He Started Freelancing at 12, Lost $4,500 on His App, and Now Runs 8 iPhones for Marketing

Imagine spending an entire year building an app.

You hire a developer, invest in beautiful animations, make sure everything works properly and spend thousands of dollars trying to get it into people's hands.

You believe in the idea because it solves a problem you've personally struggled with.

Then you look at the numbers.

Total spent: $5,000.

Total earned: $500.

That's roughly $4,500 gone.

Now imagine experiencing all of this before turning 19.

Meet Fanti, an 18 year old developer and indie hacker from Italy who has been experimenting with making money online since he was just 12 or 13.

When I invited him to The Underdog Show, I expected to hear about a young developer building applications.

Instead, we ended up discussing failed startups, freelancing, burnout, AI, social media marketing and why he believes distribution matters more than the product itself.

And one thing became clear.

Fanti isn't waiting until he finishes school to start building his future.

He's already doing it.

How a 12 Year Old Started Freelancing Without a Portfolio

Most of us remember being 12 and spending our afternoons playing games or watching YouTube.

Fanti was watching YouTube too.

But he was interested in something different.

He wanted to understand how people built things with computers.

His curiosity started with programming, robotics using Arduino and small Python projects.

Eventually, he came across videos of people earning money by building websites.

That gave him an idea.

If other people could make money from programming, why couldn't he?

So he started looking for clients.

He didn't have years of professional experience.

He didn't have an impressive portfolio.

And he certainly wasn't running an established agency.

Instead, he went where people were already looking for help.

Discord communities.

Reddit.

Online forums.

He contacted people who needed websites and offered to create free demos so they could see what he was capable of building.

Some of those conversations turned into paying clients.

He eventually built websites for businesses such as restaurants and hair salons.

Later, he experimented with platforms like Fiverr, Freelancer and Upwork.

His early projects didn't make him rich.

But they taught him something important.

You don't always need a perfect portfolio to get started. Sometimes showing people what you can build is enough to open a door.

Over time, he experimented with video editing, web design, game development and other opportunities.

Not everything worked.

And eventually, he realized that trying to do everything at once was slowing him down.

Why He Stopped Trying to Do Everything

When I asked Fanti how he manages so many different projects at such a young age, he corrected an assumption I had made.

He wasn't doing everything simultaneously.

Those were different stages of his journey.

He had tried many things, but most hadn't generated enough income to continue.

Now he tries to focus on only two or three activities at a time.

His reasoning was simple.

Multitasking was destroying his focus and reducing his output.

Instead of jumping between every interesting opportunity, he started choosing where to spend his energy.

Today, most of that attention goes toward building and marketing applications.

But his first major app taught him an expensive lesson.

The $5,000 App That Made Only $500

One of Fanti's first major applications was called Momentum Focus Coach.

It was a productivity app designed to help people overcome procrastination.

The idea came from his own life.

He struggled with procrastination and wanted a system that could help him stay productive.

So he started building one.

The app included task management features, AI guidance, productivity techniques, coaches and animated characters.

He wanted the experience to feel polished.

And he wanted the technology behind it to be reliable and scalable.

So he invested.

He hired a developer to help with the technical side.

He spent money creating more than 100 animations.

He also invested in hardware and marketing experiments to promote the application.

By the time everything was added together, he had spent approximately $5,000.

But the revenue didn't follow.

The app generated around $500.

That left him with an approximate loss of $4,500 before any potential proceeds from selling the app.

When I asked whether he regretted it, his answer surprised me.

He admitted that it was a mistake.

But he also said that if he could go back, he would probably do it again.

Not because losing money was enjoyable.

But because the experience changed how he thinks about building businesses.

He learned that spending more money doesn't guarantee a better outcome.

And that a beautiful, technically impressive product isn't necessarily a product people want to buy.

His advice to other developers was to start smaller.

Build something inexpensive.

Test whether people actually want it.

And only then reinvest money into improving and growing it.

The expensive part of his first startup wasn't just the money he lost. It was discovering how much he still needed to learn about finding customers.

The Biggest Lesson: Marketing and Distribution

During our conversation, I asked Fanti about the most important lesson he had learned from his failures.

His answer was immediate.

"Marketing and distribution is the product."

He believes developers spend too much time focusing on technical details while ignoring the most important question.

How will people discover what you've built?

He argued that good marketing can sometimes make a weak product successful, while a strong product can struggle if nobody knows it exists.

I wouldn't take that to mean product quality doesn't matter.

A product still needs to deliver value if you want people to keep using it.

But I understood the point he was making.

As developers, we often enjoy the building process so much that we delay the uncomfortable part.

Talking to potential customers.

Making content.

Testing different messages.

Asking people to pay.

Learning what the market actually wants.

And by the time we realize distribution is a problem, we've already spent months building.

Fanti learned that lesson through his own failed app.

So he decided to approach his next projects differently.

And that's where his unusual marketing setup comes into the picture.

Why an 18 Year Old Bought Eight iPhones

One of the most surprising parts of our conversation was when Fanti started explaining how he markets mobile applications.

He told me he operates eight iPhones for social media marketing.

Not because he likes collecting phones.

But because he's experimenting with reaching audiences across different countries and platforms.

His setup supports content publishing for apps and businesses on platforms such as TikTok, Instagram and Facebook.

He uses scripts and automation to produce different kinds of content, including short videos and slideshows.

He also uses multiple accounts and devices to distribute that content.

According to Fanti, he currently works with four clients and has seen videos regularly reach around 100,000 views.

He also claims that a large proportion of the people reached are within his intended target audience.

Those are his reported results, not independently verified performance figures.

But the most unexpected detail wasn't the number of phones.

It was who helps him operate them.

His girlfriend.

