29So I would have to say some of their later models, if you're willing to spend a little bit more. There's a beautiful Veyron. Supercar Ron had a beautiful spec, and I forget which one is. I even drove his, but that one was, in my opinion, the most beautiful spec, and I think he paid around two. It's probably already worth three now, and in five years, that one might be worth eight. It seems like whatever Ed Bolian

41:49Graham Stephan:buys, give it five years, and he's always right. Yeah. Oh, nice. It's largely the case with me, too. I just sell them before I had the LaFerrari. I had the 918. I've had a lot of cars that have really gone up in value, and I sell them right around what I paid for them. Maybe I make a little bit of money. But again, they're not financial investments for me. So what else besides the Bugatti that you think is underrated? Would have said the Senna a year ago, but that one went from$1 million to$3 million over the course of a year everything is overvalued right now man like there's there's five cars for every 95 that 95 are overvalued five are probably undervalued i mcclaren 720 750 people always ask me if i have like 250k what what car uh should i get and i'm like if you want reliability and and a very fun driving experience get a porsche gt3rs if you want relative reliability and you want the most fun possible experience in my opinion it's the mcclaren 720 or the 750 like they're highly tunable, extremely good UI driving experiences.

42:50They're just such fun cars. So do you think any EV supercars have any collectability right now? No, no. The Ramac is the prime example. Like I can't sell that. Like in order to sell that, I'd have to be about half of what I paid. I paid like two, seven all in with taxes. The highest offer. And I've tried very hard as like one, three on that car right now. Those are, and that's a car where I think when the market has gone broadly EV, like that is a car that might be the F1 of the 90s that's worth 20 million. Like maybe that Remak is the five,$10 million car in the future because it broke all these records.

43:25Like it was the very first electric broadly built hypercar. But I'm not going to sit around for five or 10 years on that car to get that value out of it.

43:33Graham Stephan:I would argue that that is going to be the future collectible because you are selling it. And it seems like you get these cars early, but then you sell them early. As soon as you sell them, two, three years later, they spike. Yeah, but I don't want to hold on to them for two more years and not drive them. I don't know. It just doesn't make sense. They got to be fun. I got to drive them. I have to utilize them. And we put a lot of miles on these cars. I mean, when I sell these cars, my average holding period for these cars is probably two years. And the average mileage when I sell them is probably 10 to 12 ,000 miles, which is insane for a hypercar.

44:05Like 5 ,000 miles a year when you have 20 cars in your collection is insane. Which car manufacturer have you completely lost respect for? I think everyone thinks the answer is Koenigsegg, but I actually respect them because like, if, let me just talk about that. Like the Yesco they delivered had some very big problems early on. We put a video how it like leaked brakes, the gyro was not working, but like they took really good care of it in that first month. They flew techs out multiple times. They did a lot of work on it and it's actually been surprisingly ironclad in the last three or four months.

44:38There's some small issues with it now, but like I can still drive it. as long as I can drive a car, I'm super happy with it. Like the Regera would brick and it would shut off. Like you can't drive it. The Yesco has some small issues, but I can drive it. I can wait until the big service to get that stuff addressed. I'm happy as a camper with that stuff. Um, but like there is, there's one manufacturer that came to mind and I can't, I can't actually even publicly, uh, publicly bash them because there was like a deal that we worked out, but which sounds crazy, but it's a small one and it's, it's irrelevant at this point.

45:06Or which manufacturers are you surprised that they even still exist that would be koenigsegg like it's it's with all the problems that they had they just have such great branding and a loyal following base that like their amazing marketing branding and innovative tech is really helping lead them but usually if you if you build a product that that breaks a lot and is notoriously unreliable like for consistently for a long period of time that's the end but but they've they've gotten better they've built really cool cars and they've gotten better and they've turned it into more reliable companies so somehow they rode that that long wave and and like i want them to succeed i've always said like build me a great car and i will be your biggest advocate and and my my tone is already very different than it was nine months ago when i crashed out on them and uh and so like i want to be their advocate i want this yes go to continue to perform well because then i will i will be a positive vocal advocate for them if there was one car manufacturer that you could only ever drive for the rest of your life what would it be mclaren i love i love my hennessy it's my favorite car in the collection but mclaren is they just build the the like the broad profile of all their cars is just they're the most fun cars they're the best cars in my opinion how does someone know they have enough

46:15Graham Stephan:money to be able to buy a mclaren like is there a net worth or income i mean net worth is one thing right like because a lot of my money's tied up in my company like but like disposable let's say let's talk about like income annually i mean you can get that mclaren for probably you're probably like 75 grand to$7 ,500 a month. And so you need to, I mean, if you're taking a five, six year loan on a 250K car, even if it's five grand a month, that's, that's a pretty steep payment. So you really need to be making at least two to 250 a month, but not have, not be crazy over leveraged with house and other stuff.

46:49Like probably the value of the car is, is what your annual income should be. So you need to be making like$3 million a year. No, he meant to stay a month. For hyper, for a hyper car. Maybe.

46:59Graham Stephan:No, he said$250 ,000 a year. Well,$250 ,000. Oh, is that per year? Yeah. Maybe it's one-to-one is where you should be. A one-to-one ratio, if you're going to have a Bugatti Chiron at$3 million, you probably should make around the same of what that car is worth. You should. But that's a good bridge into the leasing thing. Like, there's guys out there that are like, I just learned a lot of this and it's crazy to me. And I think this might be what's manipulating market values too, where they can just go list cars really, really, really high and set the market or a lot of them are even buying all of the inventory.

47:33So it's like, I'm going to go and buy all of the Bugatti Charans that exist. I'm going to list them stupid high. So I'm the only one in the country selling them because inventory is scarce right now. Um, and so I'm going to, I'm going to be the guy that has all four of these. I'm going to set the market at whatever it is. And I'm going to continue actually getting these people in on three to four month leases. So I'm going to charge them$60 ,000 a month, uh, for their car so they can go use it for their course program or whatever it is. There's stupid amount of this happening right now. And then they go and they go and make it look like these cars are very affordable.

48:09They help go push their courses and those course people get a lot of followers, a lot of influence from what happens. And then the car disappears like four months later. Have you had people that sell courses approach you to try to rent your cars it's not anybody well known but all the time people would come in here and then i'd see them like sitting in my lamborghini talking about like here's how i invest money in forex and i'm like no way that i hate that i will not allow so like i will i will kick them out of my you know i'm like don't use my don't use my 20 year plus years of earnings to to flex and fake what you're doing there's nothing more that drives me crazy than people trying to use my collection for their own larping essentially right they're using my collection for their clout I'm more than happy to share the cars with anybody that wants a fun experience but there's plenty of people that come in here and do that and I'm like you got to get out and some of them try to get close with my my team and then you'll realize like I don't realize it right away and then I'm like why is this guy frequently asking you to go out in the Aventador Henry like why is why is he hanging out with you a little bit more than usual like why am I starting to see videos of him like flexing stuff on on his page with my cars and And that's a problem.

49:14So in terms of the leasing, how exactly does that work in the back end? What I heard is they put a lot of money up front. Like they're basically not putting an investment in the car. They're getting nothing out of the car. It's I'm willing to go spend a half a million dollars over the course of three to six months because it's going to double my sub count and it's going to drive significantly more volume in people that sign up for the course. So I think some of these people are putting up$250 ,000 to$500 ,000 down. then they're paying 60 grand i heard it's some absurd amount of money and then they get it for six months and they just get as much usage and content as they can out of it so what that does is it allows these guys to keep listing the cars really high because they know that they're just going to lease the cars and and perceptually to the public wow bugatti's are five million dollars or four million dollars now wow this this guy that sells classes can afford one of these uh and and then they just keep like doing leases in the background and then you just turn the car in

50:11Graham Stephan:So my understanding was that these leases were actually kind of sales, structured as leases, so you'd be able to write off all the payment, but building equity in the car. And then because they technically do own the car, they are responsible for the diminished value at the time they go and give that to someone else. So if the car goes from 2 million to 1.8, they have to come out of pocket the 1.8, or they continue making payments. I wish I knew how these were structured. I've done leases like that myself. I don't have any, actually, I do have a lease. I have a lease on my, uh, my Yesco. I basically went and I, the other$1.5 million of it ebbs and flows of cash.

50:45I had to go take a lease out on that, but I, I pretty much own all of these in cash with the exception of that 1.5. I don't think I have any other lease on anything that's here right now, but I had a lot of money output for cars on order. I have five to$7 million that manufacturers have been sitting on for up to years and years and years, the Jumeirah, they've had my, I think 300K deposit for six years now. And so sometimes, yeah, I'll be like, okay, there's not infinite money. I need to go bridge the gap. And so I know those are structured that way. I don't know how these other guys are structuring it because it sounds very different to me, but yeah, these other ones are structured intelligently where it's essentially a lease to own.

