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- [00:00]
Host
This is for the folks out there who have a business that does at least $3 million a year in revenue. Because around this point, that's when you're able to look up after being heads down for years building your company, and you realize two things. One, you've done something great, but you're still a long way from your final destination. And two, you look around and you realize, I am all alone. I've outrun my peers. Which means you're now making $10 million decisions alone, by yourself. And that is when mediocrity can creep in. My company, Hampton, we solved this problem by giving you a room of vetted peers of other entrepreneurs who are going to hold you accountable, call you out on your nonsense, and help show you the way. Because the fact is, is that there's only a tiny number of people in your town who know what you're going through and who have been there. And they're hard to find. And if you can find them, it's hard to have this explicit time, this explicit place where you sit down where the rules are clear that we are here to help each other and to be one another's board of directors. The biggest risk is not failing. You have a company and it's working. You're gonna be fine. But the biggest risk is waking up 10 years from now and saying, shit, I barely grew in business and in life. And for people like you who are ambitious, wasted potential and regret is what we want to help you to avoid. We have made so many of these groups and we have a thousand plus members. And I know this stuff actually works, whether you work with Hampton or you get your own group on your own. But having a group like this, a group of people who you meet with in real life once a month, and it can change your life. It changed mine. And I know it will change yours. So check it out. Join Hampton.com he grew up in Mitchell,
- [01:32]
Interviewer
South Dakota, collecting aluminum cans from baseball games to make extra money. His mom was a school librarian and his dad was a cop. He worked at McDonald's in college because it was the only place that called him back. But today, Matt Paulson runs Market Be, a company doing $50 million in top line revenue at insane margins. He takes home $25 million a year, owns 2,000 apartment units, nine Starbucks locations, a private jet with his logo on it, and has invested in over 100 startups. And he's never raised a dollar of outside money. He's never sold, and he has no plans to. This is Matt Paulson on money Wise. Welcome to Money Wise. Matt, thanks so much for joining us today. How you doing?
- [02:17]
Matt Paulson
Doing good. Happy to be here. Love the Money Wise podcast. I was honored to be be a guest on it.
- [02:21]
Interviewer
Awesome. Thank you. Well, we're excited to learn a bit about what kind of qualifies you to be on Money Wise. And, you know, I think where we'll start is, is the way you grew up, what you did when you were, when you were, you know, a kid, and then kind of how you thought about money, what your parents, you know, did in the household to really create the philosophy around money and how you adopted that into your later life.
- [02:41]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, I grew up in a small town, Mitchell, South Dakota, about 15,000 people. Didn't have a whole lot of money growing up. My mom was a school librarian, my dad was a police officer. So solidly lower middle class, got an allowance. It wasn't very much. So when I wanted money, I'd have to kind of like wait for birthday money or figure out how to go get it. One of the things that I did was there a big park next to our house. I'd go, like after the baseball games, I'd go collect all of the old moon cans and recycle them. That was, that was my stick when I was probably fourth, fifth grade. That worked pretty well for a while. So, like, there's that, like, you know, I never had a lot of money. But we also like, not starving either. In middle school, you know, we got a computer at home when people, people didn't really have computers and we had fast Internet when people didn't really have fast Internet. So, like I made a, a website about like SimCity 2000 and other games that Maxis, the publisher was making at the time and had like ads for free website hosting on my website. And I'd make like 25 or 50amonth. And this was in middle school, late 90s. So I was making money on the Internet before. You know, a lot of people listening to this were born. So I guess I'm the old guy in the room now. But just kind of had some entrepreneurial inklings. Like I was, you know, one of many people that sold cand other kids at school. You know, if there was a hustle and say I did all of them, but like, I was always looking for something to do that would be a good, good way to make money.
- [03:59]
Interviewer
What was it about making money that drove you to keep doing stuff like that?
- [04:03]
Matt Paulson
I mean, I just wanted more of it and wanted to spend it and like, didn't have it So I had, you know, you had to figure out how to get it, you know, And a lot of what I spent money on was just dumb crap. Like, I would go to the gas station and buy popping candy all the time. And, like, that's where most of my money went.
- [04:16]
Interviewer
And walk me through kind of the experience from all the random, you know, lunch money type of sales that you were doing through the McDonald's experience. I know you worked at McDonald's through college, right?
- [04:26]
Matt Paulson
Yeah.
- [04:27]
Interviewer
When did your mindset shift from, you know, onesie twosie to, you know, I want to make millions of dollars?
