What does Elon Musk do with all his cash?

Tesla boss Elon Musk has been one of many world’s richest individuals for a number of years now, and that wealth just lately went stratospheric when he grew to become the primary half-trillionaire.

Regardless of this, Musk has insisted he leads a largely unglamorous way of life. He mentioned in 2021 that he lived in a Texas residence valued at $50,000 (£38,000).

His former associate Grimes, with whom he has two youngsters, advised Vainness Honest in 2022 that he doesn’t stay the extravagant lifetime of extra luxurious many assume.

“Bro doesn’t stay like a billionaire. Bro lives at occasions beneath the poverty line,” she advised the journal. As soon as, she mentioned, he refused to purchase a brand new mattress, regardless of her facet having a gap in it.

Whereas his day-to-day dwelling quarters will not be as lavish as one would possibly count on, he’s recognized to have a love of distinctive automobiles, together with one that may morph right into a submarine. He additionally has a non-public jet assortment, price many tens of millions of {dollars}.

After which there was that small splurge again in 2022, when he purchased Twitter for an informal $44bn.

Musk as soon as had a formidable real-estate portfolio. The Wall Road Journal reported in 2019 that he had spent $100m on seven homes in about seven years – most of them a stone’s throw from one another within the prestigious neighbourhood of Bel-Air, California.

Collectively, the properties boasted swimming swimming pools, a tennis court docket, wine cellar, non-public library and a ballroom. One was a ranch home as soon as owned by legendary Willy Wonka actor Gene Wilder.

However in 2020, Musk had a change of coronary heart – tweeting that he could be “promoting nearly all bodily possessions” and “will personal no home”.

“Do not want the money. Devoting myself to Mars and Earth. Possession [sic] simply weigh you down,” he wrote.

There was one stipulation – that Gene Wilder’s home, “can’t be torn down or lose any [of] its soul”.

He did certainly promote the three-bedroom property – to Wilder’s nephew, Jordan Walker-Pearlman, after giving him a multi-million greenback mortgage to purchase it. However in June 2025, Musk reclaimed possession, after Mr Walker-Pearlman reportedly fell behind on the repayments.

In 2021, Musk tweeted that his “major residence” was a modest prefabricated home that price him about $50,000 on the southern tip of Texas, the place his aerospace firm SpaceX operates – an space that has formally change into a metropolis known as Starbase.

“It is kinda superior,” Musk mentioned concerning the humble dwelling.

The next yr, Musk mentioned he didn’t personal a house in any respect, utilizing it for example of how low his consumption is, regardless of his monumental wealth.

“I am actually staying at pals’ locations,” he advised head of media organisation TED, Chris Anderson. “If I journey to the Bay Space, which is the place most of Tesla engineering is, I mainly rotate by way of pals’ spare bedrooms.”

That is nothing new – in 2015, then-Google CEO Larry Web page advised creator Ashlee Vance that Musk was “sort of homeless”.

“He’ll e-mail and say, ‘I do not know the place to remain tonight. Can I come over?'”

There was numerous hypothesis over time that Musk is shopping for up properties across the US, nevertheless the house in Texas seems to be the one official home he personally owns.

Whereas Musk doesn’t spend huge on property, automobiles are a special matter.

Because the proprietor of Tesla, it is not stunning that he has a big assortment of bizarre, and in some circumstances extraordinary, automobiles.

They’ve included a Ford Mannequin T, the twentieth Century automotive credited with being the primary inexpensive automobile, revolutionising the motor business.

Others have been a 1967 Jaguar E-Kind Roadster, which Musk is alleged to have coveted since he was a baby; a 1997 McLaren F1, which he crashed and spent some huge cash repairing earlier than promoting; and a Tesla Roadster, which was the primary Tesla mannequin to go on sale and was famously fired into house by Musk in 2018.

Essentially the most uncommon, nevertheless, is the 1976 Lotus Esprit pushed by James Bond within the 1977 movie The Spy Who Beloved Me.

Within the movie, the automotive, nicknamed Moist Nellie, may rework right into a submarine. Musk purchased the automotive in an public sale in 2013 for nearly $1m with the intention of creating its submarine transformation capabilities a actuality as soon as extra.

Musk has admitted that planes are one other factor he’s blissful to splurge on, however insists it’s to do together with his dedication to his work.

“If I do not use the aircraft, then I’ve much less hours to work,” he mentioned within the 2022 TED interview.

Among the many non-public jets in his assortment are quite a few Gulfstream fashions, which price tens of tens of millions of {dollars} every.

He makes use of them to journey between SpaceX and Tesla websites within the US, in addition to for worldwide journey.

Musk has donated billions of {dollars} in shares to charities, in keeping with US regulatory paperwork, and has pledged many tens of millions to varied causes. However his philanthropy has been criticised.

The New York Instances final yr known as it “haphazard and largely self-serving – making him eligible for huge tax breaks and serving to his companies”.

His charitable organisation, the Musk Basis, says on its web site that it’s “devoted to advancing humanity’s progress by way of ground-breaking scientific analysis, technological innovation, and impressive endeavours that push the boundaries of what’s attainable”.

However the New York Instances reported that the muse fell in need of the quantity it was required to present away for 3 years in a row. The paper, which noticed the muse’s tax filings, additionally discovered that a lot of its donations went to organisations with hyperlinks to Musk.

Elon Musk, and the Musk Basis have been contacted for remark.

When requested about philanthropy and charitable causes previously, Musk seemed to be sceptical of conventional charitable presents.

“I believe if you happen to care concerning the actuality of goodness as an alternative of the notion of it, philanthropy is extraordinarily troublesome,” he advised Chris Anderson in 2022.

To Musk, the very existence of his enterprise ventures is philanthropic: “In the event you say philanthropy is love of humanity, they’re philanthropy,” he insisted.

Tesla is “accelerating sustainable power”, he mentioned, whereas SpaceX “is attempting to make sure the long-term survival of humanity” and Neuralink “is attempting to assist clear up mind accidents and existential threat with AI”.