The Growth Booth

How To Get PAID To Own A Ferrari (plus Super-Yachts & Planes) | The Growth Booth #50

December 20, 2022 Aidan Booth Season 1 Episode 50
The Growth Booth
How To Get PAID To Own A Ferrari (plus Super-Yachts & Planes) | The Growth Booth #50
Show Notes Transcript

Did you know you can make money owning a $400,000 Ferrari?

Welcome to the 50th episode of The Growth Booth Podcast, a show focused on supporting budding entrepreneurs and established business owners alike, towards achieving lifestyle freedom through building successful online businesses.

For the penultimate episode of 2022, Aidan’s business partner Steve Clayton is back to share about his version of lifestyle freedom. From private planes, superyachts, and other cool toys, listen in for Steve’s amazing recipe for this lifestyle design and what this kind of freedom is all about.

Whether you're looking for step-by-step strategies to start building an online business, simple game plans to grow your business, or proven lifestyle freedom frameworks, you’re in the right place.

Stay tuned and be sure to join the thousands of listeners already in growth mode!


Timestamps:

00:00 Intro

02:37 Owning & Flying Private Planes

12:52 Owning & Navigating Superyachts

26:15 Owning A Ferrari… And Making Money From It?

38:55 Outro


Links and Resources Mentioned:


About Our Host:

Aidan Booth is passionate about lifestyle freedom and has focused on building online businesses to achieve this since 2005. From affiliate marketing to eCommerce, small business marketing to SAAS (software as a service), online education to speaking at seminars, the journey has been a rollercoaster ride with plenty of thrills along the way. Aidan is proud to have helped thousands of entrepreneurs earn their first dollar online, and coached many people to build million-dollar businesses. Aidan and his business partner (Steven Clayton) are the #1 ranked vendors on Clickbank.com, and sell their products in over 100 countries globally, as well as in 20,000+ stores across the USA, to generate 8-figures annually.

Away from the online world, Aidan is a proud Dad of two young kids, an avid investor, a swimming enthusiast, and a nomadic traveler.

 

Let's Connect!

●  Visit the website: https://thegrowthbooth.com/ 

●  Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/aidanboothonline 

●  Let's connect on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aidanboothonline/ 

●  Subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/TheGrowthBooth 


Thanks for tuning in! Please don’t forget to like, share, and subscribe!


Aidan

Hey, Aidan Booth here. Welcome to episode number 50 of The Growth Booth. I'm super excited today because we are going to talk about how you can get paid to own a Ferrari and other supercars. And I've got no one better to talk about that topic than my business partner, Steve Clayton. Steve, thanks for being here.

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, my pleasure. It's good to be here again.

 

Aidan

Now it's a super exciting time of the year as well because we are running what is, I think, our 11th Annual Twelve-Day Giveaway. And if you don't know what that is, then I'm going to tell you right now, you need to head over to the12daygiveaway.com because we're going to be giving away $1,000 per day for twelve days, or I should say prizes that are worth around about that amount of money, as well as lots of cool things. And you're going to be able to see how you can come along on a journey with us as well, which, by the way, there's a really nice Ferrari in that journey, and you're going to see how all that ties up.

 

So anyway, Ferraris, super yachts, planes. Steve, you are a lover of the finer things in life, and I feel privileged to be your business partner because I get to play around and all these things without actually having to buy them. We're going to talk about Ferraris and owning $500,000 sports cars and making money with them. We're going to talk about the experience of owning a super yacht and either making or maybe losing money and planes here. Racing, flying experiences, not finding runways, emergency levers, lifestyle, and freedom as well. But I want to start with the plane. So what was it that made you want to own a plane? Maybe you can tell a little bit of that story.

