
CEO of Bulletproof Coffee shares why he left Silicon Valley and moved to Canada - bilkoo
http://www.businessinsider.com/bulletproof-coffee-ceo-dave-asprey-moved-to-canada-2018-3?r=UK&IR=T
======
jstandard
The article, and by extension Asprey, come across as a bit tone deaf to me.

He was making $250,000 salary + stock/benefits + double income with his
physician wife. He owned a home, admitted he lived in "nice neighborhoods",
sent both his children to private school, spent weekends at Tahoe, and who
knows what else.

With all of this he says he felt "less than middle class".

~~~
gaurav_v
You have excluded the sentence which immediately follows his stated income:
"The median-priced home in San Francisco costs $1.5 million, and a person
needs an annual household income of $303,000 in order to afford the 20% down
payment on a home that expensive."

I agree that it is a bit tone deaf.

~~~
akcreek
I do not understand that logic at all. Having a household income $303K says
nothing about how much down payment you are able to afford.

~~~
jeffrey_t_b
Perhaps it meant to say that one needs a $303k/yr salary to support a $1.2M
mortgage (i.e. the loan on a $1.5M house after a 20% downpayment). At an
interest rate of 3.5%, that's about $5400/month. A $303k salary is maybe about
right for that, considering taxes (income and property), insurance, private
schools/daycare and things like "food". Wow, this can't go on.

------
nkrisc
I knew from the headline his company sounded familiar. He sells coffee mixed
with snake oil - I'm sorry, I mean butter. Wait, no - medium chain
triglyceride oil. Now that sounds more like it does something.

~~~
kgwxd
I didn't even know that was a brand name until now, I've been making it myself
for months.

~~~
lev99
He even sells MCT oil at twice the market rate.
[https://www.amazon.com/Bulletproof-Brain-Octane-Reliable-
Sou...](https://www.amazon.com/Bulletproof-Brain-Octane-Reliable-
Source/dp/B00R7FFYO8?th=1)

------
geff82
Sorry, but that story was pure clickbait. So instead of moving to affordable,
yet economically strong places like the metro areas in Texas he went for
Canada to pay double the taxes... I do not get that story. There is nothing
wrong with moving to Canada, great country, great people. But no one can tell
me that the only Alternative to SV was Canada.

~~~
gameswithgo
Canadian taxes include health insurance, possibly also obviates the need to
buy a $500k house in order to be in a good school district (not sure if Canada
is like this, other first world countries are) So could be a net savings.

~~~
toasterlovin
Canadian real estate is insane. As bad as California.

~~~
otoburb
Vancouver Island is much more affordable; seems like the person is willing to
live away from dense urban centres. The insanity of Canadian real estate seems
to be isolated to Toronto and Vancouver, although prices are predictably
rising in "nearby" suburbs such as Kitchener/Waterloo (Ontario) or
Langley/Surrey (near Vancouver).

~~~
toasterlovin
Yeah, what I mean is that, if you compare like to like, it's at insane
California levels. So, in the city in Vancouver is comparable to SF. In the
suburbs of Vancouver is comparable to suburbs of LA/SF. Rural land anywhere in
BC is comparable to rural land in CA.

So, rural land on Vancouver island is more affordable in the sense that there
are less economic opportunities that come with that land, so the land costs
less to buy. Which might be a good tradeoff for somebody who doesn't need to
be near a job, but is not super useful to the majority of people who do.

------
msie
$88000/year for kids' schooling?!?! Couldn't enroll them in public school?

~~~
refurb
Calling himself "lower middle class" is a joke. How many middle class send
their kids to a private school?

~~~
Jtsummers
A decent number. But most middle class folks (or those outside upper middle
class at least) don't send multiple kids to $44,000/student/year schools, let
alone one kid.

------
begoon
This guy is just a charlatan. Period.

------
spraak
I recently watched a debate with Dave Ausprey [1] where he said something like
"we're animals so we need to eat animals". I wonder what he thinks cows eat.

Edit: So I'm curious why I'd be downvoted for this. This guy is truly hand-
wavy crazy.

[1] [https://youtu.be/o5N-qPEnThs](https://youtu.be/o5N-qPEnThs)

~~~
beagle3
Cows eat whatever they can find that looks like food to them, including
chicks[0].

