DJ Khaled, known for his success in the music industry, has a unique approach to managing his wealth. In a recent interview with Shannon Sharpe on “Club Shay Shay,” DJ Khaled discussed his decision to handle his own finances instead of relying on accountants and money managers.
While many celebrities and high earners typically delegate financial matters to professionals, DJ Khaled prefers to personally oversee his bank accounts. According to the Grammy winner, he says it’s important to stay aware of his financial transactions and he says that by handling his own money it allows him to spot any discrepancies.
“I have a rule. If you pay for everything yourself, you notice you’re paying too much for stuff, right? The balance got to always go like that, so if I touch that, that means it got to be replaced that hour, no more than two weeks, right? OK, that’s just a rule in my life,” he says.
He continued, “Now, if I notice I’m paying so much, if I let somebody else say, oh, to pay the bills, you’re not going to notice it in real time because it gives you a harder time to fix it. While I’m paying all these bills traveling, vacation, my mom’s bills, my house bills, you know, shopping, the chef, the kids.”
He manages various expenses, including bills, travel expenses, family support, and more. The this time-consuming task, DJ Khaled prefers the hands-on approach to protect his hard-earned money.
One reason he’s taking this route is because he has heard about accountants and money managers. He wants to minimize any potential risks.
“We could talk all this big business manager, and no disrespect to all you beautiful business managers out there, I don’t want to mess up your hustle, but I’ve heard a lot of crazy stories, right, and there’s no way in the world I’m letting somebody have the power to touch the hard work, no way,” he shares.
He stresses, “I don’t believe in no accountant, I don’t believe in — what’s the thing they call — money manager. I pay the grass, the car washman, the guy that’s cut my hair, the electric bill, the car note, the mortgage.”
Past Lessons Learned
The music mogul, who has an estimated net worth of $75 million, says he’s learned from past finical errors.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, he said that durng the mid-2010s he almost lost his home.
He acknowledges reaching a critical crossroads around 2015. Despite his visible success, he was “hustling not smart,” he told Rolling Stone. He was still renting his home and after investing his own funds into We the Best, his record label, he was struggling to cover his expenses, to the extent that he almost lost his home lease.
“I remember I had like a month to come up with this [large] amount of money. I kept saying, ‘There’s no way in the world that we worked this much this far and we don’t have nothing to show for it.’ I changed that right away,” he recalls.
He realized he had to change the way not only how he looked at money but how he spent it
“I was like, ‘Yo, if I want a family, I got to get my sh-t right.’ And I gambled on myself. I always bet on myself from day one. But I tripled down that day.”