Wealth Quotes

"The secret to wealth is simple: Find a way to do more for others than anyone else does."

"Wealth consists not in having great possessions, but in having few wants."

"A fit body, a calm mind, a house full of love. These things cannot be bought — they must be earned."

"Work like hell. I mean you just have to put in 80 to 100 hour weeks every week. This improves the odds of success."

"I would rather be optimistic and wrong than pessimistic and right."

"Being an entrepreneur is like eating glass and staring into the abyss of death."

"I don't spend my time pontificating about high-concept things; I spend my time solving engineering and manufacturing problems."

"It's okay to have your eggs in one basket as long as you control what happens to that basket."

"I think it’s very important to have a feedback loop, where you’re constantly thinking about what you’ve done and how you could be doing it better."

"I think it is possible for ordinary people to choose to be extraordinary."

"If something is important enough, you should try; even if the probable outcome is failure."

"You have to be very rigorous about self-analysis. You want to be extra rigorous about making the best possible product."

"My proceeds from the PayPal acquisition were $180 million. I put $100 million in SpaceX, $70m in Tesla, and $10m in Solar City. I had to borrow money for rent."

"I think it's important to be able to fail. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough."

"If you are trying to create a company, it’s like baking a cake. You have to have all the ingredients in the right proportion."

"The point of a company is to organize people to create a product or service. It's not a thing in itself."

"Money is just a tool. It's not the end goal."

"Wealth is just a database entry for the allocation of resources."

"If you make a product that people love, the money will follow."

"If you're co-founder or CEO, you have to do all the tasks you might not want to do... If you don't do your chores, the company won't succeed."

"The reason I am selling my possessions is to fund a city on Mars."

"I don't really care about wealth. I care about the future of humanity."

"Capital is just a way of moving resources around. If you're on a desert island, a billion dollars is worth nothing."

"Profit is not the goal, it's the result of doing things right."

"Money is a low-bandwidth way of communicating between people."

"I'm selling almost all physical possessions. Will own no house."

"The most important thing is to make sure that the company is moving in the right direction."

"I don't think it's a good idea to have a lot of money sitting in a bank account. It should be deployed into things that are productive."

"Possessions just weigh you down. And they're kind of an attack vector. People say, 'Hey, billionaire, you got all this stuff.' Well, now I don't have the stuff—now what are you going to do?"

"I think the best way to attract capital is to show that you don't need it."

"I'm not interested in money. I'm interested in the future."

"I don't think people should be rewarded for doing things that are bad for the world."

"I don't like to talk about my wealth. I like to talk about my work."