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, I kind of feel like I have a much better perspective on what drove me to do that now than perhaps I even did when I first got into it, just sort of by virtue of experience and knowing yourself and that sort of thing. So I mean, flying has always been something that has fascinated me. I mean, I've always been super interested in, I guess even when I was a teenager and saw Top Gun and everybody's favorite flying movie. So I was really into flying, but as it turns out, the other thing that I'm really, really into is systems and procedures. It sounds ridiculous, right? My father always makes fun of me. That is the ultimate I think the old expression was like a busman's holiday where you go out and relax, you consume a whole manual of an airplane and air traffic control guidelines and procedures and reading charts. And he's like, “How is that relaxing?” I'm like, yeah.

 

Aidan

Sounds like it makes you go to sleep!

 

 

Steve

Yeah, I know it's crazy, but it's like a thing with me. I love to dive into something and master it, and that's just something that I don't know. That's how I can relax. I think all those things drove me to fly. But the other thing was also incredible. We talked so much about freedom and the ability to get in your own airplane and just jump in and then land and get out, and you're somewhere completely different. I mean, I know it's the same thing you could do with a car, right? But the distances and the types of freedom that you have are just so much different. Like, I remember I always wanted to do a lot of training with my instructor. It was really important to me. I'm really all about safety and all that sort of stuff. So we would be looking for things to do and we would wake up and we'd get on the airplane in North Carolina and we would go to New Orleans for lunch. And we'd go to Memphis, New Orleans, and we'd have some of the New Orleans dishes. And then we would go to Memphis and have a barbecue for dinner. And then we'd just come back so you can do this. It just had this incredible amount of freedom to it.

 

The other thing I remember was perhaps the single most amazing experience of my flying career. I was flying by myself from North Carolina to Key West. And that was a route I did very often because we had kids in North Carolina. We had our boat in Key West. And anyway, I was by myself, and it was like at night. It was 11:00 at night or something, so it was obviously dark, but it was a full moon. And I remember I came upon the clouds up above a cloud barrier, and I saw the moon. And I was sitting there by myself, maybe 30 minutes out over the ocean, heading to Key West, and I'm just floating in the air like some kind of astronaut. And I was like, this is the most amazing sense of freedom I have ever had in my life. I didn't even know that that's what I was chasing when I was going after it. But I'm sure that's way more than you wanted to know. But those are the things that really drove me to want to learn how to fly.

 

Aidan

Talk about that freedom. It wasn't just like domestic freedom either. I mean, I traveled with you on a couple of occasions internationally in your plane, and tell us a story about not being able to find the runway because as a passenger, that was kind of unnerving when Steve was like, supposedly…

 

Steve Clayton

First of all, it wasn't my fault. It wasn't my fault. I just want to be very clear about this. So what happened was we were filming, and we were going to go to this place that I know very well in the Bahamas, that you can only reach by private plane or private boat. However, the problem was that the runway that we would normally use, which calling it a runway is being very generous, was closed for an extended period of time. So we knew before we left that we had to go to another island. And this runway was even less of a runway, right? However, it was in our navigation systems, so it's a real runway. So we navigated to the Bahamas, and we flew right to where the runway ought to be. And as we got down to look for said runway, it was not there. So as it turns out, they had moved the runway to some other island like next door, but you can't see it.

 

Aidan

I don't think it ever existed where they said it was because I remember looking out the window. There's not much down there. Just like, a bit of scrub, a little bit of bush, and we're definitely not going to land on that.

 

Steve Clayton

No. And the runway itself is big. In fact, I knew it was really going to be the shortest runway I had ever landed on. And so I had actually practiced on other runways in the United States that were short and then just said, “Okay, well, I'm only going to use half of it,” or whatever. And so I had done that like a published time because I wanted to make sure I didn't kill everybody.

 

Aidan

That reminds me of the people that have seen Top Gun and even the most recent Top Gun, they have to train themselves to do things that you wouldn't normally need to do, like get down the valley in a certain number of seconds or something, and then go up and go down. This was like Steve navigating into this teeny tiny runway. Not only it wasn't very long, but it wasn't extensive either. You got to nail this, otherwise, we're going to be in the grass.