51:23And because it says it's a lease, you're allowed to write it off for tax purposes because it's harder to write off an actual financed car, I guess. Yes. The government scrutinizes that a lot more and people don't usually pass that sniff test. If you have a deposit to purchase a car for six years, that's$300 ,000, what do you think of the chances of you actually getting that car? Hi. Hi. But like the Roadster I've had on deposit for like, what, when did they do those deposits? 2018 or 19? I've had that one. I've had, they've had 50K of my money forever. I think they're going to deliver it. Right.

51:54And, but I think the real question is what if they don't, do they pay you interest on your money and they probably don't, right? Like that 50 should be a hundred after eight or nine years, that should be a hundred K of my money. If they give me just my 50 K back, that's a problem. But I think it's high probability. I've never had an auto manufacturer not deliver the Yesco I waited five years for, but they got it to me. Um, most car manufacturers are actually probably a two to three year window. It's, it's not short. Which car manufacturer are you most bullish on? Like you think that they're going to continually stay on the cutting edge and put out better and better and better cars i think i think mclaren is like i i'm not trying to like i'm not trying to put them on this pedestal but like they are releasing a lot of really cool cars they have a big color palette that they offer they're fun and exciting cars they're quick i put money down on my w1 a year and a half ago i think and it'll get it delivered in sub two years uh my 788 hs that they just launched a month ago i think I'm going to have that six, seven months after, stupid six, seven, six, seven months after I put the money down and my spec is insane.

52:59It's the most bold, crazy spec we've ever done, but I think it's the coolest spec I have ever done in my life. And like, I hate to say it, but, but I hate to like sound like a broken record, but McLaren is doing it right, right now. What would you recommend for someone who wants as little depreciation as possible? Porsche GT3 RS. Everyone since like 07 has maintained whatever their MSRP is or above it. And they're highly reliable. That is the best car if you want something that's reliable that's going to hold its value and that's going to deliver a fun experience is there a certain year that's going to be better than others um i think the newest year if you can get one it's sticker of course that's it because those are still going like 100 plus above sticker but i really like the the 2019 the 9912 uh it's one i've had two of i had the lizard green i have a miami blue y suck now and it's one that's just stuck to its value like it's just hell actually it's a little higher than it was but they're still affordable like the newest model are like 350 to 400.

53:52The older model from 19 are like 250, but they drive near the same. Like they're 90 % the same car. The newer one just has some more aero and looks different. But like if you blindfolded me and put me in either car, it'd be hard for me to differentiate the driving experience. Is it ever worth it to buy the extended warranty? In some cases, the LaFerrari, they offered me a two-year full drive train warranty for$30 ,000. This was on a million car at the time so one percent i think that you would do it you know if you have a hundred thousand dollar car and they say for a thousand dollars we'll give you peace full peace of mind for two years of course you would do that that i was the most shocked by the cut that shows how much they must believe in that car uh maybe that car has been very reliable and mine was too so did you ever use the 30 000 i don't think i had to i think i sold it before i could before i could do it but by and large extended warranties i think i think it really depends on the price but i feel like they're usually a little bit too overinflated and but like if you're that supercar guy that's that's buying a car beyond your means and if that thing breaks and it's going to sit in your garage for six months because you can't fix it then yeah you should probably find a way to

54:56Graham Stephan:work that into financing what other cars do you believe are going to be going up in value a lot over the next 10 years i mean everything's already gone up i think it's more about what's going to He's trying to figure out what car he should want to buy. He's really... What to buy. What do you think about Graham's current collection? If you were to rate it, one to 10, what would you rate it? I mean, it's phenomenal. I'd give it a seven. Like, it's great. What could take it to a nine? $30 million. Really? It would take$30 million to go from a seven to a nine? Yeah, it's the battle between, like, how do you value your collection?

55:30Is it clout? Is it drivability? or is it strictly just what's going to increase the most in value? And for me, it's like, candidly, it's clout and drivability are the two most important things that you have to have for a YouTube channel. So you think his collection is a little boring, maybe? I think it's fun. You still have the Ford GT, right? I do.

55:49Graham Stephan:Yeah, that's a phenomenal car. Ford GT, Tesla Roadster 2010, which may or may not be for sale. I'm still debating that. And those haven't really popped either. They're still going for$40 to$60, right? It depends. on the car. Mine is one of 26 that was ever made in yellow. So it's the rarest color. Got it. Those overall have sold more just because of the color itself. So I'm guessing it's a little more than that. Okay, that's fair. I was hoping that car would be a$200 ,000 car. Yeah. And it has not reached that. It's got to get there. It has to get there. There's so few of those built relative to the S, the X, especially the 3 and the Y.

56:23That's a car I've been following on Bring a Trailer for a year now. I'm waiting for the right one to go through and buy one. It's funny that maybe we should talk about it after. I would 100 % tell.

56:31Graham Stephan:I just spent 15 grand shipping this thing to Seattle. They did a new internals of the battery and shipped it back. So I just spent money on this thing. And you're like, I still want to sell it. It is pristine. I never drive it. I was talking to a lot of these guys. I'm like, I never drive the cars because they work from home. If I do drive, it's usually for a podcast or a podcast guest. Or Jack and I are driving to LA. And sometimes Jack will drive. a few times I'll drive. So it's not often. And then I sit there and I have to shuffle cars to like get one out of the garage. Like imagine you have to get that car out in the corner.

57:07Graham Stephan:You have to shuffle the whole thing. It's a pain in the butt. Get the one and like, eh, I may as well just not drive it. It's a total pain. It depends like. And clout is important. If you're on YouTube, there's a certain level of clout and recognition that you want to have, right? Like there's always an element of, I want to be known, I want to be public, but you hope that you can spread a good message and connect people and deliver something awesome to people. Like if you can do both of those, which you guys do well, then it's a win-win. so like you got to bring like a lamborghini to the collection like that's that is the that is the pinnacle clout car for someone that's i did mention a mclaren and then a porsche gt3s if i had 250 but if you have 250k and clout is your most important thing which i know you didn't say that was but like that's the car when you throw a huracan in the mix or you can get a an aventador maybe around i don't know what the aventadors have popped to but 300 oh they're still okay good because pre-covid they got sub 300 during covid they went up to 350 even up to 400 and then i think they corrected themselves so it's really an aventador a hurricane that's that's kind of the best clout yeah i don't like i don't like the cloud cars because as soon as a lot of people have them are like oh you have this car i don't like it too many people have something i just i'm not into it i like the cars that no one else has it no one else on youtube really besides like a few car guys sure have the four gt almost no one has a tesla roadster i think i'm the only one and then almost no one has the lotus evora gtc like no one so i like that the oddballs and and like the twr super cat that i have in order is one of those it's a jaguar xjs that has a naturally aspirated v12 in it you can get one of those cars the xjs is for 15 to 20 000 dollars which is it's because they're so terribly unreliable but then twr takes them and wide bodies them and makes them into this like supercharged beast machine and and for me there's still like 500 ,000 plus dollars, but it's such a cool and unique looking car.

58:59When you say that for me, I think that's my car of the one that nobody has on social media that really is just going to be thrilling and fun. I get to spec myself. And then the BAC Mono that I bought that from Houston Cross right there in Vegas. And like, that's a car that's, you know, upper 100s for the non-Type R, the Type R is upper 200s. And that's a really fun and unique car. You just can't have a passenger in it. I noticed on a lot of these cars too, you have

59:21Graham Stephan:really incredible license plates. And I'm so curious how you're able to get these plates. I got to say, everyone's had that one business idea that they've been just sitting on for way too long. And taking that first step is usually where the idea stops. But getting started is actually very straightforward when today's sponsor, Shopify, handles it for you. Literally everything that you need to start selling is included and ready to go from day one. You can launch a store in just a few simple steps and their AI site builder and design templates mean it actually looks good without hiring anybody.

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1:00:25Graham Stephan:Shopify powers millions of businesses worldwide, from household names like Mattel and Gymshark to people launching their very first store. So if you're ready to hear the of your first sale today, head over to shopify.com slash ICH to start your free trial today. That's shopify.com slash ICH. One more time, that is Shopify.com slash ICH or click the link down below in the description to get started today. I noticed on a lot of these cars, too, you have really incredible license plates. And I'm so curious how you're able to get these plates. I know that the lady's name at the Illinois Secretary of State is Caroline Shirley.

1:00:58I only know this because I always get a letter from her or a call on what does this mean? What does THC BBC mean? And I'm like, oh, it's the Hamilton collection. And in BBC, it means big black Cadillac. I'm like, what else would it mean? and she's like nope and i had to turn it that was one that slipped through and i had to turn it in i think that we try to use like modern lingo where the one that i think a lot of people that make the decisions are like 30 40 something people like myself we did bbc on the revolto bb we must have some obsession with bbc we told you about our mascot here yeah and it's bbsee and that one slipped through even though when you say it it's bbc so i think it's just being creative and sneaky, huge wang on the McLaren Senna.

