Poker is Still Profitable in 2025! Mexico/ Real Estate/ GG MTT Grind

Cliffs from previous PGC´s and an update on what's been going on in life since the last one:

-36 year old living in Mexico for the last 15 years.

-My wife and I have a property management business and manage our own portfolio of rentals (short and long term) here in Mexico which we have built up over my time down here.

-I´ve played off and on over this period of time, but never completely given up on poker. I have had years with very little volume and some years where I´ve been dependent on poker income. Most of that volume has been live cash with some tourney series in there, and always with a healthy mix of online cash/tourney.

-During the pandemic I had a ton of real estate related debt coming due and very little income coming in from said rentals, (especially 2020). This forced me to get back on the poker horse with mixed results, including a pretty brutal 10-month downswing at live mid stakes cash/tourneys. I was playing a lot on the untracked apps and not enjoying playing at all but was basically forced to keep going. The added stress of needing to pay down debt didn´t help mentally, but I was convinced, and still am, that the games are still VERY beatable. It took longer than I would have hopped, but between poker and the real estate business taking off things got much better the last 2 years.

As of January 2025, I am debt free with no outstanding mortgage or personal debt. For the first time in a while I have breathing room and the RE portfolio is completely stabilized. This, along with my kiddos getting older has left me with more free time, and I have been grinding pretty regularly (for me).

I´ve had a really profitable start to the year, with about a 35k upswing on exclusively GG tournaments and cash in January playing roughly 80 total hours.

I jumped back on 2+2 last week and have been trolling around the PGC´s and NVG and am shocked by how negative and down on the poker experience this forum seems to be. Obviously 2+2 is not completely indicative of the poker communities' thoughts; but it seems that between bots, cheating, rake, game quality etc. there isn´t as much excitement about the future as what I currently feel. There are some really entertaining threads that I have read all the way through: Namaste90 and Portemillo are the two that come to mind. They seem to have found some profitable spots, and I like reading about people having success and with a slightly rosier outlook on the future of the game.

So instead of setting goals for this year, which I have abandoned in the past anyway, I am just going to document what a year as a semi retired poker player looks like. And (hopefully) show that the game is still beatable and profitable even without putting in insane study or grind. I am tired of dealing with agents and all the BS that comes along with the apps so this will all be taking place on tracked sites. For now I am just going to be playing on GG. 80% of the volume in MTT and some Zoom and Reg table stuff and some shot taking thrown in.

I started a bankroll prop bet on GG yesterday so that people can follow along with the journey. Got someone to bet $20 at 2.0 markup that I won´t make 35k over the next 3 months lol. I will definitely be looking to win that prop, but the main goal is to just have some accountability to put in volume and track the journey.

First day in the books, small winning day to start the challenge. I will post a mix of stuff, including real estate and Mexico related stuff but the main goals will be volume based. I want to be playing 300 tournaments a month at an ABI of $50. I want to study a few spots per month which I will post here but for the most part just a fun PGC which hopefully has some fun binks along the way.

Cheers! Hope everyone has an amazing 2025.