The Iced Coffee Hour - Beast Games Winner Breaks Silence on $5,000,000 Prize, MrBeast Controversy, & Spending Everything

Episode Date: April 13, 2026

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CBC News. So what was the final amount that you won in Beast Games too? $5,000, $106,000. It was one of the hardest things I've ever done. I'm a competitor. I came there to go to the end. I came to win. Now that I have all this money,

I'm trying to figure out what I have to do with it. How much money do you have left? The last time I checked, I had... What did you spend it on? A Lamborghini, and then I bought two new houses. I knew that there would be... other opportunities to make money. What would you criticize

about these games? It's tough, man. Eight months of keeping it secret. But the truth is... Tyler from Beast Games 2, thank you so much for coming on the Ice Coffee Hour. You just won $5 million. And everyone wants to know how much are you paying in tax?

Exactly, man. It's a good question. Fortunate enough to have Texas as my state, so I don't have to worry too much about that, but got to mitigate the federal taxes. So right now, I've got a legal and financial team that I'm working with, and we're coming up with good strategies to move forward and try to mitigate as much as we can, man. And how did Mr. Beast send you $5 million? Just direct deposit, man. No issues with the bank? No issues, yeah. Did he show up? Yeah, it showed up. I was expected

to be in the bank the 25th, because usually you get paid out the episode after it airs. So I was double checking the whole time. You know, it wasn't in there. So I was like, man, did I fat finger a number or something like that? But we filmed the reunion in 26, and they didn't send it to their. I got there because they wanted to get my reaction when I sent it. They sent the money to me. So they sent it that day.

They told me to check and just flabbergasted, man. It was surreal. What do you feel like to get $5 million like that? It was humbling, man. It was crazy. You know, I signed up to do this for. my family to change their lives, to set my boys up for life, and just to know that I accomplished what I set out to do, and then see that money hit the account after the fact.

Eight months later, after keeping a secret, it was just surreal, man. It was like a big relief to know, like, yeah, I really did it. Like, I can set my boys up for life. So how much money do you have left? Yeah, I think last time I checked, I had $1.2 million left. What'd you spend it on? Spend it on a Lamborghini, and then I bought a new house, two new houses. I'm just kidding.

I still got it all. I still got it all. But that exact feeling, let's say it's in the moment, take your mind back to when the money hits your account. What's the first thought? Is it a sports car? No, no, not at all, man. My first thought was just like, wow, like, I need to start planning. Like I need to make sure this money lasts and keep it for it to continue to grow.

Because I'm not like an extravagant guy. I'm someone that likes to invest. You know, I want to make sure that this lasts a while to take care of my family. Because that's ultimately why I did it to buy back time with my family. Because there's been multiple times where I've been away from family due to the natures of my work. And I've missed out a lot of monumental moments with my kids and stuff like that. So just whatever I can do, buy back back that time. But on the actual number that you think you'll have when all is said and done,

because we didn't get a specific number, how much will you have after taxes? I'm not too sure, man. I'm thinking worst case scenario, like 3.5 if I don't do anything with it, just because, you know, all I have to worry about is federal. But ideally, I'm hoping to try to keep as much as I can. over four, close to 4.5 or something like that, just depending on what strategies we roll with and go from there. Did you quit your job?

No, no. Unfortunately, I can't quit the military just like that. There's a whole process and stuff, but some conversations that we'll have down the road and then decide what's the best decision moving forward. So being in the military, how are you able to take so much time off to go to compete these games? That's a great question, man.

It was a time where our manning was low, so it was more difficult to take that time off. But I had so many great supervisors and leadership that were so supportive of this unique opportunity. So they decided to do what they can in their powers to make it so I could pursue this opportunity. How does that work? You go to your boss, you say,

hey, I got selected to compete in a Mr. Beast competition. I need an indefinite time off. Yeah. Right? Yeah. And at that time. How do they pitch that? Yeah.

At that time, we didn't know how long it was going to last. It was just a rough estimate. So I told them, I was like, hey, their applications are live. I'm going to apply for this. I'm not too sure how long it's going to be. And then when I got selected, they're like, oh, man, that's actually happened. We got to get this ball rolling so we can make sure you're able to do this. But they were super supportive, man.

As long as you, if you come up to your, you know, your leadership with a potential opportunity, as long as you come with a solution to, you know, kind of fix the issue with you being gone, you know, they're more than likely going to help grant the opportunity and do what they can to be supportive. Did they give you PR training? Because every answer that you're giving here is also like, you know, how did you get the time off? They're like, man, the staff is incredible. The supervisors are amazing. They're super flexible to my every need.

Sure, it was a little bit of work up front. Yeah. But hey, that's what I signed up for. They just did. It's just to be. Yeah. No, I mean, yeah, we definitely have, like, public affairs in the military that give you PR training for specific things. But, no, like, it was just awesome.

I work with a great group of people, very supportive. I'm just thankful to be in a great environment that, you know, they're willing to let me pursue this unique opportunity and be gone for six weeks. So where did you see the advertisement to sign up? How did you know about it? Yeah. I saw it on Instagram. So I've been following Mr. Beasts for a good, good time now. So it came across my feed.

And this was after seeing season one. And I was like, man, the season one was awesome. Big adrenaline rush would be so cool to participate in this. And I was like, yeah, I might as well, you know, try, apply and see what happens and go from there. And then hopefully work gets on board with it too. And then went through the whole process. What was the process like? What's the vetting?

Yeah. So it starts. with an application. So you've got to answer some questions, fill out your personal details, your job, background checks, stuff like that. And then you submit like a one-minute video talking about who you are, where you're from, your job.

Now, what was your inspiration for applying? Did you watch season one? Who was your favorite on season one? And then what you would do with the money if you want. So I sent in a video like that. You know, I wasn't thinking like anything would come from it because I guess there was allegedly 400, thousand plus applicants.

So they picked me for the smart or the strong team. How do they determine that? They felt from like my background playing college football, being on a previous show and making it to the finale. It's another physical competition and then just military experience that I'd be better suited for the strong team. Did you want to be the strong team or did you want to be secretly the smart team? I wanted to be the strong team because a lot of the smart people in there, you know,

they have huge accomplishments. engineers, CEOs, you know, eight degrees, photographic memory. It's crazy, the accomplishments that they had. And,

you know, because I'm sure some of them looked at us like, oh, they're, you know, they're just jacks. But we got a little bit of brains, too,

you know, not a lot of people knew, like my background, you know, my training and stuff like that. And, you know, just being in the military,

being a strategic thinker and stuff. So it was nice to kind of hide that. What was your background, your strategic, What is it exactly that you do for the military? Yeah, so I'm a pilot in the military. So it's a two-year pipeline.

It's rigorous training. You know, you really have no time to breathe. It's either sink or swim. And for me, I didn't have any aviation experience beforehand. So it was all brand new to me. So I just stayed in the books, studied hard, and then just did my best. What are you flying?

So I fly MQ-9s. It's unmanned aerial vehicle or a drone or UAS, whatever you want to call it. but it's a pretty cool asset with multiple capabilities. How much is that drone worth? Upwards of 30, 30 million or so. Have you ever crashed a drone before? Not that one, no.

Thankfully not. A DGI drone, maybe, but not that one. That's incredible. It's very challenging because you're not in the aircraft, so you need to know how to read systems and things like that. So you just have to know your platform inside out, And that's what the whole two-year pipeline is. What was your mentality going into Beast games?

Did you think that there was a real chance of you winning? What percent would you say that you thought you would win? And what strategies were you expecting to employ? Like numbers, maybe you'd walk with. What was the whole idea for you? So it's funny because after seeing season one, seeing the first couple episodes were chance and luck, I told my wife, I was like, hey, I'll probably see you in a week.

Like, I don't know if I'll last because it's all chance. and stuff, but luckily they got rid of that. So I went in and then once we started getting through the grind and stuff, I thought I could make it far, but I didn't really believe in my abilities to make it to the end because there are so many people, so many accomplished athletes and smart individuals. So I knew it was going to be tough. And my wife and I kind of talked about it like, hey, if you can leave with at least 100 to 150, that would be awesome.

That would definitely change our lives. help pay off some bills. So that was a number I had in mind moving forward. And then to get to the strategy aspect, I just went in, was my genuine self, try to make good connections with people, and just be a good guy and just be positive. And try to lay low, too, be conservative with what you say, no one to be a leader and no one to be a follower, and then make moves when necessary. because if you saw, like, a lot of people that did a lot of talking and stuff like that, they kind of talked themselves onto the bus, and they became targets. So just knowing your place, knowing when to speak up and whatnot, and then when to take those

roles on, and that's ultimately what I did. How long were you gone for in total? I think it was like 42 to 45 days. We left May 30th, and we got back July 12th. So it was, yeah, around six weeks, 42, 45 days, something like that. Were you allowed to have any access to your phone? No. Not at all.

No internet. As soon I landed in Vegas got picked up. We got shuttled to South Point, the hotel, and they confiscated our phones, any electronic device. They went through our suitcases, luggage, and all that stuff. And then I was it from there, and we didn't see it until July 12th. What was it like going without your phone or the internet for that long? For me, it wasn't too bad. Like, I went through that before with the military.

