30-Year-Old Billionaire Says She’s Frugal, Shops Uber Deals

Lucy Guo, 30, noticed her web price attain $1.3 billion in April. However the entrepreneur, who’s now the world’s youngest feminine billionaire, is dedicated to discovering the very best offers — even when she will afford to pay full value.

Guo instructed CNBC on Wednesday that she stays “frugal,” admitting that she has completed issues like reserve flights on the airport and cancel them later so she might have a meal at no cost within the Amex lounge. She additionally rides UberX, the budget-friendly, low-cost model of Uber, and compares costs for meals earlier than shopping for one thing to eat. Her closet consists primarily of $10 items from shops like Shein.

“I am frugal at some issues, and I spend extra on different issues,” Guo instructed CNBC.

^{Lucy Guo. Picture by Gonzalo Marroquin/Getty Photos for Passes}

Guo’s fortune was constructed by way of Scale AI, the AI knowledge labeling startup she co-founded with Alexandr Wang in 2016. Meta made a $14.3 billion funding in Scale AI in June, buying 49% of the startup and permitting the corporate to realize a $29 billion valuation.

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Although Guo left Scale AI in 2018, she has held onto a virtually 5% stake within the firm, which has grown to be price $1.25 billion. Regardless of her billionaire standing, Guo says that her life has remained the identical.

“My life pre-money and post-money, it hasn’t actually modified that a lot,” Guo instructed CNBC Make It earlier this month.

Whereas Guo could also be frugal in terms of her closet, her meals, and her rides to work, she nonetheless has the means to spend lavishly in key areas with out enthusiastic about the price.

For instance, in terms of houses, Guo purchased a newly constructed mansion in L.A.’s Hollywood Hills for $29.5 million earlier this 12 months. She bought it at a reduction: The 5-bedroom, 13,500-square-foot mansion was first listed for $43 million in January 2024.

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Guo can be the proprietor of a $6.7 million condominium in Florida, which she bought in 2021, in addition to one other L.A. residence, which she purchased for $4.2 million final 12 months.

Guo moreover owns a Ferrari in a classic rose coloration, which she admits was a “splurge.” A Ferrari can price upwards of $230,950. On the subject of transportation, she additionally typically flies by way of personal jet to skip the strains on the airport.

Guo is a university dropout who studied laptop science and human-computer interactions for 2 years at Carnegie Mellon College, per her LinkedIn. She left to pursue a Thiel Fellowship, which rewards younger entrepreneurs for following non-traditional paths and selecting to construct a enterprise over going to varsity. Thiel Fellows obtain a $200,000 grant and entry to a community of founders to develop their firms.

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Guo nonetheless places in lengthy hours at her startup, the creator commerce and monetization platform Passes, which she based in 2022. Passes has raised a complete of $66 million throughout three funding rounds. She says that the conventional working day for her stretches twelve hours, from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.

“9 a.m. to 9 p.m., to me, that is nonetheless work-life steadiness,” Guo instructed CNBC.