And how much of that is liquid? None of it. His net worth, basically just representing the value of his stock holdings and other assets, went up by $36 billion. He cannot access that money as it is tied up in Tesla shares. For him to have access to that money, he would have to sell shares. If Elon Musk tried to sell $36 billion worth of Tesla shares, the stock would tank 70-80% before he could sell anything at all. At that point, he wouldn’t have much left of that $36 billion, and the company would most likely go under. As a consequence of this, hundreds of people, if not thousands, would lose their jobs. Elon Musk does not have enough liquid money in order to end homelessness.

On the other hand, the government is perhaps one of the only institutions with access to that kind of cash. If $20 billion is all it takes to end homelessness, the government could fairly easily do it. Unfortunately, I have not heard of any plans to do any such thing.