I did eight weeks without my phone, so I kind of knew what to expect. I was prepared. The only thing that sucked about that was not being able to talk to my family and see my boys. But outside of that, like, I didn't have any issues. I thought it was a nice way to cleanse from technology, social media and stuff like that. And just live in a moment, get to meet some of these awesome people and just get to know them more on a personal level. Did you see anybody having social media withdrawals? I'm sure there was at the beginning.

Yeah, there's a lot of people that would mention like, oh, man, I wish I had my phone right now to go on Instagram, TikTok and stuff like that. But eventually, like, people got over that and they kind of adjusted. And what was your initial impression from the first competition? Yeah, the first competition, I was like, man, they're setting off season two with a bang. The smart challenge was pretty cool. And then the strong challenge was awesome. We were on that platform. They lifted us, I think, 40 feet in the air.

And then they dropped those trap doors and we had to climb through it, pick up a third of our body weight, get the blocks, and then climb back up and stack them. And then once I saw it edited and seeing like the drone footage from that, like I was like, man, they really set the tone with this challenge. And it's going to be a crazy ride for this season. How difficult was that challenge? I looked at the physical challenge and look, I'm no Arnold Schwarzenegger, Ronnie Coleman. But I was like, you know what?

Like, I feel like I could probably do that. Jack's sitting on his couch. Yeah, eating my popcorn. I was like, you know what? I get eaten. Like, how difficult was that actually? Yeah. For you.

I didn't really have any issues, man. It was fun. Like, I trained for it. And it's just climbing down, picking up a 30 body weight. When you got down to the pole, it was a little tricky there because they have like these little rings that you can kind of put your feet on. But they're very tiny and like they kind of broke. So essentially, like I had to hold myself with one arm trying to pull up a third of my body weight and then wrap my arm around, get the blocks and then climb back up. But ultimately, I didn't think it was too bad, man.

It was a lot of fun. I think you could do it. You think I could? I think you could. Yeah, man. You could see a little bit of my traps to this show. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I see it. What would you say was the most difficult challenge

out of everything that you did within Beast games? Probably the hanging from the poles, 200 feet in the air. Either that or the cubes, because we were hanging from the poles 100 feet in the air. We had different, like, segments for rounds, timeframes and stuff like that. And they get in total, like, maybe 20 minutes, 25 minutes I was up there. And then the people that went to the end were like 45 minutes or so. So that was tough because you're just, you're getting fatigued. And then you're just trying to hold on with all that you have to not fall.

But that was physically probably one of the challenging ones. And then like mentally, probably the cubes being in there eight hours. And you have to like convince someone to eliminate themselves. And then, you know, you're just asking for whatever you want. making time go by, but ultimately in the back of everyone's heads, it's like, we got to play a game, someone's got to handcuff themselves, who's it going to be, and what game are we going to play? So those two challenges were definitely probably the toughest in the respect of physical and social aspect, or mental aspect.

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And that's yours. And seeing that four out of the five people didn't do that. You know, you got people online saying like, I want to press that button in the heartbeat. But seeing those people turn it down for their teammates. It's pretty awesome. You know, it's a chance for them to stay in the game, too, their teammates, because they could have took that million dollars

and eliminated a team and stay in the game. Okay. When I sell my business, I want the best tax and investment advice. I want to help my kids, and I want to give back to the community. Ooh. then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my out of office has a forever setting. An IG Private Wealth Advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your business,

your family, and your dreams. Get financial advice that puts you at the center. Find your advisor at IGPrivatewealth.com. But just as an example, it was crazy to see that. People turn down life-changing money. So it's very much so like a social experiment. Would you have taken a million dollars? No.

No. That early in the game. Even though your wife said, hey, if we get 150, we're happy. And you could say, hey, honey, I brought home a million dollars. You went on a game show and turned down a million dollars. Yeah, she would have been mad seeing up for sure. But for me, it was too early in the game. And I was willing to bet on myself and risk it to make it further.

because I knew that there would be other opportunities to make money. So I just took it day by day and then just took it challenge by challenge and then stayed optimistic. And then, yeah, I'm a competitor. I came there to go to the end. I came to win. Like, I wasn't going to take a bribe. What if it was $2 million? $2 million.

I would definitely consider it more for sure. But I likely wouldn't have taken it just because... Two and a half. You could win half the prize bowl. Because they're going to be out anyway. Two and a half, I would consider it a lot more. Oh, yeah. So it's, it's crazy, man.

Like, you have that much money. It's guaranteed. But I'm just, I'm such a competitor. When you look at the odds and you say, okay, there's 25 people here. And I could get a half of the total prize by eliminating like seven of them. Yeah. Yeah. You wouldn't do that.

No, I wouldn't. It's, I know it sounds crazy, but if, if I were to do it, you know, yeah, would have 2.5, but, you know, there's a chance to win five, potentially 10. Yeah, but that's like a gambler's mentality. I was about to say. There's like, well, I could just keep parlaying this thing to make even more. It is. And then you end up getting voted out and then Yeah. It was just a risk I was willing to take, man. I was, I was ready to better myself and That's the thing. You called them your teammates. But in actuality, I feel like the people that you were saving by not pressing the button are just your competitors. Yeah. Those are the people that

you're up against. For sure. And they can try to say, oh, yeah, these are. You know, these are like people that you're like all working together, but in actuality, it's only one person that's going to walk with the money. Yeah. And so that's the thing where it's like, I was surprised that more people just didn't push the button earlier, especially after seeing season one.

Yeah, absolutely. And then they get turned on. And they get turned on either that or they walk with no money. Yeah. And you're there to try to make the money. Yeah, exactly. It's crazy. But I think people realize that if you want to move far in this game,

you have to build trust and have those solid relationships. with people to move further in the game so you can have people that you can rely on because then that comes to a point where hey, it's every man for itself it's time to play the game. You know, alliances are at the door. You know, there's only one person that can win.

And we all knew from season one there would be more opportunities to make money so a lot of people were willing to gamble or take that risk. But you would say that it was a test of social intelligence. Yeah. Of all things. For sure.

That's really interesting. One thing I mentioned to Jeff when we filmed with him is that if you round up the people that made it to the top 10, top 15, top 5 of season one of Beast games, they're probably overall, like, high skill, like high intelligence, just overall really well-rounded individuals with like a high stat sheet. You know, if you're like playing a game, they're probably like pretty max stats and things, just generally speaking. And so if there are any recruiters out there, it's not a bad place to look for some talent. Would you agree with that? It's a test of, I mean, virtually every skill that you can possibly employ. Yeah, 100%. I would agree with that. Yeah. It, it, it, it, it, it, it's definitely a test. And it's, it's, it's very accurate with what you said. Because it, it shows the different type of skills that you have, what you're capable of doing. And it's, yeah, it's it's, it's super accurate, man. I agree 100%. So at what point did you think that you're going to win? I think when I got to the top 10, when we got to the top 10 after seeing our families, I know, I know.

I knew I had like a 10% chance. I was extra motivated after seeing my family. And that's when I was like, starting to feel like, hey, I'm here. I can do this thing. We're so close. I just gotta, you know, keep my head down, keep playing to my strategy, and then just make moves when I need to. So that's when I started to really feel that I had a good chance to win. How much strategy did you have going into it?

So I watched this first season a couple times and I saw like different characters and how they he played the game and then seeing the ones that went the furthest because jeff was my favorite for season one seeing how he played the game i could relate to that because that's kind of how i embody myself you know kind of laid back you know love to meet people very outgoing and you know not quick to like be cool you know it's so loud or make moves but be rational about it so when i saw how he played i was like okay i could see myself playing this way because that's the type of person I am. And I just went in there, did that, and, uh, yeah, it ended up working out for me. What was your first impression of Mr. Beast?

My first impression of him was, so we had a steak dinner. He took us out to a steak dinner when we came to Vegas and he came in, greeted everyone, and he spent time, talked to everyone. So I thought he was awesome. You know, I've seen him on his videos, YouTube videos and whatnot, doing all these awesome, amazing things. But then getting to see him in person and see him interact with people was pretty cool. What did you say to you? I didn't get a chance to talk to him. He talked to a lot of people because at that point there was 200 people and we had like

maybe two hours or so. But just seeing him interact and take the time out to talk to other people was really cool to see because he really cares about what he does. He's very passionate and you could tell. And then as the season moved on and the numbers dwindled, we got more and more time to talk and engage with them. So what was your first conversation with me? Mr. Beast?

I think, like, our first conversation was probably about, like, a challenge or something like that. He's very, like I said, very passionate. So he was always open to criticism, feedback. You know, he would ask us, like, hey, did you guys like that? If you not, if not, like, what could have been better? You know, what could we do to be better? So he was, he was very down to earth, cared about what we thought and just very attentive.

What criticism did you give him? I honestly didn't give too many criticism, man. Like, I thought the challenges were well put together. They're awesome. Like, I'm pretty late back. Like, it doesn't take a lot to, like, you know, upset or, you know, for me to criticize things. But I thought everything was well put together.

Yeah. And then, like, the social aspect, the city, everything was awesome. Like, I was, I was willing to sleep in a tent, worst case scenario, to compete for this money. But they had all this extravagant, like, different opportunities and, like, the city. and challenges and stuff. So, yeah, I had no criticism at all, really. What do you miss most from the Beast games?