 

Stave Clayton

So, we get there, and it's clear the runway is not there. And so Adam and I were flying, and I think we had somebody else with us. It was like, “Okay, well, what are we going to do?” I was like, “Yeah, I'm not sure.” But then luckily, we saw another airplane, I kid you not, which you don't often see. I mean, you don't love seeing other people around you. The whole idea is to maintain a lot of separation. Anyway, we saw this guy. I was able to reach him on the radio, and I was like, “Hey, I'm just calling for directions. Do you happen to know where this runway is?” He's like, “Oh, yeah, right over here. Follow me.” So I just ended up… it was the most bizarre flying I've ever done, because normally when I fly, and again, I'm back to the whole procedure thing, I'm a stickler. Like, I know exactly when we're going to leave. I know how much fuel we have. I know how much we weigh. I know what the winds are doing. I know exactly how long it's going to take us. I know the procedure that I'm going to follow to get down and land here. It was like, just follow me.

 

Aidan

No air traffic control?

 

Steve Clayton

No, no air traffic control. Nobody wanted to hear from you at all. Yeah. So that was kind of an adventure. There were a few of those things, but that was a thing.

 

Aidan

I know we want to get into the superyacht, and everyone wants to know how the hell you make money on earning supercars, but how long does it take to get a pilot's license to the point where you're able to fly for yourself? Or is it like the number of hours that you have to do? It's a combination of that.

 

Stave Clayton

Yeah, so there are a bunch of different ways to answer that question. There is a minimum number of hours that you need to do in order to be eligible to take the driving test with an FAA examiner. But most people need more than the minimum hours. And to be honest, it's been so many years, I forget what the minimum hours are. I think it's like 40 or something for a private pilot. This would be a good time to say that I think that there are two kinds of pilots. There are pilots who are natural. I call them the stick-and-rudder guys. They can get in an airplane. They can fly anywhere. Tom Cruise, for those of you who don't know, is an actual pilot and the guy is an absolute natural. He flies helicopters. He flies a million different kinds of airplanes. And it comes easy to him. There are several pilots that are like that.

 

And then there are the other guys, which I fall into. I'm not a stick-and-rudder guy. It doesn't come naturally to me. And so you have to really, you know, work at it a lot to maintain that and build up and maintain that muscle memory of flying. So that's why I'm saying anybody can do it, but there are some people that can do it a lot easier. So if you're a stickler guy, you could do it in 40 hours and you could take the test. But then the other reason it's not so simple, to answer that question, is that it only gives you what's called a private pilot. Everyone calls it a license. It's a certificate, but it's a private pilot's license, which isn't really enough. Pilots call it a license to learn at that point.

 

So then you can fly others within certain rules or regulations, but you can only fly what's called VFR. You can only fly visually when you can see what's in front of you. You're not going to fly in any kind of weather, you're not going to fly in bad weather. You're not going to be talking to air traffic control. You're not in the system. You're going to be going up and burning holes in the sky close to an airport. You could do some cross-countries, but it's a visual flight. So then you have to fly for about another year or so, and then you can go and train to get your instrument certificate, which I did, all those things because you really need that in order to fly internationally, in order to fly in any kind of weather. And we started to use the airplane a lot for commuting back and forth to Key West. So we really needed that. I mean, I needed to fly in rain and clouds and that sort of thing, again, way more than anybody wanted to know, but it's just a hard question to answer.

 

Aidan

Right. It gives us a bit more context anyway into that process, for those of you that are wondering. Now, let's move on to the superyacht, another interesting toy that not that many people end up getting, but you got one, and it wasn't your first yacht. I went down and stayed on a smaller one. But still amazing that you had before that there was always an attraction to having a vessel on the water kind of a thing. What's the back story?

