This is a pretty unique episode because we’re going to talk about a recent adventure that I went on to the United Arab Emirates and specifically to the city of Dubai. And I went there not just for a vacation. I rarely travel for personal reasons, mostly it all revolves around business. But we went there with a recent mastermind group that I joined called the Venture Alliance.
Venture Alliance was started a few years ago by Jason Hartman and it was quite an adventure. I have never been to that part of the world before and I am really excited for you to hear this episode. On the episode, I invited one of my good friends, a client of ours who also, about a year ago, became one of our advisors named Gary Pinkerton. He came to Paradigm as a client 5 years ago and after some time made the transition to becoming one of our agents. He was able to make this transition because of his already sizable knowledge along with the hours of due diligence in studying and learning how to be a great agent.
Gary was also part of this mastermind group and we just talked about a few things. Specifically, the two main topics were number 1: the idea behind the Venture Alliance mastermind group. Now, maybe you heard what his name is so we really got into the nature of the group and the nature of why this group has come together and their objective. For topic number 2 we also got into the topic of Dubai. Dubai in the sense that it’s one of the most popular cities in the world right now, and because it is one of those cosmopolitan hubs of the Middle East. What makes Dubai interesting is how there are representatives from all over the world doing business there. This includes the Middle East, India, and Asia. It really was a cool experience just to see all of the different nations represented out there. On top of that, we also got to do a lot of the really fun tourist-type things that the city has to offer.
So Gary and I talked a lot about Dubai and discussed the Zero to One concept that was championed by Peter Thiel. If you are unfamiliar with the concept it is basically something rising out of nothing so I think that’s something you guys will get out of that. Now I’ve known him for a number of years now. He has an incredible background in the military. He has served in the Navy for nearly 25 years and he’s actually finishing up his final year of being posted at the naval academy. He commanded nuclear submarines for 2 years on several missions and has served on several attack submarines and a ballistic missile submarine. He has loved being a member of the Venture Alliance for the past year and really just has an amazing mind and you’ll definitely see that in these posts.
The Venture Alliance mastermind group is essentially a group of primarily real estate investors and business owners that was put together by Jason Hartman. For those of you who don’t know Jason, he runs a number of podcasts and is an active real estate investor himself. His most popular podcast is the Creating Wealth Podcast that can constantly be found toward the top of the business section of iTunes. Jason has an incredible network and a deep knowledge on a number of different topics.
The two principles we are going to discuss are the Zero to One principle and the Mastermind concept. The first of the two we will talk about is the Zero to One principle. The Zero to One principle was developed by Peter Thiel. He’s a famous VC guy that has worked with Facebook and a lot of other big companies to get them off the ground. He wrote a book called Zero to One where the idea behind the name is create something from nothing. For example, I’m drinking a Red Bull right now, but it isn’t about making a better Red Bull, it’s about creating something that does not currently exist. We use a lot of things that haven’t existed since the beginning of time. Microphones were invented, right? Cameras were invented, computers were invented, software programs were invented. All these things came from basically nothing, they were just ideas in someone’s mind and they created something physical out of it.
So that’s the idea behind the zero to one concept and that’s why Dubai is so profound to me. In Dubai, they basically had a blank canvas where they had a desert with nothing in it. Maybe some water because it’s in the Persian Gulf, but not much else besides that. It is basically a desert with sand and some brushes. Eventually, somebody had the vision and it started with fishing and pearl diving. Then it went into shopping and finally it really took off with some oil. Now it’s one of the most famous cities in the world and it’s one of the fastest growing cities in the world. Everybody knows what it looks like.
Now they’re not just building on what existed but they’re actually creating land. The Atlantis Resort in Dubai was created by just taking some of the sand that was out in the desert and made this big palm tree out of it. I’m sure they did more than just get the sand, but they’ve started putting houses, buildings and the massive Atlantis Resort and water park. So the zero to one concept when it comes to Dubai is that somebody said look at that, that’s nothing and I’m going to create something out of it. The speed at which it is growing is amazing too. It already has one of the largest and most active airports, and they are already planning one 10 times its size. Compare that to a place like Atlanta, that already has a very large and busy airport, but they aren’t planning to build a larger airport to replace that one.
That isn’t to say that this rapid growth doesn’t have any risk. I think they’re overbuilding. I look at it as a real estate investor and I see a crane here, a crane there, and I wonder what the occupancy is, the price per square foot, who they are building for, and where they are finding the demand. At the same time, it’s kind of like the Steve Jobs idea where he was having product launches for products that didn’t even exist yet. So sometimes that is like the hardcore entrepreneur that takes those risks and in Dubai, it’s one of those things that’s been created. I think often times people don’t take enough risk. I don’t mean risk as putting all your chips on black, but taking risk from a standpoint of trying this and trying that and just continue to try without being afraid of failure. I think Dubai is the epitome of that just because it basically is proof that you could have a wilderness of nothing turned into one of the most beautiful cities on planet Earth right now.
Zero to One can also be applied in our own individual lives, and even in investments. Although I don’t encourage anyone to go out and create a brand new financial vehicle just to do something different, you can create something that’s different for yourself personally. Something that isn’t just the same as everyone else. Something outside of the norm. Learn as much as you can about all the different products out there, how they fit into the grand scheme of things, and talk to people about them. Get some opinions. Find what’s right for you.
Our agents can certainly help with that as well. We have materials and workshops and classes that are all free to learn about and to study. In fact, you can find a lot of these resources in our free eLearning course, Infinite 101. Check it out!
This blog was created based on our podcast The Wealth Standard. Click here to listen to it now!
