How is it possible Audrey Hepburn lived in such luxury during her life and then left such a large fortune?

Because Celebrity Net Worth is total bullshit. It's probably put together by an aged teenager in their bedroom: it certainly has that accuracy. Do they have a string of financial researchers? No. Just a lone blogger. Forbes it isn't.

Marilyn should have played Holly.

Point taken but what about the rest, the quality of life she enjoyed?

All that money for the powder room.

Smart lady who banked early at Edmond de Rothschild S.A. in Lausanne. Poor Capucine should have followed her example. Though Capucine was never A list.

Her primary house was wonderful. Perfect country living IMO.

She used to steal checks from Katherine Hepburn's mailbox.

She made her big money while married to Ferrer who then got half of it. So still makes no sense to me. Her expenses were huge.

In many parts of Switzerland for many decades a VIP could pay a commune 1 "tax" 1 time and that's it for a lifetime. Her expenses were not extraordinary and when she bought the house, real estate was not astronomical.

She had a lemonade stand on the side.

She must have had one hell of an agent. Probably made sure she got some decent residuals.

Wasn't she the highest paid actress in Hollywood for awhile? And I would guess she made something off being the "face of Givenchy" for years and years. The New York Times referred to them once as the "original brand ambassadors."

She smuggled blood diamonds out of Botswana in her vagine.

She was a pretty big star.

The only accurate estimator of wealth is Forbes. They use actual accountants, financial advisors, and industry experts who pour over a celebrity's salary, endorsement deals and other sources of income to determine annual income and total net worth. Don't trust any other source. Kanye West even sent Forbes his financial statements to get them to certify his billionaire status.

She was so poor during WWII...she resorted to eating tulip bulbs.

[quote]Kanye West even sent Forbes his financial statements to get them to certify his billionaire status.

*slow blink*

I don’t know about $100 million, but she wasn’t Elizabeth Taylor extravagant in her life and never saw her in gaudy jewelry or living extravagantly.

Irene dunnes career was over in the 50s but when she died in 1990 she was a multi millionaire many times over because she invested early and wisely and didn’t splurge or over indulge.

Her personal grocery and restaurant expenses were practically nil.

She might have been good at investments?

She did her family's shopping in Gstaad and had the same trolly for years.

Well she never ate, so imagine the lifetime of savings.

R5 was capucine having financial difficulties? I just thought she was depressed about being old and alone.

Capucine was not living the lux life. I don't know if she was broke but there was no maison de maître on Lac Leman and no chalet à Gstaad.

Didn't her sons fight for decades over the items in her estate? I assumed that meant there wasn't a lot of actual cash in the estate, but I'm not finding any real details online.

Trump fooled Forbes for years. They finally stopped believing him.

R24 Capucine was the poorman's Hepburn.

Hepburn charged $600,000 for 6 months. Capucine could be hired for just HALF of that amount.

Audrey's house wasn't on the lake. Capucine was just about on the lake and the view from her enormous terrace was magnificent.

Ok R28 you got me.

She was hugely popular in Japan and became the face of some Japanese brands in the peak of their economic boom in the 80s. I assume they paid her fortunes.

How much did she auto dump in her man's bank account every month? Seriously, what was the going rate?

R21, I love that.

She probably saved and invested and wasn’t a big spender. If she’d been achingly poor as a child, she probably feared being poor again, and developed careful habits.

She seems to have been a lovely person inside and out. Class act, that one.

You are correct, r18, Dunne didn't splurge. When she was appointed one of five alternative U.S. delegates to the United Nations, Loretta whisked her off to Mainbocher to get an appropriate updated wardrobe suitable for the position.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Another story about Dunne and Loretta Young that showed how she was about spending was when her and Loretta went to a function together and Loretta saw Irene wasn’t wearing any jewelry and took off her diamond ear clips and insisted that Irene wear them. Irene reluctantly did. Dunne took the earrings off later on and wrapped them in a tissue and put them away. The next day she realized she hadn’t given the earrings back and when she went to get them she could only find one of them. Irene went to lorettas jeweler to have the earring replaced/copied. It cost her $12k and she never borrowed anything from anyone again.

I would certainly take fashion advice from Loretta!

[quote] Kanye West even sent Forbes his financial statements to get them to certify his billionaire status.

Oh please. Forbes gave up its credibility a long time ago. It is a publicity outlet for trashy stars like Kanye et. al. There is no way his net worth is what he claims. The only reason they exposed Kylie is because they were about to get called out for enabling the Kardashians.

She was on the board of a bazillion hospitals, charities & yes she got paid for it. And got perks - gowns, limo service, tickets to everything, jewelry, etc.

I heard she was a yacht girl in Dubai!!!

Probably whored herself out to middle eastern oil shieks once in a while. They all do/did.

Not *all* r40 and certainly not Audrey.

Wasn’t Mel ferrer from quite a wealthy family. Seems both her husbands may have been wealthy in their own right.