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, I mean, for me, my dad always had boats, nothing as big as I had, but we always had a small boat to do something or other fishing the ocean or whatever. So I was always pretty enamored with it. Love the ocean. But again, it also comes back to the whole systems thing. These are floating houses with the bigger ones, and they have their own HVAC systems, they have their own generators to create electricity, and their own water treatments, not only just treating regular water but making regular water out of seawater. They have systems to keep the boat from rocking. I mean, there are just a million different things. And then there is again, being a captain of a boat, a certain size boat is very analogous to being a pilot. I think it's a little less complicated having done both, but it's still pretty complicated being able to read charts and navigate all the computer systems. So it really is right in my wheelhouse, all that kind of stuff. So a lot of synergies between pilots and captains.

 

Aidan

Tell us briefly about, like, we've sort of mentioned one of the little hair-raising stories about not finding a runway. Now we've got another partner who [slot], Tim, and apparently, you almost killed Tim out on the boat, which I think you're also heading to the Bahamas. It's like you're in a bloody Bermuda Triangle or something.

 

Steve Clayton

We were, yes, we were in the Bermuda Triangle, actually, but which was scary. We were heading from, I can't remember, maybe we were heading from Abaco to Atlantis in Nassau, Paradise Island. So it's a pretty decent trip, maybe a six, eight-hour trip kind of thing. And you do get some open ocean.

 

Aidan

To be clear, you're on your middle-sized yacht at this point.

 

Steve Clayton

No, this was a 52-foot boat that I kept by myself for about ten years, and a great boat. It's the size that everybody is within everyone's grasp. I mean, obviously, if you know what I'm trying to say, it's not a million-dollar boat. I mean, if you bought one new, but you can buy plenty of used 52-foot cruising boats that can do these kinds of trips for a couple of hundred thousand dollars. So it's equivalent to having a vacation kind of thing. So well within people's eventual grasp, not crazy. And I had that for ten years. And so, yeah, we were in that boat, a very capable boat, but as we were navigating there, a beautiful sunny day all of a sudden turned into an absolute nightmare with squalls.

 

And as if that wasn't enough, we actually had several water spouts, which are essentially tornadoes on the water. And Tim, who has no boating experience and was not a happy camper, was very, very unhappy. And I don't have any water spout experience. I have a rough weather experience, but not this, and so Tim was like, “All right, well, we need to avoid those.” I'm like, “Well, yes, we do. However, I don't know where they're going.” They're all over the place. Like, I can't avoid something that doesn't have a track. Anyway, we made it through there, but it did rip. It actually ripped off the hydraulic lines of our radar mast and everything. It did some damage to the boat.

 

Aidan

I'm glad I wasn't on that one with you. I'm sure you guys must have had a celebratory drink upon arrival.

 

Stave Clayton

We did. We sure did, and Tim’s like, “Yeah I'm not going back.”

 

Aidan

Is that when you decided that you needed to get a bigger boat?

 

Steve Clayton

No, we were safe. That was a great boat. Again, I liked the whole freedom thing – a couple of times. I took our young kids, and any one of their friends once, and we went all throughout the Bahamas for 30 days at a time in this boat. And it is, in my opinion, it's that sweet spot for the owner-operator. And honestly, now they're even easier because now they have joystick control. Because the hardest thing about once you're out in the middle of the ocean, there are challenges, obviously, the weather and things like that, and navigation, but you don't have any docking problems. Where most people have problems is docking. It's like, oh, there's wind, there are currents, I got other boats. It's a scary thing. It took me a long time to feel comfortable doing it. But now they have these joysticks, which basically annoys all of us captains because it lets anybody do it without any kind of experience or practice. You don't have to worry about asymmetrical trust and changing two engines and dealing with all sorts of other things anyway.

 

So people should feel comfortable, if they have a dream like this, thinking about it because it's very attainable, these boats are very fairly easy to manage in that size range, and they're now even easier to dock. And while that was new technology 15 years ago, now these boats are available on the used market at very reasonable prices.

 

Aidan

Right. Sounds like the transition from a manual shift in the car, manually changing gears to all of a sudden just having a car magically do it automatically. And then a lot of people are learning to drive nowadays, and they don't know how to drive manually.

 

Steve Clayton

I think it's really analogous to that. Yeah.

