4 Mistakes First-Time Investors Make

Summary

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Podcast Summary: "4 Mistakes First-Time Investors Make"

Podcast: Business School with Sharran Srivatsaa
Host: Sharran Srivatsaa
Date: November 11, 2025

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Episode Overview

Sharran Srivatsaa delivers a tactical, straight-talking masterclass on the four most common mistakes that first-time (or early) investors make. Drawing from his own investing journey—from Wall Street banker to serial founder and prolific deal maker—Sharran breaks down not only what goes wrong, but exactly how to avoid the common pitfalls that derail new investors. Using real stories, scripts, and simple frameworks, this episode is a must-listen (or read) for anyone starting to put capital to work.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Impact of Early Investing Mistakes

• The experience from first few investments shapes your confidence and future behavior as an investor. If your early investments lose money or go sideways, rebuilding trust with yourself and the process becomes much harder.
  • Quote:
    “Most of the times the first few investments that we make shape not just what returns we get, but...it shapes my confidence.” [01:37]

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2. Mistake #1: Being Embarrassed to Show Ignorance

- The Problem:

• Many first-time investors pretend to understand things—out of ego or the desire to look competent—leading to poor decisions and costly mistakes.
  • Quote:
    “When I started investing, I would just pretend like I understood more than I did and just to make myself be and look cool. Looking back, clearly this was dumb.” [03:14]
• Nodding along without asking simple questions results in committing to deals you don’t actually get.

- The Solution:

• Prepare a script that gives you permission to ask basic questions:
  • “Hey, I’m a really simple guy. Would it be okay if I asked you a thousand easy questions?” [04:32]
• Join investor groups for your first few deals so you can learn collectively and not feel isolated or embarrassed by not knowing everything.
  • Quote:
    “My favorite way to invest is investing in groups...Different people in the group have different expertise, so they can kind of jump in and explain things in a much better way.” [06:01]

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3. Mistake #2: Succumbing to Peer Pressure

- The Problem:

• It’s hard to say “no” when friends or people you respect invite you into a deal, especially if there’s social status involved.
• Many worry that declining will make them look poor, uninformed, or timid.
  • Quote:
    “Social pressure can be significantly more intense… because of the type of car you drive or the house you live in… It’s way more intense.” [06:57]
• People often either ghost (ignore follow-ups), make up fake excuses, or feign interest with unnecessary questions.

- The Solution:

• Use a direct, respectful script to protect both the relationship and your own boundaries:
  • “Hey, Jimmy, I’m going to pass on this one. I’m already committed to another opportunity for this allocation. Thank you for including me. I would love to consider a future one with you.” [07:28]
• Don’t ghost, don’t make false excuses, and don’t fake engagement if you’re not interested.
  • Quote:
    “The truth is very freeing. So please don’t make up fake excuses.” [09:45]
• Always respond to deals clearly, even if you decline—this keeps you in the loop for future opportunities and helps you see more deal structures.
  • Quote:
    “The more deals that I see, the more structures I can see. And the more structures I can see, the better structuring I can do for others.” [09:12]

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4. Mistake #3: Trusting the Operator of the Deal Blindly

- The Problem:

• First-time investors often assume that the strength of the idea or asset is what matters. In reality, it’s all about who is executing the deal.
  • Quote:
    “Good ideas are sexy…but the operator, the person who’s wielding the sword, makes or breaks the deal.” [11:33]
• When things go wrong—and they almost always do—it’s the operator’s grit, integrity, and tenacity that determines whether you lose money or not.

- The Solution:

• Always vet the operator, especially if the deal is significant and you haven’t worked together before.
• Offer a mutual background check:
  • “Hey, Jimmy, we want to make sure that we are good partners to each other. For that, we’d like to offer a mutual background check where you can run a background check on us and call our references, and we’ll do the same with you.” [13:01]
• Emphasize diligence over trust or gut feel.
  • Memorable Story:
    Sharran lost more money than most people make in their careers because he invested with someone he didn’t vet:
    “He was running two sets of books…when I did [a background check], he had a felony. And I was like, okay, so…I would have at least asked him about it, and it would have given me a red flag.” [13:40]

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5. Mistake #4: Chasing Trends and FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out)

- The Problem:

