From Survival Mode to Multiple Businesses in 3 Years

What happens when you leave everything behind, move to a new country with almost nothing, and bet on yourself anyway?

In this episode, Fede and Caro share their raw journey from Argentina to America — from making $3.50 an hour and cleaning apartments for cash, to building multiple businesses in just a few years. They open up about entrepreneurship, ADHD, AI, creativity, risk-taking, scarcity mindset, and why they still believe the American Dream is alive.

This conversation dives deep into:

•  Building businesses from the ground up 
•  The reality behind hustle culture 
•  Neurodivergence as a superpower 
•  Why creativity may survive AI 
•  The mindset shift that changed everything 
•  Immigrant perspective on opportunity in America 
•  Mental health, fear, ambition & resilience 

A real, honest conversation about what it actually takes to create a life you once only imagined. 

Hosted by Ethan Glidewell & Sarah Glidewell 

You can view the video & audio version on our Youtube Channel 

Thanks for listening!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

You know, 'cause like you had mentioned, what's wrong with me? Why can't I do what everybody else is doing? And now it's like, no, that's actually your superpower. Everybody it's gonna flip completely upside down, or the people that could do all that can't think outside of the box.

SPEAKER_00 0:12

I feel like people thought arts would be the first to go, and I think it's gonna be the last.

SPEAKER_01 0:30

All right, well, welcome back everyone to another episode of Design to Glide Well. This is another episode where we're bringing on another couple who's been in the entrepreneurial space running alongside us for several years now. Really since the beginning.

SPEAKER_05 0:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

Um, and so I'm super excited to open up this conversation. My hopes is in this conversation, it gives you guys a little bit of a more real perspective on what it looks like to build from the ground up. The guests that we have today are two of my favorite humans that we've gotten to connect with on this journey, Fede and Caro. Welcome you guys.

SPEAKER_04 1:04

Hey.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

Um, disclaimer, Caro absolutely hates being on camera in general, so we feel super lucky that she's here.

SPEAKER_02 1:10

We're just calling her on the beginning. No, no, no, no. We're gonna cut the ice in the beginning. Now we're done. Let's be quiet.

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Um, but honestly, she's like the world's best hidden gem uh when it comes to our group of people that we have developed in the entrepreneurial space. So you guys get to take a little peek at why we love her so much today. Um but to kick us off, I just want you guys to kind of tell our listeners who you are, where you came from, and a little bit about your story to give them a backdrop of your journey so far.

SPEAKER_06 1:43

Gotta start. Okay, I'm Fede. Um from Argentina. Came to America around three years ago. I do it over three years ago. And hustling since we got here. Um this time I built multiple businesses. I went from describing myself as a host uh to an entrepreneur running multiple businesses.

SPEAKER_01 2:12

Yeah, you guys have you have built a lot since you've been here. I'm gonna go off script a little bit here, but I think one thing that is unique about your dynamic in particular is a lot of the people that we're surrounded by, even Cassidy and Aaron, who we just interviewed, Maddie and Skylar, Zoe and Reed, it's like you've got two very entrepreneurial people running alongside each other, and that works in certain aspects, but with you guys in particular, you are like a gazillion miles an hour the entire time, 100% of the time, and you've got your perfect match on someone who grounds you. Like I cannot imagine you being with someone who is as hustle culture as you are. So talk to me about that dynamic and why you think it works for you guys.

SPEAKER_06 2:58

Yeah, it's uh it's the yin and yang, you know, it's you you need that balance, and I think that we both support each other and put each other in you know, get getting each other out of the comfort zone. And uh I can be extremely impulsive, and Carol will tell along multiple times, but sometimes she will be my voice of reason, even if I don't follow her. Uh advice sometimes, uh I definitely I I it's so important to have that balance, yeah. Uh and that voice that tells you, hey, you know, slow down, you know, breathe, relax, enjoy what you've been doing and building, and it's extremely important.

SPEAKER_01 3:46

Yeah. Yeah, I think a common dynamic with people is one is all gas and one is brakes. Yeah. And like from your perspective, do you feel like there's value in the brakes? Like, do you feel like, oh my god, what would FedE be like without me kind of pulling him back sometimes?

SPEAKER_00 4:02

Yes. But I don't think he listened. Ask me if I wanted a bookstore. No. That do we own a bookstore? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 4:15

Yeah, that's so fair.

SPEAKER_02 4:17

I I also don't like to look at it as a gas and break. Um, I'm gonna go one more, and our friends in Argentina know what I'm talking about, but I like to look at it as a gas and a clutch. Yeah, right? Like a clutch doesn't stop you, right? But it certainly doesn't allow you to go forward when it's engaged. So I like to look at it as a gas and a clutch.

SPEAKER_05 4:34

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 4:35

I think that the the difference is that I I'm passionate about businesses, and I I I think I bring the full picture on the reason why I'm doing certain things or opportunities that we present with that will allow us later on to be in a good place. I I think one of my skills or powers is to really look forward and anticipate certain changes. So with the bookshop and the restaurant, what I would explain, Caro, is you know, I don't wanna put all my eggs in one basket, especially with the amount of things that are changing in the world and the dynamics with AI and stuff like that. And I can see how certain things that I've been building can be erased pretty quickly, even we having the know-how, even we being top in our in our industry. And that a lot and and time over time that proved me right that I some of the decisions I made, given what I see, the trends that I see and the pattern that I recognize because I feel like I'm really good at pattern recognition, allow me to, when something changes, having the opportunity to pivot. Um, and kind of like we have that conversation very often, which is you're doing this, which is adding another thing, more work, more time, but this is the reason why I'm doing it. So I I close on the bookshop, and that same week, a lot of companies aren't laying off people due to AI.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Yeah, that's true. When he explains it, I get it. Yeah, like I I hate to say it, but he's usually always right.

SPEAKER_06 6:17

And I love that that's recorded. I'm gonna pull up another recording number.