 

Aidan

So then you upgraded to the superyacht, which was amazing, a really amazing boat, and I was fortunate to go on it at least a couple of times. And I mean, to paint a picture here, this is something that had, correct me if I'm wrong, we had, like, three or four bedrooms, at least a couple of these were bedrooms with en-suite bathrooms and double beds and a big ship. And you don't realize how big it is until you're on it, because there's like, a level below deck. There's a level, which I guess is like at deck level, and then you've got the top level. It's absolutely amazing. It really is like a floating house at that point, and even bigger than a house sometimes. So what was the deal there? I mean, I know that we went out on a superyacht one time. I know a little bit about the deal, but you can fill on the gap. So we went out on a super yacht. Steve was like, “Oh, this is nice.” Steve disappears for half an hour, comes back, and he's made a spreadsheet about buying a super yacht. Okay, that's interesting. Well, there we go. And then, sure enough, this tends to happen, what Steve starts imagining, he ends up having, and he got superior. So was that always something that you had in mind, or was it something that you just sort of thought about one day and realized that it was doable?

 

Steve Clayton

It was something I always wanted to do and I really wanted to experience it. There's a tipping point from the 50-foot boat that I captained myself for ten years to maybe around 80 or so feet, maybe a little, maybe 90. This boat that I had was just shy of 100ft, and it had three guest cabins, all of which could have two or three, or four people, depending on how you wanted it. And they all had suites, and then it had crew quarters as well because when we ran, we always had our crew. So this is like, anywhere between eight to ten people are living on this yacht.

 

And so it's some of the same things as the 50ft. In fact, I mean, I could maneuver the boat. I could drive the boat. In some ways, it's actually easier because it's much bigger and much heavier and so you're not pushed around as much by current stuff. In other words, it's harder. I didn't drive it a lot. But I wanted to experience that tipping point where all of a sudden, the systems are way more complex. So, like, for example, instead of small individual air conditioning units, there was a central chilling unit or several of them which were much like a high-rise where it would chill water and then route water through air handlers among the boat. I guess I have a little bit of an engineering kind of person in me. My dad's a mechanical engineer. I love that shit. I just love getting involved in all that, learning it. So it had amazing systems on it, converting seawater into drinkable water and all that sort of stuff, all the different hot water heaters and how that all worked.

 

So you kind of got this: it's an almost mini little apartment complex, really bigger than just a single house. And so there was so much to it. And so I always wanted to experience that. I always wanted to experience more of the business side of yachting and chartering and having a crew. I love the idea of having a chief and somebody who could freaking wash my boat so I wouldn't have to wash the boat and I could just show up or meet me. And we did that a few times. The one I kept for myself. I always had to move to where I wanted it to go, this boat. I could show up in the Virgin Islands, which we did at least once and it was there. Stuff like that. It's something I had always wanted to do.

 

Aidan

I think a lot of people could imagine the appeal of having one of these things. I mean, if you've ever been down to a dock in a major city or a port or something, or you've just seen them on TV, I mean, they are absolutely mind-blowing and definitely look like they are a toy of the rich and the famous. But what was it that you didn't like about having a superyacht? What's the other side of the coin there?

 

Steve Clayton

Well, fast forward. I had that boat for four years or so, maybe five years, and ran a charter business and stuff, among other things. And I sold it. I guess the time goes so bad quickly. I think it's two years now and I probably will never have another boat. It's like it's over for me, which is not to say it's horrible. It's just that I got it out of my system. And the thing that I really didn't like is the people aspect. For those of you guys who've watched Below Deck and have seen the interpersonal issues with the crew, finding crew, interviewing them, that sucked. I mean, it was really bad. It was really hard to find qualified people who would stick around and that was really tough. So I didn't like that. It was horrible and I just didn't want to deal with anyone.

 

Aidan

When it gets to the point where it's causing your stress and you're waking up in the morning or in the night and you're solving problems, it's no longer the dream that you should have had. But you had a good run there. And I know that it is great to be able to be in a position where anytime you want to, you can always go back until they have the best of both worlds by chartering one of these ones for a couple of weeks.