1:01:41They probably didn't even know what that meant, but like a wang means a wiener. And then everything is wiener related, isn't it? What's the obsession with wieners? I don't know. I think it's because everyone always assumes you have like a small wiener. So we're like, we're either saying, no, we have a big wiener or we're saying we're affirming. Yes, it is. So we did small PP on my Resvani. We did small D on my Ferrari. That's my crew car that isn't it funny that ferrari gtc4 uh luso is our crew car but that's what they drive to run errands and like i remember seeing these girls behind us just like snickering and laughing and i felt like so humbled because they're laughing because my license plate says we all have a small i can't believe that you're able to get away with that me neither there's the wall of license plates over there like i'm i'm looking at all of these cop lover yeah that one that one was that one makes sense um the box one backwards like they didn't catch that i don't know if you saw that one the third from the right on the top oh no i didn't see that um cracked yeah uh that was for the yeah there's a small pp one small d is up there aura we're the aura makes sense that one's not that bad there's been some interesting ones that are still on the vehicles what's the one you wished you could have gotten that they denied oh gta irl i'm like grand theft auto in real life i'm like because everyone always says bros live in like grand theft auto garage in real life or forza so we're like oh that would be a great license plate gta irl and they denied it like she asked me she's like what is gta and i had to find a website that didn't show that it meant grand theft auto i tried to i had to go to a website that just showed the acronym and i'm like here it's it's a video game called gta and she must have done more diligence and she's like nope

1:03:20Graham Stephan:not happening i didn't think that would be like bad yeah of all of the ones that's the one that gets rejected i know and that one would have been so cool to have in here but you're gonna have everyone now going to their state's website to try to get gta irl they should and hopefully they can get it hopefully their state passes because i think it's reasonable if it's in nevada i think you should get it why me what about you i mean i can six cars i don't want to put that on like a tesla model three it'd be even funnier on model three what am i putting my two thousand like three thousand dollar i'm gonna look for it i'm gonna look for it okay if it's available i'll get it it's funny you say tesla because like my daily is a cybertruck and if i had to keep one car it's it's that out of all of the cars.

1:04:02I love my, it's very drivable. Right. And then my son has a model three. My other son, Jack, who's about to be driving as a model X. My wife has a lucid gravity. Like I have this whole collection of loud, wild cars. And every one of us that drive in the house have an electric car. Why is that? Because they're just so much more convenient. The tech is so good, especially in a tech. I mean, you have. Yeah. I love it. It's just so reliable. And the autopilot has gotten crazy good in the last year. If you have the new hardware from 22 on up, it's I'm leaving my driveway, clicking it on going an hour into the city and stop and go traffic all the way to my destination and it's parking me in a parking lot like insane it's also really nice for me not to have the maintenance on it even when you there's so much less parts for them to have to fix and even when you do you just go drop it off and they get it done no they come to your house now oh yeah sometimes yeah it's incredible we had some bigger jobs that they had to do but you drop it off you don't have to see a human which is kind of what tesla's very anti-personal communication it's like cool you want to buy a car order it online oh you're ready to pick it up we're gonna have it parked in a spot for you click your screen for a video if you need to learn anything that's i'm like very impersonal but i guess if you're that good of a company you don't need to be

1:05:05Graham Stephan:personal so i saw recently one of your videos you're doing a flip yeah the guy flipped over one of the cars and the hoa was upset and he made this whole response to the hoa what happened what's the current status of that so frankie la pena he's the guy on tic tac that has the big booty and does every stunt known to man and he just came here and he practiced for he actually imported snow from michigan because there was no snow left here right outside of my window he built the snow ramp he was testing it safely for like five to six hours test runs test runs test runs and then he finally took the koenigsegg pulling the snowboard and and he jumped it low speed very very like like two out of ten in terms of what he's done like he's a very talented stuntman he said he's never injured himself in any stunt which i find crazy because some of the stuff he does is is a 10 out of 10, like an insanity.

1:05:53And the HOA didn't like it. Now, nobody came out to say anything during that six hour period. Uh, but somehow they caught wind of it. Even though people come in and out of this community all the time, the HOA is feet away from my door after they're like, we don't want him to post a video of it. And I'm like, I'll let him know, but he's his own channel. Like he spent a lot of time and resources doing that. He drove out of here from Michigan. He had to, he had to spend the night prior, like shoveling snow into his truck. I'm like, I'll let him know, but I can't promise anything. And then I conveyed that to him, but I'm, but he still posted it, which I told him like at the end of the day, like, it's your decision.

1:06:30Like, I can't tell you not to post it. And like, I still love Frankie. He's a good dude. And he's been an advocate for me as I battle with the HOA, but they really didn't like that. And so they, they're worried that it was going to increase their insurance costs or their insurance was going to drop them. And like, it's still been six months and no word from insurance, like nothing's happened. And they, so they find me$25 ,000. And like, according to the stipulation of the HOA agreements, like they can't really find me above and beyond two 50. And they're trying to pull some caveat in the language there that they're able to go claim this$25 ,000.

1:07:04And then, but it was all, it was all total BS. So I said, there's no way I'm going to pay that fine. Like, I'm just not going to pay it. I'll sue you guys. And I just didn't agree with it. And so they, they then reduced it to 5k which i thought was cool but then they're like but if our insurance does drop us you're responsible for all of our lost car show revenue for in perpetuity like and they said they make 185 000 a year from their car shows which i think is crazy that they're profiting off of car shows because that's it's very counter hamilton collection do they profit from the car shows they charge a lot of money and they do bring a lot of people into here okay uh that's that's really the gist of it right so so i'm like i'm not gonna what am i gonna be on the hook for 10 years of lost car show revenue like that's insane you took it from 25 000 to one to two million potential dollars and who's to say that you lost insurance because you're holding car shows you have cars weaving in and out of hordes of children and people you have golf carts that crashed into electrical junction boxes that were driven by kids like the amount of exposure you have guys fixing cars in your parking lot you got a guy sitting under a truck uh fixing cars be more threatening to their insurance that's what i'm saying it depends who's filming it yeah yeah you don't want the insurance coming yeah great point about that don't let me forget about so one of the stipulations was i also can't film something nobody else has a stipulation to so i'm like that sounds kind of damaging to me because that's my business like we film here all the time we intro videos we're doing stuff and they said you can't film i think it was outside of the premises but like we drive our cars out of here like that's that is a primary uh traffic and uh cash driver to the business and it's crazy like why why why can't i film me driving in a car out of your community?

1:08:44What harm is that doing? Really, they just have a personal vendetta against me. That's what I genuinely think it is. I think these are tiny wienered guys that just don't like that we have a social media channel that it's done really well because of our awesome followers. And they just have a chip on their shoulder about us. I don't know. I don't know what it is. How many people are in this HOA? It's I think the board has like eight people. And so these guys all just agreed most likely that they just want to come after you. I think there's like two or three that are really anti-Hamilton collection, and they're the guys with the tiniest wieners.

1:09:17Graham Stephan:Was the wiener tiny because of the jump, or was it always tiny? I think it was always tiny. I'm pretty sure it was always really, really tiny. That's what caused you to be exposed as tiny. I suppose, yeah. There's something they're trying to overcompensate for, but aren't we all trying to overcompensate for something as I sit behind a$30 million collection? You should be brothers in arms with them. I should, yeah. The tiny wiener brethren. Yeah. Do they know your wiener is just as tiny? I'll have to show them one day and we'll find out. All of a sudden, all of the fees dropped. They're like, let's go.

1:09:51Graham Stephan:They're like, listen, man, we're fine. We had no idea you're one of us. The small wiener dab up. It's a special one that I'll have to, maybe I'll have to show you guys. We'll have to see first. That's incredible. So how are you going to solve the situation? I mean, they just got served with, well, not served. I just sent them the complaint. So it's like this, this phase of you send them the full legal complaint, but I haven't filed it yet. I let them review it for two weeks. They can, they can see how much work and effort we put into the complaint and they can make a decision if they want me to go ahead and officially sue them.

1:10:22Um, they just won't respond or they won't agree, uh, or they can reduce and either drop the fine or reduce it to something that's like of this earth and that will close the matter. So I think they have days left to reply to me and then I'll just sue them. I don't care. I've already spent$25 ,000 on legal fees. Sounds great. Like I'm like a guy that will, if I feel like I've been wronged, I will spend, it sounds stupid and I don't mean it to sound arrogant, but like I will spend$100 ,000 to remedy a$5 ,000 issue if I think I've been extremely wronged just to prove a point to people. It's rare that I have to do it.

1:10:54Graham Stephan:But isn't your peace of mind and just going about your day worth more than like the - This is his peace of mind. Yeah, this is, yeah. But I'm just saying, but like you're fortunate enough to have like so many great things going on where it's like, hey, if it's a little inconvenience today, it's like not the end of the world and life goes on and sure they might have gotten one up on you. But like in the big picture, you know, I would agree if I got a ticket in some city in California and I was doing this, but I have to deal with this community and these people every day. So like I don't want to set a precedent by being the guy that just bowed down to them and paid the fine because what are they what are they going to do if something else small happens?

