S2 EP 7 | 9 Money Habits That Are Keeping You Broke (And How to Fix Them)

In this episode of Building Billions, I break down the nine money habits that are keeping you broke and holding you back from building real wealth.

I share the exact mistakes I see people making every day — spending money before they earn it, ignoring their numbers, living for appearances, and surrounding themselves with the wrong people. More importantly, I walk you through how to flip each of these habits into powerful wealth-building strategies.

If you’ve ever felt like you’re stuck working hard but not getting ahead, this episode will give you the practical fixes and mindset shifts to finally start building lasting financial success.

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Episode Transcript

S1 (00:00):
Welcome back to another episode of Building Billions. Today we're
going to be talking about money habits keeping you broke.
If you feel like you're constantly broke and struggling with
making more money, this is the fix. I own multiple
$100 million plus companies, and I've seen firsthand the habits
that can make you either rich and successful, or hold

(00:22):
you back from making millions of dollars. These are the
nine money habits that are keeping you broke and exactly
how to fix them. First up is number one stop
spending money before you earn it. Look, if you have
to go buy things before you actually have a net
worth like fancy purses, jewelry, watches, cars. That comes from
a position of insecurity, to be honest with you, because

(00:43):
people feel like they have to look better, they have
to look bigger than what they've actually accomplished. And when
you do that, you have imposter syndrome, and when you
have that, it pulls you off of being the best
version of yourself. Be honest with yourself and spend relative
to what you earn, and have things that represent the
levels of success you've been able to create in your
life already and have the discipline to invest the difference

(01:05):
owing money to the bank or your friends or family
or other people is the fastest way to stay stuck
and broke. You can't build enthusiasm about life and what
you have or haven't been able to accomplish. When you're
getting this life sucked out of you, drained out of
you by your debts. Get your money working for you.
And this takes time. But this is how you set

(01:27):
yourself up for long term financial success. Habit number two
is to stop ignoring your numbers. Most people live day
by day. People that are broke, they scrounge up for money,
they go spend it and they're right back to needing money.
If you're gonna live day to day, you're never gonna
get ahead. You have to learn your numbers. What's your inputs?
What's your outputs? How much are you spending? How much

(01:48):
are you saving? Where are you putting your money? And
this is something most people aren't taught. So if you're
struggling with money, it's not something that people are teaching,
but it is something I promise you that you can learn.
Even people who put money with investment advisors or into
investment accounts don't actually pay attention to the returns. They
have no idea what's happening with their own money. Treat
your money like it's your own business, and look at

(02:11):
it every day to see how it's doing. Review your
finances daily. Weekly, monthly. Make sure you're able to earn more,
spend less, and save and invest more. Habit number three
is to stop thinking you can save your way to wealth.
You have to earn your way to wealth. For me,
taking my attention from how much money can I save?

(02:33):
Or how much money do I spend to putting it on?
How much money can I earn? How do I go
out and generate income? I'm not been the best saver,
but I am the best investor because I know how
to go out and make a lot of money and
put it into things that work for me while I'm
working for my income. That is something every person can
learn to do. Look, it's simple. Just like in business,

(02:55):
if a business is struggling to make money, they have
to put their attention on cutting costs or how to
generate more revenue. You can't just focus on cutting costs.
You have to learn and focus on how to create value.
My fix to having money issues is simple learn to
create more money. Develop your skills where people will pay

(03:15):
you money based on the results you get. As long
as it's legal, moral, ethical and compliant, you can solve
huge problems for other people and they'll pay you a
lot of money. Remember, real money doesn't flow to people
with big degrees. Real money doesn't flow to salespeople. Real
money flows to people who solve bigger problems. And to
the extent that you find big problems and solve it

(03:37):
through your skill set, your ability to communicate, and your education,
whatever that may be, it's simple. The bigger problems you solve,
the more valuable you are. Habit number four is probably
the most important. Stop surrounding yourself with the wrong people.
I work with so many business owners and I see
it all the time. The people they're spending their time with,

(03:58):
communicating to, asking questions of I call it pulling p
o I n g. What should I do? What would
you do? What do you think we ought to do?
Gonna fail every time because they're asking the wrong people.
Imagine a room of ten business owners who are all struggling,
and you ask them what you should do. Then imagine
going into the next room. Business owners who are all

(04:20):
killing it. You're going to get an entirely different response.
The people you seek, guidance, advice and mentorship from, and
who you choose to follow as the example, will ultimately
dictate the success that you have. If you surround yourself
with like minded people who are always complaining and talking
about what's wrong, you're going to find more problems. But

(04:40):
if you surround yourself with like minded people who are winning,
who are conquering, who are crushing, who are excelling, you're
going to do better because you're in a group that
thinks about opportunities and how to get them, than in
a group that's complaining about what they can't get. What
group have you chosen to be in? Don't settle. Always
push yourself. Have a number five. This is what most

(05:01):
people do. You have to stop emotion driven buying. Look,
I've watched so many young entrepreneurs start making a little
bit of money and they go rent the Lamborghini or
lease the Porsche or borrow the Ferrari, or go buy
a new Range Rover. Those things are cool. But here's
the thing they're not cool if you're broke and they
sit in the wrong message too early. A business owner

(05:24):
who knows how to have discipline and accountability and responsibility
actually sends the message that they're focused on the right
things at the right time. But those that don't, well,
they simply keep themselves broke by trying to appear as
the opposite of reality. This is imposter syndrome, and it
will always keep dragging you backwards and holding you down.

