Kevin O'Leary REVEALS His MULTI-MILLION Dollar Watch COLLECTION!

Hi there! As always, this week's episode of Ask Mr. Wonderful comes from questions. It's a dialogue; it's a two-way thing. What I'm trying to do is gather a lot of questions into areas where it's the same question over and over again, so I'm answering as many people as I can.

Listen to this one; this is so on trend for what's happening.

"Hi Mr. Wonderful, I saw a segment you did on something called Money Dispute where you were talking about tuition fees. I was scheduled to go to college in Boston this fall for my first semester. I had already paid rent for off-campus housing, both first and last month. As everybody knows, the college is now only offering me online courses until further notice. My student housing landlord is willing to let me defer but not refund my deposit. I got it; I'm on a half scholarship, so I'm in good shape on tuition fees, but I'm thinking of deferring for a year to wait out this pandemic so I can experience the real classroom. I get it, my parents are willing to let me continue living in my bedroom here at home, but they want me to start paying rent. Any advice?"

Okay, well look, there's a lot of stuff going on here! So let's start about, let's think about college. What is college all about? Is it about learning? Yeah. Is it about, you know, specific classes toward a career? Yeah, some of that. But I'm going to argue something else: College is a chance for you to meet people and develop a network of contacts that are going to be with you for the rest of your life.

If truth be told, and I'll tell you my own experience, I don't remember a damn thing about what I learned in undergrad or in my MBA, but I certainly remember all the people. What's being robbed from this generation during the COVID period, in my opinion, is the fact that they are not together, and they are not forming those bonds. Often that's where you meet your spouse or your significant other, or whatever, going through the whole process and the learning experience of college.

So in this case, do you stay at home in your basement or in your bedroom? I don't think so. You know, I'll tell you something remarkable. This is incredible data. I was looking at investing in student housing, and then, of course, the pandemic came in and said, "Well, I don't want to go there because no one's going to go and use any student housing." Do you know in towns like Boston, they're sold out? Why? The kids are still coming into town. They don't want to live at home; they're in their early 20s, and they want to experience life and meet others.

Even though they're not going into the classroom, even though they're going to be learning online for some indefinite period of time, they're going to experience what it's like to live in that college town. Live in Boston, live in New York, live in L.A., live anywhere there's a college, in Miami—whatever. They're leaving home to start their lives.

So my recommendation to you is to do that. You've already paid, you know, for the first and last month, and they’re not going to give you that back. You're not going to get it back; that landlord is probably not going to do that. On the other hand, you could move to Boston, start to experience what that sounds like, and I guarantee you're going to love Boston.

Now, it does mean you have to be thinking about social distancing. You can't go crazy; you don’t want to get caught up in this craziness of partying your face off and then getting COVID—bad outcome! But it doesn't mean you can't start to be careful and experience life there and meet others that are doing the same thing you are.

That's what's going to happen when you're walking around Boston. You're in a coffee shop in Boston; you're meeting students, people just like you. It's just packed; it’s got to be a million of them there with all the colleges in Boston and the surrounding areas.

So I'm going to say stay on course, stay in class, even though it's online, and go cruising through and basically live your life in the new COVID world. But you're going to meet a lot more people than living at home with your parents. You've already met your parents; you know who they are. They'll still be your parents. You can go back and see them any time, like at Thanksgiving or whatever.

But start your life in Boston. And for those of you considering, because I got a lot of questions like this, you keep going. You deal with the hand that you were dealt. This COVID thing has really screwed up a lot of stuff about our society, particularly college, but this too will pass. We just don't know when.

In the meantime, start to experience what it's like to live by yourself. Take care of yourself, even if you're in a dorm, which, you know, may be closed in some cases. But this sounds like it's off-campus housing, so start to live your life there. Who knows what you're going to find out? Who knows who you're going to meet? Who knows what's going to happen next? But that's my advice.

You just keep on the path; stay focused. You're going to be getting an education in just a slightly different way.

