Transcription
I just don't know how people managed to work a 9 to 5 for most of their life because I just couldn't do it. I mean, I had a normal job, a 9 to 5, but actually more 8 to 6, and I did that for about 10 years. But it just made me depressed, anxious, exhausted. I just felt I didn't have time for anything else beyond working.
But after about 10 years, I kind of woke up and realized, now this needs to change. And so I implemented a lot of changes, and the end result is me being here in the south of Brazil now, having totally left the rat race, doing what I enjoyed doing. Now, I'm not criticizing anyone who works at a 9 to 5 job. I mean, everyone's different. Now, there's lots of people who found a career and a job they really like, and that's great. But then there are lots of people like me. Um, and the only reason I did a 9 to 5 was for one reason, and that's money. And had I won the lottery, or I don't know, inherited lots of money from some distant relative, then I would have quit my job that second. And I suspect that the majority of people who are watching this video are probably a bit like me.
So I had a couple of jobs during these 10 years. They're all in finance. Um, they're okay jobs. The pay was decent, not great, but okay. I'm not going to lie. I would say in my first job, I found that exciting, probably for the first two or three months because I was in this new, really nice office. I was given a desk, a laptop, I had all these new colleagues, and I could sit in these meetings with senior managers and directors, trying to understand how the business works. And I got a paycheck at the end of the month, which was something new for me. So again, I thought that was great.
But then after about two or three months, that had totally changed because I realized the work that I was doing was very repetitive. Um, some of the colleagues were a bit annoying, not all of them, but some. And also my boss wasn't the greatest. He'd be complaining when I didn't do things his way, constantly giving me more work to do, even though I still had loads to do. And also realized quickly that I just hate having people telling me what to do. Um, I guess I should go to a psychiatrist or something and work out where that comes from, really. But I just don't work well when someone's constantly telling me what to do, kind of micromanaging me, and it just got very, very annoying for me.
But it wasn't just the work and the colleagues which I didn't like. There's also other things like the commute. So, I mean, my commute wasn't very long, it was about half an hour in the mornings and half an hour in the evening, but still, that adds up to an extra hour per day. So like I said, my 9 to 5 wasn't really a 9 to 5, it was more like an 8 to 6 because my boss expected me to work longer hours. And then in addition to that, you have to add on commuting as well. Obviously, there are lots of people working even more hours than that. But even with these hours, I felt like I came home and I just didn't have time to do the things that I wanted to do. So kind of working out, um, cooking healthy meals, spending time with friends and family. I just felt like I didn't have the time to do the things that I wanted to do. Or what I tried to do was still cram all of these things in, which meant that I slept less. I didn't have much time to sleep, which made me very, very exhausted. So, I mean, in the mornings, I had to set three alarms in order to actually get out of bed, and I was constantly tired. That's when I started drinking lots and lots of coffee during the day. But then that had a negative impact on my sleep. So then I started drinking alcohol in the evenings to relax, and it's, it's just a disaster, basically.
And then finally, and probably the biggest thing for me, was the fact that I was working really, really hard for the benefit of someone else. So yes, I mean, I was getting a a salary, a paycheck every month, but it wasn't great money. And and really, the one benefiting from all my hard work on the the senior directors and the owner of the company and the shareholders. And I kind of just felt that if I'm really going to work this hard, I might as well do it and benefit myself rather than these directors and shareholders who I've never met, probably never will meet, and they probably don't really care about me.
So then after having worked, I would say about a year in my first job and really realizing that I'm not enjoying it for all these reasons I explained, I started thinking, how can I change things? And the first thing that came into my head is the fact that yes, I need to keep working really hard to get a promotion. And then I'll get a job which is a lot more fulfilling because I'll be a lot more senior and and then I'll get a much higher salary as well. And that's the way to go. But then I looked around the office and saw all these other colleagues were also trying to go for this promotion. And and I just thought to myself, am I more motivated, more intelligent, luckier than these other people to be able to get these promotions to become senior in the company? And I thought, yeah, that's probably not me. And then I also looked at my boss and my boss's boss. And yeah, they have more power, higher salaries, but they they looked even more depressed, exhausted, fed up than I was. So then I quickly realized that staying in this company, going for promotion is not the way forward.
So my second option was, okay, maybe it's this company, maybe I need to find another job in another company and it'll be a lot better. So I changed jobs. Um, so now working for a different company. And yeah, the office is different, the colleagues were different, but the same problems. So basically, nothing improved by changing company. So then having ruled out going for promotions, getting a better job, changing companies, I realized that no, I need to work for myself. And obviously, the first thing that came to mind was I need to start my own business. So I started researching that. I um, researched a lot of franchises. And these days, we have franchises for everything from restaurants, cafes, uh, delivery companies, uh, car repairs, um, accountancy firms. I mean, you have franchises for everything. So I looked at that. And then also just starting my own business on my own. Now having, you know, slightly better understanding of who I am and how I work, I can ask myself, am I really motivated enough and driven enough, um, and intelligent enough to be able to start a successful company that's going to do well? And my honest answer to that was no. I don't think I have it in me to work super, super hard to make a business a success. I just, I just don't have it in me. Um, so then I ruled that out. And I said, is there another option for me? I don't want to have a job. I don't want to start my own business. What the hell do I do?