I miss the interactions with the players and the contestants and just the producers and crew because everyone was so nice, so friendly. They cared for us. They made sure that we were doing well not only like physically and mentally and all, but just make sure that we're maintained and taken care of. Do you wish that you'd be able to compete in a future one?

Because when I watch it, I'm like, that looks just fun. Above everything else, it just seems fun to like, it's like summer camp, the good kind, and you get to compete and hang out and make a community. And, you know, you're getting at film so you can go back and watch it. And then just getting to see how the Beast team works, like the hours that they put into it,

the dedication, the drive, and how passionate they are. It's a surreal environment to be in. What would you criticize about Beast games? That's tough. there's there's not too much i would criticize honestly um i mean we can't just put out a fluff piece here no for sure for sure no i'm trying to think like the only thing like is that i can think of is just like we i mean we had like a lot of downtime um it wasn't on them you know it was there's weather days and stuff like that so there were things that you know we had a lot of free time and just you know not doing

much so that was kind of frustrating not to do anything but outside of that you know just jimmy took on a lot of responsibilities. He was filming YouTube videos, TikToks. He had a lot of famous influencers, streamers come through. So the only thing I had to criticize on this aspect is maybe take on less and get some more

sleep because he was just constantly busy. But game-wise, you know, I don't really have any issues with that. Maybe some different games for season three since we've seen a couple of the games and I know that was like a criticism online. But outside of that,

Like we were, it was awesome. Yeah, I got to say my criticism was that some of the character development, I thought, was really boring. Yeah. And I just found myself skipping through it just to get to the challenges because the challenges were great. And I think it has to be a little bit more engaging and more like the fear factor, like a little edgier. Yeah. And less of like the drama between the players. Yeah.

Because the drama wasn't even that good. And the relationship between that one. Like, that was the only one that I actually followed because of like, oh, man, they always get voted out, but they made it some time. Yeah, they did. But that was it. I just found it. I just couldn't get through it. Yeah.

Skip, skip, skip, skip. And then I get to the challenge and I'll watch that. Yeah. No, that was definitely a criticism online. I remember doing Ask Me Anything on Reddit, and that was one of the things that they criticized. So I think that's one of the things that they're planning to make a better development for characters moving forward in season three and giving. and giving more back stories and getting to know people

more personal level. Yeah, so the one thing I was curious about because there were cameras everywhere. Everywhere. Does that mean they have footage of you sleeping? Oh, yeah, absolutely. We had like three or four cameras in our dorms. Was that unnerving?

It was, at first, it took a little bit to get used to. But after a while, it was just like second hand nature. You just forgot it was there. But at first, it was like, man, like, Because my bed was in the corner, and one of the cameras was right next to my bed. And then, like, every once in a while, you'll just see it, like, pan and look right at you and stuff. I'm just like, oh, man. What does that feel like to be watched 24-7?

Because you know there's someone just, like, just staring at that screen, watching you and listening to you, everything you say. It was tough, man. Like, it was tough to get adjusted to. And then a lot of people, you know, were very conscious of how they conducted themselves. because, you know, they don't want to put bad things out there in the world and stuff like that. So once, after a while, people got used to it and they knew, like, what they could and couldn't do and stuff like that. But it was adjustment, man, just constantly being watched. Is there anything that someone said on camera, they're like, oh, crap, I should not have said that.

Oh, plenty of time. Cut that out. Plenty of times, man. In our pods is what we call in the dorms. We had some funny, funny conversations at night that I'm glad that that. they didn't air but did anyone go and say hey listen jimmy we're having some locker room talk just some guy talk listen just make sure that's cut did anyone ever say that i'm sure i i think i can't remember who but i'm pretty sure like a lot of us joked about that with him like hey man like we're having

some interesting conversations you know maybe maybe not pay attention or so yeah but um yeah we definitely had like a bunch of locker room talk and you know it was just fun getting getting to have a good time with the guys in our dorms at night and then just, you know, have fun in the past time. Where do you get privacy? In the bathrooms. That's where you get privacy. There's no cameras in a shower.

Are you still miced though? No. So usually when you wake up, if you tell them like, hey, I'm going to go shower stuff, like they'll let you do that. And then you're going to go see the audio people to get miced up after that. And you're miced up the whole day. So if you go to the bathroom, let's just say midday. you're still miced up there

they hear you yeah so that's definitely interesting that's hilarious yeah because it's also very difficult to pee when the mic is on you yeah so some of us would take it off

because there was a lot of times in the beginning where the mic would be on your back like your back hip and people would you know go to the bathroom and the mic will ultimately fall in toilet and stuff like that so they're like all right we got to change something then we got to put it in our pockets.

Or if you guys go to bathroom, just please take it off, put it on the counter, and then put it back on. So they definitely lost some mics from that. Let's be honest, staying consistent with nutrition can feel like a losing battle. With work, exercise, and everything else going on in life, cooking every meal just is not realistic. That's why today's sponsor Cook Unity has become such an easy part of my routine. It's the first meal delivery service that connects you directly with award-winning chefs,

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by using the code ICH-50. Again, that is 50% off your first order at Cookunity.com. slash ICH or just click the link down below in the description and use code ICH 50. What other crazy stories have you seen that have not been published? Like I saw on season one, you know, there was a lot of backlash for the living conditions and stuff like that, but I haven't seen any crazy stories from our season at all. Not that I can think of. Anything that you noticed out on the field, like competing in the game that they didn't

publicize that you thought maybe should have been shown? I feel like they definitely got everything that they needed to hype up certain things or like drama aspects in the episodes, maybe a few more conversations that they could have included. But outside of that, I think they represented and portrayed each moment very well. I'm curious how the controversy affected the first one, because from my perspective, that controversy may be very curious to see, okay, now I got to watch this show to see how the,

this was playing out. Yeah. I think it helped. But I don't know if the numbers of the second one were better than the first. Yeah. But I think a little controversy, you want just like a little edginess so that people say, oh, man, that happened. You hear about that.

And then all the people make YouTube videos about it and then people tune it. Yeah, absolutely. It's every advertising that's good advertising in a sense. So it drew people more, a lot more people back to season two to see, you know, if there's going to be any controversy or if there's going to be like certain drama or, you know, different situations, like, how is it going to pan out? How's going to play out different from season one? So, um, I definitely think that helped with getting more eyes and attention to season two for sure. Were you allowed to split money with somebody else and say,

hey, if, if I win, I'll give you $100,000. No, unfortunately not. It was in our contracts where we can't do that because it would be considered a game advantage. Um, so we weren't able to split money with other contestants. Did anyone try and say, hey, man, we're not allowed to? Like, they take, the mic off they're in the bathroom yeah i'll slip you a 50 no no not at all everyone was super strict about that because they mentioned how if that were to happen it could if you made money it could affect you getting paid out if they found out about that or if you know you were talking about that too so everyone once they said that to us everyone was very strict um with that rule and they did not want to affect their chances of moving forward or getting eliminated from that or

or potentially getting paid out their money. Was there a time you really doubted yourself that you thought you're going to lose? Towards like... When a country's productivity cycle is broken, people feel it in their paychecks, their communities, their futures. What does this mean for individuals, communities, and businesses across the country? Join business leaders, policymakers, and influencers for CG's national series on the Canadian Standard of Living,

productivity and innovation. Learn what's driving Canada's productivity to climate. and discover actionable solutions to reverse it. The beginning, you know, I was still, like when we first got in a city, you know, you're still trying to create those bonds and relationships and stuff like that. And at the time, like, I talked to a lot of people, but I didn't have, like, super close friends that I could, like, consider allies. That didn't happen until, like, later.

So at that time, I was like, I don't know what team I'm going to go with, who I'm going to align with and stuff. Like, I'm close. Like, I've talked in a good time. standings with a lot of people, but I'm not like super close on a personal level just yet. So I thought like for social aspect of the game, that might not work out well for me, moving forward. So I was a little concerned there.

But ultimately, I ended up finding a team at the beginning, separated from that team, and then joined another team and then went all the way with them and worked out. Were you ever tempted to leave early? From the games? Yeah. No, not one bit. You miss your family or anything or like, hey, maybe. Maybe I should take this 300 grand and just dip out of here.

No, not at all. I missed them, but I was there on a mission, man. I was there to set my boys up, to change your lives, provide for my family. And I wasn't going to leave without giving my all. Because I didn't want to live with what is. Like, I know before the second challenge, it was maybe like two weeks in. They had, when they revealed season two competitors coming back in, those 10 individuals, individuals had 100 grand cases, and you could have took that bribe, I'm self-eliminated.

If I were to took one of those bribes, I would have been living with what ifs the whole time, like if I didn't take this bribe, what if I'd stayed in the game, how far could I've gone, could I've made more money, could have had more opportunities to do so, how would my game be played? So it's like that strategic. How many people, though, regret not taking the case who've lost and they got nothing? And then they look back and say, I should have taken the case. So I can only speak on like the top 10 portion because I got to know them more on a personal level and we had conversations like that.

But a lot of them don't necessarily regret not taking that bribe. A lot of them were there to go as far as they can and just soak in this once in a lifetime experience. So a lot of them were happy that they were able to make in the end. And granted, some of them walked away of nothing and, you know, they were happy with their experience. of course they wanted to leave or something, but they're happy, you know, that they had to, they got to live this whole experience into this entirety. What traits did you see in the people who failed?

