Elon Musk Net Worth, Companies, Lifestyle, Houses, Cars, and Many More
Posted By: John Wick | September 11, 2018Elon Musk is considered to be one of the richest men in the world and one of the most influential people in the world today. He is often called the Thomas Edison of 21st century. The renowned entrepreneur has a number of high profile companies to his name and some pretty cool inventions as well. Before we look at the Elon Musk net worth, it would be worth it to take a look at his early childhood and his educational background.
Elon Musk was born and grew up in South Africa. He had a lot of interest in computer programming since his childhood. He was so sharp at programming that he was only 12 years old when he sold the code for a video game. He earned $500 from the sale of this video game. When Elon Musk turned 18, he moved to Canada for higher studies. He enrolled into the Queens University of Ontario for his undergraduate degree. He later transferred to the University of Pennsylvania and got his Bachelor of Science degree from this university. In addition to getting a degree in physics, Elon Musk also got a graduate degree in economics from the Wharton School of Business of the University of Pennsylvania.
Elon Musk started the Ph.D. program at the Stanford University in California in 1995. However, he left the program only couple of days after joining. The motive behind this move was to pursue his dream of becoming an entrepreneur and to change the world through innovation in the Internet. Elon Musk always wanted to move to the US. Since his childhood, he thought that the US was the place where great scientific discoveries and the latest innovation was happening. So in order to pursue his high ambitions, he permanently moved to the US and became a US citizen in 2002.
Elon Musk net worth started growing after he sold his first company named Zip2. Today he is one of the richest people on the planet. And because of his massive vision, foresight, and talent, people often say that Elon Musk can be the first trillionaire in the world.
Elon Musk Net Worth
Elon Musk net worth is $13.2 Billion. He is the world’s 87th richest person. Elon Musk net worth can be credited to his stake in Tesla Motors. He has also sold some high profile companies in the past. Elon Musk is much different from most of the other billionaires. He has a very broad vision and is derived from the passion of bringing a positive change in the world. He is involved in a number of high profile companies and is changing many industries simultaneously.
Companies Sold by Elon Musk
Elon Musk has sold 2 high profile companies during his entrepreneurial career
- Zip2 – Elon Musk started his first company in 1992 with his brother Kimbal Musk. The Internet was new at that time and Elon wanted to do something on the Internet. He invested $28,000 of his father’s money into the company. Elon Musk and his brother worked hard and created a “city guide” for newspaper publishers. The company became quite successful and won contracts from big newspapers like ‘The Chicago Tribune’ and ‘The New York Times’. Zeip 2 was sold in 1999 for $307. Elon Musk received $22 million. Rest of the money went to other shareholders. So the Elon Musk net worth in 1999 was $22 million.
- X.com and PayPal – After earning huge amounts of money from the sale of Zip2, Elon Musk did not sit and relax. He immediately started a new venture. This time he co-founded a company named X.com. It was an Internet-based financial service as well as an e-mail payment company. However, there was another company working on a similar product called PayPal, so Elon Musk decided to collaborate with that company. And so he merged X.com with that company, named Confinity. Later on, the company changed its name to PayPal. And we all know what PayPal has achieved and how it has changed the way we do daily transactions. In 2002, the owners of the company decided to sell it to eBay for a huge sum of $1.5 billion. Elon Musk was the biggest shareholder of PayPal and he received a huge sum of $165 million from the sale of PayPal. This took Elon Musk net worth to around $190 million in 2002.
Elon Musk Companies
Elon Musk is currently actively involved in three of his companies:
- Tesla Motors – Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla Motors and he owns about 25% of the shares in the company. In addition, Elon Musk is also the product architect of Tesla. The aim of the company is to bring the electric cars to the mainstream. And in order to achieve this aim, Elon Musk has told about the three-tier strategy of Tesla. According to this strategy, the company was the first to build sports cars with the high price that the celebrities and other influential people could buy. This was the Tesla Roadster. The second tier of the strategy was to make a medium priced sedan with medium levels of production. This was the Tesla Model S. And the final tier of the strategy was to bring a low priced, high production car to the market. This will be the Tesla Model 3. The share price of Tesla Motors has a direct impact on Elon Musk net worth. And as the company is doing pretty well in terms of sales and the future prospects look bright, we can expect Elon Musk net worth to increase further in coming years.
- Space X – Elon Musk founded SpaceX a space technology company in 2002. He invested most of his earnings from the sale of PayPal in SpaceX. The aim of the company was to make space travel easy and affordable. The company has been able to bring down the costs of rockets and is working on making reusable rockets. SpaceX has also been able to win some pretty big contracts from NASA. Elon Musk is currently the CEO and the CTO of SpaceX.