1:11:34Like if I mistakenly chirped the wheels, taking a corner out of here, are they going to find me$50 ,000? Uh, because I skidded a little bit turning, like, I think it sets a dangerous precedent by succumbing to them. And I also think they genuinely, there's malice and they genuinely have it out for me. So it'd be different if the situation was different. If I, if I genuinely, if I crashed into a building and they wanted to find me and I had to pay for the damage, that's fine. But no, no harm was caused to any people, any property. It was cleaned up. Nobody came out here during the six hour period.

1:12:05We've done stunts like this in my unit, outside of the unit Frankie has filmed before. No verbal anything. So like we've already set a precedent that we do stuff like this. Also, I think to defend the people that may have access to less resources, because I'm kind of thinking I'm a member of an HOA where I live in Vegas. And let's just say the HOA started being really aggressive with fees or doing some things that I kind of disagree with. Maybe I didn't necessarily have the resources to fight it, but someone else in the community did. I feel like, okay, wow, like now I feel a little bit more protected or insulated from some sort of like governor around me trying to like exercise control or like, you know, I would say too much power.

1:12:45Agreed. Yeah. So maybe we'll help other people within the community and maybe some people are advocating for us to win this because it means they'll be better protected in the future. For sure. Would it ever get to a point where you'd have to move? I'm listing this unit up for sale anyway like I don't I don't want to be I don't want to be part of a community where I feel unwelcome there's plenty of good people in here but like there's also a lot of back talk that happens like I don't I think by and large we do very good for the community like it's kind of what we do is counter to what a lot of people in there do now a lot of people do share the garages they're kind but like not everybody we share them we let people sit in the cars um we let people use this unit for various events we've even let the HOA use this for a Christmas party like two years ago.

1:13:25Like I didn't charge them anything. Like that's just what we do. And a lot of these people are condescending to people that are less fortunate. And they talk about those people behind their backs and they refer to them as, uh, it's just, it's, it's toxic. And, and I don't want to be part of a culture like that. I think as I'm building this in Florida, like my message is like unity, be open, like people can do what they want with their cars and their units. But like, at the end of the day, they should be willing to share, be open, be kind to people. And so I'm hoping that that's a fresh start, but I can very much see me pulling away from this community.

1:13:58At what point do you think your detachment from money started? Because it seems like you don't make a lot of decisions based solely off of like ROI. Like you were saying, you'd spend$100 ,000 in order to fight a$5 ,000 thing just based off of principle. Was it a financial thing? Was it a mentality thing? There's multiple layers to that. I would say like, I always flew regular class up until like 2020. And I'm just like, why, what benefit does it give me sitting in the big seats? And then now I'll, now I'll kind of, it's probably two to one ratio, first class to regular class. And that's more relative to income.

1:14:35Like that, that's not going to hurt me going to spending this money on, I think about it and I'm like, God, this lawyer is kind of, he's kind of charged me like 25 grand up to this point, just to file a legal complaint feels expensive. So I am, I am scrutinizing that. And there is a point where if I'm 300 grand into this, I'm like, yeah, I kind of messed up. I shouldn't have done this. I don't think it's going to get there at all. I think we've done most of the work up front, but, but like, there is a very different mindset that I have than I did five years ago where, where I'm like, I have 20, a list of 20 things to do on my house right now.

1:15:03Um, we've been in it for five years and I realized there's a lot of maintenance that I need to do. I've kind of shuttered. And back in the day, it'd be a couple of things at a time. And I'd get three quotes for everything. I'd be bargaining. And I'm just going to like, I'm just going to one guy that I've used in the past. I'm not even really scrutinizing the guy. and I'm just at the point where I'm like, this guy's not making as much money as I am. He wants $3 ,000 to epoxy the foundation of my house. I'm not going to nickel and dime him for another$500. I just don't care. I'll just give him the$3 ,000.

1:15:30It'll make him a better person. It'll give him more income. I'm not really scrutinizing a lot of things. There is some stuff I scrutinize where I'm very close and I know shipping carriers. I have an abundance of shipping carriers that we have accessible to us. I know what it costs me to ship a car to California if someone comes in at $4 ,000, I'm going to be like, that's too expensive. Like I can use 10 other carriers and, and get this for two grand. But the mindset has definitely changed over the last five years on, I just don't care as much. I do care. I just don't care as much. Was it an intentional thing or was it more of a subconscious change that kind of just gradually started changing and then you observed it later?

1:16:06And, and like I said, was it like a number thing or how did you know you were there? I don't know. I think it was, I think it was gradual, but I remember my wife, we were at a restaurant she's like she's tipping like i always tip 20 and i'm like that's i still think that that's a that's slightly above it i don't think everyone tips 20 but that's probably in in the realm of the average it's toward the high end of average so it's still i would say average is probably 15 to 18 okay got it so so yeah so exactly it's on the high end of of the average right and then there's 25 30 and then she's writing like 40 tips and i'm like kirline like it feels like but then i'm like well this this server is probably making 20 to 30 an hour all in if they're lucky and they're really doing the majority of the work, like we should be compensating these people better.

1:16:49So, so like that was kind of one of the triggers that changed the mindset. And so now the tip is 50 to a hundred percent, no matter where I go, unless the service, if the lowest I'll leave is 20 and the service has to be atrocious for me to leave 20. Uh, but everywhere else it's, it's 50 % that I go. And if it's, if it's like a cheap place, like a waffle house, I always leave them a hundred bucks. So if it's a$50 check, I love waffle house. I love the people there are just a different breed of people. And I love, like, I'm like a blue collar person type of guy. I will, I'd rather hang out with a bunch of blue collar folk than, than white collar folk all day long.

1:17:22Um, I don't know why I just feel like they're far more relatable to me. And so if my check's 50 bucks at Waffle, I'll still getting a hundred bucks, no matter what. And so that it's just, there's just been little things that I've made realizations along the way that it's, it's my way of kind of giving back the best that I can.

1:17:39Graham Stephan:What's been your biggest financial mistake that most people don't know about? I invested in an Arby's. And I'm like, why the fudge did I invest in an Arby's? I don't even really care for Arby's. Like, who says I want to go to Arby's tonight? Nobody. Nobody says they want to go to Arby's. Of all of the fast food restaurants. Yes. Like Arby's? Why Arby's? They had those good, like, it was like a pulled beef something or other, like a barbecue. When's the last time you ate it? I know. It's been over 10 years. He's like 1990. I don't mind Arby's, but like, I need to make sure that I'm not necessarily passionate, but that like, I really like what it is that, that I'm doing.

1:18:18And I had two partners that basically had this deal all lined up and they just needed like a financial arm. They were going to operate and run it. And I'm like, cool. Like they pitched the world to me and they're like, you just gotta. And so the problem with that is that it's like a 12 year lease that I signed up for and the Arby's failed very quickly. Uh, and they, it failed after like one year. So I'm still paying$11 ,000 a month for that lease for the next like seven years. Are you serious? Can you sublease it? I did. I did sublease it. Now I was paying that forever and I finally found a sublease about six months ago, but there's no even, and that's the other thing.

1:18:51Graham Stephan:But you're basically the guarantor of that lease. So if they leave now, you're responsible again for the payments. Yeah, exactly. Until they find someone else. Unless I want to sue the sub because they're, they're also tied to me, but like, I almost don't have the heart. I don't need like, it's crazy. to say this but like i hate my landlords because of that like i i asked them for a buyout i'm like let me give you two hundred thousand dollars it's almost two years of lease and they they realize that i'm such a cash cow and that i can afford and ride this out for 10 years that there's like there's nothing they refuse to offer a bio which is just such so crappy of people to do that in my opinion i don't even think i could sue these guys that are leasing for me now if they decided to i I hope they're not watching because I'm creating a bad foundation here.

1:19:36But like, I just don't think I don't think I could be like, I'm going to go after you because there's a good chance I have more than them. And it just doesn't seem fair to do that. I think I would just suck it back up. I don't think so because like just because you have more than them, they still probably have more than a lot of other people. Yeah. And so like as long as you're past kind of that critical mass, like a lot of people will use their money to like exercise their power. Yeah. Like in good ways and bad ways. Sure. And so it's a decision for you, you know, use it to exercise good or. Yeah.

1:20:08I don't know. It's tough. It's tough with that. But that was probably it because think about that over the long term, right? $10 ,000 a month times at the time, 10 more years of payment sets and they escalate rent escalations too. So I'm, I'm a million dollars plus in the whole. What about the other people who did the Arby's with you? Are they shipping in? Bankruptcy? Nothing. No, not at all. How's your relationship with them? I don't hate them. Like I don't, I don't like them. I don't really talk to them unless I need tax info from four years ago that, uh, might've gotten misplaced or something, but like, I wish them the best.

