Dan Martell - How to get rich without luck, talent, or a trust fund

00:00:00.000 I'm going to share with you all the rules of money that you can follow to get rich without

00:00:03.500 talent, luck, or having a freaking trust fund. And once you learn these rules and apply them,

00:00:08.160 you'll finally be able to stack cash. So in this video, I'm going to tell you exactly what these

00:00:13.080 rules are and how I went from broke at 24 to a millionaire at 27, and then being worth over

00:00:17.800 a hundred million dollars today. Rule number one, the 4% rule. To get rich, you need to have a

00:00:23.820 number in mind that if you saved up and you were able to live off of that, you would be able to

00:00:28.860 live off the passive income. I know this sounds boring, but true rich means freedom. Freedom means

00:00:35.780 you don't have to work. I'm talking safe, simple, guaranteed, no around a dollar amount that you

00:00:42.020 live passively off that. Once you get there, everything else is great. The 4% rule, super 0.98

00:00:47.420 simple. You take the number you want to make per year. Let's say it's a hundred thousand dollars

00:00:51.680 and then you just divide it by 0.04. That'll give you the number you have to save so you can live

00:00:57.320 off of that easily. Sounds crazy and like a lot of money, but it's not because if you invest your

00:01:01.860 money and it compounds and grows and you start early, you can get to that place simply. So now

00:01:06.480 that you've got your number, how much you need to save, how do you actually make that kind of money?

00:01:10.380 Rule number two, master a high income skill. If you already knew how to make that kind of money,

00:01:16.200 you'd be making that kind of money, which means you're going to have to invest in yourself to

00:01:20.080 develop a skill that the world values. That's why it's called high income skill, meaning people are

00:01:25.640 going to pay you a lot of money for your time to do that work. The best part is, is that everybody

00:01:30.200 has access to the same tools. The information's out there. It's just most people pretend like

00:01:34.740 they can't solve this problem. You don't have to spend 200 grand to go to some fancy university to

00:01:39.260 learn any of this. You can do it on your own. So here's how you simplify it. All high income skills

00:01:44.500 can fall into one of four categories. The first M is make, means you're a creator. Either edit

00:01:49.720 videos, you create websites, you create video scripts, you create things that other people

00:01:55.640 value. It sounds so simple, but most people never learn how to make a solution. They make a piece

00:02:00.700 of solution, but not the complete thing. The second M is market. If you know how to get somebody to

00:02:06.160 pay attention and redirect that focus to buying something, people will pay you a lot of money to

00:02:11.300 do that for their business, to get customers. Even more important than the next one, which

00:02:15.500 everybody talks about, which is monetize or sales, like the ability to talk to somebody and get them

00:02:20.300 to part with their money, incredibly valuable. But if you're asking me which one's more valuable,

00:02:24.800 marketing or sales, marketing is more valuable. Sales is just easier to learn. And the final one

00:02:29.780 is manage. People will pay top dollar to have somebody come in and manage a project, manage an

00:02:34.680 outcome, manage a problem for them. So the way I look at it is four components and you can look up

00:02:40.000 icky guy. What do you love? What are you good at? What does the world need? And what can you get

00:02:44.680 paid for. If one of those four seems like a default for you, maybe it's marketing or making

00:02:49.380 or monetizing or managing stuff. The key is mastery. Decide to be the best in the world at it

00:02:55.040 and stick with it for at least a thousand days. Like go all in and find somebody to pay you to

00:03:00.540 do that work. But here's the deal. Even a high income skill won't make you rich if you don't

00:03:05.420 own anything. Which brings us to rule number three, don't work for your money, make your money

00:03:10.080 work for you. This one's going to be hard for people to understand because the whole world is

00:03:14.940 trying to convince you to do this, which is work for a salary. The only way you're going to get

00:03:19.020 really rich is to own a part of the business. Wages might feed you, but ownership frees you.

