How being a Maverick Can Change Your Life #18

We are joined this week by legendary investor, author, and world record holder Jim Rogers.  Not only does Jim have one of the best investment track records in history, he also has one of the most diverse.  He found success early as an institutional hedge fund manager in tough years of the 1970’s, made bold moves in commodities markets, and was one of the first to recognize and capitalize on the tremendous opportunities of rising Asia.  He’s famous also as an adventurer and his trips around the world—one by motorcycle and one by car—are now the stuff of Wall Street lore. 

I wanted to have Jim on the show because he always has such an interesting perspective.  He’s an investor who’s seen a lot, both across time and across the world, and has demonstrated a willingness to think differently.  Jim is not so much a contrarian as he is a fiercely independent maverick.  In my view, what’s made him such an interesting and successful person is his determination to couple his passion and curiosity with his adventurous and independent spirit and live life on his own terms.

In this episode, Jim shares

  • Thoughts on what’s happening in the global financial system

  • Some very interesting unexpected / non-consensus views about where future opportunities may be (e.g. agriculture)

  • Some great life advice around honoring your passions and finding the courage to be independent

    &

  • Much, much more

 As always, thanks for tuning in and hope you enjoy this fascinating conversation.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music and Youtube or on your favorite podcast platform.

Nick Halaris

I’ve been fascinated by investing for as long as I can remember. As a kid, I would read the Wall Street Journal, the Economist and Barron’s, pouring over the data tables, stories and interviews with a passion and an insatiable kind of curiosity. As I grew into adulthood, I struggled to find the right outlet and channel for this passion and spent much of my twenties wandering and trying out different things. I had a very brief career as an attorney, spent some time as a strategy and leadership consultant for big multinational companies, failed in an attempt to start a hedge fund, and even ended up helping run a scrap metal recycling operation for a while.

At the age of 30 though, I took my stand. I made up my mind that no matter what I was going to be an entrepreneurial investor. As crazy as it sounds, I owe everything in my life to this one foundational decision—even my amazing wife and my beautiful kids. I don’t think I would ever have met Alicia had I not made this one choice. At that moment in time, the financial world had just been devastated by the crash in the housing market and the near systemic failure of the global banking system that followed. I’ve always had a contrarian bent to my investment thinking; so, to me the carnage in real estate looked like an opportunity.

It all started with one house in Compton California. The business plan was simple: buy a distressed foreclosed home from a bank, bring it back to life with a big renovation and sell it to a first-time homebuyer. Things progressed slowly as they tend to do with real estate. In the first years of this, I think I did 6-7 homes. But then after plugging away day-by-day, suddenly it seemed, things just came together. I found the right investors and the right loans and the right deals and in just a few short years I ended up investing in over 100 such transactions, building a portfolio of almost 2,500 multifamily units and creating a fully vertically integrated real estate company with almost 100 employees.

Fast forward to today and I’m running the second evolution of my entrepreneurial investing career and having so much fun that I have to stop and remind myself that this is all real.

http://www.nickhalaris.com
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Darius Dale - Founder and CEO of 42 Macro #19

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Mike Green-Chief Strategist of Simplify Asset Management #17