Codie Sanchez’s Good Business Parameters - Codie Sanchez defines a good business as profitable and cash-flowing, where you get paid upfront. - It should be sustainable and historical, meaning it can and has existed for a long time. - It should be easily understandable and benefit from the Lindy effect, making future cash flow likely. - A bad business, in contrast, is unprofitable, complex, new, and requires service before payment. Transcript: Codie Sanchez In my definition, good business equals profitable, cash flowing, what I call a cash flow versus cash suck business. So you get paid upfront for a service, not after you provide a service. Sustainable, it can exist for a long time. Historical, it has existed for a long time. Understandable, you can explain it to grandma really easily. And you have what’s called the Lindy effect, the likelihood of the future continuing to cash flow just as it did in the past.

1min Snip Transcript: Shane Parrish Welcome to The Knowledge Project. I’m your host, Shane Parrish. In a world where knowledge is power, this podcast is your toolkit for mastering the best of what other people have already figured out. Today’s episode will transform how you think about building wealth and financial freedom. My guest is Cody Sanchez, who is known for her bold advice on helping people buy, grow, and sell businesses. Whether you’re looking to increase your income, start a side business, or completely transform your financial future, Cody breaks down exactly what separates those who successfully Build wealth from those who stay stuck. This conversation is packed with immediately actionable insights. We talk about the single most important thing to know about building financial freedom, and it’s not what you think it is. The biggest myths around money, the difference between acquiring and keeping money, the rich versus broke mindset and how it changes everything, non-obvious lessons on negotiating, And so much more. If you’ve ever wondered about the real playbook for financial freedom, this is it. Keep in mind, this podcast is not financial advice. Cody’s opinions are her own and she’s pretty bold about them. It’s time to listen and learn. There are too many podcasts and not enough time. What if you could skip the noise and get just the insightful moments, even from shows you didn’t know existed? That’s what Overlap does. Overlap is an AI-driven podcast app that uses large language models to curate the best moments from episodes.

1min Snip Transcript: Codie Sanchez I stole it all from private equity. So I, you know, I never would have thought about buying businesses and it seems too big and scary. And I didn’t grow up a lot of money or cash or understanding of money. And so if you would have told like 20 year old Cody, you would be buying businesses and then buying more businesses and building on top of them, I would have thought I had to win the lottery Or something. But thankfully I got into finance and I kind of hated finance and I didn’t want to be anybody in any of the companies, even the people at the top. I finally realized that after like 12 years. But I was like, wow, they really understand this language of money and they know how to buy assets that make money leave and bring back more friends. And so I was like, I want to learn how to do that. And I just don’t want to have to do it in a suit. And I want to be able to do it in businesses that I want to be able to do it. I want to be able to hold the businesses forever as opposed to buy them, you know, split them up for parts and then sell them off. And so it got started because I’m a pretty good copycat. You know, I was just like, oh, here’s a model that works. Can I do the same thing, but a lot smaller because I don’t have that much cash? And then if it keeps working, can I scale up to be like the big boys? And so that’s where it started. I think sometimes the best way to make money is just to follow other people who are really good at making it, try to mimic the same thing, and then add a little bit of your own sprinkle to It.

1min Snip Transcript: Codie Sanchez You know, I was just like, oh, here’s a model that works. Can I do the same thing, but a lot smaller because I don’t have that much cash? And then if it keeps working, can I scale up to be like the big boys? And so that’s where it started. I think sometimes the best way to make money is just to follow other people who are really good at making it, try to mimic the same thing, and then add a little bit of your own sprinkle to It. Shane Parrish Talk to me more about that language of money. What does that mean? Codie Sanchez Yeah. Most important language I’ve ever learned is money. So growing up, I didn’t understand anything except how to save, maybe how to spend less, right? And, you know, my parents were, my mom was a 30-year special education teacher. My dad came from an immigrant family to the U.S. And so they didn’t have any money. And their biggest concern was like, don’t fall into debt, kind of like Dave Ramsey, right? No debt, save everything you possibly can. Don’t use credit cards, the typical things we learned. But when I went into finance, I realized that’s not how the rich think. The rich actually know how to use debt intelligently. They understand that money is simply a tool in a toolkit. There’s no emotional value to it. And that if you understand what attracts money, then you probably will never have to work again in your life because you will just be able to take money and like a magnet, sit it next to More money and it’ll bring it over. And it took me a long time to figure out how to do that since I was a journalism major.

1min Snip Transcript: Codie Sanchez But once you have a decent chunk of change, then you can put it into other people spending their active time to make more money for you. Early on. And the algorithm that taught me that the most was, you know, every single way to make money is sort of like a game. And there are some games that are low level games. So think about it like pickleball, let’s say. If you want to become a top paid athlete, get all the chicks, you’re probably not going to go play pickleball, right? It is a game that people play. It’s not a highly highly paid game. And maybe it’s not that high of a status game as opposed to football, you know, soccer internationally. Oh, well, some of the highest paid athletes in the world. Also, you get lots of chicks if that’s what you’re into. And so if you’re going to think about where do you spend your time if you want to be an athlete, you think about what your skills are, but also what’s like the best indicator of future success, People who have future success. And so with money, I realized, oh, wow, if I want to make more of it, I probably don’t want to be a teacher because that’s just not a highly paid job. And probably I want to be in the industry in which more people than anywhere else are on the Forbes, let’s say, 100 list. And that would be finance. The number one category of people on the Forbes 100 list is some version of finance, whether that’s buying and selling companies, whether that’s being an active investor in equities, Whether that’s being in hedge funds.