- SolarCity – Elon Musk is the chairman of SolarCity. The company was founded in 2006 by his cousins Peter Rive and Lyndon Rive. The initial concept of the company was given by Elon Musk and he also provided the financial capital for the company. Elon Musk is the biggest shareholder in SolarCity. The company is doing pretty well and is the second biggest solar power systems provider in the United States.
Elon Musk Investments
Other than being a major investor in Tesla Motors, Solar City, and Space X, Elon Musk has also invested in a number of other companies. Here is the list of companies Elon Musk has invested in:
- NeuroVigil – Elon Musk invested an undisclosed amount of money in this company in May 2015.
- Vicarious – He invested $40 million in Vicarious in May 2014.
- Halcyon Molecular Inc. – Elon Musk made an investment in this DNA sequencing company. However, the company did not succeed and it was closed in 2012.
- DeepMind Technologies – Elon Musk made an investment in the Artificial Intelligence company DeepMind Technologies. The company was sold to Google in the year 2014.
- Stripe – Elon Musk invested $2 million in this startup in March 2011.
- OneRiot – According to reports Elon Musk made an investment of $15 million in the company in June 2007.
- Mahalo – Elon Musk invested $16 million in Mahalo in January 2007.
- Surrey Satellite Technology – Elon Musk bought a 10% stake in this satellite company in the year 2005.
- Game Trust – Elon Musk invested $9 million in Game Trust in the year 2005.
- Everdream – Elon Musk made an investment of $12 million in Everdream Corporation, an IT company.
In addition, to investing in these companies, Elon Musk net worth has allowed the billionaire to invest in a number of non-profit, scientific, and charity organizations as well.
Elon Musk Lifestyle
Elon Musk is a very hard working individual. He spends most of his time working on Tesla Motors and Space X. He currently resides in Los Angeles, California with his 5 sons and wife. Being one of the most visionary businessmen and one of the richest people in the world, he is often invited to various conferences and seminars for keynote speeches. He also spends time on his other ventures like Solar City. Despite being busy with many companies, different events, and family, he still finds enough time to constantly think about and deliver incredible futuristic ideas like Hyperloop.
Elon Musk Houses
Elon Musk owns 5 different home in the high profile Bel Air area of Los Angeles. According to reports, the billionaire has bought these properties for a huge sum of $70.3 million.
According to reports, he was residing in a $17 million mansion in Bel Air. The total area of the mansion is 20,248 sq. feet. The house has 7 bedrooms. It also has a huge screening room, a tennis court, and a pretty cool swimming pool.
Elon Musk Cars
Being the CEO of Tesla Motors, you would expect Elon Musk to have few Teslas for himself. The billionaire is surely a huge fan of Tesla cars and is massively biased towards electric cars. However, before he brought Tesla Roadster, Tesla Model S, or the Tesla Model 3 to the market, he had to drive cars made by other companies. One of the top reasons for the success of Tesla Motors is Elon Musk’s love for cars. Here are the different cars that he has owned at some point in his life.
BMW 320i – Elon Musk’s first car was an old BMW 320i of 1978 model. He bought the car in 1994 for $1,400.
1967 E-Type Jaguar – One of the first cars that Elon Musk bought was a 1967 E-Type Jaguar. He bought this car from the first bonus that he received for his first company Zip2.
McLaren F1 – Elon Musk bought McLaren F1 after selling PayPal. Elon Musk tells that he had the car for several years and he drove about 11,000 miles on it. He used to drive the car regularly. However, the car was wrecked in 2000 because of an accident. Elon Musk was driving with Peter Thiel on the Sand Hill Road in the Menlo Park area of California. Elon Musk tried to show Peter Theil hat the car was capable of and hit an embankment. The car was launched into the air and it hit the ground pretty hard. The wheels of the vehicle were completely shredded and there was heavy body damage to the car. The car was not insured. Surely, Elon Musk net worth would have allowed him to buy a new one if he wanted to.
Lotus Esprit from a James Bond film – In 2013, Elon Musk bought the Lotus Esprit from the James Bond movie, ‘The Spy Who Loved Me”. According to reports, Elon Musk bought the car in a London auction for a huge sum of $997,000.
Audi Q7 – He had an Audi Q7 as well. This mid-sized SUV inspired Elon Musk to include the falcon wing doors in the Tesla Model S.
Porsche 911 – According to some reports, Elon Musk also had a Porsche 911. The car was spotted in his house during 2012.
BMW M5 – In 2007, Elon Musk owned a pretty cool Hamann BMW M5.
Elon Musk net worth is surely quite impressive. But even more impressive are his ideas and vision. Many people believe that the current status of Elon Musk wealth is just a sign of things to come. And if he continues to amaze the world with such brilliance, he can become the richest man on earth.