SPEAKER_02 6:24

We got what we're looking for.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Yeah, yeah, that's so fair. Yeah. I think too, like when I watch you build in particular, you come from such, you both come from such a different world than the world that we grew up in. And I feel like Ethan and I are constantly trying to pull our mentality out of a scarcity mindset. And I think in watching YouTube build, there is this scarcity mindset around like we will, we cannot fail, that keeps you ahead of the game. It almost is like I view having a scarcity mindset and that fear of it going away as something that's negative that I try and like suppress in me all the time. But you're allowing it to make you grow faster and take on maybe more than you want to handle and like expand your business in ways that maybe don't make obvious sense to us, where I'm like, just go all in on the thing that like is working, that you know has the least friction or is the most profitable or whatever. So, do you guys feel that way as well? That like you are understanding of that scarcity mindset that plays a role in the decisions that you make.

SPEAKER_04 7:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:26

I feel like he can't say no to an opportunity. Like, yeah, they came, they were like, Do you want to buy my bookstore? Yes. He will he will like try to figure it out later. Like you will not say no. Yeah. It's like, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:38

In his defense, he called me before he said yes. Yeah, he called me too. And we we talked it through. We went over numbers and the little information that we had, and I thought it was a great decision. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 7:49

I I will say I make very informal decisions and I have said no to a lot of things, yeah, especially partnerships. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 7:55

And oh, I believe that. Yeah, I believe that with you too.

SPEAKER_06 8:00

But the scarcity mindset is it comes from a place that I was actually having this conversation with Shanyanne recently, which is one of our close friends from the group. And I have a fallback, yeah. And that puts you in a position where it has to work. Yes, it has to work, and that changes a lot in the mindset. Is yeah, everybody can start again. I don't want to start again. And I also, you know, experienced it with my dad. I saw my dad losing everything and never been able to recover, being in his 50s, and that's something that struck with me. And I actually, you know, in therapy I talk about that a lot. Yeah, because I don't want that to be a limiting factor, but actually something that empowers me to do things, but it's also in the back of my mind that you can lose everything one day to another. Yeah, everything that you work your entire life can be erased pretty quickly. So I feel like all the business decisions that I make now are very thought uh through thoughtfully planned, and and I put a lot of thought into where am I going with this?

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Yeah. Yeah, because I know when we watch you make decisions, they're not decisions we would make, right? Like I would never take on a bookstore, or I'm just like, how do I narrow it down to like the one thing? And you're you're approaching it in such an opposite way, but I will say that like as you said, it's like as we watch you grow, there's constant reminders of like, oh, that makes sense why he made that decision. Or like, I don't know. It's just really fun to watch the approach that you have in particular to how you're building something here in America versus people who grew up here and how we're approaching it. Um from the early days, like when you guys first met, in every conversation that I've had with you guys around your desire to come here to build something, to leave Argentina, talk to me about what those early conversations looked like, why you wanted to be here, what was the overall vision.

SPEAKER_06 10:02

Yeah. I know for Caro it's it's it's more difficult because she does miss Argentina, family and friends, I'm more detached. When we got together, I was building a career in Corporate America, in Argentina working for an American company, and actually I got an offer that didn't go through, and that's why it's kind of my my uh origin story of how we ended up here, but uh when I got proposed to come and move to Texas and work at headquarters, she was uh totally opposed.

SPEAKER_04 10:36

Oh.

SPEAKER_06 10:37

Uh she went to the to know. She hated it. She hated it.

SPEAKER_00 10:40

She had a huge fight, I remember. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 10:43

But uh the situation in Argentina started to go really bad. COVID happened, I was extremely mismanaged, and things were really, really bad. My job that was traveling around the world and refund went to Zoom calls, and you, you know, I was a bird being caged. Yeah. I was hating it. And and but the economic the the the like you know, I was 10 years in cover job, good position, I was making $700 a month. And that was a good money in Argentina. And that's where I took a job as a BA at $3.50 an hour, $3.50 an hour.

SPEAKER_05 11:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 11:17

And what we did actually, and I don't know if a lot of people know about this, we applied for a work and travel visa to Sweden, which was the only country I was taking work and visa travel.

SPEAKER_01 11:25

Really?

SPEAKER_06 11:26

Yeah, I didn't know that. So we applied for that. That was my last $300 that I had. Next day that we applied, they cancelled the agreement because everyone in Argentina was applying to leave and go to Sweden. That was the only country that was taking us. Didn't refund your money? Never. Never got the money about it.

SPEAKER_00 11:41

He still upset about it. Yeah. It was like $200.

SPEAKER_06 11:44

Sweden.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

I would be too though.

SPEAKER_06 11:46

I want people in Sweden to listen to me.

SPEAKER_01 11:49

We do have quite a following from Sweden at all.

SPEAKER_06 11:52

So that and that was right after my dad died, and I was taking care of my mom. It was an awful time, and everything was locked down in Argentina, like the economy was ruined, and that's when I took the BA job. And and I I had applied like right before COVID, that's when happened. This thing happened that I got an offer to move to the US to our headquarters. That was my dream to keep growing because I couldn't keep growing in Argentina. There were many positions that like someone had to literally die to open a position. And after a month of waiting to hear back from the people who wanted to bring me to the US, they were like, hey, you don't have a college degree, we're gonna sponsor your visa, your H1, B1, whatever visa. And that was so crashing for me. And that's exactly when that happened, um, December before COVID was 2020, 2019. Um I started learning about people that were doing entrepreneur entrepreneurship in Argentina and recommending the classic books like how to win friends and influence on people, reached out for that. And we went on vacation to our dad to to to to the the countryside, and I read all those books. And when I read Rich Dad Purdad, that really changed my mind of like I'm constantly always gonna be working for someone, and the more you your salary gets bumped, the more your expenses grow, but it's not scalable. Yeah, and I always felt like I can do more than this. Yeah. So yeah, that was kind of like one of the breakthrough moments for me.