Anyways, that was a great question. Now let's move on to the second one, which I got a ton of just like this. I think you're going to find this kind of interesting. This is a question about early retirement. Because I guess COVID in the pandemic, people are starting to make some choices about what they want to do with their lives.

Listen to this one: "I am 58 years old. I work at a top accounting firm in their international tax department. Because of the pandemic, I have been working at home for the last four and a half months. I'm going to have to retire from this firm with a package when I turned 62. One of my co-workers who is 59 told me last week that he approached management about an early retirement, and they bought him out with the same package he would have received at 62. Sounds like a pretty good deal. I'm considering making the same approach. Can you give me some advice on the best way to do it?"

I'm going to give you some advice. I don't care whether you've just started at a job or whether you're retiring from one. I want to put on my employment hat. I've been doing this for a lot of years, interviewed a lot of people in my time, and hired and fired many.

If you're planning on retiring, if you're planning on making a move to another company, if you're planning on leaving the job for any reason at whatever age you are, here's rule number one: Shut your mouth! Don't talk to anybody about it that works with you. Never, never disclose what your thoughts are.

Why? The minute people think you're retiring, the minute they think you're checking out, the minute they think you're not on course and staying with the mandate of the job you have, your status within that company collapses immediately. Word spreads like wildfire—that's just the way it works, and it will happen to you.

The only people you should be talking to about your career are those you completely trust to keep their mouth shut—completely quiet. It could be your parents, your brother, your sister, or somebody else you don't work with. Because the minute you disclose it to anybody you work with, you should assume everybody knows, and that is not a good negotiating position if you want to make a move. That's rule number one.

Number two: If you're the person that wants to retire, okay, you basically go in on a Monday with the assumption you're leaving that Friday. Because that's what they want to do to you. If you're trying to get the same package the other person got and you know that's available, it's good that you know that.

You're not yet 62 in this case and you'd like to renegotiate something. This is the time to do it, because companies are trying to figure out how to reduce costs at this time. Very often, the cost of giving your package is not accounted for the same way as an ongoing cost of keeping you as an employee, which is why they might be willing to do it now during this COVID period.

That's very, very important, but you have to make the assumption that once you bring it up and you start that negotiation, there's only one path for you, and that's out the door. But the opportunity is for you to go and say, "Look, I'm interested in retiring. I heard about that other package that my co-worker got; I'd like the same deal if you're willing to do it. We can agree on it right now—I'm checking out here on Friday."

Now, for the person that's thinking of moving to another company and you want to go see your boss to talk about it—don't do that! Do not do that! The only meeting you're having with your boss is after you've made the 100% decision that you're leaving, and you walk in and tell them that.

You should make the assumption you're leaving 15 minutes later, because in financial services, that's what happens. They put all your stuff in a box; it's not adversarial—it’s just the way it is—and they walk you out the door. They take away your clearance card, your security pass, and you're out of there.

That's why, in all of these decisions about making career changes, you keep it to yourself until you've already committed to the change. Until it's in your head that you know you're going to do this thing and there's no turning back. You're doing it, and you're going into that office and you're telling them your intentions, and there's only one way after that—you’re going to execute on what you decided to do.

So the better thing to do in thinking about moving—a lateral move or a move to a better job for a competitor or whatever—is really explore that as quietly as you can. Get it in writing; get the offer in writing so there's no dispute after you've made your big move as to what you were promised. Get it in writing. Let me say it one more time: Get it in writing! Get an offer in writing so that everything you thought you understood you do, and it's written down.

Then you walk in, and you're out of there in 20 minutes. Very, very important! Basically, there's a common theme here regarding employment: You don't negotiate your career path with your boss or your peers; you do that on your own in your head or with people you trust that are not going to talk to anybody else.

Once you've made that decision, once you know the direction you're going, then you make your move. That's when you do it, because you know with certainty that morning—your life's going to change. You're out of that business, and you're on to a new one, either you've retired or you've made your move. But get all your ducks in order before you do it. This will help you immensely.

Think that through! This is very important; I've done it a thousand times. Talk to people that come in to see me: "Look, boss, I've been thinking about making a move. Can you sweep my offer over here?" I get rid of those people in five minutes; they're not on board anymore. Don't let that happen to you.

