Elon Musk's Acquisition Made Me $50M, But Fatherhood Redefined My Life

Moneywise

Hampton

Business, Entrepreneurship, Investing

4.8 • 674 Ratings

🗓️ 4 February 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What if the key to success wasn’t grinding harder—but learning to let go? Chris Bakke made 10s of millions selling two companies, including one to Elon Musk’s Twitter. But after years of chasing big wins, something changed: he had kids. And suddenly, the drive that once defined him wasn’t as important as being present for his family. Chris started as a scrappy startup founder, building and selling multiple companies for over $50 million each. He worked directly with Elon, made bold investments, and built a net worth of $25 million (or 50 depending on how you value Twitter stock). But fatherhood led him to reevaluate everything—including his ambition in the tech world. In this episode, Chris opens up about how becoming a dad reshaped his perspective on work, money, and happiness. We dive into: Why having kids made him rethink the endless pursuit of success. How he balances financial security with personal fulfillment. The trade-offs of working with Elon Musk—and why he ultimately walked away. Why he believes the multiple cashflowing agencies he runs make him better off than a highly valued illiquid tech company anyway. This is Moneywise, a podcast where host Sam Parr is joined by high-net-worth guests to explore exclusive insights into personal finance and lifestyle tailored for other high-net-worth people, or those on their way. They'll get radically transparent about the numbers, revealing things like their burn rates, portfolios, and spending habits. Who is Sam Parr? Sam is a serial entrepreneur and the co-founder of The Hustle, which he sold to HubSpot in 2021. He's also the co-host of one of the world's top podcasts for entrepreneurs, My First Million. Known for his insightful business acumen and candid communication style, Sam Parr continues to be a prominent figure in the world of media and entrepreneurship. Sam's newest and biggest venture yet is Hampton, which he co-founded in 2022. Check out Sam’s Companies: Hampton Sam’s List This podcast was made for the Hampton community, a private, highly-vetted, peer membership community for founders and CEOs of fast-growing, tech-enabled startups. Chapters: Chris Bakke's Financial Breakdown (02:18) Early Career and First Startup (08:16) The Success of Lasky and Acquisition by Elon Musk (13:43) Working with Elon Musk (18:16) Family Life and Career Transition (20:24) Balancing Family and High-Stakes Career (20:52) Shifting Focus to Smaller Projects (22:29) The Trade-Offs of Ambition (23:34) Finding Joy in Simple Ventures (26:26) Parenthood and Professional Ambition (27:54) Lessons from Working with Elon (29:58) The Impact of Wealth and Parenthood (36:49) This podcast was produced in partnership with Lower Street and distributed by Morning Brew.

Transcript

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0:00.0	So I just packed all my shit, moved up to San Francisco in 2010,
0:09.0	and then got a job in sales at a startup, and then kind of kicked off from there.
0:13.0	Chris Bakke wanted to be the center of the tech world.
0:16.0	And he actually almost made it there.
0:18.0	Like a month after Elon bought Twitter,
0:26.6	Elon bought Lasky and then merged it into Twitter and then like formed X.
0:30.5	Chris worked his way up to a net worth of around $25 million.
0:33.0	Though if you count the value of his Twitter stock,
0:34.1	it's closer to $50 million.
0:37.3	The reason, he's got three kids under three.
0:38.3	And by the way, those kids, they're not twins. So that's one after the other. So we have a two-month-old,
0:43.6	one-and-a-half-year-old, and a three-year-old. And so Chris's life, he's shifted it to
0:48.6	optimizing for being a dad. And his drive for business success is not what it used to be. And that sounds like I'm insulting
0:55.0	Chris. I'm not at all. I compliment him a ton and I think he's an amazing person. But what I mean
1:00.1	is after I had kids, frankly, I became less driven and I think Chris did as well. The good news is
1:07.7	that Chris admits this and he acknowledges this and he's genuinely happy and content with his life.
1:13.0	And I'm envious of that.
1:14.3	And I wanted to sit down and figure out how he thinks about that.
1:17.8	Because frankly, a lot of people who have children,
1:20.7	their ambitions change and I think that's scary.
1:24.1	And also in this episode, you see, Chris actually worked directly
1:27.3	with Elon Musk when he was
	...

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