1:20:38I would never open a business with them again. Um, but like, and that's another example. Like I could, I could sue them and go after them, but like, I know that they have significantly less than I do. So like what, what, even though they were the driving force behind doing it, like what good it's not going to, this 10 grand sounds like a lot of money, but at the end of the day, it's not impacting me that bad. So I'll just ride it out and I'll make their lives easier, even though they brought me into this mess.

1:21:05Graham Stephan:See, my mindset has always been because I've gone into business with people and lost. And as much as I would want to blame like, oh, it's because of them and they did this. And at the end of the day, like I was also the one who like decided to like, I made the decision to do that. And that's on me. And I can't, you know, even though I think they might be more responsible. I was the one. The buck stops with me at the end of the day. and like I just gotta live with that. Yeah, and I'll still be accountable. Like I could have said no. I could have said no and part of it might have been me being a yes man and that's why I got stuck in this mess.

1:21:38Like would the Arby's have changed my life at the time? Absolutely not. It just felt like another leg to stand on when in fact it was a broken leg. It wasn't a good leg. But I'm with you. Like I have accountability towards it as well and that's probably driving some of the reason why I'm just footing it and dealing with it.

1:21:55Graham Stephan:Why did the Arby's fail? Because it's Arby's. did you not think this in the beginning it's like yo it's an arby's i didn't know what did you have anyone you you talk to no they just said dude this is arby's we're talking about i know i know i know i should have did you like arby's like i like their roast beef sandwiches just their plain beef and their curly fries are delicious but like it's number like 57 on the list of fast food that i'm gonna go to so when's the last time you had arby's five years ago I never even I never even went to my Arby's after it opened you never went to it not after it opened I went to the they were like doing their grand opening but like after that I'd never visited it would you go to another Arby's or is it forever ruined if I was super hungry and there was like no exit for the next 10 miles and this exit only had an Arby's and like a Subway and a Chipotle because I hate Chipotle and Subway if it was like those three then I'd go to Arby's why do you hate Chipotle and Subway they're disgusting Subway's disgusting like it smells I can't stand it I love Subway.

1:22:55I get sick every time I go to Chipotle and it just... You get E. coli when you go to Chipotle? What's that? E. coli? I don't know. I hope not. I just feel like... Oh, that's the new thing. Oh, lettuce and other stuff. The E. coli thing, yeah. Yes. I love Taco Bell, which makes no sense because Chipotle is better. I actually think in terms of flavor, Taco Bell is much better than Chipotle and Subway. I think people go to Subway because they think it's healthy and people go to Chipotle because it is healthy. Yeah, that's fair. And Taco Bell will clean you out. Yeah. So that's also how it flushes the system.

1:23:23Yes. It's like a cleanse. It is good. So what does your portfolio look like today? You'd be surprised. It's largely stock in my company and cars. I'm an idiot where I bought depreciating assets. I still have quite a bit of property that I own. I probably have, I mean, I sold at one point I had like, I don't know, 75 doors, but now I think I own eight properties. And so there's still, I don't know,$40 million worth of property that I have. I have mortgages on some of that, but I do have a lot of equity. I have my cars. I have significant value in my business. And then I have very limited amounts in stocks and probably a million dollars in stocks and the kids stuff.

1:24:07Why'd you sell your real estate? like de-stressing. Part of that was the Arby's closed. I sold seven Pet Supplies Plus stores that I had. I sold a lot of my properties. I look back and I don't know how I managed all of that stuff. Like mentally, I just don't want that much stress. We've created enough value in the wheel businesses where I don't need all of those other legs to stand on. Even if crap hits the fans now and everything went away, like I have enough to live comfortably on for the rest of my life. So I'm like, why am I still filling my life with all of these stressors when And I'm okay now.

1:24:39So I just sold it. Did you end up making money in real estate when all of a sudden happened? Oh, yeah. I made money on like, I've been really good with real estate. Like the opposite of cars where I break even on cars. I've done very well with real estate. What made you do so well in real estate? Just timing. Like I don't, I would do most of my purchases around a big market correction. So I did a lot of purchases from like 09 to 12 where I'm buying$135 ,000 houses that I later sold for like 350. there are old dingy apartments in nice areas so i essentially would wait till someone moved out i'd make the unit real nice and then rent it for significantly higher and apartment apartment buildings get their valuation out of the percent of income that you make like sure some people might be like okay that apartment building is million dollars that doesn't make sense it's too high but like really it's just most people look for a six to eight percent cap rate and if i can create significant more rent income then it just increases the value of the building even if the building is in the same shape that it was theoretically, right?

1:25:36So I would go, I had a team of actually three carpenters on staff that we would go in and fix up properties full time. Because again, I had a bunch of properties at the time. And then I would sell the buildings for like 2x of what I paid. And I would only put 10%. If you could go back in time, do you think it would have been wiser to just focus all of your efforts on the wheel business? No, because that didn't take away. And that stuff didn't really take away from it. My business gets all of my attention first and then everything else is secondary. So I will, I will work to the bone on the primary business and then I will fill in the gaps of time with the other stuff.

1:26:10Graham Stephan:You don't think that you could deliver higher returns though, using that extra time to think of more ideas at the wheel business. We have such a big and great and competent team. I mean, a lot of guys are five to 10 to 12. Like we have 500 people. I have a full C-suite. I have, I'm one of five owners. Like we have a lot of really brilliant, great minds at our organization. so like i can i can brainstorm and come up with ideas and we have a fabulous team that can execute them and i'm not like putting myself on the same plane at all as elon because he is he is a brilliant guy but like that's that's kind of his his method right like he he comes up with the idea he he is intimately involved with the team in the early stages and from what everything everything i've read and i've heard then then he empowers the team to go and do it like he's the idea guy he'll be boots on the ground and in the trenches when he needs to be but then he trusts his team to go and develop and create wacky new crazy ideas that change society i'm again i'm not comparing myself to that but like in a small basically the same a micro yeah i'm basically in a small micro way where i'm one trillionth of his net worth um that would only put me in a dollar so maybe not but uh in my my own micro way i try to like emulate that like i i help be one of the idea guys we have a lot of really phenomenal ideas rolling out um on our websites we just did a new IX revamped that I think is brilliant.

1:27:25And my team took a lot of my advice and direction on a lot of the projects and they executed it very, very nicely.

1:27:31Graham Stephan:How is your business doing now with tariffs? Hey, by the way, really quick, if you want extra content just like this, as well as early access and a bonus post show posted every single week, feel free to join as a channel member to get immediate access to all of that, as well as early access to everything else that we post, along with priority responses to all of your comments. So if that sounds cool, feel free to join. Would love to have you on board. Thanks so much. We'll get back to the podcast now. How is your business doing now with tariffs? There's so many headwinds in the automotive business.

1:28:02We grew 35 % to 50 % for almost 20 straight years. There was a COVID correction when stimulus money ran out and just a lot where we shrunk. It's crazy to go from 35 % to 50%. Actually, in 20%, I think we grew 70%. uh and then to to go from that and then you have 2022 where you're down like four percent i'm like it's so weird it was usually you think it'd be like okay you only get 20 or 15 but you go down after that just very strange correction period so that happened for a couple years and then the last few years we've been up like mid single digits which also is kind of hard to to deal with and i think that that's kind of like i think that's been very large industry-wide i think there are slightly less enthusiast than there were.

1:28:46So you got to fight harder to get some of that market share. I think there's less disposable income. I think Walmart just reported their, they were still up 2%, but they just reported their worst quarter in quite some time. That just came out a few days ago, I think. It seems like there's something like that that comes up every six months where we're like, cool, we're in the green, we're in the clear, we can expect some growth. Oh, great. Tariffs just hit that just raised prices 10 to 20 to 50%. Now we got to deal with that oh great we just bombed iran oil prices are high what is the first demographic that stops buying when oil prices hit truck owners what is our biggest source of revenue truck owners so it's like it's like you keep getting like hit i'm thankful that we're growing given market constraints and conditions and wheel and tires are like ants largely wheels are like ancillary spends they're they're luxury spends and so in i don't think we have a down economy by by any means but it doesn't feel like it doesn't feel the same that it did back in the day like people i don't i don't feel like people are as prone to customize their vehicles yeah manufacturers are delivering much nicer wheels with vehicles like my escalade v had 22 inch black chrome wheels on it i'm like i don't even want to change these these look nice and there's a lot of cars that look like that so there's just constant headwinds and as a business owner you have to learn how to adapt to that attack different market segments.

1:30:06And I think we've done a lot of that focus in the last year, and that's going to start paying its dividends in the coming year.