 

Steve Clayton

Which I probably will do. Yeah, I mean, we've talked about it. But on the other hand, I may not do it anytime real soon because I just feel like I kind of got it out of my system and now I want to do other things. I've been a boater for a really long time.

 

Aidan

Well, I think we should do it. I think we should do it. I'm going to work on convincing you.

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, it's like a guy's business trip kind of thing. I'm totally on board. That's not an issue. I just mean, like with family and stuff.

 

Aidan

Yeah, right, I get that. And I'm also telling you we haven't spoken about, but if you're listening to this and you want to own a super yacht, there's actually some pretty interesting tax. There's an interesting tax side to it. And if you do a Google search for tax benefits of owning a superyacht, you might be able to find some pretty interesting things which might make it much more viable than you would otherwise think.

 

I know there are some really, really interesting things there and lots published about it, but everyone wants to know, how do you own a Ferrari and make it make you money or not? Like, lose your money? Because I've got a Nissan and my Nissan is not worth a lot of money, there's not really much that it can sort of go down in value. But you've got a car and have had lots of cars that have been worth half a million dollars or more, and they actually make you money. So what's the deal there?

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, I think you have to look at a few things. One is you have to look at the total cost of ownership of anything. If you look at it like a traditional Toyota, this is pre-COVID. Before, the used car market was crazy, but now it's starting to normalize, obviously. But pre-COVID, you buy a Toyota for what, $30,000, and you keep it for three years. And at the end of three years, it's probably worth picking a number, $20,000, $15,000. So you've lost that amount of money on that asset, plus all the operating expenses that you might have had, like tires and oil changes and anything that went wrong with the car. Hopefully, it's fixed on the warranty.

 

So you buy a Toyota, and maybe at the end of the day, it ends up costing you after three years of owning it. And now you divest of that asset, it may have cost you $15,000. So contrast that with the Ferrari that I just bought about eight months ago or so. Now, that one I ordered new, and I waited two years for it - a long time - and I paid $400,000 for that car. Now, if I paid, you can obviously pay with cash or you can finance something like that, right? And in this example, right now, that car is being sold for $550,000 to $575,000. Now, when I go to get rid of it, I tend to get rid of cars quickly because I get bored with cars and I switch cars and things like that, which actually works to my advantage here. So when I go to sell this car, which will probably be at the two-year mark, since I already have the next one ordered, then I’m guessing the car will be worth maybe $500,000, maybe more, honestly.

 

And so what I bought for $400,000, I will have held for two years. Ferrari includes all the maintenance. I will spend no money on maintenance. I probably won't spend any money on tires or anything. I'll have insurance and stuff like that. But look, at the end of the day, I'll make $100,000. So I'll have two years. I'll sell it for $500,000, I bought it for $400,000, which is a hell of a lot better than the stock market, right, even the stock market during COVID. And the reason that that happens is that the Ferraris obviously keep their value more than a Toyota in general. But Ferrari has always been a more limited car, so there's more demand than there is supply. And people don't like to wait. Whereas if you kind of get on the train where you have a car and you've already ordered the next one, the waiting is not so hard. As I always say, my next one is two years away, but it's not a hardship because I have a Ferrari in the garage. So not a big deal, right?

 

It sounds insane, and I finally have convinced my father that I'm not an irresponsible person here. It's not like I'm going out and spending $400,000 on a car. I'm just not because even if you financed it, let's say you financed it, and your car payment was something ridiculous, like $2,000 a month, right? Even if you do that, you're still making more than you would in the stock market. So it's not about, “Oh, if you have the cash, you can buy.” No, it's not. Yes, obviously not someone who's homeless and can't buy a Ferrari because they don't have the credit. So I'm not trying to say that, I'm not trying to be ridiculous here, but the math is real, and that does speak for itself. It's not every single Ferrari model. You have to know the market. You have to do your research. You have to maybe have a little experience with it. I've lost track, to be honest with you. I think I'm on my 8th Ferrari. Maybe not, because I also have a Ferrari race car. Now, I don't even know if I told you about it. These are investments. These are assets that are appreciating in value or at least not losing money. So even if I sold it in two years for the same thing that I bought it for, it's still cheaper than buying a Toyota.