SPEAKER_01 13:19

Yeah, that's such a common thread with so many people in real estate, is like you read that book in particular, and it just seems to be the thing that like uncovers people's eyes, or they go through this awakening period of being like, wait a minute, I didn't realize I was like completely stepping into this trap of the you know standard way to go about life. And it is something that's gonna end me in a situation that I'm not excited about.

SPEAKER_06 13:45

Yeah, and especially because you know, I always had this life wasn't easy for me since my my dad lost everything. I had to go and work, we moved to the countryside, I went back to Buenos Aires and started working living at my aunt's place and having two jobs for many years. I never got to go to college. And I started college like six times, and I'll do a semester and drop.

SPEAKER_04 14:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 14:09

And also ADHD that I didn't know at the time, but I couldn't like hold a commitment of four or five years of studying. I couldn't sit down and study. And I always had this guilt of and I have a college degree, which actually we're talking about this morning with youth. And it was like my dad was you gotta have a college degree because if you lose everything, it's the one thing that they can take away from you. And now, how many number one, how dated college is many degrees and and careers, and number two, it's like how many things are gonna be replaced and wiped out by AI so easily. And I and you know, I shared yesterday kind of like jokingly a bit of us with the with the caption from uh volunteer CEO that says the future is gonna be owned by neurodivergent people. Yeah. And for me, that is huge because it shifts my reality from what is wrong with me, why cannot do the normal path of go to college, get a job, and then growing a company to actually build all these skills my own way and implement it to grow my business and becoming this unhirable person that I'm right now because I can't go back to having I was ever.

SPEAKER_01 15:21

Yeah, me. Yeah, that's so fair. Yeah, and I completely agree. I think that like the neurodivergent side of people who are hyper-creative, hyper curious, unable to sit still, don't want to have the same routine, are definitely gonna win in the world that we're existing in today.

SPEAKER_02 15:39

What a change that's that's becoming.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:42

You know, because like you had mentioned, what's wrong with me? Why can't I do what everybody else is doing? And now it's like, no, that's actually your superpower. Everybody it's gonna flip completely upside down, where the people that could do all that can't think outside of the box.

SPEAKER_00 15:56

I feel like people thought arts would be the first to go and everything's gonna be the last.

SPEAKER_01 16:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:02

Like D is gonna be it.

SPEAKER_01 16:04

Yeah, you can't automate creativity in the same way that you can automate almost anything else. Yeah. Yeah, all of a sudden we're gonna have a renaissance. Um, I want to talk about kind of the early days of us getting connected because I connected with you from a huge pain point that I was going through. I had a property manager that was managing our arbitrage units for all through COVID, you know, through maybe a year and a half we worked with them. And I am loyal to a fault, you know, like I want to give everybody the grace to like figure their stuff out and and work through the problems that they have in their business, just like I want the grace to work through the problems in mine. But I hung on to them far too long. And you were in particular constantly in my DMs, being like, hey, give me a chance, give me a chance, give me a chance. And they're like, no, no, no. I mean, I had shot you down three or four times. Yeah. Um, and then as the world works, it was like literally the day that I was having a huge falling out with the management company that I had at that point in time. You had messaged me and you were like, I'm gonna message you one last time, like, would you let me manage your properties? And I remember getting on a Zoom call with you.

SPEAKER_06 17:14

In the broken bun.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

In the broken band.

SPEAKER_06 17:16

I remember that day very well.

SPEAKER_01 17:17

And you had an entire presentation of how you know you were going to change the trajectory of our properties, how you were different than the management company that we had been working with. And so, from my perspective, in those early days, you had your poop in a group. You know, like you had something that was like built out, established, better than the rest, it was figured out, it was buttoned up. And I was like, yeah, of course, like this is already a way better experience than you know, who I've been working with. But then now looking back, you guys have shared stories with us on like what that actually looked like when you came to America and all the hustling that you were doing. So, from your perspective, what did those early days actually look like?

SPEAKER_00 17:59

I don't know what we used to stalker these things, right? And like we couldn't believe the messages that like the reviews and the and then when you gave him your properties and we read the messages, we couldn't believe it. Because I because I used to help him back then with the messages. It was just him and then me, and we would turn, like I would stay up and he would go to sleep, and then he would wake up and I would go to sleep. It's just for a few months, but but I did help.

SPEAKER_06 18:26

You actually did a lot.

SPEAKER_00 18:28

Yeah, you guys were on a 24-hour shift. I couldn't believe it.

SPEAKER_06 18:31

Yeah, and when we got to America, you know, uh everything was rough. Um we got here by uh Thanksgiving. We were gonna close on a condo that I was working to buy with invest with my father-in-law and her dad, and and my ex-partner. It got delayed to after Thanksgiving weekend. We had nowhere to stay. We had two dogs and a cat, and we just drove three days from Texas to Miami, from Miami to Texas. And we just found ourselves in this empty apartment in Fort Worth. We couldn't find a mattress. We're sleeping in another mattress in an empty apartment. You know, it was rainy, it was cold, new country.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

Thanksgiving food from what was it?

SPEAKER_06 19:16

Yeah, Kroger or something like that. Tom Tums.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

I don't know the name, but we call it Tom Tums. Yeah. It's like Tom Tums or something. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 19:25

But it was like, but you know, this is it. It's like we knew that we had the whole world to take over.

SPEAKER_04 19:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 19:35

So we started, we we were doing a little property management with that partner, but it wasn't going great. I actually went through depression because I didn't see the properties in personal the neighborhoods, and I was like, these are shitholes. And then we started cleaning the properties because we were trying to get cash as soon as possible. It's like we're here, we want to get cash. And I I I will always remember this this day. We started cleaning at 10 a.m. we finished at midnight. It was a Sunday. We and you know, and you feel disgusting, it's like you know, clean all the people's shit, people were routing with the properties in the bathrooms. It was this we felt dirty, you know. You feel like you don't want to touch anything, you don't want to eat anything with your hands. Yeah, you're just in a shower, and we're driving back in an old like 2005 GMC Sierra. And the blue one? Yeah, but I look at her, it's like, dude, today we made $1,200. This would have been a month of work in Argentina. Yeah, month and a half of work in Argentina. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

Like it was so easy to make, like, and it wasn't even that bad. It was just like uh one bedroom apartments, or not even like studio apartments.