- [04:33]
Matt Paulson
Yeah. So I worked at Burger King High School and I worked at a gas station. And, like, those are fine, like, high school jobs, because that's what high school jobs are. Got to college and just get another one of these jobs. And, you know, I applied at the grocery store and a gas station and McDonald's, in case I. Like, nobody else offered me a job. And McDonald's was the only place that called me back. So I took the job to pay tuition. And frankly, that job was not a lot of fun. And it's not like working fast food is terrible, but, like, just the people were not awesome and the managers were not awesome and thought, okay, I don't want to do this anymore. I've got to figure something else out. Couldn't get a job at the college because I didn't qualify for a work study. My parents made just too much money. So I thought, okay, I need to make money, but not from a job in Madison and not from the university. Then I thought, okay, I'm going to figure out how to make money on the Internet.
- [05:19]
Interviewer
Okay. And you were early. I mean, making money on the Internet was not a novel concept at that time. So tell me, kind of what went through your mind of how to actually start making money on the Internet?
- [05:28]
Matt Paulson
Yeah. So this was like, 2006 Web 1.0 era had come and gone, and we were now solidly in, like, the Web 2.0 blogging era. And I thought, okay, I was writing for the college newspaper. They pay you, like, $200 a semester to do that. And I thought, well, if the university will pay me to write, maybe somebody else will. And then that led me down kind of a freelance writing kind of career. And then from there, like, I thought, like, okay, if people are paying me to write for other websites, maybe I should, like, also make my own. So I made, like, a personal finance blog and started writing about personal finance and, you know, collecting tens of dollars from Google AdSense every month. But it was, it was a start.
- [06:04]
Interviewer
Yeah. And, you know, we'll, we'll get more to the real numbers on MarketBeat here in a minute. But you didn't raise money, right? Why did you bootstrap? What was your thinking behind bootstrapping? And what started as like an Internet blog turned into something of a behemoth. I mean, why accept no outside money? What was your thinking behind that?
- [06:23]
Matt Paulson
Well, I think you have to understand the time and location that the business was started in. I was in a college town of 7,000 people in rural South Dakota. There were no VCs walking around offering money to people. That wasn't a thing. Wasn't one of my choices. Like, nobody was offering me money to invest in, in Market Beat at the time. Like, that just wasn't a choice available. Like, I didn't even know the sba, like, existed. Like, you just don't know anything when you're, you're starting off. And like, I think if I had went to any of the VCs and like Sioux Falls or Minneapolis or Omaha, they probably would have laughed me out of the room, but it just really wasn't an option.
- [06:57]
Interviewer
And you went full time in 2012, right? What did your. Did your finances look like when you decided to go all in?
- [07:04]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, so in 2012, I made about, I think 280,000 or something like that from MarketBeat. So 2007 was first full year. I made like seven 17,000 bucks. By 2010, it was six figures. In 2012, it was like 280. So at the time I had my day job doing web design that paid like 60 grand a year. And it was not that hard. So I just kind of kept doing it. Had my business that was making good money. I was finishing up my graduate degree. And then I had a kid who was born. And the kid who was born was a 10 week early NICU baby who weighed 3 pounds went out. So, hey, you're going to live in the hospital for the next 10 to 12 weeks and then still had all that other stuff going on. I was like, this does not add up anymore. I need to make a change. And it's like, well, I'm going to keep the business because that's what pays the most. I want to finish my graduate seminary degree. So I guess the thing that's going to go is my day job. And like, we had insurance through my wife's work, so I didn't really need it for insurance. And it was really just like, okay, it's time. Like, I need to set this thing off and, you know, be focused on being dad and focused on the business, and, you know, we just make a go of it.
- [08:08]
Interviewer
When did it become hard to hide that you were starting to make more money, that you were wealthy? I mean, did your friends know? Did your family think anything of her? Or was it just kind of another day in the life? And then when did that change? When did that shift happen?
- [08:20]
Matt Paulson
It was quite a while because, like, if you're making, like, 1 or 2 million a year, like, lots of people make that. I mean, it was probably like five years before anybody noticed that I, you know, had money. And then, you know, around Covid, people kind of started figuring things out. And then it was when we got our new office that I'm in right now in downtown Sioux Falls. Like, when your logo is on a building, then people know you have money, and it's really hard to hide it.
- [08:43]
Interviewer
Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were talking offline before this, and you mentioned. Yeah, it's. It's sort of interesting and surreal. Like, I can just call the mayor whenever I want. And politicians ask you for money. I mean, tell me how that feels in a smaller town. I mean, it's not New York City. In a small town, everyone knows you. Is that nice? Is that. Is that terrible? I mean, walk me through that experience.