00:03:25.080 See, if the accountant, the lawyer, the doctor goes on vacation, guess what? It's not the cost

00:03:28.420 of the vacation that's the most expensive thing for them. It's not working. The truth is, is those

00:03:32.520 people are highly paid, but they're not rich because they don't have freedom. A business owner

00:03:36.780 creates a machine or an engine that makes money and they get paid whether they show up to work

00:03:41.440 or not because the machine runs. Owning a piece of a machine is how you get wealthy. But if you

00:03:46.220 want to get there faster, you need to understand what I'm about to share. Phase one, you have to

00:03:50.140 build cash piles with your high income skills. You literally need to learn how to save. The more you

00:03:55.160 can save, the more resources you'll have to do something with. You can't buy into a business.

00:04:00.060 You can't invest in your business to increase your equity ownership if you don't have any cash.

00:04:04.200 Phase two is reinvest in your best asset yourself

00:04:07.740 because you will take you with you to every interaction

00:04:10.540 for the rest of your life.

00:04:11.840 And you becoming better, meaning you communicating better,

00:04:14.800 you persuading other people better,

00:04:16.500 you getting other people to support you in your dreams,

00:04:18.660 that investment will pay off dividends way bigger

00:04:21.360 than any other business investment.

00:04:23.080 Phase three is to invest those profits

00:04:25.060 or that cash into assets.

00:04:27.100 That's the ownership side.

00:04:28.380 For most people, the simplest thing to do

00:04:30.460 is buy a low fee index fund,

00:04:32.280 like a vanguard for the s&p 500 something simple my son noah literally has 70 of his savings in an

00:04:39.000 s&p 500 he's 12 years old the reason i taught him that is because i showed to him that the money

00:04:44.600 works for him whether he shows up or not he could sleep in till 10 a.m and that money in that index

00:04:49.960 fund did some work so the best investment other than yourself is in your current business so

00:04:54.440 that's where i would look first then you can look at things that you have an unfair advantage around

00:04:58.280 things that you know better than most if you're into cryptocurrency and you're like super passionate

00:05:02.840 and you get paid to help people build blockchains and you're like a nerd about that

00:05:06.440 go all in on crypto sticking in what you know is how you create compound and massive leverage

00:05:11.960 that's how i've built my company i'm all software all the time for 28 years i learned how to code i

00:05:17.400 build and exit software companies i started investing in companies now i have a venture

00:05:20.600 studio where i launch a new ai company every month because i understood a long time ago me sticking

00:05:26.200 in things that I have an unfair advantage of

00:05:28.220 that I can look at deals and assess

00:05:29.720 better than anybody else in the world

00:05:31.140 is gonna give me the returns that are above the market norm.

00:05:34.400 So that's where I invest my free cashflow.

00:05:36.280 And remember, the whole point is to invest

00:05:38.040 into assets and ownership

00:05:39.560 so that you can get to that 4% rule.

00:05:41.720 Then you don't have to work anymore.

00:05:43.140 That's a beautiful thing where you can now choose

00:05:45.120 what do you wanna do with your days?

00:05:46.560 What does your life mean?

00:05:47.500 What is the work?

00:05:48.160 What do you wanna create?

00:05:49.320 That is the true meaning of being rich.

00:05:51.240 If you don't own anything, you'll be stuck renting forever.

00:05:54.500 But even with your money invested,

00:05:56.540 how do you multiply it even faster to actually get rich?

00:06:00.400 Which brings us to rule number four.

00:06:02.040 We have to use leverage, not labor. 0.93

00:06:04.520 Leverage means putting a little bit of effort in

00:06:06.680 and getting a massive result.

00:06:08.260 So there's this guy called Archimedes,

00:06:09.700 which is like a Greek mathematician.

00:06:11.180 He has a quote, he says,

00:06:12.000 give me a lever long enough and I can move the world.

00:06:15.680 That is leverage.

00:06:17.020 This really hit home for me when I was 28

00:06:19.440 and I moved to San Francisco.

00:06:20.920 I struggled, man.

