#60: Grant Cardone: The Mindset That Built $4 Billion From Zero & Why Ambition Is a Moral Obligation

**Grant Cardone** (0:00)
Like, I lost my dad when I was 10 years old. I lost my brother when I was 20 years old. I had a drug problem when I was 15 to 25 These are losses, man. These are bad decisions. My arrogance comes from a self-made, like, literally, like, nobody gave me money. There was no connections, there was no education. It's been just pushing, grinding, shove. I used to not think I was great, because I wasn't. I was terrible, and then I was average. And then I was good sometimes and bad sometimes, up and down, and then I was, like, consistently good. And then I became a master. The spiritual being, in a perfect condition, would produce unbelievable results, would never make mistakes, would constantly expand, would contract, would not have bad months, would not make mistakes. In the perfect condition, I don't believe God's making mistakes. We're made in his image.
Divot.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:52)
This episode is brought to you by Google for Startups.

**Derek Andersen** (0:55)
Today, we're in Aventura, Florida with Grant Cardone, one of the most recognized entrepreneurs, sales leaders and real estate investors in the world. Before the 10X empire, Grant was a young man from Louisiana who had lost his way, battled addiction, and then rebuilt his life from zero. At 25, he turned pain into discipline and redirected that same intensity into sales, work ethic and relentless action. That obsession became the foundation of 10X. Grant became a best-selling author. He built a global audience of over 15 million people. He proved his mindset in undercover billionaires, starting with only $100 in 90 days to build a million-dollar company. Today, Cardone Capital reports $750 million in revenue, $5 billion in assets under management, billions raised, and more than 20,000 investors. Hope you enjoy the conversation.
Do you deal with a lot of people in Silicon Valley?

**Grant Cardone** (1:46)
No.

**Derek Andersen** (1:47)
I'm trying to stay away from you guys.

**Grant Cardone** (1:49)
I know. I mean, it's fair. The amount of arrogance in that space over there is f*****g.
Like, you can't even cut through it. Yeah. It's heavier than the red tide in Miami during the summer.

**Derek Andersen** (2:05)
It's true.

**Grant Cardone** (2:06)
And look, some people could say, we're rolling right, right? And some people, they think I'm arrogant, but not compared to those people.

**Derek Andersen** (2:14)
Yeah. What's the difference?

**Grant Cardone** (2:16)
Well, my arrogance comes from a self-made, very self-made...
Look, I'm not saying... No arrogance is okay. I mean, really. But if I have that, it is because...
I am self-made, like, literally, like, no money. Nobody gave me money. There was no connections. There was no education. There was no luck here. There was no... I was at the right moment at the right time. Like, Mark Cuban, man, you know, as much as I admire Mark, Mark even admits... 30 minutes later, he would not be rich. 30 minutes later, he was, like, extremely lucky. Now, I've had some luck in my life, but it's been just pushing, grinding, shove. The amount of money that's been made in Silicon Valley, as you know, with coders and...

**Derek Andersen** (3:11)
The exponential nature, the compounding nature of some of these deals and the way that the technology sort of stacks on top of itself is...

**Grant Cardone** (3:18)
And by the way, I am completely envious.
So I just want to understand there's a lot of going on, complexities, because while I say all that, I'm like, I'd love to be those dudes. I'd love to have hit like that. But I didn't. So that's the difference in the arrogance, you know, that there's this woe is me, look.
Some of the Bitcoin community has that too. You hear a lot of that in the Bitcoin community, got guys that bought Bitcoin at 50 bucks. Yeah. Look at me, how smart I am. Smart. What the f***? You bought 200 coins that nobody knew anything about. They were 50 bucks each. You got $10,000 invested.

**Derek Andersen** (3:55)
Yeah.

**Grant Cardone** (3:55)
And it's worth $100 million today. You're not smart, bro. You were, come on.

**Derek Andersen** (3:59)
You got lucky.

**Grant Cardone** (4:00)
Please try to go duplicate that again.

**Derek Andersen** (4:03)
What's the difference between luck and like putting yourself in the right place at the right time?

**Grant Cardone** (4:08)
Well, I think luck happens to you.
And then being in the right place. Obviously, you had to buy the lottery ticket to get lucky.
You know, you had to buy it. You had to go to the store and buy the ticket. So you can't take that away from the guy that bought the ticket. You can't win if you don't buy the ticket, right? Or if you don't make the bet or if you don't show up. If you don't show up, you can't get the sale. It's impossible. So that's why I always say, the first rule of all success is to show up. Just show up even if you don't know what you're doing. Just it'd be better to show up incompetent than not show up at all. Yeah. It'd be perfect to show up competent and show up consistently. The problem with the competent person is they, they start to put that arrogance towards, I'm not showing up, they're not qualified.