- [09:04]
Matt Paulson
It's very manageable. I get a lot of, you know, people see, like, when you're. Have success in a smaller community. Sioux Falls is a quarter million people. A lot of people, like, Sioux Falls is a very accessible town. So, like. Like, yeah, I could call the mayor, but, like, really, anybody could get a meeting with the mayor if they really tried hard enough. They think you're accessible and, like, you should be available to meet with them or help them. And, like, that's kind of where it can get annoying of, like, people message you and be like, hey, I run the South Dakota Miniature Horse association, and I'd love to have you get involved. And, like, what even is this? Yeah, so, like, I'll get Facebook messages and, you know, emails and texts and, like, what. What is going on here? So it's like that kind of noise that gets annoying. Like, not annoying, but there's just a lot of it. And it's kind of hard to manage. And what I just learned is, like, okay, I can't reply to every message that comes in because I'm going to drive myself crazy if I do that.
- [09:57]
Interviewer
Yeah. Let's get into the actual numbers of MarketBeat. So MarketBeat, obviously, is kind of an umbrella company of several brands. But what did MarketBeat do in revenue this year? Walk me through, like, the actual profit margin and EBITDA of what you're actually taking home personally.
- [10:12]
Matt Paulson
So in 2025, we did just over 50 million in top line revenue, about 20 million in profit, and another 5 million in, like, bonus, like, owner payroll. Because, like, you often it makes sense to pay yourself, like, a bonus to max out your QBI deduction, qualified business income deduction. So really I took home about 25 million of that. And like, that sounds like a big number, but, like, it. It goes away pretty quickly.
- [10:39]
Interviewer
So where does the actual money go, the 25 million? What does that actual distribution look like?
- [10:43]
Matt Paulson
So, like 7 to 8 million of that just goes to federal income tax right away. Like, the income tax system is designed for people like me to pay the Most. So, like, 8 million bucks out the door just to taxes. And we don't really have that many state taxes. We pay like property and sales tax, but it doesn't add up to a whole lot. 1 to 2 million in charitable giving a year. We support a lot of things in the Sioux Falls area, different nonprofits and community events. 25 just turns into 15. And on top of that, half of MarketBeat is also owned by, like, my trusts that are, like, for kids and for future generations. So, like, half of the profit just goes to those right away. And you really don't want to take money out of those because then, like, if you do, like, you can, but then it becomes part of your, like, estate tax, and then you get, like, if you die, you pay tax on it, like, 55%. So, like, you don't really want to take money out of there if you don't want to. So that leaves like, 5 million bucks a year to live on and, you know, do whatever with.
- [11:37]
Interviewer
And is that all cash or do you have that in any equities or any investments? Or do you just pay yourself the 5 million in cash?
- [11:43]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, well, I pay myself to 5 million, and then, like, we'll live on, you know, maybe like 1 million, maybe a million and a half here.
- [11:49]
Interviewer
What does that spending look like then? Monthly, that comes out to 250, 200amonth?
- [11:55]
Matt Paulson
I mean, yeah, that'd be. That'd be on a high side. You know, Realistically, a typical month is between like 100 and 125,000.
- [12:01]
Interviewer
Okay, and then where's that going?
- [12:04]
Matt Paulson
We have a downtown apartment that's like, rent is five grand a month, and we just like it. So we have it.
- [12:09]
Interviewer
You're not renting that out. You're just going for vacations, little staycations.
- [12:12]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, like we went last weekend for like the St. Patrick's they prayed so you can like see the parade out your window.
- [12:17]
Interviewer
Nice.
- [12:18]
Matt Paulson
We have a country club membership. Don't use it very often, honestly. Like I don't track categories of expenses because it's just such a small piece of our universe that like it doesn't matter. We have, we have a Vikings, NFL Vikings suite that's like 170 grand a year that we pay for. So that's a big expense. Buy like whatever the club membership for college hockey is. I don't know. We just do the stuff that we think is fun and whatever it cost is what it cost. Yeah, but also we live in like Sioux Falls, South Dakota. There's so it's not like like there is an upper limit of like what you can spend on lifestyle here.
- [12:49]
Interviewer
Sure. Is that why you live there?
- [12:51]
Matt Paulson
I live here because I grew up here and like. Yeah, you know, my business is here, my friends are here, a bunch of our like investment properties are here. Like I want to start over somewhere else.
- [13:01]
Interviewer
Yeah, that makes sense to those listening. You have a private jet and you purchased that in 2022. Why did you purchase the private jet? And then how are you actually using that as part of your business? But then also revenue play.