00:06:21.820 I like literally my company that finally made me a millionaire also cost me everything in my life,

00:06:26.560 my relationships, my health, my mental sanity. And I almost decided to never start a business again

00:06:32.300 until I met a guy named Naval Ravikant. And talking to him, he's the one that introduced

00:06:36.400 me to these ideas of leverage. Every entrepreneur that masters these four areas have unlimited

00:06:42.840 potential of creating in this world without creating massive pain in their life. If you

00:06:47.540 master these four skills of leverage, then you can be as rich as you want to be. So the first C is

00:06:52.300 code. Think about software. Think about automation. Think about AI today. If you can learn how to use

00:06:58.440 technology to get things done, set it up, workflows, automation, you have massive amounts of leverage.

00:07:04.700 A little bit of work today means that it gets done forever. The second is content. When I look at

00:07:10.040 a playbook, a checklist, that's a piece of content, but that content can create a recipe that can have

00:07:15.280 somebody else do something for you a thousand times a million times without taking any more

00:07:19.400 of your time right when i look at the videos that i create here i can use this video right here to

00:07:24.040 share with all the young men that i mentor in my king's club program so that they can learn how to

00:07:28.660 get rich i shoot this video once and it can be seen by 10 million people massive amounts of

00:07:33.480 leverage the third is capital and capital is about how do i use my money to create more money so if

00:07:39.140 you think about it if i have money and i can run ads i can hire people i can invest that into

00:07:44.280 opportunities. It's going to generate returns and I can have my capital work for me. I can get

00:07:48.960 massive amounts of leverage. And the fourth is collaboration. It's how do you work with other

00:07:54.080 people? You know, people want to see good people win. People want to help people where they can

00:07:58.360 make money with them. So learning how to partner, learning how to recruit, learning how to manage

00:08:02.880 people, the emotional intelligence of other humans, that skill creates massive amounts of leverage.

00:08:08.580 Think about like all these luminary people like Gandhi and Oprah and The Rock even, or Rinaldo,

00:08:14.060 if you're a soccer fan.

00:08:15.060 Those people, because they understand how to communicate,

00:08:18.100 can get things done in the world that nobody else can.

00:08:21.080 That's leverage.

00:08:21.860 It's so cool because leverage

00:08:23.560 is like a volume knob for your skills.

00:08:26.260 If you wanna get more done,

00:08:28.260 then you just have to like learn how to ramp up your skill

00:08:31.020 and put the volume up.

00:08:32.480 The more volume you go up, that's the effort that goes down.

00:08:35.160 The bigger the outcome on the other side of that

00:08:37.260 is gonna be.

00:08:37.840 And then when it comes to hard work,

00:08:40.420 the hard work adds, but leverage multiplies.

00:08:43.340 See, that's why I call them multipliers

00:08:45.020 is that you can work as hard as you want.

00:08:46.720 The guy that's changing a roof

00:08:48.060 or digging a hole in the ground, he's working hard.

00:08:50.520 If he understands how to get leveraged,

00:08:52.080 he's gonna get more done.

00:08:53.060 Your effort stops looking like adding

00:08:55.060 and you start multiplying your outcomes.

00:08:57.380 And in fact, the biggest leverage for most people,

00:09:00.220 and this is true for me, is hiring an executive assistant.

00:09:03.220 Somebody that can buy back 10, 15, 20 hours of your week

00:09:07.440 doing mundane tasks,

00:09:09.180 things that don't add value to your work,

00:09:10.920 don't add your skillset,

00:09:12.020 don't teach you how to invest your money most people struggle with understanding what to give

00:09:15.780 them so if you want access to my internal ea playbook that i use it's like 27 pages of all

00:09:21.380 the best things over 15 years of perfecting this just click the link in the description i'll send

00:09:25.860 you a copy over for free but multiplication is useless if no one sees you that's why we have

00:09:30.500 to master rule number five we have to get distribution over creation having a great

00:09:35.620 offer something to sell without an audience is just like having a secret that nobody knows about

00:09:40.820 You have to build the distribution engine.

00:09:42.660 You don't wanna be the world's biggest kept secret.