Fanti told me he pays his girlfriend by the hour to help with the manual activity required across the devices.

She handles several phones at a time while he focuses on creating and organizing the content.

He described it as a way to increase his marketing output without personally managing every repetitive task.

The approach also raises questions about platform rules and artificial engagement. Fanti acknowledged that parts of the setup could be considered unethical, and he discussed attempts to avoid platform detection.

It's not a strategy I'd recommend copying without considering those risks.

But the broader lesson from this conversation was interesting.

Fanti no longer sees distribution as something to figure out after finishing a product.

He thinks about how to reach users from the beginning.

And that change in thinking has shaped the way he approaches his next startup.

His Next App Is Already Live, but He Won't Reveal Its Name

Fanti is currently working with a cofounder on another mobile application.

The app is already available on the App Store.

But during our interview, he chose not to reveal its name.

Why?

Because he and his cofounder decided to build in private.

That's an interesting choice in the indie hacker community, where building in public has become a popular growth strategy.

Many founders share revenue numbers, product updates, launch plans and development progress on X.

But Fanti sees risks in revealing too much too early.

He mentioned examples of developers dealing with copycat applications and other problems after publicly sharing their products.

So for this project, he's taking a different approach.

He's focusing on marketing the application while keeping its identity private during this stage.

At the time of our conversation, the new app hadn't started generating revenue.

He's still working toward that first meaningful result.

And he's doing all of this while attending school.

School, Startups, and the Pressure to Succeed

Fanti spends around 35 hours a week at school.

After school, he comes home and opens his computer.

He works until dinner.

Then he often returns to work again.

Sometimes he stays up until he finishes whatever he's working on.

He told me that he's reduced the time he spends at the gym because he's prioritizing his businesses.

And when I asked why he was pushing himself so hard, the conversation became more personal.

He talked about wanting to earn enough money to support his family.

He wants to buy things for his mother.

He thinks about his father returning home tired from work.

And he wants to be in a position where money isn't constantly a limitation.

That ambition is a major part of what drives him.

But there is another side to this lifestyle.

One that doesn't look nearly as exciting as the startup posts we see online.

The Burnout Nobody Talks About

Fanti admitted that burnout has been one of his biggest challenges.

Spending eight to twelve hours in front of a computer, putting money into projects and getting little in return can become exhausting.

He has experienced burnout several times.

When it happens, he sometimes spends about a week doing very little before returning to work.

Then the cycle repeats.

A few months of intense effort.

Exhaustion.

A break.

And another attempt.

He was clear that this isn't an approach he recommends to others.

During the conversation, I shared my own experience with burnout.

I've also had periods where I worked extremely long hours and struggled to disconnect from my laptop.

One thing I've been trying is keeping Sundays more open for family, rest and activities outside work.

Because working harder isn't always the same as making progress.

And sacrificing your health isn't a requirement for becoming a successful founder.

Fanti is still figuring out how to balance his ambition with everything else in his life.

That's an important part of his story.

He's young, ambitious and determined.

But he's also dealing with the same uncertainty, exhaustion and disappointment that many older founders experience.

What He Thinks About AI Replacing Developers

We also discussed how AI is changing programming, freelancing and the startup world.

Fanti uses AI extensively.

He uses it in his applications, his automation workflows and his daily development process.

He believes it has significantly improved his productivity.

But he also has concerns.

He feels AI has made people less curious about understanding how things work.

He worries about its impact on creativity and employment.

And he believes the growing accessibility of AI tools has made certain kinds of freelance development more difficult.

These are his observations from his own experience, rather than proof that AI is responsible for every change in the freelance market.

What stood out to me was that he wasn't rejecting AI.

He was using it while questioning its wider impact.

And when we returned to the subject of marketing, he made another interesting point.

AI can help automate parts of content creation.

But deciding what people actually want to watch, testing ideas and understanding feedback still require human judgment.

That's why he's spending more time learning distribution instead of simply building more features.

What I Learned From Talking to Fanti

Before this conversation, I knew Fanti was a young developer who had built several projects.

But I didn't know how much he had already experimented with.

He started freelancing at 12 or 13.

He built websites for clients.

He tried different online businesses.

He spent thousands of dollars on a productivity app that struggled to generate revenue.

He learned that marketing was much harder than he expected.

He experimented with an unusual social media distribution system.

And now he's building another application while still attending school.

Not everything he has tried has worked.

And not every strategy he uses is something other founders should copy.

But what I found valuable was his willingness to talk openly about mistakes.

He didn't pretend his first app was a huge success.

He didn't hide the money he lost.

And he didn't claim to have figured everything out.

At 18, he's still experimenting.

Still learning.

Still making mistakes.

And still trying to build something that works.

You can be ambitious without being successful yet. You can lose money on a project and still gain valuable experience. And you can be good at building things while having a lot left to learn about business.

That's what makes Fanti's journey worth sharing.

His story isn't about someone who has already made it.

It's about someone who is still trying.

And that's exactly why I started The Underdog Show.

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Watch the Full Conversation With Fanti on The Underdog Show

There are some moments in this conversation that are better experienced by hearing Fanti explain them himself.

How did he find freelance clients when he was only 12?

Why did he spend $5,000 on his first major app?

What made him realize that marketing mattered more than another feature?

How does he balance school, startups and working with clients across different countries?

And what does he want to achieve next?

We discussed all of that, along with his thoughts on AI, burnout, cofounders and the lessons he's learned from failure.

Watch the full episode on YouTube:

Watch the full conversation with Fanti

If you're a student learning to code, an indie hacker building your first SaaS, or a founder struggling to find customers, I think you'll find something useful in this conversation.

And if you enjoy hearing real stories from people who are still building their way forward, subscribe to The Underdog Show with mscode07.

Real people. Bigger stories.