Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

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BananaMangoSmoothie
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Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

Hi, let me indroduce myself -

I'm 27 years old and play online poker for a living (low stakes). I was born in Germany but grew up in the UK.

I started playing poker profesionally after i turned 20 years old, moved to Bangkok, Thailand a week after i turned 21 and lived there for 4 years. My work ethic was poor and my social life was a big money pit. I was making roughly $13-25/hour tax free depending on the games i was playing, but was spending it all on expensive apartments, eating out and bottle service. It didn't matter if i made $1,500 in a month or $4,000 in a month, i always spent what i made and had no savings. Eventually i went broke and moved back home, playing even lower stakes games where i'm still stuck at right now. Right now i'm only making $8.50/hour tax free. (In the UK there are no taxes for gambling). After reading the blog Early Retirement Extreme and other blogs on minimalism, I realised that a consumer lifestyle is only going to keep me in this cycle no matter how much/little i made. 1.5 years ago i went vegan, and i realised how cheap i can live in regards to food expenses, i also increased my affinity for cooking, so i'm definitely looking forward to buying very cheap fruits, vegetable, and wholegrains once i move back to Bangkok.

After calculating various costs, i came to the conclusion that i can live happily in Bangkok on $800/month. Now my plan is to increase my hourly to $15/hour and hopefully pull in $3k/month on average and save up 12 months of expenses before i start investing the money. After reading a lot of the forums on reddit, i think investing in index funds is a good thing to do. Still a uber noobie, not even sure how i go about investing in index funds, perhaps through the UK vanguard?

I'm also (very slowly) starting an ecommerce drop shipping store which will hopefully become an income stream in the future.

Dave
Posts: 545
Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 1:42 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Dave »

Thanks for sharing your story, it is very interesting!

If you are interested in learning about investing, check out the following two links. The first link will allow you to explore alternative strategies, the second link will provide specific books to get you going.

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/wiki/ ... nvestments

http://earlyretirementextreme.com/wiki/ ... ed_Reading

BananaMangoSmoothie
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

Thanks for the links. Seems like i have a lot of reading to do.

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Egg
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Egg »

Awesome. I hope you start a journal (unless you have and I just missed it).

How did you get good enough at poker to pull in that sort of money playing? It's not mega-bucks for sure, but being geographically independent and not relying on touting for business is a major plus. I would also be interested to hear about your drop shipping. The whole side-hustle thing doesn't necessarily get covered in these forums as much as expense optimisation, so it'd be cool if you'd be willing to write about it.

Oh, and welcome.

BananaMangoSmoothie
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

I got good enough at poker to make an income simply by studying poker. The game is getting tougher every year so it's definitely not a walk in the park to maintain an edge. I haven't even thought of starting a journal. Not even sure if people care about a low stakes poker player trying to live a minimalist lifestyle. On the other hand a journal might give me extra motivation by keeping me more accountable.

Quadalupe
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Location: the Netherlands

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Quadalupe »

I would be interested in your journal BMS! (Love your avatar by the way). I'm an amateur poker player myself, but I've read quite a bit about it for some papers I had to write about poker bots back in grad school.

Also, I might be mistaken, but wouldn't a viable strategy to increase your income be to i) first increase your stash (with other jobs or whatever) ii) use the larger bankroll to start playing in higher stakes poker (and using your increased bankroll to ride out the variance) thus iii) earning more profit? The main problem problem with this strategy is of course that it might become (much) harder to win games at higher stake poker, since the casual players don't partake in high stake poker.

Dave
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Joined: Fri Dec 19, 2014 1:42 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Dave »

@BMS - I cannot speak for everyone, but I am very interested in a poker player trying to live a minimalist lifestyle, in Thailand, while developing an e-business!

Of course, you have to want to start a journal, but my guess is many of us would enjoy it, and that you will find it to be of value for yourself, too.

@Quadalupe - I was thinking about increasing the bankroll to increase poker income, too, but it also occurred to me that you play against better players at higher stakes games, so there is a balance of optimizing return which is equal to = Bankroll * Odds of winning, where bankroll and odds of winning are negatively correlated. My guess is BMS has thought of this and is working towards his optimal point on that curve.

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Ego
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Ego »

What are you doing about the Thai visa? Which area in Bangkok? We like the area around the Nana Skytrain station or near Lumpini park but the rent is too high.

BananaMangoSmoothie
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Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

@Quadalupe - Sup dude, there is no way i'm getting a "real job" lol. I'm increasing my bankroll, my main problem is my lack of motivation due to having an addiction to facebook and tv shows. My plan is to start mixing in higher buyin games within the next 2 months.

@Dave - Yes, variance is greatly increased the higher stakes you play, and sometimes the higher hourly is not worth the extra stress.