00:09:45.720 You want everybody to know about you.

00:09:47.600 Everybody have the opportunity

00:09:48.640 to buy your high-income skill.

00:09:50.280 One of my portfolio companies at Martell Ventures

00:09:52.280 is called Precision.

00:09:53.300 They have one of the best products in the world

00:09:55.660 that helps a business understand their numbers

00:09:57.500 and give them very tactical strategies using AI

00:10:00.960 based on the best practices and the benchmarks

00:10:03.260 to fix the business.

00:10:04.640 But without a distribution engine that we built together,

00:10:07.260 no one would know that.

00:10:08.580 They wouldn't have any customers.

00:10:09.600 So just because you have the best product,

00:10:11.220 it still needs a way to get distribution.

00:10:13.200 So here's how you can build your distribution plan today.

00:10:16.320 First, we have to pick one channel.

00:10:18.360 Everyone gets held up

00:10:19.540 because they're trying to pick the right thing.

00:10:21.380 I've learned it's not about picking the right one.

00:10:23.720 It's about picking one and making it right.

00:10:25.600 Everyone you know that's one at the highest level,

00:10:27.980 picked one.

00:10:28.780 Joe Rogan, podcast.

00:10:30.340 Somebody else, LinkedIn.

00:10:31.920 For me, Instagram.

00:10:33.400 Those are my platforms.

00:10:34.440 Those are the places where I decided to go all in

00:10:36.920 and be masterful and do that.

00:10:38.820 and then with the resources, I could do other things.

00:10:41.360 So you gotta pick one.

00:10:42.300 The second is we have to make sure you post daily.

00:10:45.800 Consistency becomes a foundation for growth.

00:10:48.000 The thing that holds people back

00:10:49.400 from getting an audience or building distribution

00:10:51.680 is they're just not consistent.

00:10:53.560 And I'm gonna break your heart

00:10:54.620 if you don't wanna hear this,

00:10:55.620 but I'm talking about for the rest of your life.

00:10:57.320 If you lead with free value, giving away your best stuff,

00:11:00.160 I'm talking the best stuff

00:11:01.400 because information should be free.

00:11:03.160 Implementation is paid.

00:11:04.860 You get somebody a result in advance,

00:11:06.700 they will trust you and they will buy from you.

00:11:08.360 If you can solve their small problems,

00:11:10.280 they're gonna wanna pay you to solve their big problems.

00:11:12.640 The third is once you have that guarantee,

00:11:14.820 build your list, your owned media,

00:11:17.060 meaning your email, your SMS.

00:11:18.920 That's the difference between owned versus earned.

00:11:21.620 Social media is great

00:11:22.660 because you're using other people's platform,

00:11:24.740 their audience to build your awareness, your distribution,

00:11:27.300 but you don't own that.

00:11:28.660 You can get your account canceled tomorrow

00:11:30.060 and all of it goes away.

00:11:31.240 I like to take that attention and move it to my email,

00:11:33.680 move it to SMS.

00:11:34.680 You've probably seen me give out my text number.

00:11:36.780 You've probably seen my email address to opt in.

00:11:39.160 That way I can build a personal relationship

00:11:41.100 with the audience where the platform

00:11:43.180 can't take that away from me.

00:11:44.320 And finally, number four, and last but definitely not least,

00:11:47.560 you have to integrate your promotion into the content.

00:11:50.540 Meaning, I need you to figure out

00:11:52.100 what is the skill that you wanna sell?

00:11:53.820 What is the service you wanna sell?

00:11:55.300 And integrate it into the value of your content.

00:11:58.340 That feels great.

00:11:59.660 That means that what you do and what you teach

00:12:02.200 and the value you give and what you sell is aligned.

00:12:04.620 Think about Mr. Beast.

00:12:05.420 He sells chocolate bars.

00:12:06.620 You're watching a Mr. Beast video

00:12:07.980 and then he has an integrated play into the chocolate bar

00:12:11.020 that usually is on the theme of the video

00:12:13.540 that you're watching.

