Name: Martin Lewis OBE, is a financial journalist and founder of the website MoneySavingExpert.com. Born in Manchester, he grew up in Cheshire and read Government and Law at the London School of Economics.
Written by: Mark Lupton
The numbers: His personal wealth is estimated at £128 million (source: Sunday Times Rich List 2020).
Having built up the website and after becoming a household name regularly appearing on prime-time television, Martin sold his business to the Moneysupermarket.com group, which runs an online price comparison service, for an estimated £87m. The deal saw the father-of-one receive £35m upfront in addition to 22.1 million shares in Moneysupermarket.com.
When the deal was announced, Martin revealed his intention to gift £10m to charity, with £1m of his charitable donations being given to the Citizens Advice service.
How did he do it? by being incredibly financially-savvy himself – and helping other people to be the same. He is a tireless campaigner: from fighting against unfair bank charges to helping consumers switch energy suppliers, from providing advice on student finance to reclaiming payment protection insurance. But that’s not the whole story.
Tell us more: Lewis suggests there are four things you need be successful: talent, hard work, focus and luck. Lewis says: “You can do the first three, you can do them all right and you can still fail. And if that happens to you, don’t think you did something wrong. Failure is a lesson in life. Some of you will do all of that and fail. Others will do all of that and succeed – the only difference is one of luck.”
Okay so let’s say I have all four of those. Anything else I need? Very much so. In Lewis’ own words: “If you have the money, remember you’re the fortunate one. Give back. Give to charity. Whether it’s generic or set something up. I’m very proud I have my money in Mental Health Policy Institute. I have a financial triage system I set up with a Trussell Trust food banks. I fund My Money Week in every school in the country. I give it back ‘cos it made me and I owe it and I’m lucky… I may have worked hard for it, I may have had talent to do it, I may have had the focus that did it but I also got the luck… and that brings with it a responsibility. Pay it back.”