- [13:13]
Matt Paulson
The understand like about Sioux Falls is like small market. So like limited direct flights and like netjets isn't really here any of like the charter services. Like there are a couple local ones but like any of the big ones, like if I wanted a jet to come pick me up, they probably have to relocate from Minneapolis or Lincoln. So you have to pay like for an empty jet to fly to come pick you up. And like if I were in like Vegas for JSXs, I probably wouldn't mess with it. But like to be in a small market where there aren't that many options and there frankly weren't that many great charter options either. Like you could charter a 30 year old plane and fly it somewhere. But like that's not really what I wanted to do. So I found local guy to manage it. I think I paid around three and a half million for the plane. Probably put another half million into it or something like that. So maybe 4 million total cost. Get with a good bank financing on those with like a 20 year amortization. I think the rate was 4.85, something like that. So like then you get a. You know, when I did it in 22, it was just at the tail end of 100% bonus depreciation. So I was able to take a 4 million dollar deduction off taxes and then basically paid for the down payment on the plane, which was pretty cool. We charter it out. So, like it operates kind of at break even or close to it. Yeah, between like chartering it and like, obviously I still have to pay to fly it. Like, chartering would never cover like your personal flight. So honestly, like, it doesn't save me a lot of money compared to chartering. But like it's got my logo on it. Like that's pretty cool. Like hard and hard to say like that's a charter jet when the market logo's on it.
- [14:42]
Interviewer
What was your net worth before you thought, oh, I should buy a private jet? I mean, a lot of people don't have that thought. And so how rich were you before that thought crossed your mind?
- [14:51]
Matt Paulson
Good question. In 22. Let me pull up the number. Okay, so I was worth like 36 million outside of like what MarketBeat was. And at that time, MarketBeat was arguably worth around 70. So maybe like 100 to 120 million total at that time.
- [15:07]
Interviewer
Okay, and how long have you been thinking about getting a private jet? Was it kind of a impulse buy or.
- [15:13]
Matt Paulson
I had been chartering for five years at that point.
- [15:15]
Interviewer
Okay.
- [15:16]
Matt Paulson
Like, like I had enough. Like, I just hate, like airports. So many, like, just crappy experiences or like people screaming in the road behind you and like, what is this? Just like at some point, like, okay, I need to figure out how to fly private because I can afford it now and like, I just can't. Can't do it anymore.
- [15:35]
Interviewer
Yeah.
- [15:35]
Matt Paulson
So I've started chartering 17. Like the last time I flew commercial was probably four years ago now. And that's just because, like, my plane was broken and I needed to get to Phoenix to go to a meeting.
- [15:44]
Interviewer
There you go. Yeah. And a number of your investments are also in real estate, right. You have 40 plus real estate properties. Nine Starbucks. Is that accurate?
- [15:52]
Matt Paulson
Well, there was until two of the Starbucks closed on us. But they're still paying.
- [15:56]
Interviewer
Sure, I saw something about that. You know, I think it had to do with the Chipotle CEO going to Starbucks.
- [16:03]
Matt Paulson
I don't know.
- [16:03]
Interviewer
I don't know what all that was about. But then you're also an angel investor, so walk me through kind of how you, you know what the spread looks like and why the spread is that way.
- [16:10]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, I'm probably worth like 90 million outside of what market beats worth. And that's probably worth another 200 million based stuff like what public multiples of media companies are. So maybe 300 all in, but of like the non marketbeat money. Of the 90 million, like 40 millions in real estate, 20 millions in private equity, 15 million in stocks, 15 million in cash.
- [16:30]
Host
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- [17:45]
Interviewer
the spread that way?
- [17:46]
Matt Paulson
There was kind of a unique opportunity during COVID like everybody was panicking and like interest rates for 3%. So me and my real estate business partner, Kevin Tupy, we just bought and bought and bought and bought and bought like until rates started going up. But we just bubble. Like it just like everything was so cheap and like the rates were so low. Like I was like, how can we not make money in this? And now we've got like 2,000 apartment units and some random commercial buildings in town. Like it's been a great investment so far. So it was wasn't really a strategic asset allocation, but more like a generational opportunity to buy real estate. Like we should go go nuts on this. And we did. Yeah, like we're probably 35 properties now, 2000 apartment units all in, and, and we're building more.
- [18:27]
Interviewer
So is there a reason you haven't sold MarketBeat yet?
- [18:31]
Matt Paulson
Never gonna sell MarketBeat. Why would I do that?
- [18:33]
Interviewer
I guess with the amount of money you have right now, why wouldn't you do that?
- [18:37]
Matt Paulson
Because I love it. I'm like, I would know. I would no more sell Market Beat than one of my own children.
- [18:42]
Interviewer
Like, oh, wow, okay.
- [18:43]
Matt Paulson
I have three kids. I have Micah, Addi, and MarketBeat. Like, that's how I feel about the business.
- [18:48]
Interviewer
Like, so you just love operating the business?
- [18:50]
Matt Paulson
Yeah.
- [18:50]
Interviewer
Is there a number that would change your mind, or is it just the love of the game?
- [18:56]
Matt Paulson
If somebody walks up and says, Here's $500 million, it'd be hard to say that and, like, no to that, but the number is pretty darn high.
- [19:01]
Interviewer
And, like, it can't be 500 billion, though. There's no more than that.
- [19:05]
Matt Paulson
500 million.
- [19:05]
Interviewer
Oh, I thought you said 500 billion. Okay, so 500 million, you would.