00:12:14.440 It's not like he's like, hey, eat my chocolate bars.

00:12:16.280 He's saying, and now they've got these chocolate bars

00:12:18.700 that they can eat while they're stuck in this fricking hole

00:12:20.660 for the next 60 days.

00:12:21.840 And that way there's a promotion on the product

00:12:23.960 that feels integrated into the content.

00:12:25.660 For example, if you're teaching somebody

00:12:26.880 like how to write great copy in an email

00:12:28.760 or how to do a sales call,

00:12:30.320 while you're teaching them, you can just say,

00:12:32.380 and for example, most people get stuck with these problems

00:12:34.940 if you want my help to overcome that issue,

00:12:37.540 just message me.

00:12:38.400 You literally go find me on Instagram

00:12:39.960 and you'll watch me do this all the time.

00:12:41.540 Most people just think it's content,

00:12:43.340 but it's integrated into my value.

00:12:45.740 Virality is luck, but distribution is a system.

00:12:49.520 This is important.

00:12:50.460 Please promise me you won't nuke your progress

00:12:53.540 by trying to flex at every step.

00:12:56.200 Rule number six is don't finance your flex.

00:12:59.900 Debt for assets, that's called leverage.

00:13:02.980 Debt for lifestyle,

00:13:03.820 that's a hole you'll never get out of one of my mentors a long time ago he said to me said making

00:13:08.640 money's easy keeping it is hard if you make a million dollars a year but you spend a million

00:13:13.260 point one dollars a year you're always going to be backwards learning how to use your cash flow

00:13:18.700 from your assets finance your flexing is the key and i get it everybody's like yeah but you're only

00:13:24.400 young once i'm only talking about three to five years if you can just chill the out for a few

00:13:29.700 years, you can get it today versus wishing when you're 50 or 60 that you had the freedom. And

00:13:35.160 trust me, when I was in my 20s, I was making a lot of money. And I decided to fly my little brother

00:13:39.800 to the West Coast and go on a snowboard trip for two weeks where I spent almost $16,000. I did

00:13:44.780 everything I wanted. And then I realized, oh, you didn't pay the taxes on that. And I had to spend

00:13:49.500 the next few months paying off the taxes because I didn't even know how to manage my money.

00:13:53.540 That lesson at 20 years old taught me how to set up my life so I never had to work ever again.

00:13:59.040 So remember, there's only two kinds of debt.

00:14:01.220 There's good debt, which I'm a fan of.

00:14:03.120 I'm not like an anti-debt like some finance people.

00:14:05.960 Financing that makes cash.

00:14:07.580 Things like financing inventory that you know you can sell,

00:14:10.220 investing in ads, equipment, real estate,

00:14:13.040 debt to buy assets or debt to invest in your business

00:14:16.080 to generate more returns

00:14:17.680 or buy a bigger piece of your business, good debt.

00:14:20.300 And then bad debt.

00:14:21.440 I'm talking debt to finance toys or status or your vacation.

00:14:26.460 Essentially, that's cash on fire.

00:14:28.820 The money can't work for you anymore.

00:14:30.480 Here's the rule that I live by.

00:14:32.100 If it doesn't pay you back, make you money,

00:14:34.500 then essentially you're selling yourself.

00:14:36.020 You're the product.

00:14:36.900 When you buy something,

00:14:38.600 you're actually spending the time it took you

00:14:41.260 to make the money to buy that thing.

00:14:43.500 Rich people buy assets, broke people buy the applause.

00:14:46.620 All right, if you made it this far, freaking awesome.

00:14:48.800 You're on your way to get rich.

