During my exploration process of selling Financial Samurai, I consulted with a friend who sold his website for $2.8 million some years ago. He offered to share what transpired, what he would have done differently, and why he wished he would have held on. The numbers and timing have been slightly modified to protect his privacy as well as adhere to his non-disclosure clause.

In 2003 I started a website for $1,000 and in 2010 I sold it for $2.8 million. A 2,800X return is better than practically every single angel investment ever, but I still regret my decision.

At the time, I thought it was the best move I could have ever made. I was 30 years old and like Sam, had just started a family of my own.

By selling the site, I thought I would free up some valuable time to take care of my young boy and it did. But after six months, I wasn’t satisfied with only being a stay at home dad after working so hard on my business for so many years. When our boy turned one, we decided to send him to daycare so I could go back to my old routine of building a business. At 2.5 years old, we decided to send him to preschool. My wife worked a full-time job.

I also thought that by selling the site, I would feel much happier cashing out. In 2010, there was still a tremendous amount of uncertainty in the economy. I thought I was smart for selling because my site survived the downturn while so many other businesses went to zero.

Despite having a nice payout, I wish I never would have sold. Here are the reasons why.

I’ve been delaying this post for a while partly because I didn’t want to recognize the formal end of my 10-year journey writing on Financial Samurai. I was also waiting for some divine inspiration to figure out what’s next.

Earlier this year, several potential acquirers contacted me about selling Financial Samurai. I thanked them for their interest and told them I needed to first fulfill my 10-year goal.

In July, after achieving my goal, they all contacted me again. This time, I told them I first needed to write my 10-year recap post in order to make the achievement official.

Now that that post has been written, I know I’ll soon be contacted again and forced to make a decision. Financial Samurai has been a part of my life for so long that it’ll be tough to let it go. As I don’t want to be tempted by money, I’m trying to keep the offers at bay for as long as possible.

With Financial Samurai I have autonomy, fun, a sense of purpose, measurable results, and the ability to help people achieve their financial goals. As a stay at home dad, I can’t think of anything intellectually better to do while my boy is sleeping.

Financial Samurai has been a dream come true. Ironically, nothing kills a dream quite like achieving it. 

One of my luckiest investment decisions was not selling anything during the 2008-2009 financial crisis. I just held on for dear life, continued to max out my 401(k) and squirreled away anything left into an online savings account or CD.

In 2012, I got lucky again by receiving zero offers for my SF primary residence. Facebook just went public, but nobody wanted to buy my home. As a result, I held on, paid down more of the mortgage, earned some rental income, and then finally sold it five years later for 68% more. I probably should have held on.

In 2015 and in 2018 I passed on selling Financial Samurai. To sell before realizing my goal of writing 3X a week for 10 years would have made me feel like a quitter.

Then in August 2018, Google had a large algorithm update that has since boosted organic traffic by 50%. That was an unexpected upside surprise, especially since the site has been around since 2009.

It sure seems like the secret to creating wealth is to consistently save, invest, grow, hold and build for the long-term. Almost every significant wealth event in my life has taken at least five years to stew.