Some people would, you know, just be playing very hard, and people saw that, which kind of made them a target, you know, strategic and the way you're thinking and, like, over-communicating with people because a lot of people at the beginning were able to tell, like, who was trying to, trying to play the game really hard right now. Who's like overstepping?

Yeah, who's overstepping and like making all these promises and talking to a lot of people? And then like some of those people were getting caught in lies too. Really? Yeah, which really stood out. But yeah, those were like the traits. Were there any fights? There was, yeah, there was not like anything like physical, like anything like anything like that, but like more so verbally.

There was right before the obstacle course, two teams with, The Pugel Sticks, if you guys remember that, they had like a little verbal encounter right before the challenge. So they wanted to go against each other and settle it on the obstacle course. Then outside of that, there's other drama, too. All verbal, nothing like no physical altercations or anything like that. But there were some people that had beef. Because not everyone, not 100 people in the city is going to get along with everyone.

There's going to be people that are different. different ways of life, different ways of thinking, and how they conduct themselves. And so there was definitely some clashing at times. But yeah, there was a few. What do you think about the players who play dirty? Taking all too much money. For example, I'll talk about Nick when he took $2.50 out of the $1 million. Me personally, I had no issues with that.

There was a moment where he came right around our graves right before he went to do his split and he was telling everyone like hey you know i'm gonna be going you know whatever he was saying and then when he got to me i told him i was like hey man because he was he was my number one ally in a game yeah especially after you turned down to a million dollars and allowed me a chance to stay in a game continue to keep compete for my family i was like that that meant so much to me dude i'll do whatever i can to help you move further in the game too like i got your back and when we got to that point, I was like, hey, man, take what you want. Like, you turn a million dollars down. I'm not going to be upset. This is guaranteed money from you. And knowing his story, his background before the

games, like, he deserved it all. He's such a great guy. And I had no issues with him taking it. I'm just thankful to have left with something from that instance in the game. Did you create any enemies in the show? No, I don't think I had any enemies, man. I think I was on good terms with majority of people, 99% of people, maybe like one or two, but 99% of people I was on good terms with. Do you still talk to Jimmy much? I talked to him a couple times. He hit me up and asked me what I thought about the finale and like what I liked, didn't like and stuff like that. So we were chatting about that. And then we got to talk a couple days later for that. A couple days later for the reunion. And then after that, you know, he's been busy with work. What was it like watching

it back? Was there anything that happened with you watching it that you were unaware of in person? Yeah, watching it back was definitely pretty well. For me personally, there's nothing that I wasn't surprised or didn't remember that I did that threw me off. But seeing some of the conversations other people had was interesting because, you know, you're seeing them and like you just remember were like engaging with them throughout the season and the show and stuff. And then, you know, you thought like, oh, yeah, they're awesome. They're good people. But then you see some of the conversations that they had that was shown in the show.

And you're just like, oh, wow, I had no clue that they were playing hard like that. So what's an example of that? I got to go with my friend Katie. You know, she's awesome. She was in our alliance and stuff. But then there's a couple of episodes where she was having these conversations when she was doing different challenges or something outside of us. And then seeing some of the conversations that she was having and stuff,

I'm just like, dang, she came to play. Was there anything she said specifically? There was one moment when she was doing the balance challenge. It was the second episode. And I remember her saying something like, I'm sniffing out the week. And I was like, dang, Katie came to play. She's a gamer. Because we didn't see that side of her when she was around us.

because she was in our alliance. She was with us all the time. But then when I saw that, I was like, dang, okay, she came to play. She's a competitor. So that was pretty cool to see. How did you keep it a secret that you won? It's tough, man. It was eight months of keeping a secret.

The only person that knew was my wife because I told her the day I got back. I made it sleep. And I have a piece game season two chips. Stop it. And I won five poor. $1 million? No. Yeah.

And that's where you saw that reaction video from. Yeah. And then I think January or so, I got an NDA for Jeff so he can find out. So we could talk about like. Who gave you the, like how did you get the NDA to the previous winner? Yeah. So I just reached out to their production crew. I reached out to Mike Cruz.

He's one of the executive guys on the show and asked if that would be possible. And he said, yeah, we can. make it happen so you can start game planning and, you know, getting good advice from Jeff. But if you're reaching out to Jeff saying, hey, can you sign this NDA for me? It's pretty clear what's happening. Oh, yeah. That was that was after the fact. I personally didn't reach out to Jeff. I reached out to the Beast teams. Oh, and then they reached out to Jeff. Yeah, they reached out to Jeff. And then after he signed it, then they connected us together via text. Okay. Yeah. And how many people on the Beast team knew about it? I'm not too sure. I think there was maybe, because the

finale was in Saudi Arabia. I don't think they had like the whole production crew out there. So whoever was on set that day were the people that knew. And I'm sure more people knew too because they had to edit the videos. Amazon had to play their role in it. So I'm sure there was a lot of people that knew. What's crazy though is that the winner was spoiled. You were spoiled very early on in the Palmy market. And it became very obvious who the winner was very clearly. Yeah, that was stressful because I didn't want them to think like I'm out here telling people and stuff like that. How much money did you make betting on Polly Market that you won? Five million.

Yeah, they doubled it. I put my whole life savings into it. No, but yeah, I was very stressed because I think like maybe week six or seven I had people like sending me screenshots of the prediction markets. And what were they saying? They're like, hey, have you seen this? Like, did you win? What would you say? I was like, I think they're just voting for me because it's like a six, seven trend going on, like that meme.

Like, I don't know how accurate this is. Like, don't ask me for any advice. I'm not going to tell you what to do with your money type of thing and stuff. Or I would just like ignore it. Like, if it was like my close friends or something like that, just not give them anything. Because all the people that hit me up were like my close friends. And they had zero idea that I won until the finale. Those who lost, were they not able to tell other people that they lost?

They weren't supposed to. I'm sure some people did, and I think some people did from conversations that were had, but you're not supposed to. You're supposed to abide by the NDA that you signed. It's so impossible because you can't. Because people are going to be coming back sooner than others. Yes. I'll say this.

Yeah. The people that got out early, they were very into. with what was going on a show. Because I remember getting out, getting my phones, and then seeing, like, there's a group chat on Instagram. And they were, like, detective level, like, looking to see who was active on Instagram when. And, like, when was the last post?

And, like, activity-wise. So, like... Yeah, that's true, because if you're posting on Instagram, then that would suggest that you got out. Yeah. And so did they tell you you can't do that? No. They gave you your phone back, and then you had free reigns.

And they just said, hey, just don't tell anyone. Yeah. I mean, we all signed NDAs, so. But, yeah, I remember seeing the chat and, like, conversations with people. There were, like, there were people in there just eye and stalking people's pages. Well, not necessarily stocking it, but looking at for activity. It's going to be impossible to enforce. Yeah.

Unless if you keep everyone there for the entire duration. You have to keep everyone for the entire duration, but then you get the footage and you have to maintain, like, you have to keep that final episode or no, probably the last, the whole season to, like, like a small group of people. Yeah. And then how do you prevent any one of the people at Amazon from, like, reviewing the thing? Yeah. You probably have 50 to 100 people who have had their eyes on that final episode to approve it. I think there's like over a thousand production workers and stuff like that on set.

But. Yeah, because you could narrow it down. Best case top 10. I can't believe they did it for the first season, how they kept it a sequel. I don't think Polly Market was it. No, it was Polly Market had Jeff winning by like, week two or three. Really? Really? Yeah. It happened in both seasons. I didn't realize. I had no idea. Yeah. I guess I'm only recently into Polly Market and I watch a lot of the odds. Yeah.

And you could see as soon as something spikes up, I'm like, okay, that's an insider. They know what's about to happen. We're about to invade this because no one's going to dump $10 million into this obscure bet. Exactly. Sure enough, it happens. Yeah. So I'm now paying attention to it. Yeah, it's wild, man. Like, I didn't really know too much about polling markets until our season, and people were sending me screenshots. And then just looking back and seeing like the odds shift heavily, like week two or three, like me going from like, I don't know, 5%, 10% to like 50%, 60%.

So I was like, dang, this definitely some insider trading. All you have to do is look at probably the top five largest accounts and say it's probably one of them. But even then, it's somewhat anonymous. Yeah, exactly. And then what if it's someone who heard it from someone who heard it from someone, how far down the line do you have to go? Exactly. And at that point, if they're risking their money from like a tip to a tip to a tip, I think they kind of deserve it at that point because they could just as easily be wrong. Yeah, absolutely, man.

They went through the whole dot process of how to like, you know, go through multiple like different levels of like security in a sense of how to like do this. So were you unable to spend any of the money because that would be a display of newfound wealth? No, I mean, I, as soon as like for, I think it was episode. Or I guess no, they gave you the money after it was. Yeah, but like episode, I think it was seven or eight, you know, I made the 100 grand and stuff like that. So I was able to spend it as soon as I got it. But the $5 million didn't come to the finale. So what did you spend the $100,000 on?

So yeah, I've only really spent money on that. And that's literally just been for like legal service. services, financial services, just to, you know, get the best advice of... You haven't treated yourself for your family to anything? No, not yet. Not even like a steak dinner. No, we just, we haven't had the time. My wife's work schedule is busy.

