Elon Musk – the richest man on the planet – claims he doesn’t actually own a house and spends most of his time skipping between the various spare rooms of friends.
Musk, who has an estimated wealth of $264.6 billion (£203.2 billion), seemingly relies on the generosity of his mates for somewhere to kip while he’s working.
In a video interview with Chris Anderson, who is the head of the conference company TED, Musk said: "I don't even own a place right now, I'm literally staying at friends' places.
"If I travel to the Bay Area, which is where most of Tesla's engineering is, I basically rotate through friends' spare bedrooms,"
Advert
Well, it’s certainly true that people don’t become super rich by being frivolous with the money that they have.
Elon isn’t exactly short of a couple of quid though.
To be fair, he could probably buy a flat every night and repeat the process every day with the amount of cash he’s hoarding.
Musk was being pressed by Anderson about the attitude some members of the public have towards billionaires, with specific reference to how much tax some of the world’s wealthiest people pay, and the fact that some people have more money than they need and others have absolutely nothing.
Musk said: "For sure, it would be very problematic if I was spending billions of dollars a year in personal consumption, but that is not the case.”
The Tesla founder went on to say that he doesn’t own a private yacht or go on fancy holidays, though he does own a private jet – as you might already know.
"It's not as though my personal consumption is high,” he said.
“I mean, the one exception is the plane, but if I don't use the plane then I have less hours to work."
That being said, Musk did accept that his own personal fortune is ‘bonkers’.
While this seems to be the first comments he’s made about not owning a house, Musk’s spendthrift ways have been discussed before.
In May 2020 he said he would ‘own no house’ and sell all of his possessions.
Then, it was reported that he lived in a pre-fabricated house owned by SpaceX that cost just $50,000 (£38,383).
His ex Grimes also said he would sometimes live ‘below the poverty line’.
Google co-founder Larry Page has also opened up about Musk’s sofa-surfing.
He claims Musk once emailed him, writing: "I don't know where to stay tonight. Can I come over?"
Tom Wood