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXhElaGCZVU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXhElaGCZVU)
\- warning: could be considered animal cruelty.

~~~
spraak
So you have one instance of a cow eating a chick. That's hardly enough
evidence to claim that cows eat "whatever they can find", especially without
considering the cow's environmental circumstances. How many cows living in
their natural environment would eat another animal? I'm open to being shown
otherwise, but this is just silly at this point.

------
rdl
Paying California income taxes and property taxes and everything else would
maybe make sense if you lived in Palo Alto/Cupertino/Hillsborough with
multiple kids in school, but if you're paying another $44k/yr for school on
top of the taxes and high cost of living, it's pretty crazy. It also makes
sense if you want to work at the HQ of one of the bay area tech companies, or
if you're involved in a startup or other business selling to other startups,
but probably doesn't make sense in any other case (including enterprise-
focused startups, or potentially, even consumer focused startups now.)

While Vancouver real estate is expensive (largely due to foreign buyers, many
of whom do not live in the properties), rental isn't as bad, and Vancouver
Island or other areas outside metro Vancouver aren't particularly bad. If
you're already willing to accept a Cessna ride to civilization, you can
definitely find something cheap.

Las Vegas or Texas would have been cheaper, though.

------
driverdan
Take a look at his supplement company and you'll quickly find he's a quack.

They sell collagen for $40/lb. Collagen is the cheapest, crappiest animal
protein source and is incomplete. I bet their markup is over 1000%.

$23.50 for a 16oz bottle of coconut oil with unsubstantiated claims.

> Brain Octane oil is rapidly absorbed by your body and converted into brain-
> fueling, fat-burning ketone energy.

Fat isn't converted to ketones unless your body is low on carbs. If you are on
a low carb diet the fat source doesn't matter. A ketone is a ketone.

Also he hasn't built a "$100 million empire" as the article claims. On LI he
states that Bulletproof has a valuation of $100 million.

That leads me to another point. Why do investors keep putting money into these
garbage supplement companies? Stop funding quackery.

~~~
mixedCase
>Why do investors keep putting money into these garbage supplement companies?

Occam's razor says the investment pays off, not all investors have issues with
the placebo business.

------
manishsharan
Is drinking butter with coffee still a thing ? I had thought that was a
passing fad. This guy can make $250k for himself selling this gross concoction
blend make me rethink everything I know about humanity.

~~~
AndyNemmity
It is still a thing, butter and or mct oil. It's a passing fad insomuch as
keto is a passing fad, which depending on who you talk to, or care about as a
group can be a fad.

------
Tempest1981
I tried to find something similar -- here's 5 acres for CA$350k (US$270k).
Home not included.

[https://www.point2homes.com/CA/Home-For-Sale/BC/Qualicum-
Bea...](https://www.point2homes.com/CA/Home-For-Sale/BC/Qualicum-
Beach/Lot-9-Wesley-Ridge-Place/54815192.html)

------
Balgair
The Reddit AMA is here:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1fa2xs/i_spent_20yrs_...](https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1fa2xs/i_spent_20yrs_and_250k_to_hack_my_own_biology_i/)

It's a bit of a disaster, really.

------
msie
Just call it a gut feeling, but I don't think he will be criticized as a
foreigner buying property in Canada and employing a loophole to gain entry (ie
creating a company to sponsor his work visa).

~~~
sdfjkl
Investor visas (aka Golden Visa) aren't really a loophole, they're quite
intentionally designed to bring money into a country and provide employment
for existing citizens.

~~~
mrnobody_67
Though in this case, all his employees are in Seattle, not in Canada....

~~~
sdfjkl
Nope, as part of the golden visa, he would've paid an immigration attorney to
set up a Canadian company, shove some money into it and hire the minimum
amount of employees. This is unrelated to the coffee business and doesn't have
to be profitable, it's merely a requirement to gain residency.

After 6 years of residency, he can then apply for citizenship.

------
Kluny
Oh god, he's on Vancouver Island now? Just what we need, another snake-oil-
selling pseudo-hippie to run up real estate prices.

------
aphextron
Who would have guessed being a drug dealer makes good money.