My work schedule is busy. We really haven't had that much time and then trying to figure out vacation time because my wife travels for work, too. So she got, she's got a trip coming up this upcoming week and then, you know, she's got, like, a trip every, every month or so. How does it feel clocking into your job? now as opposed to before. Yeah, there's definitely days where I'm just like,

oh, man, I got to go to work and, you know, do this. But once I get there, man, like what helps me get through the days is just being around, like, awesome people. The people that I work with really help the day go by faster and, you know, make the job enjoyable. You know, I do like doing the job. There's days when it's tough,

and there's days when it's awesome. But ultimately, the people, or what make the job worth it for me. How much longer do you think you're going to stay employed? It's definitely some conversations I have to have. It's a process in the military to separate for this reason. So I'll have to have those conversations and then, I don't know, could be potentially the end of the year.

Oh, wow. Yeah. Ultimately, it just, you know, we have to make the best decision of what works for my family and stuff, how soon we could do it or the timeline. So there's a lot of questions in the air. And would you say that your overall happiness in life, your average happiness, there was an increase after getting $5 million hitting your account? Oh, for sure. I was definitely, yeah, definitely a lot more happy and less stressed, knowing that I got that and knowing that we can live more comfortably now.

and we have more things, more money to do more things, invest more, and set up ourselves for our futures. So definitely an aspect. But there definitely comes like a stress level because I've never had this much money in my life before. You know, newfound wealth and this absurd amount of money, you know, there's that stress level of like trying to be a perfectionist, trying to make the best strategies moving forward and how to use that money to ultimately, you know, get you passive income and then to have it continue to grow. So the stress of like making the right smart investment decisions is there for sure. It's real. What are you going to be spending the money on? So I'm thinking about getting into real estate and then investing some in ETS, dividends and things

like that. We'll see how much I do. But real estate seems like it's a good way to make passive income and help with mitigating taxes too. So you're going to be a real estate. You're going to be a real estate professional? Or what's the play on that? So if I get out of the military, I'll definitely look to become a real estate professional because I think you have to have,

I've heard conflicting information. You need to have like 700 or 750 hours. Yes, correct. But then I've heard someone say, like, if you own properties, you're technically considered a real estate agent. No. So.

No, you have to spend, I think it's 700 hours, but also more time on that. than you do anything else. For sure. So if you spend 701 hours in a military, then you're disqualified. Yeah. Okay. So yeah. Depending on like,

if I get out, when I get out, that will definitely determine if I can meet that requirement and stuff. So... Here's what I'm worried about is you're running down the clock right now to become a real estate professional. Ideally, it's something you really start in January, February, March the latest.

And we're at the end of March now. Yeah. I don't like the idea of buying rental property for tax purposes. Unless you're just going to buy a rental property because it's like, oh my God, this is a great rental property. And I just so happen to be a real estate professional. And this property is great otherwise.

And it's icing on the cake, then I would do it. Yeah, for sure. I don't think in this case, it's worth it to buy rental property at this level for any sort of passive income. Because real estate right now is a really volatile market. Yeah, exactly. We just had our weakest home sales. in years.

Yeah. So. And that's why like I'm trying to like work with, uh, our, our financial team that I've, because I think maybe you guys have worked with Amanda before, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, we like, here we go again. We like Amanda. We're always just shouting out Amanda Hahn. Yeah. Tax strategist. All right. Amanda, we'll link your information.

Your email is going to get inundated. So I'm so sorry. But she said I could technically share it. So I'm, I'm sharing it. So just, listen, if you get. hundreds of emails. It's not our fault. Yeah, we gave her information to Togi as well. Oh, yeah. She's working with Togi. Nice. She actually working with him now? Yeah, yeah. She's had like, she's had several calls with him and his team. Yeah, she's phenomenal. And so that was a great

recommendation for Jeff. Yeah, man. Yeah, because Jeff said that you guys put him on with her and then he paid it forward to me. And it looks like I'll pay it forward to season three winner. She is good. Just be very careful getting into a rental property. Yeah, absolutely. And then doing the depreciation. It's just going to be hard for you to become a real estate professional. Right now is a difficult market. It can be done. But you've got to be so careful about that. Yeah. And that's one thing that we've talked about too as my wife and I, like, would she be willing to potentially leave her job to do this full time to build those real estate hours as well? So definitely some conversations. What does your wife do for work?

She's a HR. She did a little bit of recruiting, but she does HR. And does she want to quit? No. Surprisingly not, man. She worked really hard to get her job. She loves it and she doesn't plan on Quinn. She can't see herself not working. Does she want to spend some of the money?

Oh yeah. She definitely, she definitely knows. She's not like super like gun-ho about spending a lot of it. But one thing that we're going to do first is get her a new car. She definitely needs a new car. What kind of car? I think she's looking at like tell your rides, palisades, stuff like that. Nothing crazy.

Lamborghini, you're a... Yeah, she has a nice on like Lamborghinis or like G-wagon or like that. A rangerover. That's a great car. A G-wagon would be nice. Yeah, but... For tax purposes. And what about all of these other people? Yeah, for her real estate business, right?

Exactly. Yeah, exactly. All of these other people that you know, they're reaching out to you, they're asking for money. Yeah. I feel like that's pretty just run-of-the-mill. That's pretty standard when you come into a windfall. Have you experienced much of that? So I'm surprised that I haven't seen a lot of people come out of the woodworks, family-wise,

friendwise asking for money. It's more so like a lot of strangers. Like, I could go out on my Instagram and look at like thousands of messages of people just asking for money. It's wild. And some of them are just straight up, like direct with it. Like, hey, give me $50,000. I'm just like, dang, man.

Like, not even like a- Did you do it? No. Okay. Not even like a- That was my other account I asked. Not even like a hello or anything like that. Like, it was funny.

I remember one message I got, this one guy was asking me to pay for his frat dues. How much is that? I think like a, I don't know, a thousand bucks or something like that. So I thought that was pretty funny. But yeah, it's wild. And then, like, I'll have people that will engage, like, you know, say that they're super supportive and, like, they're rooting for me and stuff like that.

And, like, I try to answer those messages because I want people to know that I appreciate their support. And we'll have a conversation and stuff like that. And then they'll just hit me with, like, you know, I'm really struggling right now. Like, anything would help and stuff. And I'm just like, man, like, that's a tough situation. to be in because, you know, I want to use this platform to help others out. But like, I got to take care of my family first and then those closest to me before I start doing that. Once I have that all settle, then I'll look to like do what I can to help others out.

So it's definitely been interesting. Never would have guessed this would have happened. Kind of got a heads up from Jeff too. Because Jeff experienced a lot too. But yeah, I really haven't had like family members come out asking it's just more so been like people online and I've been getting that a lot I've been getting that a lot lately have you I don't know if it's real or not though because I'm getting it as well but some of the accounts look like like they look like fake accounts but also what's weird is that they ask for money a lot of them say like hey been following you for a while or hey I heard you're very generous not true but then they they ask for for money but then I check their account because I always, I'm just like curious.

And they have like one photo up and they're not even following me. Yeah. Like you would at least, it's free just to follow. I wonder how much that works then. Like, do they have these just like AI chatbot agents or something that they just deploy these accounts out? Yes. And just hit up all of the check mark accounts.

And somehow like they spend $5 and they get back $7. I bet because all of a sudden this has come up for me in the last five months. Yeah. It's I probably get three to six a day. Yeah. Every single day out of nowhere and all very similar messages. Yeah, I've had a lot like that. Like, I've had a lot that are from legit accounts.

You can tell, like, they have a lot of followers. And, you know, some of them follow me too, but none. There's been a lot of accounts that, like, are following 200 people when they have, like, zero to one followers and stuff like that. Right. That don't follow you. Like you said, asking for money and stuff just straight up. They'll send, like, some sketchy link or whatever.

Never click on knows. No. Of all of the things that you're going to spend money on, because you still will spend, some of the money you got. What are you most excited to spend? I'm excited to spend it on a much needed vacation with the family. You know, that's that's something that we've been talking about doing. We just got to find like the right time when our schedule is aligned to do that. You're going to fly first class? Yeah, I think. Really? Wow. I was not expecting that. Yeah, I was not expecting that either. Have you flown first class before? Where are you going to go? If we were to fly first

class, it's got to be like 10 to 14 hour flight. Yeah. Something like that. Like, I'm not going to do it for like three-hour flight. It's not worth of that. Like, I flew here in freaking middle seat. I sat middle seat here. So, but if we were to fly first class, it would have to be like a trip to like Asia, you know, Korea or something like that or go to Europe or something like that because we lived in Europe and we really loved it out there. So, yeah, at least once, just to say we did it.

So if you're flying first class, does that mean your kids are also flying first class? Now they're going to be, no, I'm just kidding. They'll be in business. Yeah, I would definitely treat them. Really? Wow. But I don't think. I would argue that's not worth.

Yeah, same here. That's not. I don't think I would do like something like a trip like that like super far away because it's tough to travel to long distances with kids. Oh, it's just you and your wife then. Yeah. Like if definitely my wife and I would do a nice trip like that and we would fly first class together. But when we do like a family trip with our kids, then, you know, we'll probably just do business or something like that.

Because they're young, man. See, what I think is that if you're, if you still really do want to fly first class, but not be like separate from your kids to show your kids like, hey, sorry, you can't come up here. You can always just say like, hey, look, first class flights are like $5,000. Back economy is like $500. How about this?