(05:45):
Here's my recommendation. Pause 24 hours before you make any
emotional purchase, and make sure that it aligns with your future,
who you want to become, not who you are today.
Look for me. This is what I do. When I
was younger and I started making money, I would pause
for 24 hours before making any big emotional purchasing decision.
And I'd ask myself this question does this actually fit

(06:08):
with where I'm at in life, or does it make
me look like I'm more successful than I am? Don't
rationalize your spending by calling it investments. Investments actually make
a return over time. So if you're spending to look better,
that's not giving you a return. And the old adage
of fake it before you make it, that's not a
return either. If it won't make you money and you

(06:30):
really don't have the money to spend on something, don't
do it. I'll give you an example for me. When
I made my first $100,000, I had no debt and
the one thing I wanted to buy myself was a
gold presidential Rolex, and I did. Now, looking back on it,
it was a stupid investment. I had no business walking
around with a diamond face, all gold presidential Rolex. At

(06:52):
2425 years old. It sent the wrong message. I eventually
figured that out. But here's the cool thing. I took
that Rolex off and I didn't wear it for years
because I hadn't yet deserved it, and I put it
in my safe. Fast forward 30 years later, I get
to give that to my daughter, who's now 32 years old,
as something that I get to pass on to her

(07:14):
as a monumental moment for me. So the investment at
the time made no sense. But today, to be honest
with you, I'm glad I did it. Here's another thing
that watch is worth three times more money today than
what I paid for it. Next is number six, which
is to invest in yourself. When people claim they don't
want to spend money on mentorship or learning or skill development,

(07:36):
those are people that are going to stay broke. Because
here's the reality for someone to grow and scale in
their ability to earn more money and make more money,
they're going to have to grow and scale their ability,
their acumen, their learning, their development. And if they're unwilling
to invest in that, they won't invest in anything else. Look,

(07:57):
it's simple math. People who are unwilling to spend on
learning and mentorship and skill development, but will go out
and buy a new Mustang or a new car or
a watch or some luxury item. Well, they're always going
to stay broke. The idea that you can get more
by never investing in yourself is crazy. The only way
to succeed and get more is to invest in you,

(08:19):
so you can learn to do things you don't know
how to do today, which allows you to earn more
so you can eventually get more. But my first car
was a 1968 Ford Ranchero. What was cool about it, though,
is it had a mustang 289 engine in it. And
you know what? My dream car at the time was
a mustang with a 289 engine. So I had the engine,

(08:40):
but I couldn't afford the car. Today I have multiple
Rolls Royces. If you don't learn to start and build
your way into success, then you'll end up with the Mustang,
but not the Rolls-Royce. Look, I get it. Most people
grow up in an environment where they're told wealth can't
be created. But it takes two things in order to
create wealth one, how to generate income and two, where

(09:01):
to invest it. And most people are not taught that,
so it's something that everyone can learn. The hack I
learned is if you invest in your own personal development
and you can increase your tax attack speed to opportunities
like making things happen. You have clarity into what you
want to accomplish, and you go to the right people
and you access the right help. Getting around smart people

(09:22):
will increase your speed of learning. It'll give you the
confidence that you can do what they're doing. It'll show
you how to earn and generate more money faster by
reverse engineering how somebody else became successful and copy what
they did. You'll be able to do it too. Number
seven is next, and that's to stop living for appearances.
I have a lot of friends that I grew up with.
They had the fancy cars, the fancy suits, the nice houses.

(09:47):
But guess what? They have to go to work every
day because they're technically broke. They spend more than they
have in the bank. That is 100% the surest way
to stay broke. Your bank account should be louder than
your lifestyle. If you don't have a bank account paying
you every month, you shouldn't be spending the money. Imagine
a world where instead of buying things that your lifestyle
makes you look like you're hugely successful, but you took

(10:09):
the money you would spend on that and you invested
it in things that pay you later so you don't
actually have to work at all. That means your bank
account is now louder than your lifestyle. My fix for
all of this is to stop performing and being somebody
you're not. Start building. Next is number eight, which is
to stop avoiding the hard conversations about money. Look, you

(10:30):
need to start talking about money right now. Get some
books about money. Start reading about money. Start looking at
people who have money. Start conversations about money. If you're
not talking about money, and you're not looking for people
who are examples of living the kind of life you
want to have money, how are you going to get
the blueprint for making money? Find people that you can

(10:52):
talk to about money, and those will generally be people
who have money, have the hard conversations, and take ownership
about making money. Imagine a world where you sit down
with someone who has a lot of money, and you
ask them, how'd you start? What did you do? What'd
you have to learn? What were your failures? What were
your opportunities? How did you get better? What were the
targets you set? What did you have to do from

(11:12):
an activity standpoint and a learning standpoint to hit those targets,
and you take ownership over that conversation. You go home
and do it. Well, imagine the life you could create
for you. That brings us to the last point, which
is to stop waiting for the right time. They'll never
be a right time to get your money right, because
money follows attention. So whatever you're thinking about, whatever you're

(11:35):
putting your attention on, whatever you're actually doing, your money
will follow that. This is why you need to be
intentional about what you want in life. Put the right time, energy,
and effort into making that happen, and then your money
will follow your intention. If you simply don't have an
intention and you're not taking the right action, then you
won't make more money. If you want to know the

(11:58):
hack to making more money, you have to get out
and start moving towards money. You got to stop thinking
about it and just start doing it. How do you
do it? You follow the right leaders. You copy their
strategies and their actions, and you get up and start
making money moves today towards a stated objective and target.