00:14:50.080 And the cool part is you don't need talent, 0.99

00:14:51.560 you don't need luck or any of that other shit. 0.94

00:14:53.320 But now it's the time to make some real bets. 0.92

00:14:55.320 So rule number seven, use the money as a tool,

00:14:57.760 not the goal the goal is freedom never forget that money's not meant to be hoarded money is

00:15:05.020 meant to be used when i was growing up i had one of my best friend's dad he owned a food truck and

00:15:10.260 that guy worked literally 60 hours a week all the time in his food truck to make cash and all the

00:15:16.440 extra cash he saved it in his home he hoarded it he put it in the wall he didn't trust the banks

00:15:21.840 it was kind of wild to figure this out and then there was a fire

00:15:24.660 watching the reaction of his family lose 30 years of everything they've ever done because he didn't

00:15:34.680 understand how to take the money to invest in the skill meant he lost it all i have a problem when

00:15:39.240 people think money's evil money doesn't solve problems money amplifies who you are if you are 1.00

00:15:44.420 a great person you'll have more greatness in your life if you're an asshole and you're an evil person 0.99

00:15:48.840 guess what that more money is just going to amplify who you are there's only one really 0.99

00:15:52.620 important rule freedom isn't found in your bank account it's found in your calendar the goal is

00:15:57.580 to use money to buy back your time that's leverage so that you can spend that time doing the things

00:16:03.180 you love hopefully you fall in love with becoming better because god's not going to reward somebody

00:16:07.980 to go get free and make a lot of money to go hang out on the beach because he created you to go be

00:16:13.020 a creator go do stuff in the world if your whole plan is to get free to chill out and do nothing

00:16:18.780 Don't be surprised if that opportunity never comes to you.

00:16:21.360 That's why I spend so much money

00:16:22.840 on hiring people to support my life.

00:16:24.960 Not only does it buy back my time,

00:16:26.800 having Ann, my executive assistant,

00:16:28.420 Betty, my house manager, Sam, my creative director,

00:16:30.280 Todd, who's my CEO, Roddy, who's the CEO,

00:16:32.360 essentially team Martel.

00:16:33.700 It's I get to invest in those people,

00:16:35.720 help those people create their dreams,

00:16:37.320 create a bigger future for all of us to win it.

00:16:40.140 That to me is the whole point about having money,

00:16:42.640 is creating richness, not only in my life,

00:16:44.700 but in other people's lives.

00:16:45.940 And by the way, speaking to my team member,

00:16:47.440 especially my executive assistant and my admin team,

00:16:50.220 if you want my playbook,

00:16:51.540 just click the link below and I'll send it to you.

00:16:53.960 This is literally 15 years perfected

00:16:55.980 into the tightest, simplest format for my structure,

00:16:59.020 my templates, my North Star metrics.

00:17:01.160 It's all there for you.

00:17:01.940 Just click the link in the description below.

00:17:03.680 Achieving freedom is the goal,

00:17:06.320 but the real reward is actually not the money.

00:17:09.040 It's who you get to become in the process.

00:17:11.140 You take all of this, everything I've built,

00:17:14.040 all my companies away from me, I'm good

00:17:16.300 because I became that person.

00:17:18.260 I've got the skills.

00:17:19.460 I know how to do it.

00:17:20.620 I could do it in a third of the time.

00:17:22.160 Starting from scratch, know what I know,

00:17:23.720 not making the same mistakes, boom, watch me.

00:17:26.380 You can literally take people like an Elon Musk,

00:17:29.060 Jeff Bezos, plop them in the center of a country,

00:17:32.500 come back in five years,

00:17:33.680 and you would find a person

00:17:34.940 that's dominating in that country.

00:17:36.540 It's just who they are.

00:17:38.180 This process of wanting to be rich is awesome.

00:17:41.020 I want that for you.

00:17:42.060 But what I'm excited about

00:17:43.480 is who you get to become in the process.

00:17:45.420 Then you get to this really cool place where the work feels like play.

00:17:49.520 When you wake up and you feel like, I can't believe this is my job,

00:17:52.620 this is how I create, this is what I'm doing, and it feels so fun,

00:17:55.860 that's when you know you become rich and you need talent, trust fund, education, none of that.

00:18:01.860 Now, if you want to learn how to build a business that runs itself,

00:18:04.940 just click the video and I'll see you on the other side.

Dan Martell - October 28, 2025

How to get rich without luck, talent, or a trust fund

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