I'll buy you that Lego set that you want and you won't be sitting up with that. I guarantee you they'll probably want the Lego slice. You want the Lego set over sitting in first class. Any toys. Yeah, definitely use toys to do an advantage in that situation. But then again, for me, like, I don't, and my wife is on the same page of this. We don't want to expose our kids to, like, a lavish, extravagant lifestyle. We don't want them to, you know, grow up spoiled and feel entitled.

We want them to know what hard work means so they can, you know, work hard and achieve what they can. We don't want to give out free handouts and stuff. So we really want to instill those core values into them so they know like if you want to do something, you have to work hard to get that. So we don't want them to grow up kind of, you know, snotty and like rich and stuff like that. I mean, they'll definitely get taken care of, you know, with investments and stuff like that for when they turn 18, pay for college and things like that. But we don't want them to, you know, be spoiled, too spoiled growing up and have that sense of entire. settlement. So. Now, if you run your own business, you already know this because making money is one thing,

but keeping it organized is another. Revenue comes in, expenses go out, but without a clear system, everything starts to get messy. And you really feel that when tax season rolls around, suddenly you're going through all of your statements wondering what went where. Now, mostly from what I've seen, the business itself is often fine, but it's just keeping organized with the finances that becomes the problem. Thankfully, though, that's where tools like Relay really come into help. Relay is a business banking platform built to give business owners more clarity and control over their cash flow. Now, one thing I like is how easy it is to build structure. With this, you're able to open up the 20 checking accounts, which makes it simple to separate income, taxes, payroll, and savings,

instead of running everything through one place. Relay also lets your teams have their own custom logins with their own permissions as well, so a bookkeeper or assistant can handle the day-to-day while you still see everything happening. Paying vendors is really simple, too. You could send ACH, wires, or checks from the same place with, built-in bill pay. And really also connects directly with both Zero and QuickBooks, which just keeps everything organized and your books clean. For a lot of business owners, having a system like this is the difference between scrambling at tax time and actually running the business. So if you

want to build a clearer system for how your business handles money, scan the QR code on the screen or click the link down below in the description to learn more about Relay. Now really quick, I just got to say that when Jack and I first started the Ace Coffee Hour, we were winging it. We were figuring out everything ourselves from like the best cameras to use the best lenses, how to edit, how to even get guests to begin with. Every day was a new challenge. Thankfully though, if you're starting today, you have one of the industry's best business partners and our sponsor is incredibly relevant and that would be Shopify. Shopify is like having an all in one business partner. They power millions of businesses worldwide from major brands like Mattel and Jimshark to entrepreneurs just getting started.

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everything from inventory to shipping to returns, which is basically just all of the complicated stuff you do not want to deal with. So make sure to start your business today with the industry's best business partner, Shopify, and start hearing, all you got to do to get started is go to Shopify.com slash ICH with the link down below in the description. Again, it's Shopify.com slash ICH. The link is also down below in the description. Thanks so much to Shopify for sponsoring this episode. Who's sliding in the DMs? Any like cool people that just showed up? Yeah, I've had like a lot of like people with big followings reach out.

You know, a lot of people were showing their support and appreciation and whatnot, which was greatly appreciated. And then a lot of people reached out for like podcast or just a chat and things like that. It's hard to keep track of. But yeah, it's just mainly for like just showing the support. And then, you know, if you ever in the area, let's get together type of thing, maybe do a podcast or grab lunch and just learn more about the story, the background story of these games and then just about my life and family and stuff.

So it's been cool. I never would have imagined I'd be in this position where people want to hit me up just to talk and stuff like that. I just see myself as a normal guy that just works hard and tries to stay humble. Do you get recognized in public often now? When I go out in public, yeah. So usually I'm so busy working, so I'll go to work and then come home, go to the gym and then spend time

with family grocery store and stuff like that but as I traveled here like this is the first time flying since the finale to come out to do something I got recognized a bunch of times in the airport and then a bunch of times in the strip and then in the hotel too

how is that for you? It's surreal man it's crazy like I said I never thought I'd be in this position where people want to come up and take pictures with me but it's cool It's cool opportunity. It's cool to let them know that I appreciate their support because it's a lot of people that came up

and that were rooting for me. So it's surreal. It's awesome to have that feeling that people were cheering and rooting for you. What's your advice to the next contest in a beast game? Don't be afraid to get out of your comfort zone and then just know when to step up into leadership positions and know when to be a follower. So ultimately, and just build those connections.

early because that that'll help you out in the long run. Do you feel rich now? No, not really, man. I know it may sound crazy, but I don't really feel like I'm super rich. Like nothing has really changed for me in my life. Like I'm still working hard. Still serving. Still busy. Still limited with time off. And, you know, the chance to do whatever I want, you know. I barely see my kids at as it is right now with my work schedule. So I don't feel like anything's changed. It's just, no, there's a big number in my bank account as of now.

What's crazy, though, if you have three and a half million after taxes, let's just say, and you spend three percent of that, it's really about 100 and we'll round up, 120,000 dollars there, $10,000 a month for the rest of your life, which is good. Yeah. But it's not like you're balling up at the club,

pulling up in an SVJ, you know, iced out watches. And real estate you could probably get like 5% though. Like that wouldn't be a stretch. Yes and no, you'd get 5% up front, but you might miss out on some of the appreciation long term. You don't know how the real estate's going to do. For sure. But yes, you could theoretically do 5%.

Yeah. Yeah. No, it's crazy to think about, man. I definitely still plan to do what I can to make passive income on the outside. Whenever I choose to make that decision to get out of the military, my wife still works too, so we'll have that salary. But nothing's changed. Like we still live within our means as we did before, you know, this blessing. And we continue to do that.

I'm not super extravagant. I don't need like the nicest cars or the newest iPhone or the nicest watch. Like I got an Apple watch, man. I'm fine with that. Like I'm not an extravagant person. I'm pretty cheap. And it takes a lot for me to buy things for myself. Like my wife will just see me going back for two weeks.

Like, should I be? buy this, or not. And then, you know, ultimately she will encourage me. But I'm just, I'm willing to, you know,

do what I can just to make smart investments and then set my kids. Have you always had that mindset? Yeah. It's crazy because my mom has told me from a young age that I've always been smart with money. I remember when I was like,

four or five, she was saying I had like 20, 30 bucks in my piggy bank. And they were like looking for cats. for something like that and I told them hey I have money I can help out and then I went and got my money and they were like surprised I had that much money like saved up with at five years old you know just from what they give me and they know I don't like to spend money you know I like to see it grow and do what I

can invest I've always been like that like I'm not the type of person that's gonna go out and buy a lot of clothes and stuff like that like I I want to be smart especially with this newfound wealth I want to make it last and I want to continue to watch it grow. And that's, that's what I plan to do. And Amanda's, you know, work and wonders. It's interesting, you and Jeff, both winners of Beast games are like pretty conservative when it comes to money and not spending it. Yeah. I'm curious if we're going to see a winner. Do you think the person who's going to be like, yo, I bought this Lambo, I rented this penthouse, check out these watches. Do you think that type of person could win Beast games? Absolutely. Yeah,

100%, man. You could just, I mean, it's all social game. Like, If people like you, it can help you go farther. Because I view it as Beast Games as like a way of being like a team aspect up until the end. So yeah, I feel like someone in that mindset could win and they'll have the opportunity to do whatever they want and go crazy like that. Because I'm sure there's going to be a person maybe season three or four or five or however long the Beast Games last will ball out and live that lavish level. lifestyle. So it won't be me though. So if you guys were in my shoes with $5.1 million, what would be some of the things that you would do with the money? I would certainly look at the tax strategy of it and see if it makes sense. I'm just worried about investing in a rental property.

Yeah, for sure. Right now with this market, you could do it if you became a real estate professional and you satisfied all the requirements. I would say that's a possibility. because then you have more money left over after tax to put in real estate that could make you some money back. Otherwise, if it's just you pay the tax and you move on, you keep it simple.

I like just a broad range of index funds, US international. I figured you would say some index funds, man. You've been heavy on index funds for a while and stuff. Like, I hate to say it, but a lot of this is in hindsight too. But like a lot of the real estate investments I made were good for YouTube content,

but my God, When I look at the hassle factor of it, the amount of money that I made from it, all the mental stress that they put me through, it's not worth it. For sure. And now, a lot of that is an L.A. problem. And if we take L.A. out of the equation and we put my rental properties in Las Vegas, I would probably have a different opinion on it. Yeah, for sure. But like, when I bought these properties, you could never tell me back then, oh, yeah, it's going to take you a year to evict a tenant. Oh, yeah.

You can't raise rent as much as CPI. Yeah. Oh, the tenant has to be two months late on their rent now to be able to give them a notice to pay or quit. Like all of these things. And now what's even crazy is they want to put a mansion tax on properties that sell for more than $700,000. Really? A mansion tax. That is not a mansion.

That is a tear down one bedroom in a bad part of town. Yeah. So they want to put these additional tax. And I'm like, for what? So like a lot of those I couldn't predict because they didn't even exist yet. For sure. But I'm just saying there's so many regulations and anti-landlord policies now that make me very nervous about putting any money in real estate. Yeah. And I've always had concerns getting into it dealing with like tenants and stuff like that for the reason you explain. Because that's

definitely a huge fear of mind too. It's like you just get that one tenant. That's not. Everyone gets one. Yeah. So I've had one tenant. It was my first tenant ever. Yeah. That was like, the one tenant I've had to evict. Everyone else since then I've been really fortunate, has been awesome, and has been with me for a long time. But how I feel is that I'm like rolling the dice and hoping I don't hit a seven.

