Adrian Portelli Says He Nearly Starved Himself Chasing Success on the Road to His Billionaire Fortune

Before the penthouse, the Dubai base and the billionaire label, Adrian Portelli was a broke teenager in Melbourne's western suburbs who says he locked himself in his parents' study and refused to leave until he had climbed back out of a failure. Now 37, he described those years in an appearance on Mark Bouris's podcast, Straight Talk.

Portelli was the youngest of three children. He went to a Catholic primary school and a public high school, and his father was a mechanic who later opened his own workshop. As a teenager he wanted cars and what he calls the finer things in life. He refused to take a job, he said, because he did not want to sell himself short, and so he stayed broke. He says he almost starved himself and made himself obsessed with success. A self-described introvert, he recalls skipping food and drink on the rare nights out, making excuses rather than leech off friends. He remembers tears and frustration, and says he loves his failures because they are what you learn from and what you remember once you have made it.

He is wary of being asked how to replicate his path. The way he did it, he said, is not something he would expect anyone else to do; you need to be built a certain way.

The business that made him is LMCT+, short for licensed motor car trader. He concedes the name means nothing. He had built software for buying and selling cars, but dealerships would not take it up. His answer was to give away cars from a collection he had sitting idle, starting with a Nissan GT-R, hoping to create hype and publicity. It was a big gamble given how little money he had, and at first it flopped.

With a few days left in the entry period, the fix came in a dream, as he says many of his recent ideas do. He dreamed of trying to enter the giveaway himself and being told he had to become a member, and he refused. He woke at 3am and rebuilt the model: a one-time fee to try the software for a limited period, with no lock-in to membership. By 9am, he says, it was the company's best day. After 18 months he returned to a membership model. The giveaways grew from cars to motorbikes, houses and now cash.

His profile rose further through the reality show The Block. At the 2024 Phillip Island finale he bought all five houses, which he calls one of his finest moments. He says he took his team to the site before the auction to film, build a website, apply for permits and prepare the promotion. Once the episode aired, he says, new subscriptions repaid the entire investment in under 48 hours.

Portelli has since moved part of his life to Dubai, saying he likes to keep things fresh and not put all his eggs in one basket. He says he has more control over his businesses from abroad and describes having the best of both worlds. He also cites safety: in Melbourne, he said, his home has bulletproof doors, including on his bedroom, while in Dubai nobody knows him and he can sleep peacefully.

He keeps Melbourne property, including a penthouse on levels 57 and 58 of the Sapphire by the Gardens towers in the CBD, listed at $39 million. Speaking last week to Dubai-based podcaster Kris Fade, he said it was broken into during construction, with intruders climbing lift shafts and entering through a fire door. By then he had hired a crane to hoist his McLaren Senna GTR inside. He says he agreed to buy the place during a drunken lunch with the developers, promising to buy it if they could get his car in, and they deconstructed part of the building's side. He puts the total cost of the purchase and the lift at about $50 million, and credits the worldwide exposure.

Next he plans to move into importing, expand his petrol station and supermarket branches, and open an LMCT+ warehouse in Sydney. His longer-term hope is to downsize. Money and success, he said, no longer mean anything; he wants to create a legacy and, as his parents taught him, to help.