SPEAKER_06 20:40

That day we cleaned one of the grandparents.

SPEAKER_00 20:42

The big ones were the big ones were bad, but the small apartments were so easy and so easy money. Yeah, so it wasn't like at the beginning, it was like fun, then it got old pretty quick. Yeah, but at the like the first few months, they were fun. Yeah, there was a day that we I came back and I was like, okay, I'm done. Yeah, you know, it's like I have fun for a little bit and then I need to like money's not worth it. But it was fun. We we never did it again.

SPEAKER_06 21:04

Yeah, it was yeah, yeah, but it was like, you know, how do we make make cash quickly? And we started seeing like, well, now we can buy a car, now we can you know get our get our own place. Um so that was quick growth.

SPEAKER_00 21:16

And it was before Chicago, because Chicago changed everything. Like it literally changed everything. We I didn't have anything better to do, you know. It was I was bored in in a place where I didn't have friends, I didn't have anyone, so I didn't mind it.

SPEAKER_01 21:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:29

But the that trip changed everything.

SPEAKER_01 21:30

Yeah. Why do you think? What about that trip in particular?

SPEAKER_00 21:33

Because we met you gave him the bigger properties, which were like, and then Maddie and Skylar did too, and then someone, like I don't know, but the word to mouth started like the you know, the balls started rolling. And we started doing going to the conferences because we became friends and we would go everywhere together. And that's when I started getting design clients. Yeah. And That's it literally changed everything. Well, it was crazy because he was supposed to go with his partner. Yeah. And I don't think I don't, I mean, not because of me, but I think we got we became more friends because it was like a couple friend group. Yes. You know, it wasn't a partner friend group.

SPEAKER_06 22:16

But but you know, I I always been a person of visualizing where I want to be, and this sounds crazy, but everything that I put my mind into over the years, I I accomplished it.

SPEAKER_04 22:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 22:29

I I feel like I'm a dreamer, and every time that I dream about something or say this is what I want to do, I ended up doing it however it is. Like I always dream about you know owning a restaurant, and somehow I ended up owning a restaurant by chance.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 22:42

And stuff like that, being a chef, which I was, you know, loved Anthony Bourdain, read all the books, and in another life I would have been a chef. And I ended up being a chef even for three months, but I had that in my uh curriculum now.

SPEAKER_04 22:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 22:54

But I remember meeting with my old boss from America that I love, and she was my you know, a person that really made an impact on coaching me, a mentor, and you know, helping me to think as a owner of the company, even though we're working for a company and decision making. And I met with her because we're living in Dallas headquarters, she was there for a conference or something meeting, and we went for lunch. And I showed her Orange Skylight and I told her, these are the properties I want to be managing in the future. We was still managing not managing it. This is what I want to do. I'm managing these apartments, this is what I feel I could do. Yeah. And after the trip to Chicago, came back, but a waste started from scratch. We just bought a property with her father-in-law. So we had a new property that we had to redo, had no other income that we were doing with my partner, and I was like, I'm gonna burn into the ground and start over again with three properties in Michigan and two properties in New York.

SPEAKER_04 23:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 23:52

They're gonna come in a couple of weeks. And I have the only money I had was like $12,000 saved that I saved to a point. And I put it in the mentorship with John that put me in the right room. And after that, I developed an incredible amount of relationships that made my business grow skyrocketing a year.

SPEAKER_00 24:12

Yeah. He was so excited. I remember being him being so excited about Orange Cadillac and telling me, like, that's what I want. I want the big houses, I don't want the shitty apartments. Yeah. And he came back and told his ex-partner, like, just give me Sarah. I only want Sarah. You can have everything else. I want to do it. We weren't even scared. We were like, we knew that it was the right move. Yeah. Like uh leaving everything. Like, he I mean, I don't think you had a paycheck that month, or no, but that's the part where you had something that has to show up.

SPEAKER_06 24:42

I was scared of shit. Yeah. She never knew, but uh I was scared.

SPEAKER_00 24:46

Yeah, yeah, but still, I think we knew that it was the right move.

SPEAKER_06 24:50

I knew it was the right move, but I was jumping, I I was taking another leap of faith after we're not we moved in November and that was May next year. So it wasn't even a year, and I was starting all over again.

SPEAKER_00 25:00

Yeah, and it was only three years ago or less. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 25:03

But it was a I'm saying like we moved to America in November, and by May it was or June of starting again from scratch. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:10

But I remember vividly having that conversation with you where when we were transitioning Orange Cadillac over to you, up until that point, I had been working with you at that point for nearly two years, like previous to you coming to the States. And I just remember every interaction that I had, every unlock that I had, every amount of good experience that I had in working with you and your previous business partner was with you. And I just didn't understand what role he played. And I think that both of you are very good at articulating and painting a vision for people that are around you, and whether those people around you are going to help you in that vision or not, it doesn't matter. You're talking about it, right? And so when I was looking at the position that you were in and starting to understand the position that you were headed towards, I remember having that conversation with you of like, hey, I don't mean to like overstep, but like why are you not doing this alone? You know, like what like what what value is this other person bringing to you? And is he on the same, does he have the same vision as you? Because I could see that right away that you guys were on two separate paths. And so even though I feel like it is a huge leap of faith to burn it all to the ground so soon after moving here, after not having a lot under your belt to feel that security, it's like looking back now, that was your best decision.

SPEAKER_06 26:27

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

He did help us a lot in the beginning. Yeah. I mean, we he was amazing. I'm very grateful for that. But at some point, you yeah, you definitely path and there's nothing you can do about it.

SPEAKER_01 26:38

Yeah, yeah. If your vision isn't aligned, like you could you had two choices. If there, if there wasn't an aligned vision, you either hang on for longer than you should, or you cancel it and start over and honor the vision that you wanted to honor. So um I feel like too, one thing that I love about you guys is you are excuseless. And especially in growing up in the States, we're surrounded by people who have a million excuses. And the common narrative online, especially in today's world, is that the American dream is dead, it doesn't exist, you shouldn't be excited about being here, there's not a ton of opportunity here. So I'm just curious what your opinion is of it after experiencing what you've experienced.