1:30:12Graham Stephan:Do you ever get knockoffs coming from China where they basically just see your design and just say, oh, we could do the same thing, and then they offer it like half the price? That's like the wheel industry in a nutshell. It's of our own proprietary brands. We have three Anthem, Arcan, and Novia. Not really. There's not really people just copy-pasting them, but it's so hard to differentiate a wheel when there are a million plus different SKUs, but there are plenty of brands that are what they call rep brands where they launch a whole new line of five wheels and they're basically just replicas of other wheels from other manufacturers and they just sell them a lot cheaper and they do really well.

1:30:46And so has your revenue basically probably stayed around the same since the last time we spoke? I think you said it was at 350. We've acquired companies, so I think we're going to be north of 400 this year. And the crazy thing is, you know about multiple arbitrage where you buy companies and the more companies you buy, if you can integrate them well, you get a bigger multiplier, right? A multiplier in a hundred million dollar company at 8 % profit is lower than a multiplier at a$500 million company at 8 % profit because people are attracted to bigger companies that are profitable. So we've done some of that with a few of the acquisitions and that's helped us get north of, I don't count when I say single mid single digit growth, I don't count that free bolt on growth.

1:31:23If you count the free bolt on growth, it's double digit. But to me, that feels like cheating when you're like, well, we grew 10%, but we bought some of that last year. That feels like cheating. But honestly, in the PE world, they value that. From all the conversations I've had, it's valued about 80 % as strongly as organic natural growth. They actually see a lot of value in you acquiring and bolting it because that's what PE firms do. They try to buy a plethora of companies, combine them in some cases, or encourage companies that they buy to buy other companies to create value. So it's definitely a strategy of ours to keep doing that.

1:31:58What does your day-to-day look like? How much are you working and what are you working on? I put about 10 to 15 hours a week into my YouTube channel. And a lot of that's travel and other stuff. My day is very much spent meeting with people. I do get in the trenches on supply chain. I enjoy talking to a lot of our suppliers, especially our big ones, and negotiating with them and making sure that we have COGS reduction, but also grow them as a result, where it's a good symbiotic relationship um i mean i kind of manage those projects throughout the day where i check in on stuff um but it's it's a lot of like email project management like my my email inbox is is my day-to-day and the great thing about that is i can be flexible and kind of cut it up throughout the day to get it done but it's it's really like just getting tasks tasks done on email meeting with people in person and video meetings so you work a lot yeah i probably still put 55 hours in a week, which it is not for me.

1:32:54That's not a lot, but that for the average person, I think that's a lot, but for me that it feels balanced because I can integrate a lot of family time into that and time with my wife. Do you think that you need to be putting in 55 plus hours and, and go through very aggressive work phases where you're putting in like, you know, 70, 80 hours a week in order to be this successful? Absolutely. Yeah. And I, and I actually do like, I say that, but actually right now I'm probably in that 70 hour phase because I'm meeting with a lot of new suppliers and that's a lot of work to meet with them, to follow up with them, to make sure we're doing the tactics that we said would grow them, to implement price changes.

1:33:31Like my team does in the background, but I'm like quarterbacking a lot of this. They like, it really helps when the owner of a 500 person company is on the phone with these suppliers. Like it carries a lot of weight in their perception and what can get done to grow them. So when I do that, those are the 70 plus hour weeks, but they, they grow sales and they significantly reduce our cost of goods sold. So like, absolutely. But there are other times where, um, you're solving like production problems or other issues. Like our warehouse almost fell apart in 2020. I think I was the only one that could rescue it.

1:34:03I hate to say it, but I had to go out there. I was working a hundred hour weeks. I worked mother's day, uh, all mother's day. I'm like, I'm sorry, Carol. And she understood it because she's the greatest human alive, but I had to work that entire day. And like, if I hadn't done that, I don't think we exist right now. So there are times where you have to do it just because you're at a critical crossroads, make or break. And then there are times where you see opportunity and you can sit back and kind of not work that much and not utilize all the opportunity. Or you can be like, if I work 80 hours, I'm going to get significant growth out of this.

1:34:33And anytime there's that opportunity, I will take it. How much have you explored selling the company recently? I would say like we we know what value we want and we don't think we're there but we think we're close and I feel like I legit have been saying that for two years because we we're still getting that single digit growth all I need to do like we have a great foundation all I need to do is I think that once we implement some of these huge projects that we've worked we have a team of 30 different web developers AI people like we're unlike I think most wheel companies like most wheel guys don't have 40 team 40 people in market like we are for all intents and purposes a tech company and a marketing company that happen to sell automotive parts.

1:35:08And these guys have been hard at work on a lot of these big projects. And I think as these launch, we're going to get really close in the next one to two years. So, but you can't say what these, what these projects are. I really can't, but the UIX is, was a huge, we hadn't updated our UIX in like eight years, which is insane. And it's just such a cleaner flow that like offers guaranteed fitment. It just, it's really a seamless flow to put, for you to put wheels and tires on your vehicle. You feel very confident about what you bought. You get a huge, easy to read assortment. we have AI filtering, which is really neat.

1:35:39I got inspired by cars.com where you can just type in 2005 Hummer H2, less than 30 ,000 miles black. Just type all that in free form. And then it just filters you right to that. And I'm like, this is, I love that. This is crazy. It's so much for otherwise you do dropdowns. You'd have to do filtering beyond it. Like it'd be, it'd be two minutes to get to those results before. And now it's instant. So we implemented a lot of that, that filtering and that tactics in our wheel store. And it's just some great tools like that, that increase usability. and some of the stuff we have are going to vastly, one of the things I have, I think is, could be the next billion dollar idea.

1:36:09And I can't talk about it now, but we're just, I'm really excited because during those shrinking years, it was about stability, fixing the foundation, turn off all growth projects. The two years after that, call it 24, 25. It was more like implement some growth projects, but nothing too crazy. Late 25, 26 has been about, okay, cool. 80 % growth, 20 % stability. Like we're stable. We're good. so this is the exciting time when everybody is working on growth projects and we've only that's 12 to 18 months of that where prior to that it was all stability and conservatism just to make sure that we were going to be good so this is this is the exciting time when we know that the fruits of our labor will will be utilized soon and what would you do after you sell it i think that i'll be locked up in an employment agreement like i'll always i'll always meet up with investment makers and they've i get invited to conventions all the time and i'll go to some of them.

1:36:56And I feel like the, the PE guys that talk to me make it very clear. I'll need to stick around with the organization for two to four years. And I'm fine with that. Like I love doing what I'm doing. There's, there's genuinely not a day that I wake up where I dread it. Cause like, I think what we do is so fun. Um, it's, it's enthusiast automotive parts. Like it's wheels. People love wheels, exhaust systems. Like it's not, I'm not selling like screws, um, or like gaskets. Like it's fun stuff. I think no matter what, I'm still with the company, call it four to six years. totally fine with that but I think I go get a beach house in Florida I think I permanently move to Florida and just do more things that I'm excited about like the last time I stepped away from the company a little bit I got my pilot's license I started my YouTube channel maybe it's focusing more on the YouTube channel like I know that there's a one-to-one correlation with YouTube sub growth and consistent videos like maybe it's doing that it's probably is doing that focusing more on YouTube, which sounds crazy because that's not going to drive much revenue, but yeah, just living life easier.

1:37:58How much do you think your YouTube channel has affected your tire business? I think it's been a really positive thing. Like there's always risk where people see you're exposed, like your wealth is exposed and you might get an adverse reaction. But I think people see the mission of the channel. They know that like, I'm a good guy. I'm, And I genuinely like, I don't want to like toot my own horn, but like, I think I present as a humble guy and I really try to be nice and kind to everybody. And I think people see like what you see on YouTube is who I am. Like I'm a goofy, quirky guy that likes to fart.

1:38:28And I just like to communicate and level with people and share my stuff. Like that's just the way that I am. And I think people see the true me and that helps. It's also connected us with a bunch of influencers that we advertise on that we didn't, we could not even touch before the Whistlin' Diesels of the world, the Cletus McFarlans. We already had a relationship with the Seaboys, but it strengthens that. Like there's a lot of the Amelia Hartford, like there's a lot of people that are willing to work with us because of, of this connection. And it's opened up a lot of doors for us. And then I can advertise whenever we don't have an ad partner on a video.

1:38:57Like I'm going to, I try to integrate, Hey guys, buy from fitmentindustries.com. If you need some wheels and tires, that's where I got my wheels. I'll try to plug that whenever I can. What are you still frugal about? Like I'm an experienced guy. So if it's, this is, it's kind of anything that's not travel experience or car. like I'm wearing your pants I showed up here in shorts and it was crotch shot crotch shot city so like my shoes are just regular Nikes my shirt is an Abercrombie shirt that was$40 like my watch is a$60 watch like really it's it's my clothing and the way that I present myself I'm very frugal about like I don't I don't need to look like I hate people that just flex the way that they look, even though I'm driving in cars, it feels like contradictory, but I just want to walk around and look like I'm a normal guy, but also go enjoy time in hypercars.

