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You might have more in common with billionaires than you think.

"It's funny, talking about my personal finances, because no one ever believes anything I say," said YouTube creator Jimmy Donaldson, more well-known as MrBeast, to the Wall Street Journal earlier this year (1). "I have negative money right now, I'm borrowing money. That's how little money I have."

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The YouTuber is worth approximately $2.6 billion; much of that comes from equity in his $5 billion company, Beast Industries (2).

"Technically, everyone watching this video has more money than me in their bank account if you subtract the equity value of my company, which doesn't buy me McDonald's in the morning," said Donaldson in the WSJ interview.

His situation might be more common than you think. Many billionaires are cash poor because they have their wealth tied up in illiquid assets, such as stocks and real estate (3).

Here's why it's so common for billionaires to be illiquid — and how their situation is different from other "cash-poor" Americans.

Mark Cuban, who Bloomberg reports has a net worth of over $10 billion (4), appeared on a recent episode of the podcast Pivot to talk about how liquid billionaires really are in light of a proposed one-time 5% billionaire tax in California (5).

"People don't realize that a billionaire doesn't mean you have a billion dollars in liquid assets," said Cuban to cohost Kara Swisher. "Chances are, you might have 5%, if you're lucky."

That would leave a billionaire with around $50 million in liquid assets — certainly enough to cover almost anything they'd need, and certainly more than the sub-$1 million Donaldson claims to keep for himself (1).

But Cuban says that many billionaires don't keep even 5% of their net worth in liquid assets.

"Every situation is different. But I can tell you that the day I became a billionaire I didn't have anywhere close to 5 [percent] in cash," said Cuban in an email to Moneywise. "Most entrepreneurs let their winners ride. Meaning [if] business is good, they will keep on investing, at the expense of their liquidity."

For those billionaires, they might find the vast majority of their on-paper wealth tied up in their own company's stock. Selling some of those stocks could cause their company's stock price to go down in response.

Read More: Millionaires under 43 hold only 32% of their wealth in stocks. Here's where their money is actually going

Billionaires' illiquidity could become a problem for them if this 5% billionaire tax passes, even if their illiquid wealth helps them avoid taxes in other situations (6).

But make no mistake — even cash-poor billionaires aren't struggling to pay for emergencies, like car trouble or a medical procedure. The same isn't true for most cash-poor Americans.

SoLo Funds' 2026 Cash Poor Report found that, of Americans who lived paycheck-to-paycheck, over 70% had to use short-term borrowing to pay for an unplanned expense (7). While illiquid billionaires can borrow against their stocks, regular Americans have to resort to using credit cards, BNPL, payday loans, or other high-APR loans to cover emergencies.

There might be more cash-poor Americans than you realize. Over 40% of cash-poor Americans have a full-time job. One in five households living paycheck-to-paycheck make more than $75,000; some make as much as $200,000 per year.

All of these can have major impacts on Americans' mental health.

"We live paycheck to paycheck and do not have extra money for emergencies. My debt is overwhelming and it's very stressful," said one 49-year-old survey participant. 71% of survey participants described their financial situation as "stressful" in 2025.

While billionaires may be able to keep only a small slice of their fortunes in cash and still have plenty of financial firepower, most Americans don't have that luxury. For everyday households, keeping some money readily available can be essential — especially when an unexpected car repair, medical bill or job loss could otherwise send you straight into debt.

That's why, even in an inflationary environment where holding too much cash can gradually erode its purchasing power, it can still make sense to keep an emergency fund somewhere safe and accessible. You can't predict when life will throw a financial curveball, but you can make sure you're prepared when it does.

Legendary investor Warren Buffett has long argued that cash should be readily available precisely because the future is impossible to predict.

"You do need oxygen, and if you're ever without it for four or five minutes, you will learn," Buffett said in an interview with CNBC (8). "And cash is that way. So you always need to have it available, because you do not know what will happen.

Once you've decided how much you need to keep on hand, consider where that money is sitting. A high-yield account like a Wealthfront Cash Account can be a great place to grow your uninvested cash, offering both competitive interest rates and easy access to your money when you need it.