SPEAKER_00 27:19

You know what's crazy? I never I don't have that mindset. I don't have the basic news. Like you like you two, I feel like you have a lot more of it on YouTube, but I don't I think yeah, it's quite similar. I don't have that, but I do it's funny because the other day I was like uh they paid me $150 to post 20 links. It's like so stupid, but it exists. And my friend in Argentina were like like you can't like it's so easy to make money in America, and that's I don't I don't know. Um I lost my but it's I don't know, those things are funny or crazy or shocking. Yeah, because if you want to make money, there's so many ways. You know, that doesn't exist in Argentina. No, there's no apps that pay you to, you know, yeah. I have 200 followers, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:12

Right.

SPEAKER_01 28:13

And you can make money absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 28:14

And I made 150 for like just posting a few stories. Yeah. Um so yeah, I think that did that. Yeah, no, you're yeah, that's exactly it.

SPEAKER_06 28:24

Yeah, yeah, you know, for me, I I made my mission to tell people, remind people that the American dream exists because I totally get it that you know rent is is crazy, owning a house is difficult, but it can be done. Like I got here three years ago. I owned four properties, too, with with with or five-in-law, but two, I purchased them myself. I can hear with a thousand, we can hear with a thousand dollars in our pocket.

SPEAKER_00 28:45

You have equity in all of the others.

SPEAKER_06 28:46

And I have equity in ten other projects, I own multiple businesses, two cars. But here's the thing, it's not about the material thing. Three cars, actually. Which again, living paycheck to paycheck in Argentina to being in this position in in three years, it's incredible, it's while and you get used to things. And for me, now it's natural the path I thought I would get at some point. But again, it's not about having money or having things that are material, it's about getting to a point of freedom. It's a freedom. And I I got the chance to travel the world uh when I was at a job that that you know, airlines and I've been to over 60 countries, and it's pretty easy to shit in America for a lot of things, and people have no idea how rough it is out there. Yeah. I feel like people have no idea. And I got to spend a lot of time in some countries. Like I'll go for three months to a country to open an office, and you know, I'll and I I always been extremely curious and learning about the history of the country, talking to people, going to the house to eat, uh, not just looking at the surface, because every country looks wonderful when you're just touring or spending like five days. Um and just the this country was founded, you know, on the on an entrepreneurship mindset because people can hear they they were escaping from from Europe and other countries when it was founded, and they came with this idea of you know removing the king, getting rid of like this higher power checks and balances, and build and be accountable for yourself. I'm of the mindset that you need to let people be accountable. Yeah, you need to let people make mistakes. And that's this country is like you can do really well, and if you do bad, the market is also gonna give you a lesson. But you can start over again. Um but it does take a lot of work. Like I always tell to my friends, it's like, yeah, I'm doing really well, also work my ass all day, I'm working all day. But my main takeaway is that a country is not made by who's the current president, it's not made by the government, it's made by their people. And coming here with a freaking thick accent, nothing in my pocket, and people trusting me with their most expensive asset, which is their property, and say, Yeah, go manage it. This is gonna be my legacy for my kids. This is my way to build generational wealth, and you're gonna manage it even though you have again a thick accent and you have no background and you never lived in this country, that speaks millions for me. Yeah, so that's why a lot of this country is the people, it's the people within uh, you know, if you they give you the opportunity to show and prove your value.

SPEAKER_04 31:29

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_06 31:30

And and that's what you did, and you guys did, and what a lot of people did, and I'm extremely grateful for that.

SPEAKER_04 31:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:36

So on the flip side, why do you think Americans, uh really the West, but I guess specifically Americans, why do you think we feel the way that we do? Why do you think we're entitled?

SPEAKER_06 31:48

Why do we think the the dream is dead? Because that I think there are two factors. Number one is you, you know, you cannot see it from from above and I or from from from the side, I I guess from a different perspective because I grew up looking at America and looking at the positive things and looking at, you know, we grew up media, music, everything, and I come from a place where I wanted to do all the things I couldn't. So I had this outside perspective, which is way easier than when you're looking from from the inside. And I also think that people consume a lot of content that rage them in the bad things. And I'm gonna give you an example that you know it's a little bit controversial, but I think that racism is something I hear all the time. It's oh, this is a racist country. I was like, you have no idea because the fact that that is a convert, an open conversation that this country is racist, is way more, and I'm not saying it doesn't exist, right? Don't get me wrong, that's my point is the fact that it's a constant conversation in the public eye, and that we need to do better and we need to be less less least racist is way more than any other country. But they don't give a freaking F.

SPEAKER_00 32:54

Yeah, yeah, they don't have time to think about those.

SPEAKER_06 32:56

Right. They don't even think it's so accepted, and people don't see it. And and countries where people here will be a minority of in their own country, they're extremely racist in different ways about color, about uh social um levels. So this is a country where you can move across levels, and at the end of the day, my own experience is that it doesn't matter again, your background, your anything. It's like you have something to prove, you have value to bring to the table, show me. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:30

And you'll be rewarded for it. You'll be rewarded. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 33:33

So you think we should travel more? Yeah, but really experience it and talking to people, but that's the thing. You can travel and you can see the old castles and you can see the old things, and everything looks wonderful. But when you really get to talk to people, when you really get to look deep into and learning the history of countries and what happened in every country, that for me is what makes a huge difference.

SPEAKER_01 33:54

I think that that you make such a good point there because when we went to Argentina with you guys, and you were like, We're taking you to a third world country, and you guys were like, is this what you expected when we said third world? And we're like, no.

SPEAKER_00 34:10

I'm like, this is I don't know what you would expect.

SPEAKER_01 34:13

I was like, this is so nice. Like the restaurants are cute, everything's Instagrammable. Literally, it's like third world to me. That's what that means, right?

