Perell was born and raised in Portland, Oregon, to be able to spend money as a kid, she went door-to-door and asked her Portland neighbors for metal cans which she would redeem at five cents apiece.

Her first job out of college was at an internet startup that went bankrupt. Kim began her journey as an entrepreneur from her kitchen table with a $10,000 loan from her 80-year-old grandmother, and grew the company to over $100 million in annual revenue. Kim went from broke and unemployed to selling her first company and becoming a multi-millionaire by the time she was 30.