 

Aidan

Yeah, that's amazing. It's amazing. And the first time you told me the story, I was like, “Holy crap, I really need to get myself one of these.” And so I've been working on this logic with my wife for a while, and I'm like, “Honey, we're going to make some good money out of this thing, and I'm not going to be sitting in the traffic lights in a freaking Nissan.” But anyway, that's a work in progress and that's a story for another day. One thing I will say…

 

Steve Clayton

It took me a long time.

 

Aidan

Right. Well, now I'm sure your wife is completely in on the idea and probably wants to buy more.

 

Steve Clayton

Yeah, she finally, she's just like, “Fine, I give up.” But I think that is one of the key differences between people who do this kind of stuff like me, and people who don't. It's because they just refuse to accept that those are real. That's real data. Instead, they look at me and I know there are plenty of my neighbors and plenty of people I know and plenty of people in my family who think I'm very irresponsible financially. And certainly, the boat is not a responsible financial decision. That was more of an emotional decision and something that was a dream of mine. So, yeah, boats are always going to lose money, and most cars are always going to lose money. Airplanes depend on a lot of things. But this is the path that I chose because I think outside the box, because I think, well, of course, I could figure out a way to make this work. You know, I do. And that's a big difference because other people refuse to even think outside the box there and think that it's even possible.

 

Aidan

Recently I was driving in Argentina and Buenos Aires, and I was cruising down one of the avenues, and up next to a minute it pulls up next to me, a Ferrari. And it wasn't a 2022 F8 Spider. It was maybe like a five or six-year-old Ferrari. It was a nice car. I can't remember exactly what the model was. And the next minute there were like three or four crazy Argentinian drivers all weaving in and out trying to follow this thing. And at that point, I was like, you know, getting a Ferrari down here in Buenos Aires might not be the best thing for me, but anyway, I'm really looking forward to being able to drive more in these amazing vehicles. And again, just a reminder that you're going to be able to see Steve and me going on a road trip. We were going to be in one of these things pretty soon. In fact, you can go to the12daygiveaway.com and make sure you're following along with what we're doing there because you're going to be able to see how we are cruising along in this thing and we're going to be taking off on that road trip pretty shortly. Here.

 

One last question on the whole car thing, something that has always interested me. You've owned a Lamborghini. How do you compare the Ferrari to the Lamborghini? What's your take on the uninitiated?

 

Steve Clayton

I always described it as a Lamborghini. You drive with your shoulders, they're bigger, they're heavier, and they're all wheel drive. And Ferraris are a little bit much more of a finesse thing. You drive with your wrists, they're all rear-wheel drive, about 99% of them anyway. And they are a little bit more playful, they're lighter, they feel lighter, they feel a little bit more nimble. And I think Ferraris are a little bit, I mean look, they're all supercars, they all command attention, but they are a little bit more understated than Lamborghini.

 

Now Lamborghini's changed a little bit. I haven't driven the new ones, I only had one and that was a Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder years ago. So maybe it's changed. But for me, I've always been sort of a Ferrari guy. And the other thing though that's important is it benefits you to sort of hit your wagon to a particular brand because you can build a relationship with the dealer and then you can get on a waiting list for a car that hasn't been announced yet. Not because there are plenty of people who are buying more cars than me and that sort of thing. In fact, do we have time for one quick story?

 

Aidan

Sure.

