At some point, you probably thought about quitting your job. Maybe it was the bad pay, a terrible boss, hostile work environment, or virtually no life-work balance.

Or you simply thought your skills and expertise could be put to better use elsewhere.

But it’s not easy to quit your job and follow your dreams. For many, a paycheck is their only ticket to survival. But wherever you stand, it’s possible to cut loose from what’s holding you back and take the plunge into a new world. Some people did this and landed on millionaire territory.

So let’s take a look at five people who became massively successful after quitting their jobs.

24/7 Wall St. Insights

• Some people on our list made millions on side hustles after quitting their day jobs.
• One person left a toxic work environment to form a multimillion dollar competitor.
• If you want to make it big in the stock market, you need to be a savvy investor and know the playing field. Check out our report on the next NVIDIA for some tips.

Kat Norton

At the onset of the pandemic, Kat Norton was struggling financially and moved back in with her parents. She held a consulting job and part of her job was teaching Microsoft Excel – something she thoroughly enjoyed.

So she decided to have some fun with this skill and ended up turning it into millions.

TikTok millions

Norton decided to make free TikTok videos teaching Excel. One of her most popular videos featured an overview of Excel’s new data-searching feature to the tune of DMX. It chewed up more than 100,000 views. Eventually, a CEO of an IT company asked her to make Excel videos for his clients.

After her videos hit more than 300,000 views, “Ms. Excel” quit her job and focused on monetizing her new millionaire project.

Isaac Medeiros

During the pandemic, then 24-year-old Isaac Medeiros decided to sell miniature katanas from his Los Angeles apartment. The sleek Japanese swords hooked millions.

By 2021, Mini Katana had slashed through more than $2.5 million in sales.

A sharp edge

Like many of today’s self-made millionaires, Medeiros took advantage of social media channels like YouTube and TikTok to reach the masses. But it wasn’t always clean. He clashed with Facebook at one point after the social media giant banned him and accused him of advertising a weapon. But that led him to “organic creation,” where he really shined.

Whitney Wolfe Herd

Whitney Wolfe Herd co-founded the popular dating app Tinder in her early 20s and quickly rose to the rank of vice president of marketing.

However, she left the company after an alleged sexual harassment lawsuit that was later settled. But instead of fading away, she decided to create her own dating app. And in this one, women call the shots.

Swipe right for millions

Herd went on to launch the woman-focused dating app Bumble. And in 2021, she became the world’s youngest self-made female billionaire.

Today, Bumble has more than 58 million active users and 2.73 million paying users. Bumble earned $844 million in revenue in 2023.

Tori Gerbig

This millionaire quit her day job after her side gig took off.

In 2014, Tori Gerbig was selling insurance and earning about $35,000 per year. But along with her husband Chris, she also ran a side-gig, selling clothes online through eBay and Facebook marketplace.

Turning pink to green

The Gerbigs’ customer base quickly grew to more than 100,000 from just a few hundred. It became so demanding that Mrs. Gerbig quit her insurance job to focus on what would become Pink Lily, a popular online fashion retail company. By 2021, the company was weaving more than $140 million in sales.

Leslie Anne Morris

As a commercial banker, Leslie Anne Morris was making around $250,000 a year. But she knew she could do more by pursuing an adjacent passion: real estate investing.

So she decided to start buying up cabins starting with some in the Smoky Mountains of Eastern Tennessee, as she continued her job in banking. She also earned a Master’s degree from the University of Southern California.

Morris even tapped a retirement account to buy and flip more cabins as she was getting mentored by her own clients who held real estate portfolios.

Snuggling up with millions

Eventually, her cabin business surpassed her banking salary and she began focusing on her own business. She quit in 2022. And she founded Invest in the Smoky Mountains and Josh’s Cabins.

By the summer of 2023, her own real estate portfolio was worth about $8 million.

Why we covered this

Some people may feel stuck at a job that’s not fulfilling or is holding them back from doing what they truly love. But while it can be an immensely intimidating task to quit your job and pursue your own business, many people did and found more than just self-fulfillment. They filled their wallets with millions.

So we thought we’d round up a few inspirational stories about these daring millionaires.

 

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