Revealed: How footy star Wes Maas made his $800million fortune - and volunteered to spend big bucks to help NSW win State of Origin
Former NRL player and rich-lister Wes Maas has gone from fringe South Sydney Rabbitoh to running a $1.5billion business - and he's used some of his incredible fortune to make a sensational offer to NSW Blues star Matt Burton.
Maas won two reserve-grade premierships with Parramatta before playing for the Rabbitohs at NRL level, but the shrewd businessman now devotes his time to Maas Group, a massive construction and property company that is listed on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX).
Like Burton, Maas is no stranger to Dubbo rugby league, having played for powerhouse club Dubbo CYMS, where he was coached by future Bulldogs mentor Dean Pay and played alongside Penrith star Isaah Yeo's father Justin.
The 45-year-old was forced into an early retirement from the game due to shoulder issues in 2002, but returned to Dubbo, almost 400km north-west of Sydney, using $14,000 in savings to buy a Bobcat earthmover before borrowing $25,000 to pick up a single tipper truck.
And look where he is now.
Maas employs more than 1200 people and runs a company worth $1.5billion, with his estimated worth pegged at $814 million in 2024.
Maas said business was always more important to him than his footy career.
'I was probably one of the 10 per cent of people who wanted to work. I've always been a workaholic. That was probably to the detriment of my footy career,' he told a Financial Review podcast.
'I was a full-time football player. But I used to go to training at 6am in the morning, and then I finished footy training at 11 or 12, and then I'd get straight to work.'
He was a greenkeeper at Parramatta Stadium and Stadium Australia before moving into the hire and construction industry with Coates Hire.
The former footy player still owns 50 per cent of his company, which has four divisions: real estate, civil construction and hire, construction materials and manufacturing.
'Most of the things we do, we do 80 per cent of in house. We're quite different to a lot of developers who contract out,' he told Fairfax.
'Our cost is our cost. Obviously, we've seen inflation in house building, but we've been able to pass that on in house prices. We've maintained our margin.
'On the infrastructure side the business is as strong as ever, on the construction materials side it's as strong as ever. We've got a better forward order book than we've ever had.'
Burton, who has been the 18th man five times for the Blues, got a call from NSW management during his bye week leading into Origin game one this year.
The Bulldogs star was relaxing in his home town of Dubbo and was told that Stephen Crichton had injured himself and was in doubt for the Opener.
If Crichton couldn't play, Campbell Graham would be called in to play and Burton would need to get to Brisbane to be the 18th man.
Burton decided to call Massa, who is a mate of his.
'There wasn't going to be a flight straight from Dubbo to Brisbane, they'd been booked up, and obviously you want to give Critta as much time as possible to be right,' Burton told the Sydney Morning Herald.
'Because they couldn't make a call on Critta until 8am game day, the situation was pretty tight. Dubbo to Sydney and then flying to Brisbane, that was going to be too much running around and too tight again with not many flights.
'I didn't have any footy gear or anything either. I was on holiday. So I was ringing the Dogs and my manager for boots and footy kit, just having that ready in case.
'And I had a good mate with a plane in Dubbo who was ready to go, and I think he was pretty keen to do it, to be honest. It would've made an awesome story, right?
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