SPEAKER_00 34:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:24

I, as an American, am thinking third world is like hot, is like literally something that's like underdeveloped.

SPEAKER_02 34:30

I wasn't thinking that it was Yeah, no plumbing, no electricity, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:34

Literally. I wasn't thinking that it was like this inability to move social classes. Right. And so in experiencing Argentina from your perspective and being able to have those conversations, it has completely shifted my perspective on the actual struggle that if you are in a third world country looks like because it isn't a lack of plumbing. It's a lack of ability to go from bottom floor, dirt floor floor, to I'm gonna try really hard, I'm gonna be rewarded based on merit, not on born in social class. Do you feel like that plays a role in your like I know that there's a difference in desire in being in America, right? Like you love Argentina in a perfect world, you would get to move back. In a perfect world, you would die here. Do you feel like because you guys were born into different social classes, that plays a big role in your desire to be here? Yes.

SPEAKER_06 35:29

Yeah, yeah, 100%. Because uh that the fallback, like Kara knows, you know, and she has and it's not something bad, she knows that she has a fallback, which I don't. Yeah. Uh, you know, and actually it's funny because my story is kind of like my dad was kind of like doing well when I was growing up, and then he lost everything, and we, you know, took a step back, which is that's the thing with Argentina countries like that, is you can be doing well and then you lose everything, it's impossible to recover, uh impossible to start back again, or very difficult to do it, uh, especially because of the swings in economics and you know the pressure that you get on just this is something that I tell people I've lost your mind. Like, here I want to open an LLC, I should send an email to a company, I get it in seven days.

SPEAKER_04 36:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 36:12

In Argentina, many other even first world countries, like in in taking by the example, Sweden or New Zealand, it takes months to get approved for LLC and sales tax. Um again, it it it is so simple to start. You have an idea, and and from the idea to the implementation, it is a short path here. And and it's easy to test, and again, it gives you the opportunity to if something doesn't work, people quickly because you don't need to invest this incredibly stupid amount of resources to try to launch an idea and then it doesn't work, and that's where where you go broke broke. Like I'm gonna give you another example. It's like America's known outside for work for flexibility that's so f so easy to fire people, yeah, right? And that's seen as a bad thing. That also the easy to fire is also the ease to hire, which people don't see. And in Argentina, we have a joke that is when you're employing someone, you're when you're hiring someone, you're adopting that person. You have no idea the amount of businesses that go under because of um labor laws and lawsuits. On I work here for 10 years, that person stops working, you fire them, and now you need to pay them half of your business. That's the most common thing. And that's why people don't want to be an entrepreneur in Argentina. And I can tell you for real, I have friends like my best friend, he owns like a construction materials um business. He sells like bricks and all of that. And he had employees like coming drunk, crashing their trucks, getting the trucks stolen by a friend, and then he fires them and he has to pay servants. And there's a whole there's a whole network built with attorneys like we call like um this crow, crow attorney, like they just not crow, but you know, these um beers that will what's it called? Vultures. Yeah, vultures, thank you. Vulture attorneys that they will just find. If you take the train and you are on the train and you go through a more um a poor area, you will see all these billboards of labor attorneys. Wow. Right? And it's a whole network built to make losses to employers.

SPEAKER_01 38:32

To deincentivize people from being employers. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 38:36

So backwards. It's so crazy. It's very predictive of the worker. Which is good.

SPEAKER_02 38:42

You know, there is some value there, but you mean the expense of the business.

SPEAKER_01 38:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 38:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:47

Yeah, because then it turns out not to be merit-based. Right.

SPEAKER_06 38:50

It's not merit-based, and you know, Argentina is funny because that's why, again, I'm so adamant about certain values. Argentina, uh uh up until 1945, was on the path to beef Australia and GDP, and was it was kind of like getting to be at the same level of America. Most of immigration from Europe after World War II was coming was going to America, Argentina, or Australia. We were called the uh barn of the world because we'll sell grains and beef to all the countries. We didn't get involved in the world in the world wars. It was going incredible. And also, our constitution was based on the American constitution. People and we were a liberal country, we're based off on the US, we're the third country to get independence after America and Haiti.

SPEAKER_04 39:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 39:42

It was a country that had everything to win. And in 1945, there was a lady that came with social justice. And you see the grass, and right after that it went down. Because we had a phrase that was like, where there's a need, there's uh a right. So any need that you have is now a right, and the right has to be paid with something, someone else. Um, that's why I believe in the free market. That's why I believe I'm letting people, you know, I and I know that someone that had a re-rough pad needs some type of help, but it's not living off the state, and the state being involved in every decision because the state is another business.

SPEAKER_05 40:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 40:19

Yes. That is also run by people. It's not this entity that is only meaning good. That's why I my favorite phrase, my favorite quote is the path, the the road to hell is path with good intentions.

SPEAKER_04 40:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 40:30

Because we can always say, Yeah, we need to help this person, we need to help them, we need to do all these nice and kind things, but the outcome at the end of the day is really bad. But when you let people show their value, when you let people grow, build, everybody, that and that's my thing, I should think on individuals. I think everybody's extremely capable. And of course, again, some people have really bad things happening in their life with health, with family, and you need to help them get in a good position temporarily.

SPEAKER_04 40:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 40:59

Not forever, because that becomes a business. If you rely on me forever, that is a business. I make money out of that.

SPEAKER_02 41:05

That's right. Yeah, we've talked several times about how the US government is the largest business in the world. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:12

Yeah. Poorly run, but also incredibly run. I just, I really appreciate, especially in running alongside you guys for this era where the political climate has been so crazy, and you have consistently said the road to hell is paved with good intentions. It hits every single time. Because it's one of those things where when we're having conversations with other Americans, we're we're in an echo chamber, even if we're on opposite sides. We all have had more similar experiences growing up to each other than what we have had to you, right? Like you truly have an outsider's bird's eye perspective on what works and what doesn't. And so I just think that the role that your voice plays in the conversations that we have in our groups is heavier, carries more weight than what we have amongst each other. It like we're getting your perspective without having lived it. And it's so different than what our perspective is, you know? Um, and so you you've seen it. It's like we're arguing over what we think would work or wouldn't work. You are saying, I've already lived.