- [19:08]
Matt Paulson
Somebody offers you, like, 20 times EBITDA, it's like, oh, well, I guess it'd be more than that. Yeah, it would be 20 times. Like, it'd be hard to say no to that. But sure, like, any normal, like, PE transaction. Like, don't care, just not interested.
- [19:20]
Interviewer
And you've invested, you know, back to the. The investment side of the portfolio. You've invested in, like, 80 plus different startups. Right. Have any of those startups actually provided any, you know, meaningful return to you? Or is that mostly just for the sake of angel investing?
- [19:33]
Matt Paulson
Honestly, I was kind of dumb when I started. Like, I was investing, like, five to ten grand at a time on Angel List. And, like, not a great idea.
- [19:41]
Interviewer
That's more like Play Play money.
- [19:44]
Matt Paulson
I mean, I had a few good exits. Like, Dollar Shave Club was a solid exit. I've got probably 5 million in equity and AI. Not an AI, but a technology company called Prismatic that will sell in the next couple years. Like, that'll be a good exit for me. One of Jason Calacanis's deals, Density. I was in the C drawn to that in 2014. And, like, my initial investment in that, that is like a 30x on paper. So I'm not gonna lose money. But also, like, I get 102k1 forms every year, and I have to collect all of them and send them to my tax person. And, like, that is just more complicated than life needs to be. So I'm doing much less of that type of stuff now. Like, my minimum check size that I write is $500,000. Like, if I'm not willing to write a $500,000 check to something I just won't do it.
- [20:25]
Interviewer
Just not worth it. What was the return on Dollar Shave? You said that was pretty meaningful.
- [20:30]
Matt Paulson
Oh, that was like a 3 or 4X, but I didn't hold onto it very long, so it was timing on that one.
- [20:34]
Interviewer
How big was the check you wrote for that?
- [20:36]
Matt Paulson
Oh, I don't even know. Probably five to ten. It wasn't huge.
- [20:39]
Interviewer
Small early win, but. Yeah, that's. That's cool. Tell me about. About the BuzzFeed story. In 2020, there was a kind of a BuzzFeed story, which I'm assuming you are, you know, privy to, where there was almost a bit of backlash on the way that you were structuring your. Your. Your. Your affiliate marketing and your email sending for MarketBeat. You walked it back publicly, but you also kind of made a good amount of money from what you were doing with the buzzfeed story. And so I'm kind of leaving the story up to you to divulge however much you are comfortable divulging. But walk me through that and then kind of why you walked it back and what you're doing now in hindsight.
- [21:18]
Matt Paulson
So our strategy, like, back in the day was like, we would have different websites that were in Google News, and if your site's in Google News, it'll show up in Google Finance. So we had a bunch of very generically named news websites. Like, one of them is American Banking News. And, like, that site is still up today. And, like, it's really hard to get new domains, like, into Google News, so we would just buy them that was for sale on Flippa. And some of them had, like, the names of towns. So like, Sioux Falls Tribune might be one of them. And. Or, like, Omaha Hair Order. I don't know. I guess that's a real publication, but just like, name of city and then publication. And like, so we would just take those and, like, we wouldn't really claim, like, oh, yeah, we're based in Brainerd, Minnesota or wherever. Like, never actually say that, but, like, that was the name of the site and buzzfeed saying it was like, you're a fake news. These are fake news websites. You don't have anything, like, associated with. Like, you're not from Brainerd, Minnesota. How dare you have a site called Brainerd News? And, like, that was the whole thing. And like, we honestly weren't like, like, we had our company information, like, had our mailing address and email on a website and phone number. Like, people could find us. And, like, we weren't hiding who owned the websites. One of our affiliates, like, people that was like doing lead gen for MarketBeat was like doing what we were, but honestly a little bit more shady about it. So like that guy, like, he got it harder from the buzzfeed journalist.
- [22:35]
Interviewer
Yeah.
- [22:37]
Matt Paulson
I don't know, it just like it seemed like a big thing at the time, but honestly, it just really wasn't.
- [22:42]
Interviewer
Yeah, that's fair.
- [22:43]
Matt Paulson
We lost one of our, like one of the ad networks. We were running a company called Domi. We were running like those ads on our site and they like, yeah, we saw the article. We're not going to, you know, do ads with you anymore. And like, okay, fine, whatever. And just like replace them with Google AdSense.
- [22:56]
Interviewer
Sure.
- [22:56]
Matt Paulson
And two or three, two or three years later they came back like, hey, do you want to run Dynomia? And like, no.
- [23:02]
Interviewer
Yeah, that's interesting. So you didn't really feel that them leaving.
- [23:06]
Matt Paulson
No, it wasn't that big of a deal. Like, I mean, it was annoying, but. Cause like I was at a. This is like February 2020, like right before COVID And like I was at the last conference. I was for like a couple years. And like I was dealing with this when I was at a conference and it was not fun.
