Johnny's journey from property investing to indie hacking

Meet Johnny Situ.

Johnny is 38 years old. Originally from China but now lives in North Carolina, USA.

Currently he is running PigeonForm as a side gig. A tool to design beautiful forms - no coding or design skills required.

This is Johnnys’ story from a crumbled business owner investing in properties to becoming an indie hacker.

The story told by Johnny Situ

There I sat, staring at my computer screen, 38 years old, my financial empire in ruins. This was 2024.

Ten years of hard work gone in an instant, and I couldn’t stop it. The weight of family obligations, the disappointment I imagined on my wife’s face, and the concern my parents would have haunted me.

My world had collapsed, but it wasn’t always this way.

A leap of faith

The beginning of my story was less about failure and more about survival.

I vividly remember my first international flight. I was heading to the U.S. coming from China in 2009. I travelled alone and barely had $1,000 in my pocket. It wasn’t a vacation. It was a leap into the unknown, with the future of my family resting on my shoulders.

The immigration officer’s words still echo in my mind:

"Your savings seem low. How will you support yourself during school?"

I had no real answer but mumbled, "Whatever it takes."

Go big or go home

After graduation in 2010 I took a safe path. I bought my first investment property in 2015, living modestly, and building a family. In a few years, I amassed a property portfolio worth millions. It felt surreal, dining out without worrying about prices.

Everything was on the rise - stocks, real estate, the economy. Even as COVID hit in 2019 and the government flooded the market with stimulus money, it all seemed to be working in my favor. The world, and my ego, inflated.

In my newfound confidence, I told myself, "Go big or go home."

I 2021 I sold my real estate portfolio and became a syndicator of apartment buildings. I solicited investments, maxed out credit lines, and built a social media presence where I posed as a "financial guru."

Gone were the humble investment principles that had gotten me this far. Instead, I was obsessed with likes and follows, feeding my ego every day. I believed I had it all figured out - my investments would set me for life in just two years.

The fall

But ego is a dangerous thing.

As the U.S. economy faced rising interest rates, everything I had built crumbled. Real estate tanked, short-term loans became unsustainable, and my inflated net worth deflated just as quickly. In just one year.

Finding redemption

But losing everything has a strange way of clarifying what truly matters. When the material things vanished, I found myself in search of something much deeper: inner peace.

For the first time in years, I noticed the little things - the warmth of my wife’s smile, the joy in my children’s laughter, the sunlight streaming through the window each morning.

Ryan Holiday’s book Ego is the enemy on ego and humility helped me unlearn the destructive habits I’d fallen into. I wish I’d known these lessons when I was younger, but I’m grateful to be learning them now.

The next chapter

Albert Einstein once said, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

This time, I’m approaching life from a different angle. I might have to start from scratch, but there’s beauty in that. With nothing left to lose, I can finally focus on what truly brings me joy.

In my spare time, I’ve been working on a project called Pigeonform, a new way to create engaging online forms.

I started building in May 2024 and launched Pigeonform in August 2024. Currently I’m at 20 users.

The goal is to help small business owners, marketers and entrepreneurs to capture leads, increase sales and engage with audiences. I’m just starting out and the app is in beta and completely free to use for now.

Here is how it works

Marketing Pigeonform

When it comes to marketing, I'm taking a highly personalized approach by manually reaching out to potential audiences one at a time through private messages on X.

While this method isn’t scalable, it allows me to deeply understand how the market reacts and engage in authentic conversations.

Below is my approach.

My focus right now isn’t on rapid monetization like most would expect. Instead, I’m dedicating time to truly understand the pain points and challenges my potential customers are facing, offering help wherever possible.

By gaining this deep insight and building a community around them, I know that even if Pigeonform doesn’t succeed, I’ll have developed lasting relationships and a better understanding of this audience, which I can build on for future endeavors.

When the time is right I plan on releasing premium subscription with more advanced features.