• Hot deals and trends come in waves: crypto, real estate, Airbnbs, forex, penny stocks, etc. The details change but the emotional pull remains.
  • Quote:
    “There’s always a season for hot opportunities...The FOMO is totally real. And this is where most kind of early investors get swept up in this excitement.” [14:24], [14:49]

- The Solution:

• Tie every investment decision to the next milestone or goal in your financial journey, rather than doing it just because others are.
  • Quote:
    “The way to solve that is to tie every investment to the next milestone in your journey.” [15:00]
• Examples:
  • If your next goal is to build 12 months of cash reserves, ask, “Does this opportunity help me achieve that?” [15:44]
  • Don’t contribute to a retirement account or buy Bitcoin if it doesn’t contribute to your immediate goal (like generating your first passive income check).
    • Quote:
      “You putting $63,000 in your SEP IRA is a dumb idea…If the goal is to generate your next passive income check…” [16:42]
• Remember: time and capital are not unlimited! Each sizable bet matters, and not every investment makes sense for you.
  • Quote:
    “I honestly thought that just constantly investing in things would make me wealthy…You don’t get rich by investing. That’s a myth. You get wealthy by learning to become a good investor.” [19:43]
• Reference: Warren Buffett’s punch-card analogy—imagine you only have 10 lifetime investments, and treat each choice with that level of care.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Asking Questions:
  “Hey, I’m a really simple guy. Is it okay if I ask you a thousand easy questions?” [04:32]
• On Saying No:
  “Hey, Jimmy, I’m going to pass on this one. I’m already committed to another opportunity for this allocation. Thank you for including me. I would love to consider a future one with you.” [07:28]
• On Vetting Operators:
  “When things go wrong—and I will tell you things always go wrong—you want someone that you trust in the captain’s chair…” [11:33]
• On FOMO:
  “The way to solve that is to tie every investment to the next milestone in your journey.” [15:00]
• On the Reality of Building Wealth:
  “You get wealthy by learning to become a good investor. There’s a big difference.” [19:43]

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• [01:06] – Overview of the episode’s goal for first-time investors
• [03:06] – Mistake #1: Embarrassed to Ask Questions/Show Ignorance
• [06:24] – Mistake #2: Succumbing to Peer Pressure (incl. scripts for saying no)
• [10:50] – Mistake #3: Trusting Operators Blindly (and how to vet them)
• [13:59] – Mistake #4: Chasing FOMO and Hot Trends
• [15:46] – The Goal-Oriented Approach to Investment Decisions
• [18:38] – The Myth of Investing Your Way to Wealth
• [20:01] – Recap of Four Mistakes and Final Thoughts

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Summary Table: 4 Mistakes & Their Fixes

| Mistake | Solution / Fix | |----------------------------------------------|-------------------------------------------------| | 1. Embarrassed to show ignorance | Ask simple questions, invest with a group, script for transparency | | 2. Succumbing to peer pressure | Use a direct script to decline, respond to all offers, never ghost | | 3. Trusting operator blindly | Always vet operators, propose a mutual background check | | 4. Chasing trends and FOMO | Tie investments to specific goals, ignore hype |

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Conclusion

Sharran leaves listeners with a powerful message: focus not on investing for its own sake, but on deliberately becoming a better investor by learning and avoiding common traps. The difference, he stresses, isn’t in doing more deals, but in doing fewer things wrong.

Apply these frameworks to start your journey with intention, clarity, and confidence—and skip a decade of painful mistakes.

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Transcript

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Hey, this is Sharan Srivatsa.

[Podcast Host]

Welcome back to the Business School podcast.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And I got to tell you the truth, when I quote started investing, I.

[Podcast Host]

Made a bunch of dumb mistakes.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Even with the Goldman Sachs background, I'm not joking, I had ego and FOMO.

[Podcast Host]

And peer pressure kind of run me. So on this podcast, I'm breaking down for you the four mistakes that first time or early investors make and how.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

You can solve it.

[Podcast Host]

I break it all down for you step by step, starting right now.

[Sharan Srivatsa (Promo Voice)]

One thing is for certain, just because it's tried and true doesn't mean it's working right now. So the big question is this, where can you learn what is working right now? The strategies, the tactics, the psychology, and the exact how to, how to grow your business, how to blow up your personal brand and supercharge your personal growth. That is the question and this podcast will give you the answer. My name is Sharan Trivata and welcome to Business School.

