Fact Check: Did Elon Musk help save home of elderly woman who lived there for 70 years?
WASHINGTON, D.C.: Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and one of the most popular businesspeople in the world, often finds himself embroiled in various claims and controversies. While the Tesla owner’s name is often laced with controversies, there are times when stories about his generosity also circulate on social media.
In March 2025, a viral post claimed that the DOGE head once helped a 96-year-old woman when she was "forced to sell her house to real estate agents."
As the claim took off on the internet amid Musk’s proposed social security cuts through his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the netizens started praising the tech billionaire for his apparent charity. Let's find out if the claim was actually true.
Claim: Elon Musk helped save an elderly woman’s home
As reported by Snopes, the claim that Elon Musk helped a 96-year-old woman save her home appeared initially in a video published on December 8, 2024. The video, nevertheless, appeared on a channel called Story Rewind, which mostly publishes embellished and false stories.
The video claimed that the real estate dealers were allegedly bullying the house’s original owner, an elderly woman named Margaret Turner (who the video claimed to be his former foster parent ), to sell the property that she used to share with her deceased husband.
The video was accompanied by a caption that read, "When Elon Musk, with plans to preserve historic homes, learns of her story, he steps in to offer her a lifeline. He promises to restore the home and protect it in perpetuity, allowing Margaret to remain until her final days. Musk's unexpected kindness grants Margaret the miracle she'd quietly prayed for."
The story again emerged in March when a Facebook user by the name of Elkarameloo shared a similar story on the social media site, complete with a collage made of images of Musk, a tiny house, and the X owner posing with an elderly woman.
Fact Check: The claim of Elon Musk helping woman has been proven false
As the Facebook post went viral with 162K likes and more than 31K comments, it became imperative to check the veracity of the claim.
However, detailed investigation over the internet proved that the story did not have an iota of truth in it.
Not only had the YouTube channel that initially posted the story been proved untrustworthy, but it has also been found that Story Rewind has previously made such false claims about the PayPal founder.
Moreover, as reported by Snopes, the video was also made partially using AI. A check on the AI detection platform Hive Moderation showed that there is a 99.9% chance that the video was made using AI.
Moreover, the images used are either AI-generated images or stock photos used in different contexts.
For example, a reverse search of an alleged photo of Turner with her husband gave the result that it was a stock photo downloadable from photo hosting sites, including Shutterstock.
The outlet further revealed that the elderly woman’s photo, which has been used to denote Margaret Turner, is actually the photo of a Scottish woman named Jessie Gallan, who passed away in March 2015, aged 109.