1:39:48So it's probably my clothing and how I present myself. At what point do you think you felt financially secure? I mean, when you grow up with nothing, like my first month of doing this, I made, I think$6 ,000 my first month. And that's what I'd made the, probably the prior year. Uh, so like it just felt I felt really good about what even though there were many points along the way where it's like if I took this one path we cease to exist and I and I always took the right path but like I felt really good right away however when we started getting business valuations during the COVID time frame when all everyone was 20x and one of the companies valued us at a billion dollars at that time I feel pretty financially secure right now when they're throwing out billion and one of them even offered us like a 20 % stake.

1:40:36So they offered us a$200 million. They get a 20 % stake. However, the clawback, like they expected 35 to 50 % growth. And we're like, in our minds, we're like, well, we're going to do that. Like we can do that. But they would have owned a hundred percent of my company at that$200 million because they would have clawed back every bit of it. We wouldn't have hit their growth targets over the next five years. So I'm glad we didn't do it because we would have short sold ourselves.

1:40:57Graham Stephan:What car YouTuber is the worst with money? Steve Hamilton honestly you can't name yourself but it really is me why would you say you're bad with money I think you have a great collection that's gone up in value quite a bit I would say you're actually pretty smart I'm modifying these we're putting way too many miles on them we're doing stupid stuff the channel hurts the values of the cars if it's a Steve Hamilton car that inherently drops at 5 % but I think you're good with money I think of all the car YouTubers who am I not necessarily who will have the most because obviously you will have the most because of your business and all that but like who's gonna have a higher growth rate I think you're gonna probably have the highest like net worth growth rate maybe I think that they're all they all have to be most of them this is their primary business right like the mad armstrongs of the world Houston does have a like this his channel is very secondary to what he does but I think he's really good about his cars he buys them cheap he tries to buy stuff off I'm like no bro I'm not gonna I'm not gonna buy that car from you for that much money that's insane i'm not going to sell this car to you for that little money but he like finds the deals like stradman does his best i don't know that anyone's bad i'm trying to think like shmi is really focused on his stuff i mean stradman always talks about the agira his koinigsegg that was on the podcast that we did with him that was one of it so i love james and stradman but i know he's made some bad financial investments much like we have and so he's the one that comes to mind because most recently he's the one that that stuck out the most in that Aguirre example.

1:42:25He couldn't sell it. He lost a lot of money. He thought it would be a good thing for his channel, but he gets as much views out of the Lamborghini. And that put him in a lot of, I think it was a$30 ,000 a month payment on that thing. And so maybe James. Who's the best? I mean, probably Houston Costa. What makes him so good with money? Because he's cheap. We're talking about just on cars, right? Yeah. Yeah. No, no, I don't think we're talking just on cars. I thought we were talking about who is best investing. cars who is who is the most financial literacy in like yeah but they're all to do with cars at the end of the day yeah if we're talking about cars yeah but if we're talking about financial literacy it'd have to be like a if i can't include myself it'd have to be like a supercar ron who's he's got a decent sized channel but he's not as known as stradman like because it'd have to be a business guy first right i know shme does his own thing with real estate but he's very i feel like he's very private about what he does beyond the scenes but i know that his channel like i know what YouTube pays and I know you can't afford his collection value with YouTube revenue alone so like he must be it's really who has the bet like Manny Koshman it's it's it's really who is who is channel is secondary like I literally did a Google search not that I believe this Google search at all and I was like oh how much money do you think custom offsets makes yeah and it was like probably like 15 million dollars and I was like top line uh it just said 15 million oh weird and then I said like what do you think of the chances that this business makes 350 million dollars in revenue it said zero to one percent yeah well custom offsets is is about that's one of the many brands and i think that one drives about 200 million dollars of top line so again all of the channels combined do the north of 400 but custom offices is our biggest driver of traffic but yeah it sounds like even if you had asked 200 million it probably would have told you one to two percent it would have been wrong but i don't know why that like why that shows up so incorrectly well the more i I'm talking about it now.

1:44:18So AI, I bet you if you check, they read everything. They analyze every video. The more input that you give to the AI machine, the better that it does. And they're probably going to scrape this video. And in two months, you'll probably look it up and it'll say. But even so, we spoke about this in the last podcast that we did. Yeah. Well, I mean, we threw around some numbers and stuff. And for me, it was just absurd that it was that incorrect. And then I just did a simple Google search. It's like a 300 ,000 square foot warehouse. I'm like, there's just no way that a business makes like five,$10 million.

1:44:46Yeah. has a 300 ,000 square warehouse. No chance. Yeah, it would be absorbed. All of that would be absorbed in just building costs, right?

1:44:52Graham Stephan:Until just recently, it was pulling from Reddit. ChatGPT actually just stopped doing that, which is crazy. Oh, did they? That was their primary source? They were pulling a lot from Reddit. I read about that. I remember them touting that they're going to be doing that. And even Google, I think, does that as well, especially for reviews and other stuff. Yeah. AI's getting stupid smart, though. Is there anything that you wanted to discuss? I think for YouTube, we're at a crossroads right now like we are i think it's worth talking about like youtube changes every three to three to six months and we have to constantly have come to guide meetings and we do that and we're always able to change the the style of our content if you use a very business mindset you can do really well on youtube there's a lot of people that channel kind of fizzles out and we've always rode those storms and done really well and it feels like we're largely at a crossroads right now where we pivoted, took huge inspiration from Matt Armstrong.

1:45:45He is the greatest storyteller on YouTube, probably the greatest automotive influencer right now. And so we started telling stories on our YouTube videos and it's done really, really well for us. But we feel like we've hit that ceiling of subscriber penetration where we need to either shift the content that we're doing to be more like, how do you, like Matt Armstrong's are a multi-part series. They bring people in. People hit the subscribe button because the journey is unfinished. We are giving people something that took a year to do to build spec visit factory do a car all in one video so we're not really giving them a reason to hit that subscribe button because we're giving them too much why does the subscriber count matter this is just my own my own personal thing is like this is my youtube channel is secondary to me it's it's a hobby but i have to win at it on both facets i have to get good views and i have to have high sub count or i'll stop and i've always said that to them like i will and i'm at a point right now where we we've always turned around views if views get in the in the trenches which they'll do for two months we'll sit down we'll revamp and we always get the we'll have banger videos come out if you want to grow your subscribers the best thing that you have to do is unfortunately like play the game but playing the game is sometimes not very fun at all like that means you have to make youtube shorts that like that like and if you want to do more then you subscribe and like and you have to like so close to two million subscribers The entire purpose of the short is to get subscribers.

1:47:05Like people do that and they can get over a million subscribers from one effective short. But then again, that's just like not very fun. But they've throttled even that. I think that shorts growth was tremendous for two years and we still have high performing shorts. And I don't think that they're the submachine that they used to be. So like that was a pivot a year ago. It's or two years ago. It was OK. YouTube YouTube is really pushing shorts. They're really giving subs from that. So let's put a lot of focus on high quality, consistent that. but I think that they've really de-throttled that and so now it's now I think I know what I need to do but the reason why I'm at a crossroads is and Matt Armstrong stayed with us at Monterey for three days and he is a great inspiration and it's like I need to be I've always been told I need to be consistent but consistency I didn't realize how important it was for sub count I started looking up on AI talking to him it's like the attention span is barely more than a week some people have beat this like the whistling diesels of the world still get five to ten million views a video and sometimes you won't drop one for a for a month right but there's still a significant importance in being consistent weekly the c boys are pinnacle example of it mad armstrong pinnacle example where cletus mcfarland great example where like they have this cult following and it's because they're so consistent and they stay true to their viewers so i have to be more involved in the channel i have to start posting every two we do every three weeks every two weeks and then every week so i'm actually to crossroads where it's am i going to stop my channel are we going to go out I feel like we're kind of at a peak on top.

1:48:29We've done really well over the course of four and a half years to get to 2.2 million subs. I think that's great in the YouTube world, especially in something that's overcrowded with automotive influencers. So we're having a come to God meeting tomorrow. It's how do we get to this increased sub count?

1:48:45Graham Stephan:I'll tell you, sub count does not matter at all. I think you're focused on the wrong metric. It's like all these other things matter and you're focused on the one thing that does not matter. it's not going to move the needle you're putting all your attention on the wrong place I agree, viewership is more important, right? but also, YouTube is now starting to test in certain phones, removing the sub count entirely where you just see the video, a thumbnail, title it doesn't matter how many subs you have they're moving away from that they're really just pushing the best content possible which makes sense, and I think we're delivering much better content so the only way to do it, in my opinion if you want to grow the channel is making broader topics that appeal to more people, doing more shorts and more collaborations.

1:49:30Collabs, I agree with all of that. I think we continue nailing down storytelling. Collabs are huge. We went on Cletus's channel and got 30 ,000 subs over the course of a week. It was insane.

