out for the kids to eat during recruiting visits.” STRONG WORK ETHIC With a degree from MSU’s business school, the overachieving third-string point guard morphed over two decades into a feisty 41-year-old chairman and chief executive. The Bloomberg news service estimates his personal fortune at $9.42 billion, ranking him as the world’s 244th richest person. Yet he still credits Spartan basketball coach Tom Izzo, along with his father, lawyer Jeff Ishbia, as the mentors most responsible for his position today. “My father always worked extremely hard when I was a kid,” he said. “He used to come and coach my games and then go back to the office, because there weren’t computers in those days. Like Izzo, he showed me that the guy who works the hardest has the best chance.” One of his first athletic accomplishments was Ishbia’s selection for Detroit’s youth Maccabi team at the age of 13. The Detroit Jewish News named him as the Jewish Athlete of the Year as a senior in high school. These days, Ishbia hasn’t much time for basketball. He arrives at the headquarters of his company, United Wholesale
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COURTESY OF UWM
BUSINESS
LEFT: Ringing the bell on the New York Stock Exchange. RIGHT: Mat and his father, Jeff Ishbia.
Mortgage (UWM), in Pontiac by 4 or 4:30 a.m.; he remains at the office, he said, until 6 or 6:30 p.m. “I’m competing with Rocket Mortgage, Dan Gilbert, Jamie Dimon from Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, these big guys,” he said. “We didn’t have as much money as them. We didn’t have as much access to things, but we have all 24 hours in a day, and if I can outwork them every day, I’m going to end up ahead. That’s what I’ve been doing for 18 years now, coming in and working three extra hours a day more than them. That adds up to a lot of hours of overtime.” MOVE TO PONTIAC Ishbia acknowledges great affection for Metro Detroit and welcomes the responsibility of deploying his wealth on behalf of the community, especially where the need is greatest.
Finding UWM’s former headquarters in Troy “landlocked” and not able to expand, Ishbia chose Pontiac in 2018 “as a place we could grow into and make a positive impact.” In November, UWM paid $23.3 million to buy the 15.8-acre onetime Ultimate Soccer sports complex, part of which will be converted to workspace and the rest for youth sports activities. “I love Pontiac,” Ishbia said of the city, which has been one of Michigan’s most economically troubled. “My mother was a teacher in Pontiac for 25 years. I played basketball there. We’ll do some cool things with the sports center. We’re bringing activity to the city. I’ll do a school, a community center. But our biggest impact will be to run a really great business.” He noted that UWM hired 1,500 new employees since January.
Among his philanthropic activities was a $32 million donation in February to — surprise! — Michigan State athletics. The money will be used to upgrade football facilities and will include the renaming of the Breslin basketball arena for Tom Izzo. Like Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and many other billionaires, Ishbia knows that great riches come with societal expectations. “I’m newer to the game of making an impact,” said the single father of three children. “The things that are most core to me are kids, making an impact on children, and at the same time homelessness and people who are hungry.” The pandemic hasn’t slowed UWM’s growth. While some employers point to a future mix of in-home and in-office work, Ishbia prefers keeping his team together as much as possible. When directives from the state
Josh Linkner’s Big Little Breakthroughs will be on sale April 20. Linkner, founder and CEO of five tech companies, including Detroit Venture Partners, and a popular innovation speaker and author, shares his Eight Core Obsessions of Everyday Innovators.
A recent staff addition at Cherry Republic’s headquarters in Glen Arbor, Mich., is Leah Moskovitz, from West Bloomfield and a 2012 graduate of West Bloomfield High School. Moskovitz is the Workgroups & Housing Supervisor. She earned her bachelor’s
here’s to Veteran journalist/ author Berl Falbaum’s new expanded book on Donald Trump has been published. Not One Normal Day: Trumpedia: A Tome of Lies, Scandals, Corruption and Much More is an important reference book for future generations who
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will have a difficult time understanding how Trump ever occupied the highest office in the land. Originally published in 2019, it has been updated to include his loss for reelection on Nov. 3, 2020, the Jan. 6 insurrection and Trump’s acquittal of his second impeachment.