[Podcast Host]

All right, today I'm going to give.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

You the cheat code. This is what I wish I knew before making, I don't know, a hundred.

[Podcast Host]

Plus investments that I've made.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So if you are kind of earlier.

[Podcast Host]

In your investing journey, this is probably for you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And I would wager that every single.

[Podcast Host]

One of us are earlier in our investing journeys, right?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

If you are not a day to.

[Podcast Host]

Day professional investor, then this is not.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

What we do day to day. So I think it's important to know kind of the eliminating the mistakes that first time investors make will already make.

[Podcast Host]

You a significantly better investor.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

The reason I'm telling you is this, it's important because most of the times the first few investments that we make shape our not just like what returns we get, but I don't know, it shapes my confidence. If the first deal you invested in totally crushed it, you'd be like, man, I'm really good at this. But if it didn't, if you kind of got crushed, if you didn't work out well, it would take time to almost kind of rebuild the trust and the confidence that you have with yourself and you naturally end up being a little bit more gun shy and that, you know, that kind of takes a long time to get over. And then you miss the power of compounding, you miss power opportunities and you miss a lot of things.

[Podcast Host]

By the way, if you are unfamiliar.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

I was a banker on Wall street.

[Podcast Host]

At Goldman Sachs and Credit Suisse. As you know, I've had a chance.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

To build two public $2 billion companies, one publicly traded, which makes you understand Wall street even More, I've kind of invested in over 100 plus deals.

[Guest or Co-host]

After a hundred days, stop counting.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And I will tell you this, looking back, I wish that someone had kind of given me a little bit of insight into these things. And I've realized that, you know, when I talk to people and if they can share with me the mistakes that they have made, most of life I have figured out is just doing fewer things wrong, making fewer mistakes, because you don't. It's very hard to, you know, it's very hard to fix a bad diet, right? So if you just didn't have the bad diet in the first place, you would win way more. And so I will tell you the good news is that most kind of.

[Podcast Host]

Early mistakes are easily avoidable if you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Know what they are. And today I'm going to give you.

[Podcast Host]

Four of these mistakes.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So mistake number one is probably the biggest one, which is, I think it's being embarrassed to kind of show that.

[Podcast Host]

You don't know what's going on.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So being embarrassed to show ignorance in a particular topic. So I will tell you this. When I started investing, I, I would.

[Podcast Host]

Just pretend like I understood more than I did and just to make myself.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Be and look cool. Looking back, clearly this was dumb. And so any conversations that I would have, investors that would pitch me on stuff, I would just nod. I, even though I was confused and lo and behold, what do you think happened? The I made investments, I made commitments.

[Guest or Co-host]

Without fully understanding a bunch of things.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

I learned very little in the process.

[Guest or Co-host]

And the, the, some win, some deals won, some deals lost. But here's what was bad about that. Because of this whole thing, I really think that I was not only stressed about the deal itself, but I lost more money than I should have ever had. So if I actually understood it, I would not have been stressed about the deal. And if I was not stressed about the deal, I would actually understood what investment to make. And if I understood what investment to.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Make, I would have lost less money.

[Guest or Co-host]

Therefore, I should probably not be embarrassed. Now, how do you not be embarrassed? And I think that's very difficult.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And so what I decided to do was my kind of advice, number one, on how to not stop being embarrassed. To show ignorance of this stuff is.

[Podcast Host]

Like, I just tell people, hey, I.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Don'T know much about these things. Hey, I'm a really simple guy. Hey, would it be okay if I.

[Podcast Host]

Asked you a thousand easy questions?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Like when I talk to people who are pitching me a deal, I literally use this phrase.

[Podcast Host]

And I love this phrase, I use it in sales conversations a lot because it reframes the number of questions you're going to ask. And I say, hey, I'm a really simple guy. Is it okay if I ask you at that thousand easy questions? So clearly they know that it's I'm not going to ask a thousand questions, but they know it's going to be a lot. So they don't say, oh my gosh, this guy's going to ask me a lot of questions. And secondarily I say, can I ask you a thousand easy questions? What I've done for myself is given myself permission to ask a bunch of simple questions, and now I force them to be simplistic and help me understand the foundations of these things.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So the key in all of this.