A Wealthfront Cash Account currently offers a base APY of 3.30% through program banks, and new clients can get an extra 0.75% boost during their first three months on up to $150,000 for a total variable APY of 4.05%.

That's ten times the national deposit savings rate, according to the FDIC's March report.

Additionally, Wealthfront is offering new clients who enable direct deposit ($1,000/mo minimum) to their Cash Account and open and fund a new investment account an additional 0.25% APY increase with no expiration date or balance limit, meaning your APY could be as high as 4.30%.

With no minimum balances or account fees, as well as 24/7 withdrawals and free domestic wire transfers, your funds remain accessible at all times. Plus, you get access to up to $8M FDIC Insurance eligibility through program banks.

Billionaires have a powerful arsenal at their fingertips — assets which tend to appreciate in value over time. For millions, their home may be their biggest asset. Americans collectively have an estimated $11 trillion in home equity available to borrowers, according to ICE (9).

If you've owned your home for years, rising property values and regular mortgage payments may have built up a substantial amount of wealth — even if you don't have much sitting in your bank account.

Rather than selling investments to raise cash, homeowners may be able to tap that equity through a home equity line of credit, or HELOC. A HELOC can give homeowners a way to access some of that equity without selling other investments.

You can tap into your home equity with a HELOC from AmeriSave and access your full funds right at closing.

You can choose a draw period that fits your life — three, five, or 10 years — along with 20- or 30-year terms to suit your budget. And with a 10-year interest-only option, you can keep monthly payments manageable while you plan ahead.

It's essentially a flexible credit line secured by your home, delivered through a mostly online application process.

Billionaires aren't simply stuffing cash under the mattress and hoping their fortunes grow. Much of their wealth is tied to assets that can appreciate or generate returns over long periods of time.

Many built their fortunes by owning businesses for decades — either through founding companies themselves or investing in businesses capable of compounding their earnings over time.

The concept is simple: give your money enough time to compound.

The catch? Billionaires often have an army of professionals helping them decide where to put their money. They generally have teams of analysts, accountants and investment professionals who can scrutinize financial statements and industries before making major bets.

Most investors don't have that kind of support — and trying to pick the next big winner without doing the homework can be a costly experiment. But that doesn't mean you're out of options.

Platforms like Moby can help you identify stocks with strong growth potential, helping investors uncover opportunities they might otherwise overlook.

Their team of former hedge fund analysts and experts spend hundreds of hours each week sifting through financial news and data to provide you with breaking stock recommendations.

Moby's success speaks for itself. The platform's stock picks have outperformed the S&P 500 index by about 11.9% over the past four years.

Even better, Moby offers a 30-day money-back guarantee so you can see if the service is right for you. And if you sign up for Moby Premium you get one free top stock to get you off to a good start.

You don't have to pick individual stocks to invest like someone who understands the power of compounding. For many everyday investors, a more practical strategy is to own a broad slice of the market and keep contributing over time.

Broad-market ETFs spread your money across hundreds of companies. That diversification can help limit the damage if any single company takes a nosedive.

And instead of waiting for a large windfall to invest, investors can start small and make the process automatic. Investing just $20 a week for 30 years could grow to more than $179,000, assuming a 10% annual return (10).

For context, the S&P 500 has averaged annual returns of roughly 10.5% since 1957 (11).

Platforms like Acorns let you invest spare change from everyday purchases into a diversified portfolio of ETFs automatically, helping you steadily build wealth without having to think about every market move.

All you have to do is link your cards, and Acorns will round up each purchase to the nearest dollar, investing the difference — your spare change — into a diversified portfolio of ETFs managed by experts at leading investment firms like Vanguard and BlackRock.

With Acorns, you can invest in an S&P 500 ETF with as little as $5 — and, if you sign up today and set up a recurring investment, Acorns will add a $20 bonus to help you begin your investment journey.

— With files from Kit Pulliam

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We rely only on vetted sources and credible third-party reporting. For details, see our editorial ethics and guidelines.

Wall Street Journal (1); Fortune (2); 24/7 Wall St. (3); Bloomberg (4); NPR (5); Richmond & Blackwood (6); SoLo Funds (7); CNBC (8); ICE (9); Acorns (10); Investopedia (11)

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.