- [23:21]
Interviewer
Yeah. Yeah. That's interesting. Earlier you mentioned something to the effect of going to seminary. Doctorate or a master Divinity, you know. So you're a churchgoer. I believe you're the treasurer of your church, is that correct?
- [23:35]
Matt Paulson
I was not. Not.
- [23:35]
Interviewer
You were.
- [23:36]
Matt Paulson
Yeah. Okay, so I got a Master's of arts in Christian leadership, which is like 2/3 of an M. Div. Like it's a legit like 64 credit hour master's degree. So like I actually have two. So like I got one from my regular university, like computer degree, Master of Science and information system. That's like a 37 credit hour degree. And then I decided to go to seminary after I moved to Sioux Falls because I thought it would be fun and interesting and cool to learn about church history. And I thought like, oh, I'll just be like a better leader and I'll be more informed about church and like church history and like, this would be great. And I had a great time at seminary. Like, I would totally do it again. Okay, so like, loved it.
- [24:13]
Interviewer
Does your church know what you make and does that kind of affect your relationship with people there or is it too divided?
- [24:19]
Matt Paulson
I don't know. Some of them do. You know, we give. You know, you're not supposed to really talk about what you give to your Church, but we give plenty of money to the church.
- [24:27]
Interviewer
Sure.
- [24:27]
Matt Paulson
And, like, whenever they say, like, oh, we need money for whatever, like, we always give. But, like, also, like, you know, if you're Christian, you know, the idea of tithing, like, if we tithe, there would be two or three times the church budget. And, like, that doesn't seem like a great idea either.
- [24:40]
Interviewer
So you mentioned you give philanthropically. What else are you giving to outside of church?
- [24:46]
Matt Paulson
So, like, there's a few different buckets. Like, there's the religious bucket of, like, we have friends who are missionaries and we support them or people doing Christian ministry in town. And there are a few organizations that we've supported for a long time continue to do so. There's also a community bucket of, like, different community events. Like, we have the market be open USTA tennis tournament. That's kind of a fun thing that somebody said, hey, we're going to bring a national tennis tournament town. Do you want to be the title sponsor? And I was like, well, that sounds fun. Let's do that.
- [25:13]
Interviewer
Yeah.
- [25:14]
Matt Paulson
We sponsor 50 free concerts every summer. We renovated Children's science museum that my daughter likes to go to. We had a big music festival last summer called Lolly Cooler where we had Pitbull, Comm&TLC and other artists. Like, that was a lot of Uncle Cracker. Like, that was just a ton of fun. Going to do that again next summer. And we just do a little bit of everything. Like, we have a committee at Markabee that, like, they take applications from people who want money for whatever nonprofit, like, thing. And. And there's criteria around it. Like, we don't just give anybody money, but, like, if you're a legit nonprofit, like, doing good work in Sioux Falls, like, you can apply for a grant. It's up to like, 25 grand. And, you know, that committee gives away about a quarter million a year in revenue. So we do a lot of stuff.
- [25:55]
Interviewer
Yeah. Earlier you mentioned, like, one and a half or two a year goes to philanthropy. When you think of philanthropy, is it part tax break, part meaning, or is it actually just meaningful for you? And the tax break is kind of the cherry on top.
- [26:09]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, it's definitely, like, not about the tax break because, like, I could give you a dollar to get 30, 37 cents back. I'm like, why would you do that? I would just keep the dollar. Right. So it's not. Not like a money thing. It's really a. You know, there are some really cool business leaders in my community that have, like, created the example for People like me that are younger and like, they're starting to age out and a couple of them have passed away and it's like, okay, it's my turn to do that and I'm gonna go do that and I'm gonna do it really well.
- [26:37]
Interviewer
That's cool. That's cool. And money wise, we have a term called like the, the threshold number and it's, you know, when you have enough money, you feel like, you know, any more money won't make any meaningful difference. Do you know what that number is for you?
- [26:49]
Matt Paulson
No, but I'm definitely there today.
- [26:50]
Interviewer
Okay, when did you hit that number? If you had to guess, how much was the number prior to now?
- [26:56]
Matt Paulson
I don't know, I've never really thought about that. Yeah, I mean, it's been a couple years since like, okay, I just don't need more money.
- [27:01]
Interviewer
Okay.
- [27:02]
Matt Paulson
But yeah, I've never really thought about that.
- [27:05]
Interviewer
Yeah, it's interesting. So. But you have hit it. No, no more money from this point forward would make any difference in your life.
- [27:11]
Matt Paulson
I mean, the only thing I would do is buy a bigger private jet, which. Okay, cool. But like, probably wouldn't meaningfully change my life.