[Podcast Host]

Is like, number one, to have some scripting around asking, hey, I'm a really simple guy. I don't know much about this. I want to support you. Is it okay if I ask you a thousand easy questions? And instead of being like all sophisticated and trying to do chatgpt research to figure out, you know, you figure out what the Sharpe ratio of a deal is and what the efficient frontier is. And you know, because you know what.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Cap rate compression is, you don't need to know any of those things.

[Podcast Host]

Right? And that's why this is important.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So the solve in all of this.

[Podcast Host]

Is to just find a way to invest in groups.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

If you have a group, if you.

[Podcast Host]

Have an investor group that you invest in, I would just commit to, you know, kind of doing your first five deals a deals in the investor group.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

By the way, investor groups will never.

[Podcast Host]

Force you to do things.

[Guest or Co-host]

So you can say, hey, I, you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Know, I don't feel comfortable about this.

[Podcast Host]

Or hey, I'm already com promised my liquidity elsewhere right now.

[Guest or Co-host]

But they will continue to show you.

[Podcast Host]

Deals as long as you're involved, as long as you're engaged, and as long as you follow their process, investing in groups is a really good thing.

[Guest or Co-host]

My favorite way to invest is investing in groups because when someone brings you the deal, they have a sense of responsibility around it. They are in the game with you. You can ask questions off them. You can now sidebar conversations with the group. Different people in the group have different expertise, so they can kind of like jump in and explain things in a much better way. So I'm a big fan of investing in groups to solve this idea. The mistake number one of being embarrassed. And so that's mistake number one.

[Podcast Host]

Here's mistake number two. I really believe that often we succumb to peer pressure. So succumbing to peer pressure is really like mistake number two.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And the, the, the, the reason is most of us will probably find it difficult.

[Podcast Host]

I'm at least me to say no.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

When a friend or somebody that you respect invites you to a deal, especially.

[Podcast Host]

If there's status involved overall, right?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So most people, and here's the crazy part, most people worry that, you know, saying no or declining that you want to make this investment will either make.

[Podcast Host]

You look uninformed or worse, make you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Look poor or that you, you know, you're just gun shy and don't want to participate. They'll think you're a wimp. And by the way, I've been there too. And like, the social pressure can be significantly more intense on stuff like this because it is, is way more intense as a pressure of the type of car you drive or the type of house you live in because everybody knows your home's a low value. The, the way to overcome this is to prepare a script in advance that I'm going to give you that I.

[Podcast Host]

Use all the time.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And so when I don't want to do a deal, here's literally what I say, right? I literally will say this or send.

[Guest or Co-host]

Them a text message and I say.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Hey, Jimmy, I'm going to pass on this one.

[Guest or Co-host]

I'm already committed to another opportunity for this allocation.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Thank you for including me. And I would love to consider a future one with you, right?

[Guest or Co-host]

So think about that script. So see, Jimmy was giving me the deal. Say, hey, Jimmy, I'm going to pass on this one.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So you always lead with the clarity. I'm already committed to another opportunity for this allocation. Two things there.

[Guest or Co-host]

One, I'm allocating some resources.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Two, I'm already committed means I have something else that I'm doing with this money that I'm not going to tell you what it is. Thank you for including me. That means, you know, hey, I appreciate the thought, but I would love to consider doing a future one with you. Not I'd love to do a do one with you. I'd love to consider doing a future one with you. That means, hey, I'm in the game with you, right?

[Guest or Co-host]

So the, the I will tell you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

The crazy part of what I'm sharing with you. There's what other people do instead. The first thing that they do is that they ghost. They'll, they'll literally tell the person who invited them to the deal and will say, hey, let me think about it, and they'll just ghost. And that, that that person now has the pressure to follow back up three or four times. And this is really bad because if you do this, you won't get any show. You won't get shown any deals in the future. And that's why this is important. You don't say, let me think about it. And if you're not interested, just wait around. And if they have to follow up, you've screwed up because of this. You will not get shown deals in the future. And I will tell you, you want to get shown all the deals in the future. I will. You have no idea how many deals I get. I see, I see hundreds of deals a month. When I say, when I say hundreds, I'm not joking. I probably see 10 to 20 deals a week, right?

[Guest or Co-host]

And every single deal that I get.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

I respond very clearly to them. And a lot of times it's exactly the script, hey, I'm going to pass on this one. I'm already committed to other opportunity for this allocation. Thank you for including me.

[Podcast Host]

And I would love to consider future one with you.