Something to think about: If you're retiring, there's a fantastic side hustle emerging in America now, and it's all around the world too. Because the world is digitizing at a really rapid rate because of COVID, there are all kinds of new jobs on the artsy side. Let me explain what I'm talking about.

If a company was selling 50% of its products to retail, it was basically going through distribution and selling in a retail location. Today, much of that has gone away because the stores are closed as a result of COVID.

So now companies want to tell stories; they want to use Instagram; they want to use Facebook; they want to go online; they want to take pictures of their products; they want to video their images. They want to have really rich content about the service or the product they're trying to sell. That takes art. It takes great people that have photographic skills, video skills, editing skills, sound skills.

If you have any of those, they were considered to be lesser in demand in the past, and very often people would sell their services for a very low price. Not today! If you're a good video editor, you're in hot demand. If you're a great photographer of products, you're in hot demand. If you know how to construct digital editing or mix video or sound, you can find a side hustle helping a company that does that or helping a company that's built a department to do just that.

Because there's so much digital activity going on right now, we're using editors all around the place now to cut our content for all of my companies so that we can do videos, 59 seconds, 30 seconds, 15 seconds, two minutes, all these different platforms have different rules. You can put a 10-minute video up on LinkedIn and on Facebook, but you can't do that on Instagram. So you have to have different formats, and that's done with editing.

So if you're one of those people, that's a great career for you right now and can lead to a much bigger job over time. I've always said this about work: There's the discipline of business, and it's very binary; either you make money or lose money—it's very digital, plus one, negative one—that kind of thing.

And then there's the art; the ying and the yang of the creative aspect. What makes a great manager? What makes a great business person? A great entrepreneur? Someone who's combined both music, the arts, video, photography with the discipline of managing a business. It's a great combination, and it's all coming to the fore now; it's coming to the front because of the digitization of the entire global economy.

It takes art to tell a story; it takes video; it takes sound; it takes an image, and that's all the art side—the left side of the brain. It's a wonderful thing to think about and a great new opportunity for artists to make money like never before. I wish you all well on that one!

Now, my third question kind of is a nice little foray into this idea of art. It's an interesting question; I've got it many, many times. I've never decided to answer it, but I wanted to. Let me just tell you what it is.

"Hi, I'm an early follower of your YouTube channel. You are always talking about watches as investments. How can they be investments if you never sell any of them? Good question, good point. Also, what is the point of buying more than one watch when your phone is far more accurate in keeping time? How do you decide what watch to buy next? I ask this because I'm considering buying a mechanical men's watch to wear as oversized jewelry. Thank you, Becky."

So Becky is going to buy a man's large format watch and wear it, which is a hot trend in watches. Let's get to the issue around— I don't buy watches as investments because Becky’s right: I never sell them. I consider them collecting art. To me, a watch is about the dial.

I don't own just one brand of watch; I own many different brands and I've always been someone who studies the dial. Now, one of the most popular watches in my wardrobe is the Rolex Daytona because the dial, you can see against a red band, just pops! It looks great with a black suit; the dial just accelerates visually, and that to me is the hallmark of a great dial. But there are many other great dials.

So, for example, as I'm preparing to go and shoot Shark Tank, I can't take my whole watch collection with me, but this year I'll be taking eight. So I thought for Becky, I would actually walk through the process with you of what it's like to actually choose a portfolio of eight different watches, knowing that you're trying to mix and match and make a statement with the dials.

Because the collecting of watches for me is: Is that a unique dial? Do I have a dial like that in the collection, as I like to call it: Le Collection? Do I have something in there that's not the same or is this something unique? And if it's unique, it piques my interest as a watch collector.

But watch this, and you'll see the agony I've gone through to choose what I call the Shark Tank Eight for this season—the eight pieces that are all unique, all have different dials, and all have red bands, because I wear red bands for continuity on television.

I have many watches that don't have red bands; I just never wear them on TV, as you'll see. But these are the eight that I'm going to be wearing for this season. I hope you enjoy this, and if you're into watches as Becky is, and you're just exploring getting into collecting, think about it as art.