SPEAKER_06 42:24

I come for the future. I see it all the time. I've seen this, I've seen this movie and I know the end.

SPEAKER_01 42:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 42:29

I know how to go. Yeah, and that and that's the number one thing. Um, but again, it comes out of a place of caring about people. I think that's a misconception because it's way easier to default into saying things that sound really nice.

SPEAKER_05 42:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 42:42

And I really care about people again being able to develop themselves and skills, having the the freedom to again do things, being successful, being fulfilled. Because you know, that's a big conversation taking back to the AI thing. It's like, oh, AI is gonna take all the world, and now we're all gonna have free time and um we're gonna have a universal income. Oh, crazy. Yeah, because and I was explaining to Caro, and and I feel that for a lot of people that do not have this passion about creating things, it's great and that's perfect. But when I see everything that I built so far and the amount of people that I employ, out of not because it's not a sum zero game. Yeah, I created value out of thin air, I feel. That's my my perspective because again, I didn't take anything, anyone, or maybe if I took a client that was working with someone else because I had something better to offer. Yeah, but again, there's there's a sense of fulfillment in this life, you know, I get it super deep, but it's it's this fulfillment like look what I built.

SPEAKER_04 43:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 43:46

And I think it's not about the money, it's not about if I get too too too too by this car, but it's really about that sense of purpose, purpose, creation, building things from the ground, having this idea and seeing it be, you know, alive. I mean it's crazy.

SPEAKER_00 44:01

It really isn't about the money. That's another thing we talk. Like he I don't think he gets motivated about money. He just gets motivated about the work and building things. Because I joke that he will be 70 a millionaire and he will still be working because he just likes to work. Yeah. It's like it if he thing. Yeah. He doesn't care about it. He just wants to.

SPEAKER_02 44:22

It's just a benefit. Yeah. Yeah. The money is the benefit.

SPEAKER_01 44:25

Yeah, I think that's the artist in you. You know, we were just talking about that with Cassidy and Aaron as well. It's like building becomes so much more fun when you're doing it for art's sake. It's like the same thing with you when we were talking about like you loving to do crafts. You know, it's like it's the same idea, and sure, he has an obligation much more than you do, or same thing vice versa, where like he has to make money, right? Somebody's got to be like putting food on the table. But nonetheless, like I'm playing. Yeah, like and this is your version. But this is your version of play.

SPEAKER_06 44:58

That's exactly it. And you know, I I've been jokingly saying, you know, how I've been so engaged with AI and everything I've been building and creating apps that are replacing the apps I pay for all the SaaS and stuff like that. But the the really root of when I'm hyper focused on something new and in the computer, and I had three computers, I was saying, like, have my Mag Mini 1, Mac Mini 2, and laptop running at the same time. It's just like I can feel the new neuropath being developed, like the learning.

SPEAKER_05 45:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 45:30

I'm just I'm learning. I feel like you know the neuroplasticity that is so good because like that's what keeps you young. It's like I'm 35, I'm still learning a lot of things. I think I'm just like first day of college in a new class, so it's interesting.

SPEAKER_04 45:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 45:45

But I'm learning by myself.

SPEAKER_04 45:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 45:47

And and I hit a brick wall, and now you need to resolve it. And it's like building this puzzle. And I get so passionate because I I was talking to Aston, my partner in Ref Factor. But dude, I just feel my brain growing.

SPEAKER_01 46:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 46:00

And I love that.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

Yeah. So it's Yeah, because a lot of the conversation around AI is that it's shrinking people's brains.

SPEAKER_04 46:10

Right.

SPEAKER_01 46:10

But I don't I think that that's almost one of those things where it's like anytime something new like this is introduced into society, whether it be TVs, iPhones, social media, everybody's very doomsday about it. It's like this is all the negative effects, we need to stop, everybody be careful. But I would agree with you. It's like, no, it's requiring you to completely relearn how you approach problems, how you solve problems, how you build, how you add value. And so I would argue that it is the opposite.

SPEAKER_00 46:39

Yeah. I think it depends on how you use it. Don't use it to write a text to the boy you like, which I know people have. Yeah. Oh. Use it for that, to build stuff, you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 46:51

You write your text to me with it.

SPEAKER_01 46:54

Always, every day. She's like, feed this ego.

SPEAKER_06 46:56

No, but that's really it. It's like if you're using like Google or you're using to, you know, not that there was a study made that it was explained that, you know, they took a group of college kids and they were like, you know, you gotta write a paper. And half were just writing the paper from scratch with AI, and those were writing themselves and then running through AI to make it better. And the ones that were doing that were their development on learning the topic was way better than the ones that were just going and building it from scratch with AI. Because AI is like, hey, write a paper about Shakespeare, right? It's like you'll speed it out and submit it. The other kids were just writing themselves, look at what AI would build, iterate it, making changes. And that's what I've been doing with all this. And now I joke that I opened the terminal in my computer for the first time to you know write code in the computer, but it's you gotta something's not working, I need to fix it. Okay, teach me how to fix it. And now I understand the architecture of an app. I'm miles away from an actual developer, but I've been able to going back to the ideas, all these ideas I had for many years that I wanted to do, I just been seeing them come to life. And I went from me adapting to a lot of software for my operations to the software adapting to my operations. So that's been the biggest change that I've seen.

SPEAKER_01 48:15

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's the same thing with social media, right? There are some people who have used social media to just doom scroll and turn into a larger victim and have this like very pessimistic outlook on life, on their country, on their future. And then there's other people who, like us, who have used it to connect and build and grow and learn. Yeah, and completely change our own reality. So I think the same is is true with AI. Um, last question that I've got for you guys is um when you were thinking about coming to America and and creating maybe a a bit of an expectation of what that was going to do for you, do you feel like you have exceeded the expectation that you had already in coming here? Yes.