- [27:18]
Interviewer
So if someone gave you like 30 million post tax to buy jet, that would be a meaningful difference?
- [27:24]
Matt Paulson
I think it'd be a lot of fun, but I don't think it would be meaningful difference.
- [27:27]
Interviewer
Okay, no, that's fair. Earlier you mentioned your, your children were born and one of them was premature around 2012, which is when you decided to kind of go all in. How is being a father and even that moment in your life shaped the way that you think about money and business and family?
- [27:43]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, so my situation is a little bit unique in that, like, my 2012 kid, Micah, who is now 13, he, like, he's just fine. Our 2016 baby, Adeline, or Addie as we call her, like, she was five weeks early and like, fine when she came out, but it turns out she has a genetic condition and like, she's probably going to be living with as an adult. So. And she is like a total daddy's girl. And like, you know, honestly, she's my priority. So, like, evenings, weekends, like, I don't do a whole lot of stuff. Like, I hang out with my kid who wants to hang out with daddy, and you name the, the fundraising gala, I get invites and I just don't go to any of them. Like, it's like, oh, you have this thing from five to seven, like, yeah, I'm not going to be there. I'm gonna be at home with my kids, so I kind of have to be like, not a militant, but like, I probably get two or three evening event invites a week and I'm just like, yeah, I don't go to those things. Sorry.
- [28:34]
Interviewer
So it's all about family.
- [28:36]
Matt Paulson
It really is. Because like some of the other stuff that you get invited to, like, yeah, it'd probably be fun to go, but I think I just, like, my kids are 9 and 13 now, so like, like the clock's ticking. Like they're not going to be kids forever. And like when I'm 50, I guess I'll go to some of those events, but until then, like, not a priority for me.
- [28:57]
Interviewer
Is part of the, the trust you have and some of the generational wealth that you're building because of just wanting to leave your kids without having to worry about money. Are you building them a of future wealth right now?
- [29:09]
Matt Paulson
I mean, we are by just like, that's what's happening. I don't know that that's the goal. Like, obviously I want to take care of my daughter because, like, I don't know what her ability to work as an adult will be like. She'll probably be able to do something, but, you know, probably not anything super advanced. You know, my son will be just fine and you know, sure, we'll pay for college and maybe a car or whatever, but like, I also don't want him to be a trust fund kid that never works and never provides any value to the universe. So, I mean, obviously they will get a bunch of money when, when we pass away. But like, that's also like, not the goal to leave them a certain amount of money.
- [29:45]
Interviewer
Yeah. What about Market B? Let's say Market B passed away tomorrow you're just, you know, poof, it's gone. What would you do with your life if it wasn't MarketBeat?
- [29:55]
Matt Paulson
So one of my side projects is a VC fund. You know, we have 40 million under management between two funds. And I probably spend some more time doing that, probably spend a little bit more time on real estate stuff. And then I would just go make a very degenerate version of Market Beat.
- [30:09]
Interviewer
Walk me through what. What about it would be degenerate? How would you, how would you approach building that?
- [30:13]
Matt Paulson
There's like two aspects of MarketBeat. Like, there's the subscription business and website tools business. Like, that stuff's very hard to maintain. And then there's just like the create content and stick ads in it and run Facebook ads and run Google Ads and buy Coret and build an email list side of things, and, like, that's much more profitable. So I would just skip the marketbeat stuff that's really hard to do and, like, do all the easy stuff.
- [30:36]
Interviewer
Yeah. In a quarterly update that you wrote last quarter, I think you mentioned that people get really weird about the private jet. How do you teach your kids about the life you have? I mean, what do they think about their dad having a private jet and all this money? Or do they even know yet? I mean, their age, like, how much are they really aware of?
- [30:56]
Matt Paulson
They definitely know. What keeps them from, like, being spoiled rich kids, I think is like, our house was like, $400,000 when we bought it. So it's nice, but not, like, crazy nice. Like, they go to public school. They largely have the same lives of, like, their friends. So, like, that's my strategy, to not screw them up. And, like. Well, I remember when my kid was little, Michael was little, like, he was sad that we had to fly on the small plane and didn't get to fly on the big plane like everybody else. It's like, well, daddy, when do we get to fly on the big plane?
- [31:24]
Interviewer
That's very funny.
- [31:25]
Matt Paulson
Yes.
- [31:26]
Interviewer
Yeah, totally. Totally backwards from. From typical. Well, that's great. So what if you had to. If you had to give the listeners one piece of advice on building business wealth, being a family man, for those listening who are, you know, part of families, what would you say?
- [31:39]
Matt Paulson
Ooh, one piece of advice. That's always such a loaded question.
- [31:42]
Interviewer
I know. You can give two pieces if you need to.
