What does Elon Musk spend his millions on and how did he earn them?

The state of Elon Musk fluctuates at the level of $ 23.6 billion, but the head of Tesla refuses the minimum wage of $ 56 thousand per year. In January, Tesla announced that it would pay nothing to the Mask over the next 10 years — no salaries, no bonuses, no shares until the company reached $ 100 billion in market capitalization. If this happens, Musk could potentially overtake Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, on the list of the richest people in the world.

Musk does not spend his money on luxury holidays and expensive hobbies. Instead, the entrepreneur spends most of his free time in the office or in the factories, leaving at the end of the day at one of several of his mansions in Los Angeles.

How did Musk make his fortune and what does he spend it on?

As a child, when Musk grew up in South Africa, he learned to program. By age 12, he had sold the source code for his first video game for $ 500. Shortly before his 18th birthday, Musk moved to Canada and worked there, doing manual labor: he mined grain, chopped logs and ultimately cleaned the boiler room at a sawmill for $ 18 per hour – an impressive salary in 1989.

In Canada, he and his brother Kimball were looking for businessmen whom they would like to work for. Cold calls were taken in turn to ask if they could have lunch with them. One of these businessmen was Peter Nicholson, chief executive officer of Bank of Nova Scotia, who was fascinated by the boys’ initiative.

Meeting them, he was so impressed with Ilon that he offered him a summer internship at a bank for $ 14 per hour. To earn extra money, Musk sold and repaired a PC in a hostel. At the University of Queens in Ontario, Musk sold and repaired the computers of his classmates.

After being transferred to the University of Pennsylvania in 1992, Musk quickly found application in his entrepreneurial spirit. He and his friend moved into a 10-bedroom house for a relatively inexpensive amount. They studied for a week, but on weekends they turned this place into a nightclub.

Musk earned a bachelor’s degree in physics and economics at Wharton School and moved to Stanford to defend his doctoral dissertation. However, Ilon did not complete this process, starting to develop Zip2, a company that provided maps and catalogs to online newspapers. They invested $ 28 thousand from their father’s bank account in their company.

Zip2 was purchased by Compaq, a computer company in 1999, which was then a leading provider of PC systems. The Zip2 deal amounted to $ 307 million. Ilon’s share is $ 22 million.

Following the sale of Zip2, Ilon invested $ 12 million in the creation of the financial services company X.com. At the beginning of 2000, X.com merged with its rival Confinity and was renamed PayPal. As a majority shareholder, Musk was ousted from the post of general director amid a protracted quarrel on the board of directors. Then PayPal accepted the purchase offer from eBay in July 2002. After the $ 1.5 billion deal took place, Musk left with $ 180 million.

After leaving PayPal, Musk turned his attention to his new SpaceX space research company. A few years later, he co-founded Tesla, the manufacturer of electric vehicles, and then SolarCity, a supplier of solar power systems. In late 2008, Musk divorced his first wife, which affected his finances. A year later, Musk said that he had run out of cash and lived off friends’ loans, trying to keep his companies afloat.

But when Tesla made its debut in the stock market in 2010, fortune turned to face Mask, and by 2012 he first got on the Forbes list with a fortune of $ 2 billion. After seven years, Musk earned $ 23.6 billion, and he is not shy about them to spend.

That’s what.

Elon Musk acquired property in the prestigious Bel Air district of Los Angeles, California. He spent about $ 70.3 million on the purchase of five mansions. One of the houses is equipped with modern panels that allow the use of solar energy.

Musk is the head of an electric car manufacturer, so it’s not surprising that he has an affection for cars. In 2013, Musk bought Lotus Esprit Submarine from James Bond films at an auction for $ 920,000 and said he was going to improve the car, turning it into a full-fledged amphibian. Lotus Esprit Submarine was created on the basis of the Lotus Esprit S1 model – this car was mass-produced in Britain in 1976-1979.

The car was turned into a submarine by the engineers of the Canadian company Perry Submarines, which specialized in mini-submarines. They equipped the Lotus Esprit S1 with four electric motors, which were connected to the propellers. In addition, flaps were installed on the sides.

Musk also owns two gasoline cars: the Ford Model T and the Jaguar E-Type Series 1 Roadster.

Despite the availability of available funds, Musk almost does not spend money on luxury holidays, and indeed does not go on vacation. In 2015, Musk said that for all 12 years of SpaceX’s existence, he took a vacation of just two weeks. In August 2018, Musk told The New York Times that he worked 120 hours a week. “There were times when I didn’t leave the plant for three or four days — days when I didn’t go out,” he said. “This happened due to the time I did not spend with my children and friends.” Musk admitted to spending “many nights” at the Tesla factory in Nevada, rewriting software during the “production hell” for the release of Model 3.

Musk not only spends a lot of time at Tesla, but also spends a lot of money on the company. In the first six months of 2018, he bought back Tesla’s shares for more than $ 35 million.

Musk also founded The Boring Company in 2016 to design and build an underground tunnel in Los Angeles to reduce traffic. In December 2018, Musk made his debut with the first prototype. According to The New York Times, in 2018, The Boring Company raised more than $ 112 million – and more than 90% of them came from Musk.

The billionaire claims to like inexpensive hobbies such as listening to music, playing video games and reading books. “Hanging out with children, meeting friends, meeting normal people,” he said. “Sometimes I go crazy on Twitter. But it’s usually connected with work.”