Every single tenant. And I'm rolling like, oh great, I got a five. Okay, fine. But then like every year you just roll again. And if you get the seven, you're like, ah, crap. Well, by the numbers, eventually you're going to hit a seven. Yeah. So that's all.

It's a scary feeling, man, to like run into those issues and have to deal with them too. Because I'm, yeah, like you said, it's probably super mentally draining and exhausting trying to deal with those issues. It is. And so that's the reason I'm trying to get out of that. I'm trying to sell that. It just, it's a, it'll be a weight lifted off my shoulders.

Are you trying to, like, limit your footprint in real estate then? Yeah, yeah. I want, I want to own nothing. Yeah. Except for our primary residence. Okay. Because right, there is just like this anti-landlord sentiment right now, especially with housing. and landlords are the scapegoat of like,

oh, they're the bad guys, they're the ones causing all the problems. And I don't see that changing anytime soon. For sure. And so I just say, why do I want to be a part of that? I don't have any interest anymore in that. So then if you were to limit your footprint in real estate,

you would just look to do like index funds, ETS, stuff like that. I prefer that by a long shot. And then I would keep a little bit on the side in maybe treasuries or something really safe. Yeah. And that could maybe be 20, percent. Yeah. And just something safe and that you have that to fall back on or if the market

crashes 30, 40 percent, you have some dry powder that you could buy in. Yeah. And if not, then you have something you could always fall back on? For sure. Do you ever, have you guys ever considered like CDs for any purposes or anything like that? Just because like the fixed term. You have tax-free muni bond and it would probably be virtually the same thing. Yeah, but it depends, it depends on what your tax bracket is. Yeah. If you're in a really high tax bracket, the tax-free muni bonds work. Otherwise, I think for most people, just a good government bond. Yeah, for sure. Right now they're paying like three and a half percent.

Yeah. And you could sell out of it in a day. It's really easy. Really? It's really nice. Okay. That's what I, I mean, I'm doing the tax premium bonds, but I also have some government bonds on the side.

Nice. Nice. You make three and a half to four percent. You don't have to worry about it. Yeah, it's not bad. It's stress free. And then you spend time with your kids. Because imagine, imagine you're at the park with your kids and a tenant calls you.

It says, hey, I busted the toilet. This is your responsibility. Go fix it. Yeah. And then an hour later, the plumber hasn't called you back. And the tenant's calling you, why isn't my toilet fixed? Yeah. This needs to be fixed now.

It ruins the whole day. Yeah, absolutely. Even with the property manager. They still, you know, some of the work falls in you. Yeah, absolutely. And that's always been like a big fear of like having those situations. Because it's not a matter of when, not if. Because I'm sure everyone goes through it.

And yeah, it was just, yeah, that would be mentally draining to do with and stuff. Yeah, some people love it, and that's their personality, and they can handle it. And for them, it's just, there is good opportunity if you know what you're doing. But I'm just not seeing the opportunity right now. It just doesn't exist to the same degree that I saw it six years ago. For sure. Yeah.

What about you, Jack? I would probably echo most of what he says. Are you paying quarterly taxes? Are you just going to do, like, the lump sum? I think I, what would you guys recommend? Because I think I'm doing lump sum. So then what does it do? 2027.

Yeah, next year. Yeah. Then if that's going to affect your income, then, yeah, tax-free muni bonds probably make the most sense, at least for the remainder of this year. For sure. And then you'd be able to put, I mean, most of it in. You could probably take, I mean, I would lump sum it personally. Actually, maybe for, how old are you? Yeah, if Jackson's.

33. If Jackson's lump sum. You're 33? Yeah, man. I would aggressively dollar cost average then. That's just me personally, yeah, because you're still really young. Stocks and ETFs and stuff. Yeah.

like index funds. International, maybe. Yeah, I don't really have a problem with that. International has outperformed U.S. last year. The last year. And so you can't really go wrong with that. For sure. Yeah, because like the rule of thumb, right,

every seven years, it's expected to double your value. And I would live off like a very low withdrawal rate, ideally as well. Like even if you could start out, because I would even, I'd be surprised if you were spending more than $5,000 a month, probably. In your current situation, like you're probably trying to save and invest as much as you can.

Exactly. Yeah. So like if you could do a 2% withdrawal rate on 3 and whatever million that you end up with, assuming you don't get like a bunch of write-offs, then you could live like that and your lump sum that you have invested could continue growing at that low withdrawal rate. And then you could slowly inflate your lifestyle like as time goes on. But for right now, just bless yourself with the freedom, not necessarily with like increased hedonic spending. Yeah.

And I don't see us ever doing that. What Chris Camillo would say. He would say lever yourself as much as possible into Amazon. Yeah. Really? Yes, he'd go triple leverage to Amazon. Really? And if you lose it, you just aggressively double down.

Yeah, apply aggressively to Beast Games 3. Double down, nice. So he's huge on Amazon then? Very big on Amazon. Yeah. How do you guys feel about Amazon? I invested a little bit. I bought it.

Yeah, I got a little bit too. I think I got 100 shares of Amazon. and that's my exposure to Amazon. Yeah, I think mine's like 50 shares. Yeah, that's about it. I went in a little bit more aggressively, but that was because I listened to his show quite a bit. He said recently, he's like,

I just bought three medium-sized houses in Amazon, and then immediately after we're buying five medium-sized houses in Amazon. I was like, okay, if he's that bullish on it, like maybe I'll put some capital. Yeah, put a little bit, see if it pans out. Yeah, I can't buy individual stocks. No? No, because I check them way too much.

But I do, what I do like to do buy is I just buy a few shares of something or a small amount, like maybe a thousand bucks max. And I just see how I would have done. For sure. Just in case. And then if it's down, I feel, oh, good. I didn't go heavy into that. If it's up, then I feel bad that I didn't invest more. But at least I know.

If it dips and it's a company that you believe in, would you dollar cost average in? Yeah, I've done that a little bit with Robin Hood. And I was buying in the low 70s. I did not even Robin Hood when it was. like back in the teens. Oh, Robin Hood, it ruined me. Yeah. Because it had all that bad reputation and stuff at the beginning with like GME.

Yeah. Jackson, the bottom. I had to, I got margin called. But it was, I had like $10 a share. Wow. Yeah, I think it was, I think it was like $11 or $13. Yeah. It was, I mean, it was in my fun account. And so I didn't necessarily care about the money.

And I was just kind of like, it was my Robin Hood account. Yeah. And then I also had like my other, you know, M1 account, which at the time was like my main brokerage. And I just like, you know, why not? I really like Robin Hood stock. And I also, it was Palantir as well. So it was Robin Hood and Palantir.

And I got Marjor called on both of those. Really? Yeah. Dang. Yeah, I went heavy into Palantir back when it was like six to ten bucks. Oh my gosh. Yeah. You're just like Jeff.

Yeah. Like Jeff was like a pretty big investor. I bet that Jeff's in your ear right now. Yeah. He's big into Tesla too. Yeah. We talk a lot, man. Like I got into Tesla back in like 2020.

I got like 20 shares back then. I mean, that's probably served you incredibly well. Yeah. And then I got into Nvidia, really, really at an early stage two back in like 2021, 2022 before it blew up too. So it's right time, right place, man. It's had good intuition and it's worked out. You have a good history of being right time, right place.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I did my due diligence. And, like, I talked to other people that were so bullish, especially on Palantir, had a couple of buddies that were very bullish and stuff like that. And they're like, you know, they're going to start signing, like, contracts with, you know, the military and a bunch of other different contracts with DOD and stuff. And, yeah, they've just signed a lot of DOD contracts and been doing and performing well. So you got to give us a heads up.

Before you, you like, hey, I got some intel. This stock, we believe, is going to do really well. And I'm buying a little bit, so now it might be a good time. Yeah, for sure, for sure. But yeah, man, Palantir was one that I got in heavy at the beginning stage. It's just from some of my buddies talking about that and stuff. So I was like, I'm going to trust your due diligence. I did a little bit of mine.

And it just took off, man. That's crazy. It's been pretty well. If you were to leave one piece of wisdom to Mr. Beast are one thing that you'd like to say to him. He's watching right now. What would you want to say? Just thank you for the opportunity for blessing my family,

for changing my life. And I'm super supportive and grateful to be a part of this experience. And I love watching what he does. You know, all the good he does for other people. He changes a lot of people's lives. So continue to do that. Continue to be your humble self. continue to care for your people to receive criticism openly and implement those changes like you have

and you'll continue doing big things. Beast games will be around for a while. It'll be like the new survivor. So keep being open to feedback like you are, criticism, and it'll pay dividends in a long run if you want to make this a long-term thing. What do you think about the rumors that Mr. Beast is a part of the Illuminati. No, I think those are crazy, man. There's been a lot of, like, crazy accusations and, like, rumors and stuff like that. I've seen that people say he's the Antichrist.

I've seen that, too. Yeah, I've seen so many crazy things, man. It's insane. Is there anything, though, that you've seen this? You're like, maybe there's some truth to that. No, not really. Like, the main things I've seen is, like, the Illuminati, like, the Antichrist and stuff like that.