@Ego - My plan is to get a normal 6 month tourist visa, and then apply for a student visa after 4 months, where i'm then going to study thai and try to become fluent as quickly as possible. My prefered area in bangkok is Ratchada. I lived in Phrom Phong on my first year living in thailand (actually on the same street as the then prime minister). Me and 2 other poker players rented a nice $2,500/month condo ( 300sqm, 3 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, 3 balconies, gym, sauna, cinema room...and we had 3 maids lol! ). I then moved to Ratchada to a nice $600/month apartment with my then gf and ended up liking the area much more because there are way less tourists and you get more of a thai feel. Through the website http://www.hipflat.co.th/en you can find apartments within a big price range with you desired area. My plan when i return is to get a $250/month studio within the ratchada area again.

thrifty++
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by thrifty++ »

Interesting I have heard of this before - people playing poker as a means of living! Crazy! Jealous! How does this work? Does that mean you get good enough at the game that you win more often than lose and that's how you earn an income? You referred to an hourly rate. Is this just averaged winnings over the hours you played? And here is me thinking that poker was just primarily a game of chance.

jacob
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by jacob »

Egg wrote:The whole side-hustle thing doesn't necessarily get covered in these forums as much as expense optimisation,...
A big reason for this is that many side-hustlers who come to this forum failed at their side-hustles.

Failed 4HW muses kinda work as a feeder for ERE because expense-efficiency is materially more robust than hustling.

BlueNote
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BlueNote »

I have considered gambling with an edge in order to make some extra money (like card counting). However it's just to monotonous for me, maybe it would be more exciting to do it in a Casino where you have to count the cards covertly while making yourself appear to be a regular gambling fool.

Gambling games like poker, where you have multiple human opponents, are subject to similar competitive forces as businesses. Therefore the more people who study and play the game the harder it will be to find an edge. Have you considered learning more exotic games that less people play in order to get a better edge? I've heard that Omaha was far easier to make money at then Texax Hold'em due to lack of popularity around Omaha.

Did
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Joined: Mon Apr 01, 2013 7:50 am

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Did »

As a child I was going to spend 3 months at the casino between high school and university on the gold coast. My system - which was, so I thought, foolproof, was to keep betting on red till I covered my prior losses and won a modest 5 dollars (it was worth more in 1991).

I used my high school programming skills to write a simulator in basic to demonstrate my future success, and discovered to my horror that I had to have access to hundreds of thousands of dollars (and the rest) in order to cover the inevitable stretches of bad luck. That, and the 500 dollar maximum bet, saw the end of that plan.

Instead I spent a couple of days solving a problem my dad was moaning about, and sold the software to schools all over the state for thousands.

Looking back I would have been better off skipping the 6 years at uni and 14 in the workplace doing boring legal crap and kept down that track!

But you live and learn don't you.

Did
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by Did »

I should mention that I had just turned 17 when all that went down. Those were the days. 42 tomorrow!

BananaMangoSmoothie
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

thrifty++ wrote:Interesting I have heard of this before - people playing poker as a means of living! Crazy! Jealous! How does this work? Does that mean you get good enough at the game that you win more often than lose and that's how you earn an income? You referred to an hourly rate. Is this just averaged winnings over the hours you played? And here is me thinking that poker was just primarily a game of chance.
You shouldn't be jealous, playing poker isn't a very glamorous job (outside of being your own boss). Poker is different from other casino games, in that you don't play against the house, you play against other human beings that make mathematical errors thus essentially giving you money in the long run. Poker players calcualate their winnings in terms of hourly (lets say you made $1k in 40 hours, that then gives you a $25 hourly). Obviously 40 hours is a very tiny sample size and the more hours you play the better idea you get of your true hourly/winrate/roi% in the games you're playing. There are thousands of people who make good money from poker. Apparently there are atleast 10 or so people in the world who have made hundreds of millions from poker playing extremely high stake cash games against extremely wealthy businessmen.
Last edited by BananaMangoSmoothie on Sat Dec 12, 2015 3:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.

thrifty++
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by thrifty++ »

Doesn't sound glamorous but just sounds so independent which is awesome! I think I might take up poker as a hobby and give it a crack!

BananaMangoSmoothie
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

thrifty++ wrote:Doesn't sound glamorous but just sounds so independent which is awesome! I think I might take up poker as a hobby and give it a crack!
I recommend playing on PokerStars. It's the largest poker site and also the safest with the best software. You can also play there for free using play money chips.

P.S. Follow my journal, i post my poker graphs there.

BananaMangoSmoothie
Posts: 18
Joined: Mon Nov 30, 2015 4:28 pm

Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by BananaMangoSmoothie »

Did wrote:I should mention that I had just turned 17 when all that went down. Those were the days. 42 tomorrow!
Selling software is definitely more productive than gambling :P Happy Birthday for tomorow~! :)

thrifty++
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Re: Hello from UK/Germany/Thailand

Post by thrifty++ »

Thanks I will check it out! I kind of like the idea of doing it in a smokey dingy dimly lit back alley room though ;)

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