Because you don't need a watch to tell time; your phone, Becky's right, is way better at telling time—more accurate. But a mechanical watch is a piece of art; it has an emotional connection with its owner. The reason Becky wants to get an oversized men's watch is it looks cool.

My wife and daughter do the same thing; they're always stealing from my collection—big oversized men's watches with big bands and wearing them out on the town because they look cool. Of course, they look cool! It's a fashion statement; it's a statement of art, and the dials are unique and interesting.

I'm always keeping an eye on my collection, and I always know when one's missing exactly where it is. It's not stolen; it’s on my wife's wrist. She just hates red bands, so that's another way that I keep her out of there.

But for me, what Becky's going through is a desire to explore the art, the dial—the experience of wearing a mechanical watch. And for those of you that are interested, I highly recommend it; it’s just sheer fun! You know, it’s something you pursue as a hobby, but it's really the yin and yang of art.

You don't need a watch, but it's good for the soul. Till next time, take care!

Okay, now something I really enjoy doing—we're just about to shoot Shark Tank Season 12. But there's wardrobe involved, and the way Shark Tank works is there's many different panels, different guest sharks, different configurations of sharks, and that means wardrobe can change.

I avoid that problem by always wearing the same thing: black tie, tie pin, white shirt, crisp dark suit. I got 25 of them; that's my Shark Tank uniform! In fact, I wear that a lot; I like the way it looks, and it's easy to remember every morning. It makes it very easy for the editors to cut between different pods.

However, I don't wear the same watch! You'll always see in each different pod I'll wear a different watch. This year, I have to choose between eight out of my collection—eight watches. Now, I already know what I'm going to wear in cufflinks: I love these skulls; they're just absolutely gorgeous! You've seen them in other seasons before, and the tie pins—I have one in gold and one in silver based on what I'm going to need on the dial of the watch.

Those are silver skulls, and I often use gold cufflinks when the watch case is gold, rose gold, or yellow gold, depending on. I also have eight different pens that I use in these different pods, and I match the pen to the watch.

But it's the watch selection that gets complicated. This is a subset of my collection here. There are many different brands, but the key to a watch is its dial. These are all unique. I collect watches based on how unique the dials are; the dial in a watch tells the story.

So I've got to choose eight out of this subset of the collection. Now, the go-to I've been using for season after season because it's such a spectacular dial is the classic Rolex Daytona, fondly known as the Pandex. It now has a black ceramic, which just goes perfectly with my suit; the white dial pops!

As you know, I only wear red bands on television, so I have to go through this dance with all the manufacturers in getting specially custom-made red bands for each of my pieces. Otherwise, it won't appear on television.

It doesn't mean I don't own watches that don't have red bands, but they won't be on television. So this Cartier—I love this; it's one of my very first watches, but unfortunately, it won't be on TV, so let's take that out of the mix.

This incredible Patek—I love it! The Nautilus... fantastic piece, but it won't be on television. Then we start to look at the subsets here. We know with certainty, in my view, that looking at different pieces, you want diversity in the actual dials.

I know I'm going back to the Daytona, so it's going to be one of the eight. So right out of the gate, let’s put it forward; it's up there. Why? Because it’s a perennial favorite, it’s been on the show in many, many seasons, many different episodes. It's probably one of the stars of my wardrobe over the years, and I just love it!

I love the dial; I love it, and it's a Rolex, so we've got Rolex covered. Now, I'm looking for uniqueness, and obviously, the collection changes as the year goes on. I bring pieces into the collection. I rarely ever sell anything, so there's always new things to choose from.

This style is a Ming, a new discovery this year—one of the hottest micro brands in the world. You can go online, look it up; it's an incredible story! But the dial is remarkable; it's a stunner! People that see it ask me about it all the time, so I'm going to include the Ming in this year's shoot. So that's number two on the hit parade.