So that's when I started looking into passive incomes and also people living quite simple lives and really cutting back their cost of living. And I realized there are lots of people who sell their home and then they start living in a van or a tiny home. So they don't have a mortgage and basically no utilities, and so their cost of living is a lot lower. And therefore, they can earn a lot less and still have a good life. I mean, that's great if you can do that, but I can't do that. I still need to live in a normal house and have all my creature comforts. But then I came across geoarbitrage and then I realized that's what I need to do. And I mean, it sounds very complicated, but it's very, very simple. You basically just move from a country where the cost of living is high to another country where the cost of living is low, but you keep earning money from the original country or other countries where salaries are high and the cost of living is high. So what you end up doing is earning a decent income, but your cost of living is a lot lower. And so I realized that's what I needed to do. And that's when I moved to Brazil and started a new life here.
I've done loads of videos about how to get a visa for Brazil, what the good things about Brazil and the bad things. So I'm not going to go into those things here in this video, but I'll leave links to those videos in the description below. And the cost of living in Brazil is significantly lower than in the States and also Europe. Um, I've done a video about that, showed you all my expenses. So check out that video if you want to. And in that video, I show that my monthly expenses are about $2,000 per month. Um, but as for me, my wife, and my daughter, so the three of us, and for that amount, we live a very comfortable life here in the south of Brazil. And if we needed to, we could reduce that down significantly. And one of the key things that's cheap here in Brazil is property, real estate. You're able to rent something for a lot less than you can in the States and Europe. So I mean, here in the south of Brazil, where I live, you can rent a two-bedroom apartment, a nice one, for $3, $400 per month. Um, or you can buy something for a lot less. So for example, I did a video showing my house, and I bought this house for $90,000. And there's no way you could spend that little money on a house in in Sweden or in the States or something. And what that means is that you just don't have the pressure as well of a big mortgage. And obviously, there are other expenses as well, which are lower here. Um, but that is the key one.
And another thing to mention, which I think is quite important, is the fact that a lot of people don't realize how much money they spend working in a normal job. So obviously, you've got the the commuting, so you spend money on petrol and gas. You've need two cars, one for you and one for your wife to get to work. You spend lots of money on childcare, buying, um, takeaway food, takeaway and deliveries because you don't have time to cook. You might take lots of expensive holidays as well, so you're able to de-stress and relax. Now that I don't have a normal job, I don't have to spend money on most of these things. So we only have one car rather than two. Don't need to spend lots of money on childcare and cook our own food and order lots of takeaways and food delivery, constantly going to restaurants. And also, we're going a lot less on holidays. And that's the other good thing about living in Brazil. We only live a couple of hours away from really nice beaches, so we can just jump in the car and go to a really nice beach. We don't have to, you know, book really expensive flights, expensive hotels to be able to to go to a nice beach.
But then on the other side, in terms of income, I managed to build up various semi-passive income streams, which means that I don't need to work here in Brazil. And so I can have a much more relaxed and enjoyable life here. And these income streams include renting out my property in Europe. I bought, um, a property, an apartment here in Brazil, which I rent out. And then I also get dividends from stocks and shares that I've invested in. And I also do some trading in shares and crypto. Not day trading, it's more long-term swing trading. And all these income streams generate enough money for me to to live comfortably. So I mean, all of these things require me to work about two to three hours a day. But I mean, the key thing is I enjoy doing these things, so I don't really see it as work. And if I don't want to work for a couple of days, or even one or two weeks, there's not an issue with that. So it's just having this freedom. And that just means that I'm now no longer feeling depressed, exhausted, anxious, um, because I'm able to do what I want to do. I can spend lots of time with friends and family, and I'm just in general, a lot happier now.
The purpose of this video is not to show off and go, look what a great life I have. There's still lots of challenges, and it was definitely very, very stressful moving to Brazil. So don't think it was all really easy and perfect, just move to the other side of the world. No, definitely not. But the the main purpose of this video is just to show you that there is this option out here. Your options aren't just work in a 9 to 5, start a business, or sell everything and live in a van. Now, there are other options as well. One of them being, can you move to a country where the cost of living is a lot lower, but you still earn in dollars, euros, sterling? So your income is significantly higher than your cost of living, but you're able to do that doing something that you enjoy. And I've done videos in the past, and I'll do more in the future explaining how I've created these passive income streams. So please check those out.
So I hope you found this video useful. Please leave a like, subscribe to my channel. If you've got any questions or anything, leave in the commentary below. So thanks for watching until next time.