1:49:40Graham Stephan:So I think that also, the one moment that really sticks out to me was you with David Dobrik scraping your car. I mean, that was probably the best thing to happen to the channel. Because I remember everyone was sharing that and talking about it. So unfortunately, the more you like do that, sort of stuff like shocking content but then it's a game of like you just keep spiraling further and further down. And people force it like the more that I shoot though the more that that stuff's going to pop up the more that I'm out creating content the more controversy other stuff like that. I got I got a great this is a banger video for you.

1:50:13Graham Stephan:You put people behind the wheel of these car for the first time but you screen them ahead of time to make sure they're going to have a good reaction some people are just terrible on camera but like imagine you get a 19 year old girl behind this car who's never driven stick before yeah and it's just you get a reaction driving a two million dollar car yeah like stuff like that is so appealing to every because everyone would be curious like what's the reaction putting a grandma like i'm talking she's 80 years old 80 years old in the hennessy yeah it sounds and she sits in there and you turn it on and she her eyes light up this is crazy like that sort of stuff like wholesome stuff that just people would genuinely want to tune in and as a short i could easily get five to ten million views easy oh yeah for sure as sure yeah that's a shorts machine but it's also long form of like we're gonna get a few people in these cars in the middle of like everything else that you're doing well when matt matt had told me like it's less important about like when he stopped focusing on cars that he thought would do good and just started focusing on cars that he wanted to get it made me think like and i don't know this is the right idea but like i'm wondering if we if we go find a family in need or someone that is like stage four cancer and there's always a car that they wanted to have it's a 69 mustang mach one it's something and then we tell the story of us finding the people finding the car uh fixing up whatever needs to be done and then the second portion of the video is us sharing it with them letting them experience that unfortunately that's not going to do well for the algorithm unless that's something that you genuinely just want to do anyway and it's spreading the message but i would not ever look at that as like that's good for the channel yeah i don't people want to see hyper and super what would do better is if you go on facebook marketplace and you say we're gonna find the cheapest car yeah and see what happens yeah like the cheapest s-class mercedes is down the street it's six thousand dollars we have no idea what's what's wrong let's just show up and see and you bring cash and you try to like haggle the deal and then you'd see how far it goes until it breaks like that would do well for you or putting like putting like a horrible engine in a hyper car or like vice versa like getting like the cheapest car like a 1500 car and putting like the craziest and we were gonna work with matt on swapping out the drivetrain on the reguera he was warm to it and uh putting like an ls1 in my koenigsegg which would have made it a very drivable car but i'm like that would probably been really good for him really good for us because he's always said the koenigsegg is the end all be all like he's like i want to get a koinck's ad but you can't find them wrecked for whatever reason you just can't get your so that would have been a good one oh another one these do well is uh let's just say you have a real lamborghini diablo yeah you get a replica and you see just how good of a replica that one is compared to the real thing and you could frame it like these cars have been going up in value too much and now i don't want to put miles so we're going to find a replica version of it and just piece that thing to get people are so fascinated by replicas that i've seen do well as well as like you people call an uber and you pick them up as an actual uber driver in hypercars we we looked at that too yeah it's been overdone though i don't think it i don't know yes yeah every time i see it just did one with the pagani and he did everything has to be extreme now on youtube yeah i think like everybody has done everything to the max to the extreme so it's so hard to do anything at this point i'm just trying to find something that is relatable like the me going and buying a 69 mustang mach one is not relatable to our viewers because they want to see hyper and supercars right and i and i agree with that i'm trying to think like what is a series that i can do weekly where everything we do now is like sub-channel stuff like taking a car delivery is our content's very inconsistent like we're doing drag races and then we're taking car delivery like a lot of people don't find success in being very inconsistent in the type of content they're putting out but we've been lucky to find success yeah but yours is personality based i feel like i watch your channel more so for you than like the car sure so i think you make it focused on you another concept would be putting a really loud exhaust and seeing how long it takes you until you get pulled over and just you have a timer at the bottom it's like all right we're 20 minutes out 22 minutes it took us let's see if we could beat that record people would love that stupid stuff yes like oh and by the way for youtube unfortunately the more mind-numbing it is yep the less people have to think the better it's going to do agreed yeah yeah i agree it's good good advice you guys should drop a comment below if there's any series or recurring thing you guys would love to see on the channel just let me know i'll read i'll read each and every one of these comments it could be specking graham and jack's new rolls royce phantom let's go think of all the views you would get i already did that and we did it on a manserie it did really well actually yeah i saw one video of an old couple recently specking out this rolls royce or it was a bentley or it was something and they got it delivered and it was it was because it was so out of touch though but it got millions of views when the wife's like oh i don't know i kind of like the purple over the blue.

1:55:05Graham Stephan:And we want this headliner. She's talking about the wood inserts on the thing. It sounds like out of touch and unrelatable. Oh, honey, it's only$70 ,000. That's really not that bad. And he's like, no, it's not that bad. Unrelatable and out of touch. Yeah. But it was great. But then they got it delivered and she talks about how much she loves her, like Rolls Royce or something like that. She closed a good story arc. She did. So stuff like that. Yeah. We just feel like we're at a crossroads and so we're going to figure it out. I'm sure that you will. The only thing that I would... say is like i would hesitate to see what someone else is doing and how they're finding success with like a specific thing and like trying to do that because i think that you're also in a very unique position yeah of having access to the capital that you have access to like the collection that you have like i do think it'd be great if you could come up with your own unique thing yeah and i'm like i could go buy a rect bugatti and build it but then yeah then everyone's gonna say you're trying to be mad i'm showing and i'm not gonna i don't have the time to go fix that so like it's it's not as even as genuine like he's good at what he does he's a talented guy he's relatable and so yeah you're right i agree 100 on that it has to be something new just like a business idea like if it is something that someone's doing do it way better and otherwise find something new and unique that will engage viewers so that's that's the decision right there could do something like a like a pimp my ride for like a high schooler or something like that like they bring in their car you know that they're like a car fanatic or like you do it for a subscriber and you like make it a really cool like the pimp my ride concept we would do even the mustang mock idea i gave was for subscriber i just i don't know if if it doesn't test well with your initial viewers then it doesn't it typically won't perform well at all right like your initial viewers are the loyal super hyper car so i'm like pigeonholed in this it needs to be super hyper car related or it won't do well with my first subset of viewers and then youtube is very unlikely to expand it that's not necessarily true you don't think so no the algorithm will test it originally with your viewers but a good video generally will do well.

1:56:52That's fair. So, but yeah, it may just not perform with the type of people

1:56:57Graham Stephan:that you may want it to perform with. Sure. Which I'm okay with. So thank you so much for coming on the podcast and for all the channel members out there, Steve is going to be giving us a full tour of his entire collection here showing you the ins and outs. So for all of the channel members out there, that is now live. It's fun. You know what? In fact, we're going to put a little teaser right here. He's turned more heads than anything else in the collection. there's 10 in the world maybe four of them in the usa we also tune this it pops whenever you shift and go on the second gear it's just pop pop pop and shoots fire i haven't even made my delivery public yet so you guys are actually the first to really see that and so these are the first cars to ever break the 200 mile an hour lap very at nascar one of the neatest cars in the collection the whole top pops up like a jetson spaceship for anyone who's not subscribed to you by the way we'll link to all of your info down below in the description go and so we got to get your subscriber count up it doesn't matter but for everyone watching seriously go and subscribe it's really cool content and you were so generous by the way with us last night with the index link down below in the description but for allowing us to go and like drive these cars and experience it for a lot of these people um they've never driven a car like this even close maybe one Andy has but besides Andy it's such a cool experience and for me too to be able to like even be in a passenger seat or to drive the GT3 RS was insane so I really appreciate that appreciate you guys for coming out thanks again until next time I think GTA is a magical moment for our culture so what's your biggest trade coming up like it's going to do phenomenal I'm not excited about I don't own any right now, but I still think the main trade is on take two.

1:58:45Graham Stephan:What are your thoughts on it? I'd love to see it falling here. I don't know when I'm going to make my big move to heavily lever back into it, but it's probably going to happen at some point in the next few months.

1:59:03Elon Musk, the world's richest person, has also become the world's first trillionaire. The system is rigged.

1:59:09Graham Stephan:At what point, though, does the wealth gap get so big that all of a sudden something has to break? And every civilization that has rose has fallen because of a growing wealth gap. Over 40 % of us are unfamiliar with Roth IRAs, money market accounts, and high yield savings. It is profitable to keep you financially stupid. Most Americans today would rather look rich than be rich. Do you have an investing belief that people would disagree with? Yeah, I have. Warren Buffett would hate that. So what do you think is the biggest risk for the economy that no one is going to see coming? Right now, we have about$40 trillion of national debt.

1:59:46Graham Stephan:We are spending about$2 trillion a year that we don't have right now. Some people say that AI is going to boost productivity to the point where all of a sudden, the national debt is not going to matter as much as it does today. I can't predict the future. All I can do is look at history. And while history doesn't exactly repeat itself, it does rhyme.

2:00:08Thank you.