- [31:44]
Matt Paulson
Yeah. I think much of my, like, career success is really, like, just throwing a lot of stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks and then just doing it much more frequently and much more often than other people do. Because, like, when my. My. My college classmates were, like, playing Fortnite in their dorm rooms, I was, like, writing blog posts and just trying stuff out. So, like, when normal people are doing normal people stuff, like, that's when you need to go, like, do your business stuff. And then if you do that long enough, it compounds over two decades, and then you're me.
- [32:14]
Interviewer
And what would you do differently if you had to go back?
- [32:17]
Matt Paulson
Oh, I. I don't. I mean, other than buy Bitcoin in 2009. Actually, I did mine Bitcoin in 2013. So I, like, I was pretty early that trend.
- [32:27]
Interviewer
Were you buying pizza with it back then, or do you still have some of that today?
- [32:29]
Matt Paulson
I didn't hold onto it. Like, I wasn't smart enough to see the price appreciation So I mined it and I sold it and turned it into cash.
- [32:36]
Interviewer
Yeah. Do you regret that?
- [32:38]
Matt Paulson
I mean, no, but, like. Like, I'm already, like, I'm so rich. Like, it just doesn't matter. Sorry, what was the question?
- [32:44]
Interviewer
I mean, if you had to go back and do something differently, I mean, is there something you'd do differently, given a second time?
- [32:49]
Matt Paulson
You know, I started a lot of other stuff and, like, got involved with different businesses and. And what I didn't realize is, like, the opportunity cost of, like, doing other stuff in addition to the main, main thing. And if I just stayed focused on, like, the main thing and didn't go get into, like, a golf media company and some of the other dumb stuff I did, like, I probably would be further along than I am today. Like, focus is.
- [33:10]
Interviewer
Wish you were further along.
- [33:12]
Matt Paulson
I mean, no, like, life's good. Things are fine. Like, I don't look back and be like, man, I wish I hadn't done that. I just, like, I know a lot more today, so I'd probably make different decisions if I found myself in 2010 again.
- [33:25]
Interviewer
Yeah. Where do you see yourself in 10 years? Are you going to still be working for MarketBeat or are you going to retire?
- [33:31]
Matt Paulson
I will still be running MarketBeat as long as I'm alive. Love the business. Some people know what their calling is, and my calling is to get people to click on ads on the Internet and buy stuff. I just love it. Love the data. Just the immediate feedback of trying stuff. I will do this as long as it's a viable business. I love it. So, yeah, like, I could be sitting at this very desk ten years from now and be very happy doing that.
- [33:54]
Interviewer
Okay, that's fair. And with the, like, in the narrowing of the focus, you only doing, you know, 500k minimum checks, I mean, how many businesses outside of MarketBeat do you envision being invested in or even operating as, you know, part advisor moving forward?
- [34:10]
Matt Paulson
My hope that is 10 years from now. I have fewer K1 forms than I do today, so.
- [34:15]
Interviewer
Okay.
- [34:15]
Matt Paulson
I would love to see that number slowly shrink over time as stuff kind of sells and ages out.
- [34:19]
Interviewer
Yeah. Like, how much you're at 102k ones. You think 50 or 20 or 50 would be fine.
- [34:25]
Matt Paulson
I mean, it's. It's so hard because, like, you know, some of these are just things I get a K1 form for every year I never have to think about. Some of them are like, I'm an operating partner at a venture capital fund,
- [34:34]
Interviewer
so that's work with some of your equities investments. Are you. Are you just having managed investments? Do you do index funds or are you picking stocks?
- [34:42]
Matt Paulson
I own two individual stocks. I own some Berkshire Hathaway and some Tesla. So. Okay, I don't want to be like, totally. For me, it just doesn't make sense to, like, manage that stuff.
- [34:51]
Interviewer
Sure.
- [34:51]
Matt Paulson
Like, I have an advisor that manages, like, almost all of it and he charges me like 35 basis points a year. So like a pretty, pretty cheap for what I get. And yeah, like, I will make the most money if I stay focused on marketing and getting more people to click on ads on the Internet.
- [35:06]
Interviewer
Yeah, it's wise. That's wise. Well, cool. Matt, I don't have any other questions for you. Do you have any questions for me?
- [35:11]
Matt Paulson
Are you the new host of the Money Wise podcast?
- [35:13]
Interviewer
This is a great episode. We'll see. I appreciate you coming on the Money Wise podcast, Matt. This has been really helpful. Looking forward to kind of seeing how market BE continues to grow, seeing how your focus continues to narrow over time and maybe, you know, one of those 102k ones taking off someday. Thanks again for joining us today, Matt.
- [35:30]
Matt Paulson
Yeah, just wanted to shout out to our buddy Sam Par for doing his podcast. I think it's a great thing for founders and just glad that it exists.
- [35:38]
Interviewer
Thanks, Matt.