And then I saw something about, like, Sociopath is one. Narcissist. Yeah, Narciss too. And then like he's just doing everything. Like he doesn't really care about people. He's just doing it for like himself and stuff. But like he invests a lot of his money back into YouTube videos to making good content for his fans and subscribers and to changing people's lives. Like this guy has a lot of money.

He doesn't need to be doing this. He doesn't need to be giving out money to people and stuff like that. but he does. I mean, it helps his brand too, but like you don't see a lot of people like that these days that are willing to use a lot of their money to invest back into their content to helping change people's lives.

Why do you think so many people believe these crazy conspiracies? I don't know, man. I think partly maybe they're just trying to look for maybe a fault in him from all the good that he's doing. There's got to be one thing that is wrong with him. There's one thing that, you know, he might be kind of, of, you know, different or have something negative about them.

So maybe they're just trying to look for something just to bash him for. Because he does a lot of good. You know, he's a good guy. He works hard. He's passionate with what he does. And he's changing people's lives a lot, like a lot of people's lives. And like when you see someone doing good and, you know, performing well, like some people won't like that.

They'll hate on that. You know, you're always going to have haters. and there's just people out there that are probably trying to make some money off of his image by bashing him or something like that get attention.

Have you had any haters? Yeah, I've had haters. What do they say? Yeah. You know, a lot of people that didn't believe in me or didn't support me or, you know,

bash me for whatever reason and stuff. And that's fine, you know. Some of it could be true. Some of it could just be made up. But at the end of there, you just got to block out the noise, stick to who you are. And then just keep one foot in front of the other, man.

Just stay optimistic and always look for the good in things. You know, it's crazy. I see a lot of people believing now, speaking of conspiracies, that Ellen DeGeneres and Leonardo DiCaprio eat babies. And they've gone to the island and eat babies. I have seen that. And I'm just, I remember seen it. I'm just reading it.

I'm just thinking like, what is wrong with people, man? Like, that's so extreme. What's so funny is that right now the new trend is to leak the, Epstein emails but they're fake emails and because the Epstein list is so big no one's gonna look through like a hundred thousand documents yeah so you leak a fake email that says like Ellen DeGeneres is going there and like sucking babies blood I feel like oh my gosh this is it we we always knew there was something going out of Hollywood but now it makes sense they they go through these satanic ritualistic

experiences to be a part of the Illuminati yeah to get these acting roles and And it involves eating babies. Yeah. I remember seeing that and I'm just like, man, people are like crazy. With some of the things they come. And it's crazy. Yeah. People believe anything these days because like you can, you can with AI and stuff, like,

you can make some believable stuff. And there's a lot of people out there that will believe anything. Like without factually checking things. It's really bad. I have started, I've started to distrust anything now that I see on Twitter. Yeah. Because there is so much AI information out there that, like, there was one, I hate to say, I felt for it. I reposted an AI video.

Oh, man. And it was so realistic. And someone later posted. That person was thinking like, I got you. I took it down. I took it down, though. As soon as I confirmed. And what's even crazier is that I kept asking Grock before posting it.

Yeah. Is this real? Yeah. Affirm this is real. Show the source of this image. And it showed all of it. Yeah. And it was like, this is real.

And then someone commented, this is real. is a fake video, this is from this. And of course, then I re-ask Grock in a new prompt, is this from this video game? And then sure enough, it says, yes, it's from that video. It's like, come on. And what's the point out of it? It even got Grock, dude. Dude, it's bad. Yeah, it's so bad, man. Like, it's hard because even with, like, all the propaganda and, like, news outlets and stuff like that, too, like, it kind of, like, makes you question on what's right and what's not. And, like, A lot of people are just having a hard time believe in things. And they'll just go with like the most like politically correct or whatever.

And then without fact checking things. You know what? This just made me realize. I would say for the last four years, we've swung away from traditional media. And we've gone to new sources like Twitter because it's more instant. At the time it was more accurate. And legacy media was so far behind that by the. time you saw. It's like, oh, no, I knew about that on Twitter six hours. It's swinging back

to legacy media. Now I don't believe something unless I see it on one of the big sites, because if they publish misinformation, their threshold, they'll get sued. But meanwhile, if some dude from a random account post something on Twitter, they can see whatever they want to. Yeah, but there's no repercussion for that. But if a legacy media does that, they get sued out the oblivion, they lose all their credentials, but some new account could get millions of views. just saying whatever. Like, you know, eating this or that or something got blown up today. Yeah.

It's not true. Yeah, it's crazy, man. It's crazy to see that shift in things. Because I, yeah, at one point in time, I was going to Twitter for a lot of my news-related articles and facts and things like that. And now, like, it's hard to tell. Like, there's this one guy on Twitter I used to follow. And, like, he just post the most outrageous things now.

He has like over a million followers and stuff. I remember when he had like 10,000 followers. And he just posts like the most incorrect, outrageous things. And people are believing it. Like as a joke or? I don't know if it's a joke. I don't know. But like if you saw some of the posts, like it does not read like as a joke.

Like it's like in a serious like manner. Could be the Babylon B. I love the Babylon B. If you know what that is. They like purposely post misinformation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

There's a lot of parody accounts out there, but it's buried that it's a parody. Like, you have to go into the account itself, and it's like, this is satire. Yeah. Yeah. I think his name was, like, Matt something. We're going to find you, Matt. He was a big Doge guy back in the day. But, like, every time, like, some of his posts would just pop on my timeline.

I'm just like, what are you posting, dude? But they get money. Yeah. The more outrageous it is, because I've been tempted. I've been tempted. just to post some rage bait out there and have it be insanely inaccurate, but like harmless inaccurate.

But, you know. They don't get engagement, man. But it gets engagement. Like the more ridiculous you say something or the harsher, the stance you take that's really unpopular, the more views you get. And you're paid directly

with the amount of views that you get. Exactly, man. That's why you see a lot of, like, controversial things these days. Because people do it for the engagement, the views. We had one I felt really bad We had Sam and Colby on the podcast. And we were going to intro with a joke on them.

And the joke was, dude, did you just hear what happened? I'm like, no, what happened? And we say, Mr. Beast just sold his channel to Disney. And I'm like, no, you're kidding. I'm like, no, I'm dead serious. He just, like, this just happened. That's why I'm bringing it up to you. Really?

Like, yeah, $5 billion. And they say, no way. Holy crap. And Jack chimes in like, yeah, it's kind of crazy. Like, it just got leaked. or something just happened, but yeah, it's confirmed. And then they're like, oh, man. And then we say, just kidding.

And they're like, ah, we had a good laugh. We started a podcast. But they clipped it before the Just Kidding. And that went crazy on Twitter to the point where Jimmy even had to address it and say, I did not sell my channel to Disney. And I felt terrible that I sent me a message afterwards. It was like, hey, man, if you watch the, we say just joking and it was a harmless thing. And I genuinely felt really bad because it's like, people were running with it.

Did he hit you up about that? Like, dude, what the heck or something? No, I reached out proactively. But also, it's like he gets clipped out of context so many times. That was one of like three that day. And so it's like anything he does, it will be clipped up. Oh, yeah, for sure. And that's probably what leads to people like, you know,

having these like bad views or something like that judgment on him. It's like these different clips and stuff. So speaking of clips, by the way, I do have to say, for all of you, you watching our iced coffee hour clips, some of them do end up getting millions, but millions of views. We end up driving a lot of traffic from them. Even back to the original episodes, if you guys are looking for a good clipper, I just want to say a huge shout out to Josh at social media money.

We'll link to him down below in the description. For any other YouTube channels or people who want to get involved with his clips, he's fantastic. He posts for us every single day, multiple times a day. He's pretty hands off, so we'd hide the working with him. He's been working with us for years, by the way. Like this is the sole clipper we've worked with for the past, what, three or four years? Yeah. I think we were actually his first, were we his first client?

We were one of the first clients. We were one of the other clients. But basically go back on our accounts all the way three, four years back. All of that stuff is done by Josh. So shout out Josh, and he's linked down below. Yeah. I'm not a fan of the social media name. He knows this.

But beyond the name, he's great. He knows this. He knows. Comment down below if you should change the name. Tell him he should change it. Say, Josh, change the name of social media money. We don't like that name. Please.

But genuinely, he's got a great service to check him out. Tyler, thank you so much for coming on the ice coffee hour. Really appreciate it. We'll link to all your information down below in the description. And how about this? If you guys want early access to our next podcast is posting next week, channel members have early access to that episode right now. And if you join as a channel member, you get bonus content that could only be seen there.

So if you want to sneak peek at next week's episode, here you go. Enjoy. Thank you so much for joining as well. And until next time. What's so unique about this podcast is that you both are known for real estate. and the show selling sunset and selling some of the most luxurious real estate, why talk about AI today? This is something that we haven't seen before.

The real question is, is anything going to stop AI? I don't think there's going to be any constraints. And if there's no constraints and it keeps going up into the right, there's no stopping it. How do you not get horrified thinking about this, though? Like, what's the optimistic part of it? I think the best strategy, honestly, is maybe to be hopefully optimistic. I think there's a 10 to 30% chance it kills us all. But there's a 70% chance that we live in an age of abundance that you couldn't even have

contemplated 10 years ago.