SPEAKER_06 49:02

Yes and no is crazy. Um I just think everything's how framing your mindset. And even when I was still employed at a company and not making you know good money and everything, I always imagine myself in the future being in a really good position.

SPEAKER_05 49:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 49:21

So there are days that I wake up and I cannot believe everything I built, but at the same time, it feels like it wasn't happening.

SPEAKER_00 49:29

Yeah, because you you you do you uh you get to these goals and now your goals are bigger.

SPEAKER_06 49:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 49:35

But if you stop and think about like we are only we've only been here for three years, it's crazy. Yeah, it's just the fact that your goals keep, you know, that's what I say, they never stop. Yeah, yeah. He always we joke with Maddie because he he wakes up one day, he's like, Oh, I've been dreaming about this since since lunch. You've been dreaming, like you know, he got new dreams every day. Yeah, he always says that no, this has always been my dream. And I'm like, since when?

SPEAKER_06 50:01

Is the first time you the things I I I I I ambition a lot of things I don't share all the time. It's like only a one yard, uh a vineyard. Uh it's something I always want to do. You want everything. That's I want everything.

SPEAKER_00 50:14

That's exactly you want everything.

SPEAKER_01 50:16

That's where we relate right there. It's like I feel almost burdened by the fact that I only get one life.

SPEAKER_06 50:22

Yeah. Yeah, well that and and and the thing with that, if I can give one tip for people, is the mental imagination of what you want and where you want it to be. I I think that there's something, you know, I once listened to this and it really struck me that it's rumination, which is this concept of when you have a problem and you're constantly thinking, oh, the problem, the problem gets worse, and your life is like going in this spiral.

SPEAKER_05 50:46

Yes.

SPEAKER_06 50:47

Mental health is really tough, it's a big issue, and I feel like no one talks about that part. It's not easy understanding, like, hey, you gotta wake up and and really, you know, um think that you're gonna be able to do all this and it's gonna happen. But the more you frame your brain into this is possible, you can do it, you have the skills, this is where I'm gonna be, and you imagine the life and you visualize that in your brain, that's all about it for me. Yeah, and don't get me wrong, like being a DHD, I'm extremely susceptible to criticism. I struggle with a lot of things, not everything is easy. Dark days I want to bring burn everything to the ground. Um, but then I just keep talking to myself. I keep talking to myself, or sometimes I may need to message you and we have a conversation, or Maddie and Skyler with Carol as well, and trying to you know get validation of what I'm doing because it's a lonely path sometimes. And again, it's pretty easy to when something goes wrong when a client is not happy, when you made a mistake, question everything. Yeah, question absolutely everything. And it's like uh I'm a joke, I'm I'm I'm fake. I and then yeah, I uh now we're here at level up and I get to meet all of our clients and they come to me how happy they are. I've just been dying from inside to I'm gonna meet them all, and maybe someone's gonna come and say they're not happy, and they're like, dude, we've been making $30,000 more this year. It's like thank you. You need it because the other part of being an entrepreneur, which uh I've also been talking about a lot lately with owning a restaurant and having employees and care about employees, and then they're messing up and having to fire them. Same with property management is employers. Sometimes you you know you have your your team's back all the time. Like who has your back? Yeah, yeah, because they're the first to turn on you.

SPEAKER_05 52:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 52:35

And it can be really tough when you're dealing with a lot of problems and you're dealing with a lot of headaches, which again for me is like puzzles that I need to resolve, and I get super excited about resolving them. But that day is that it's like I need someone, which I have Caro, I have you as a network, but again, it's just you feel this burden because also I don't want to burden Caro with all my problems because I'm the one that got ourselves into this, and also I'm the one building.

SPEAKER_01 52:58

That's so fair.

SPEAKER_06 52:59

Uh, that I feel like, you know, I need someone just to give me a pun in the bag and say everything's gonna be fine and that I'm doing the right thing.

SPEAKER_01 53:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 53:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 53:08

Yeah. Well, I think that one thing that I always have appreciated about both of you and running alongside you is that I like getting pretty existential often. Yeah. Right? Like I really like living in the thought process that like we are floating on a big rock and it's not that serious. And like, you know, kind of trying to zoom out consistently because when you are an entrepreneur and you are taking big risks, and especially for you guys, and like literally leaving everything you've ever known behind and coming here, everything feels really heavy and like life or death all the time. And it's just not right, it's just not. And so I think that like in being able to relate to you guys on that, about we're willing to take these risks because it's still not that serious. We can lose sight of that so often, and it takes having people around that can remind you of that perspective to kind of pull you out of that rut because it's so easy to feel your own pain. Yeah. So, yeah, you guys have created something incredible in a short amount of time. I feel like also the the reason why you guys are so impressive, and in my opinion, your story is so powerful, is because when you are in these rooms at these conferences and you're surrounded by 500 people who are all in a semi-similar journey in the same industry, trying to build things like you guys are, you started further behind. And even in talking last night about like you're on stage, like not only do you start further behind, but in the short amount of time that you've been putting in the effort that you have, you are so much further ahead than a lot of people who had more of an opportunity, started further ahead, had access to more, had maybe a more solid community here, or an easier time networking, or speak clearer English, or like whatever the case may be. And so I just think that your story in particular is such a testament, and I think also that it's such a breath, like your energy is such a breath of fresh air for us. Like, I think that that's a huge factor outside of the fact that you guys produce really quality work, like people are impressed with how you help their business. You also are such a reminder for everyone of what's possible here. So maybe you don't pay attention to that, but I feel like that's an undertone in a lot of the conversations that we have around you guys with other people.

SPEAKER_06 55:27

That's very nice to hear.

SPEAKER_01 55:28

Yeah. Well, that's all I've got for you. Look at us keeping it under an hour. Um, for our listeners, thank you so much for listening in again. And Feta and Caro, thank you so much for coming on.

SPEAKER_03 55:39

Thank you guys. Thank you guys.

SPEAKER_01 55:41

Bye, guys.