Quick note before we dive in:

After 3 slow years, the self storage market is finally softening and prices for assets are dropping.

If you are an accredited investor and would like to see our deals, click here.

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There are only two major questions you should be asking about any opportunity you are considering:

1. What is the return in dollars for an hour of my time today, a year from now and ten years from now?

2. If I stop working, do I stop getting paid or will I keep getting paid?

That’s it.

The answers to those questions will tell you all you need to know about the choices you’re making.

Here's a simple example:

If I work at McDonald’s and trade my time for $15 an hour flipping burgers, what is the return on that time? It is $15.

A year from now it will be $16.25.

Ten years from now it will be about $25 per hour if I become a manager.

What happens if I stop giving my time to McDonald’s?

I stop getting paid! No more of my time = no more money.

Now let’s keep going.

What if I were a franchisee and I owned a McDonald’s that I staffed with local employees to run for that same $15 an hour?

If I didn’t go to work that day or week, would I still be making money?

Of course I would.

In fact, I’d be making a lot more than just $15 an hour.

The average McDonald’s franchisee makes about $150,000 per year per location.

That number will likely be higher a year from now and a lot higher ten years from now.

Let’s imagine another scenario.

If I start today to build a business and I trade my time for money, what is the return on that time?

It is the hourly wage you charge for your work, whether that’s solar panel installation, boat cleaning, home appliance repair, photo booth rental, or any number of other boring businesses.

And if I spend five to ten years building a business, hire some employees, and turn over operations to a great CEO or general manager and then I stop working what is my return on time?

It could be hundreds of thousands of dollars per year for the rest of my life.

I could end up with a business that runs without my energy and time and makes me money while I sleep.

If your goal is wealth and doing what you want to do when you want to do it, you need to consider if your current career path lends itself to getting paid even if you’re not working at some point in the future.

If your answer is no, then it’s time to stop doing what you’re doing and start building the leverage you need to change that.

The amount of money you earn is not correlated with how hard you work.

It is correlated with how hard you are to replace and thus how much leverage you have.

If you are easy to replace, then you have low leverage and a capped earning potential.

But if you are impossible to replace, you have high leverage and unlimited earning potential.

So your goal should be to start a business (or businesses) and get to a point where people need you more than you need them. But it doesn’t happen overnight. It's a journey and takes time.

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I'm hosting 7 free online workshops in August and September. Register below:

• ​How to Live Longer (August 12th at 2pm EST)
• ​Self Storage Management (August 13th at 2pm EST)
• ​How to Get Found on Google (August 19th at 2pm EST)
• ​Hiring and Delegation Masterclass (August 27th at noon EST)
• ​How to Pay Less Tax (August 27th at 2pm EST)
• ​Sales 101 (September 2nd at 2pm EST)
• ​CEO Bootcamp (September 9th at 2pm EST)

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A few tweets from this week:

Nick Huber @sweatystartup How much money do you need coming in every month to do exactly what you want to do, when you want to do it? I think my number is $30,000. Beyond that, life wouldn't change much at all. 9:22 AM • Aug 1, 2025 17 Retweets 1172 Likes Read 271 replies

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Nick Huber @sweatystartup A realization that will change your life: 1 in 100 venture backed companies succeed. 1% of these founders make $10 million or more upon exit. More than half of sweaty startups succeed. Meaning the owners make good money, learn to hire and manage a small team, and by year 5, a 9:2 AM • Aug 1, 2025 5 Retweets 97 Likes Read 15 replies

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Nick Huber @sweatystartup Why I like real estate and why it’s never truly passive: 5:38 PM • Jul 30, 2025 0 Retweets 26 Likes Read 5 replies

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Nick Huber @sweatystartup We are going to buy a lot of self storage over the next 24 months. Market is finally coming around. 10:0 PM • Aug 2, 2025 3 Retweets 147 Likes Read 30 replies

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Onward and upward,

Nick Huber