The truth? There isn’t a single business that you can start with zero investment.

I assume you have heard a number of success stories about entrepreneurs starting companies with zero dollars. And most of these stories are true but they don’t give you the complete picture.

Example:

Let’s say you hear about John the developer building a successful app from his bedroom that becomes massively successful and John ends up selling it for a nice 8 figure number. John is obviously now a success story and when asked how much he invested to build the app he replies, “zero dollars”.

This is understandably a fascinating story and primarily because it means John is no different from you and you too can have an 8 figure app one day with zero dollars invested. Unfortunately, John is not being entirely honest but not because John wants to deceive you. John just hasn’t really thought about the question…

John doesn’t consider the following:

How many 1000’s of hours John spent acquiring the skills needed to build his app.
How many 1000’s of dollars John spent over the years on equipment and software that helped John hone his skills.
How many other projects that John built that ultimately failed or had mild traction before he made his hugely successful app.
John actually has quite a bit invested in this app. While he may have been able to sit down and begin coding it without any capital investment at that moment, John spent plenty of money and time getting to the point where this was even a possibility.

The bottomline is that if you want to start a business for zero dollars, you need to start something in an area where you are already an expert.