 

Steve Clayton

I was at the Formula One race recently and I was sitting with a guy who clearly was incredibly wealthy. We were both big Ferrari fans and we were in the Ferrari area and all this kind of stuff. And so I was talking to him and I'm like, “Well, which one are you driving now? I've got an epic

Spider.” And he paused and it took him a really long time to try to answer the question. I was like, “What's going on? Was he bullshitting me or is it not real or something?” So finally he comes around and he goes, “Well, I have all of them.” I'm like, “What do you mean you have all of them?” He goes, “Well, name one.” “Okay. 812, Superfast.” He goes, “Yeah, I have one of those.” “Okay, so you have all of the Ferraris?” He goes, “Yes, I have all of the Ferraris.” Why would you have all?

 

Aidan

I know what he's trying to do. He's trying to make like 20% return on investment on every single car, every single year. And he's making like a gazillion dollars because he owns a gazillion Ferraris. I'm pretty sure that's what he's doing.

 

Steve Clayton

No, he's keeping them. So he's not flipping them, he's not selling them, which, yes, he could have made a lot of money already, right? So his car collection is going up in value, but he doesn't recognize the gain. But what he's trying to do is he wants to get the very exclusive cars, so he wants to get the LaFerrari successor. These are multimillion-dollar cars, which even I think are ridiculous. Now, having said that, all of them will immediately make him a couple of million more because they only make 100 of them, whatever it is. Right?

 

So the car that you buy for $1.5 million is immediately worth $5 million or at least in six months it is, or whatever. It's crazy. But you don't get to buy those cars unless you're invited by Ferrari. And so the only way to get invited by Ferrari is to buy every single car they offer you. So he's like, “When they come out with a car, I buy the car. That's why I have all the cars.” So, I was like, “Okay.”

 

Aidan

I love that. I wonder if that kind of strategy could be applied to online businesses. Like you buy the whole product line and you and you get invited to something pretty special. Anyway, that's amazing. And just coming back to something fun that we've got coming up, if you want to find out if Ferraris really are made for Italian roads and small teeny tiny Italian villages, then you need to tune in for the 12-Day Giveaway and other bits of pieces that I've got coming up in the new year.

 

Steve Clayton

You'll find out.

 

Aidan

And you’ll find out about Ferraris that are really made for Italian roads and small Italian villages. Now, the last thing I really want to hammer home here is what we've been talking about are things that lifestyle design and lifestyle freedom enable you to have. These things might sound excessive, but really, where there's a will, there's a way. And you don't have to be earning megabucks to be able to do these things. We've spoken about this in the past, in fact, way back in episode number 12 and 13 that I did with Steve on The Growth Booth back in March. And you can find those by going to thegrowthbooth.com, navigate to podcast episodes 12 and 13, March 2022.

 

You'll see that we dive deeper into Steve's recipe for lifestyle freedom and happiness. And much of the same formulas that we discussed there in those episodes can be used for achieving the types of things or having the types of things and being able to live that kind of a lifestyle that you want to live and ticking things off the bucket list. Like you just mentioned going to F1, Formula One event, I think you were in Abu Dhabi, was it? That's like a bucket list thing. It's a memory that you're going to have and that's the kind of thing that I think anyone can do. If you start to imagine it and start to sort of plot the path towards it, it doesn't have to be something that is reserved for only the mega-wealthy.

 

So again, we're going to be diving into lifestyle design, lifestyle freedom, and so much more in the 12-Day Giveaway, this kind of theme for what we're doing there this year. So if you're listening to this episode right now, then you're sort of in the right place at the right time to head over to the12daygiveaway.com and find out what we're doing.

 

Look, Steve, thanks for tuning in here with us today and sharing some of your amazing adventures, near-death experiences, fast cars, big boats, private planes, and so much more. I've said it before, being Steve Clayton's business partner has got its perks and I'm incredibly grateful for that. And one day I'm going to find a few perks that I can throw your way as well. So, guys, that's a wrap. You can see this episode. It's episode number 50. Head over to thegrowthbooth.com, navigate to number 50 and I will see you in the next episode of The Growth Booth, which will be the final episode for 2022. So make sure you tune in and I'll see you next time. Thanks, guys.