[Guest or Co-host]

You know, and they keep sending me more deals. Now if at some point I would. Because the reason you may say, well, Charon, I don't like the oil and natural gas deals.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

It's not.

[Guest or Co-host]

I want to see every deal because it. I see how a deal is presented. I see how a deck is sent to me. Maybe I flip it to someone else that I've been talking to about it. It helps me like relate to industries. It figures out how I can present my information in a. I want to see every single deal. Like I am a deal guy. I want to see every single deal that's presented. If there is a deal that is out there, I need to know about it. And the more deals that I see, the more structures I can see. And the more structures I can see, the better structuring I can do for others. And I learn all my deal structuring looking at other deals. I just don't come up with random deal structuring, right? And so I cross pollinate deal ideas into the deals that I'm working on.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Here's the second thing that people do which is really irritating. They make up fake excuses. Please don't do this. The problem here is that everyone knows what a fake excuse is. And what does it do? It makes you lose cred and trust and they just won't show you stuff anymore. So don't make fake excuses. Just tell them the truth. The truth is very freeing. So please don't make up fake excuses. And here's Number three, just to be cool, don't ask a lot of questions to show interest even if you're not interested. If you're not interested, just to be. Just don't ask a lot of questions if you're not interested. If you're interested, ask a lot of questions. If you're not interested, don't ask a lot of questions because now they'll feel like you wasted a lot of their time and you were just kicking the tires even though you were not interested. That's just not fair to the other person. The reason I'm sharing this with you, if you just have the simple script, people will kind of respect you for it and do it over and over again because you want to preserve, I don't know, the relationship in some way while also protecting in this situation your decision making process. So don't let people bully you, don't.

[Podcast Host]

Let people peer pressure you. Right? So that's, that would be my recommendation.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Here's mistake number three, trusting the operator.

[Podcast Host]

Of the deal blindly.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So I will tell you that many kind of early investors assume that the strength of the idea, like whatever idea, the startup idea, the real estate deal.

[Guest or Co-host]

Idea, determines the outcome. And I will tell you that is not entirely true.

[Podcast Host]

I've seen that happen in my life multiple times over time.

[Guest or Co-host]

You will realize it is all about execution. Because when you're investing in something, it is almost passive for you. You're not working on it. What is passive for you needs to be active for someone else. Meaning if I'm going to write a check to somebody, that means I am deploying financial resources, meaning I'm not deploying time, operational capacity, et cetera. If I am deploying financial resources, someone else has to do the work.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Who's doing the work here?

[Guest or Co-host]

Meaning good ideas are sexy, but I get that good ideas can open doors. It can, I don't know, give you more new opportunities, it can make you famous on brand. But the operator, the person who's wielding the, the sword to like, you know, makes or breaks the deal. And I will tell you this, when things go wrong, and I will, I'm telling you right now, when things go wrong and good up, then things almost always go wrong. And I will tell you things always go wrong. You want someone that you trust in the captain's chair, if you will, who has like the, the tenacity, the mental toughness, the grit, the emotional integrity, they know that you will, they are your ambassador in this process. They will, they will do whatever it takes to protect the company and in turn your Investment because they need to realize that the, you know, not quitting is the most heroic thing you can do. By the way, if you don't know that quote, it's an Aquaman quote. Not giving up is the most heroic thing you could do. So because of this, I will tell you, I've made it a standard practice to, like, really bet these operators. As you know, to me, the operator, I want to bet the op. Good people, good intentions, good rationale, good contracts. I want to bet the deal and the person running the deal.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And by the way, to do this if the deal is significant for us. And I have not worked with the operator before, I do what I call a mutual. A mutual background check. So let me give you a script that I generally would use to talk to the operator, because I want to see what this operator has done in the past. So I say, hey, Jimmy, we want to make sure that we are good partners to each other. For that, we'd like to offer a mutual background check where you can run a background check on us and call.

[Podcast Host]

Our references, and we'll do the same with you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

What am I doing there? Right? I'm doing a mutual background check. Now, if I say, hey, Jimmy, I want to do a mutual back, a background check on you, he's like, well, you don't trust me? I'm saying, no, I want to be good partners. I want you to do a check on me and check my references, and I want to do a check on you and check your references. Right? And because you want to protect your downside and all this, you have no idea, by the way, I will tell you right now. I had a consulting client who paid me a lot of money for consulting, and then I invested in his company. I lost more money than most people will make in their careers because he was running two sets of books. And then after all of it, my.