So we've got a Rolex, we got a Ming; I told you this is going to be fun! Now, another piece I acquired this year, which is absolutely fascinating, comes from a collector that you know taught me a little bit about stretching outside of Switzerland.

So this piece is a Lange Zeitwerk—a digital dial, even though it's a mechanical watch—an extraordinary piece again with a red band on it. This has never been worn on Shark Tank before, but I think viewers are going to be intrigued with this because it's such an unusual dial. Again, going for the dial, trying to really make a statement with the dial, and I think it's going to work just terrific with any red pen.

This subtle grayness in the beautiful tones inside the dial and the fact that you can read the time digitally, even though it's a mechanical watch—can you imagine how complicated the movement is in this thing? It’s beautiful; it’s a piece of art, but again, deserves to be in Season 12, so that’s number three on the hit parade.

Also has already appeared last year, but I really, really love the face—the dial on this perpetual Ed Marpiquet from their new 1159 collection. I think there was a hundred of these made in gold, and I think it's just a striking dial, and I think I want to bring it back for, you know, a new appearance. Again, if you want to put it that way, repeat performance, so to speak!

So let's make that number four. That’s interesting—number four on the hit parade. So we've got four dials now, all completely different. There's another brand that has some remarkable dials. We talk about dials, FP Journe—I mean, how extraordinary is the dial on this piece? You don't see this very often; it’s subtle, it looks beautiful with a red band, but there's so much going on on the dial.

I think it really captures the eye, and I think this year it’s got to be on the show. I just love this piece. It’s, you know, Journe makes crazy watches, and if you're into this style, I have many Jordans, but this one definitely, I think I'd want to have on the show—the Resonance.

I mean, it’s a classic beauty! There we have it—five! Ah, now it gets more complicated. We have to go for total uniqueness in terms of what we're bringing to the next style, because we have to keep everything different. That's a beautiful piece too, the Elegant; it's just a striking blue dial again in FP Journe worth considering.

Of course, the classic Royal Oak AP—also lovely—but again, we're looking for diversity, diversity, diversity! Oh, I mean, this style is just—I’m kind of making this decision with you as we go through it, but Grand Seiko—stunning! I mean, the rich red of this lacquer is just saying that's an upset that comes into the collection this year: one, two, three, four, five, six.

Two more pieces—two more! You know, it's like choosing amongst children. It's really difficult. You want good representation across the maisons, but you really, really want to be selective on what you're doing with the dials.

Oh my goodness, it's tough; it's really tough! This is also striking—another Grand Seiko—just a brilliant dial, beautifully polished! But you know, you can't take everything; you’ve got to choose eight. You know, it's always a tough decision. You're trying to decide.

Oh my goodness! But I also want good diversity across the different brands here. I love it! It's coming in—Breguet Constantin. Beautiful blue face; red band—can't beat it. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

Ah, tough, tough, tough! So hard to choose, so hard to choose! Reverso—a classic! The Panerai—people love Panerai too. But I've worn it in many seasons, so I'm trying to, you know, keep a mix going here.

Cartier Roadster—a classic! Here's another Rolex, but no red band, so I won't be taking that on television. But there's so many fantastic Rolexes too. Yup, the Batman! Where are you? There we are! Classic; look spectacular!

Red band—the Pepsi. These are the nicknames of these watches: This is the Daytona with a black face versus the white face—also classic beauty! But I think the white face really works with the white shirt, so we stick with that.

Gotta pick one more; you've got to hand it to Journe. This is the Elegant—a beautiful face! But the blue—this is this blue dial spectacular! The Elegante is doing its thing, it's actually finding the right time because I moved it—a beautiful piece; you know, a very striking dial.

It's between these two really! I think I'm going to bring another Journe on set. So what do I like? Do I like le blue, the blue dial? Do I like the Elegant? I like them both, but I can only take eight.

Decisions, decisions! In this case, I think I'm going with blue. By the way, rumored to be a piece that Putin wears! Stunning, lovely. There we have it; those are Season 12 Mr. Wonderful watches: one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight—we're done! Ah, it's tough to decide; it really is!

But that's it for this season. That work is done. Thanks for joining!