[Guest or Co-host]

Partner was like, did you run a.

[Podcast Host]

Background check on him?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

I was like, no. And then when I did, he had, like, he had a felony.

[Guest or Co-host]

And I was like, okay, so I don't even care that he did. I would have at least asked him.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

About it, and it would have given me a red flag.

[Guest or Co-host]

And.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And by the way, I'm all about second chances and people being honest. I just wanted to know, and I.

[Guest or Co-host]

Did not know this.

[Podcast Host]

It allows you to do better diligence overall.

[Guest or Co-host]

All right, here's mistake number four is.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

This big idea of, like, chasing trends, mainly because of fomo. FOMO is a. FOMO is real, by the way.

[Guest or Co-host]

Fomo, Fear of missing Out.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

FOMO is real and I feel it all the time.

[Podcast Host]

And I try really hard to beat.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Myself out of it.

[Podcast Host]

And I will tell you, having done.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

This for a long time, you know.

[Podcast Host]

Being a professional investor for 20 plus.

[Guest or Co-host]

Years, I will tell you hot opportunities are constantly changing.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

There's always a season for hot opportunities.

[Podcast Host]

We've gone through the crypto craze, we've gone through real estate markets, we've gone.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Through multifamily, we've gone through flip fixes.

[Guest or Co-host]

And flips, we've gone through Airbnbs, we've gone through, I don't know, forex trading, we've gone through penny stocks, we've gone through, like, it is nonstop. There's always something else. While the, I don't know, while kind of like the details of the deal shift, there's the emotional pull, I don't.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Know how else to call it. The FOMO is totally real. And this is where most kind of early investors get swept up in this excitement.

[Podcast Host]

They want to have that locker room.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Conversation that they did this investment deal and then that's the shining penny for them. So I will tell you this. The way to solve that is to tie every investment to the next milestone in your journey. And like, let me explain what I mean. You got to tie every investment that you're doing to the next goal in your journey. I'll give you an example. So let's say, for example, your. If your next goal is to build 12 months of cash reserves.

[Podcast Host]

I don't know, I'm just making this up. I'm just assuming.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Let's say your goal is to have 12 months of cash reserves. Meaning let's say you want, let's say you spend a, you spend $20,000 a month in, in your personal nut. And that's. So that is 12 months times 20,000, that's $240,000. If that is your goal, then your question should be, hey, does this opportunity.

[Podcast Host]

Help me achieve that?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So I take every opportunity that I have and I layer it on the focus of my next upcoming goal or the future upcoming goal. And I just evaluate against now. Sometimes the next goal and the future goals are different, but that's why you have clarity of the future. But this is a really good way to avoid the fomo, right? Number two is like, give you another example. So if your goal is to generate like your first passive income check, you know, where you write a check into an investment and you get the first passive income check. Well, because of that question, you should, if you said, hey, does this. Does, does, does contributing more to your, your SEP IRA or your defined benefit plan get you closer to getting your first passive income check?

[Guest or Co-host]

The answer is no.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Right? So I'm not telling you whether you should put money in retirement accounts or anything like that. That's not my jam. What I am telling you is if the goal is to generate your next passive income check and you don't have that right now, you putting $63,000 in your SEP IRA is a dumb idea.

[Guest or Co-host]

Because that is not going to generate you your first passive income check, right? Or putting it in Bitcoin is not.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

A good idea because you're like, man, I got it.

[Guest or Co-host]

I'm getting it at the right time. Well, it's not achieving the goal.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

It's not about.

[Guest or Co-host]

It doesn't matter where Bitcoin ends up in 30 years. It only matters if you hit your next goal so that you can hit the next goal after that, so you can build the confidence in yourself that you can hit more goals. So my, my recommendation would be when you measure opportunities against like your next specific goal, it's way easier to kind of ignore what the FOMO is and what the distraction is, because I have not found any other way. Because otherwise, if the time horizon was unlimited. So think about this for a second.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

If you had an infinite time horizon, which what that means is you have.

[Podcast Host]

You know, you're not, you don't really.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Need the money tomorrow and you have.

[Guest or Co-host]

Unlimited capital, then you can take a.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Lot of, then you can take a lot that you can make a lot of bets, right? All of us don't have unlimited capital and we don't have an infinite time horizon. Now you may. I, I don't.

[Guest or Co-host]

So I'm like, all right, so I.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Have, I don't have unlimited capital. I, you know, I have, I have access to enough, and I don't have an unlimited time, you know, infinite time horizon. I want, I have a certain goals that I want to hit for myself, my family, my, my company, et cetera. So I'm thinking, all right, so how do I take that goal against the project that I have and evaluate it? If it fits, great. I want to explore it. If it doesn't fit, no, thank you. Pass. Right? That allows me to know that it's a, it's a good idea to have something to diagnose against. Otherwise you don't have a benchmark, you.

[Podcast Host]

Don'T have a filter.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And, and I want to like solve this myth for these, for first time investors or early investors, which is, I honestly thought that just constantly investing in things would make me wealthy. And I want to just remove that thinking for you. Warren Buffett said something amazing, and he said, you know, assume that when you graduate from college or when you're starting a professional career, you had a punch.

[Guest or Co-host]

Card, and in this punch card, you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Had 10 holes you can punch. Essentially, those were 10 investments that you could potentially make. Ask yourself, every time you make a sizable investment, which putting $1,000 in Bitcoin.

[Guest or Co-host]

Is not going to change your life.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

You'Re making yourself feel better about yourself.

[Guest or Co-host]

If you're going to put a thousand.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Dollars in bitcoin and, okay, you put.

[Guest or Co-host]

A thousand dollars in bitcoin and it went up a hundred X, okay, 100 X over 20 years. Now you have a hundred thousand dollars. Well, in 20 years, that $100,000 is probably worth, you know, time value adjusted, eight $12,000. You could have not done that at all. It doesn't mean anything. It doesn't dramatically change your life. But instead, if you said, hey, I have. I, you know, I have $100,000, and this is a sizable bet for me, and I only had 10 bets that I could make in my life. What bet would I make? Right?

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And so the reason I say this is it is not about just investing itself. Over time, I will tell you this. I have realized the big difference, that you don't get rich by investing. That's a myth.

[Podcast Host]

You get wealthy by learning to become a good investor. There's a big difference.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

You don't get good by just investing.

[Podcast Host]

You want to become a good investor.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

And that is a skill. And you can only learn that skill slowly through mistakes.

[Podcast Host]

Or you can do this by just avoiding the mistakes that people like me have made so that you don't have to make them. So the four mistakes that you should avoid are, number one, stop being embarrassed to show ignorance. Essentially, if you invest in groups, it's significantly better. Number two, don't succumb to any peer pressure. And if someone's going to peer pressure into something, have a script, say, hey, I'm going to pass on this one. I'm already committed to another opportunity for this allocation.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Thank you for including me.

[Podcast Host]

I would love to consider one with you for the future.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Right.

[Podcast Host]

Number three is don't trust the operator blindly. Do what we do, which is, you know, you run a mutual. You offer to run a mutual background check. And number four, do not chase deals out of fomo. And the main way to think about that is you want to have every investment be a solution to the next milestone or the next goal that you have and that always makes sure that you're making progress towards that.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Honestly, I will tell you these are.

[Podcast Host]

Probably what I wish I knew before making what a hundred plus investments. So these are the four mistakes first time investors make and hopefully how to avoid them. If you like this hey, can you.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

Do me a favor?

[Podcast Host]

Can you screenshot this, post it on social and tag me. That way I can make more like this for you. I'll know that you like this, otherwise I have no idea. So do me a favor, share this with somebody if you think it'll be helpful. But most importantly, screenshot this and tag me. That way I can make more like this for you.

[Sharan Srivatsa (Promo Voice)]

Hey this is Charon. I have an awesome free gift for you just for listening to the podcast. As you may know, I've got a chance to build build 2 billion dollar companies the hard way.

[Sharan Srivatsa]

So if you like this episode you.

[Sharan Srivatsa (Promo Voice)]

Will love getting the exact playbooks from those wins. It's on my sub stack called My Next Billion. It has the exact frameworks I wish someone had given me when I was.

[Podcast Host]

Figuring it all out.

[Sharan Srivatsa (Promo Voice)]

Now you get the real lessons from.

[Podcast Host]

The trenches as I go for a.

[Sharan Srivatsa (Promo Voice)]

Three peat and build the next billion. So everything's free atmynextbillion.com. please check it out mynextbillion.com.