You’d think someone who made $61 million in salaries during their NBA career would never end up in trouble financially, but that’s exactly what happened with former No. 1 overall pick Joe Smith. During his recent appearance on Vlad TV, Smith detailed how he ended up losing it all.
“I bought my mom’s house in Virginia, bought a house in the bay and I bought a house in Milwaukee,” Smith said. “… Those are three houses that I bought and lost a lot of money to get them off my hands. So, that’s when the issue came on the other end too, I didn’t make anything off the houses once I had to sell them.”
While he earned $61 million, taxes along with agent and management fees, meant he only ended up getting around $18 million. Buying three houses and not making much when selling them would leave even someone with millions in their pockets in a bit of bother.
What compounded that for Smith was his penchant for buying expensive cars. He had a Bentley, two Range Rovers, a Corvette, and two Mercedes. As if spending recklessly wasn’t bad enough, the situation got even worse thanks to a costly divorce in 2011.
“That’s what really cost me,” Smith said about the divorce. “I laugh about it now, but that’s what really cost me. The divorce left me with not much at all. That’s where a bulk of my retirement money went.”
When asked how much the divorce cost him, the 48-year-old revealed it was close to three million, which meant he lost over half of what he had. Vlad then brought up how Smith ended up $157k in debt and he shared how some properties in Las Vegas contributed to that.
“We had a place in Vegas, actually I forgot about that place,” Smith stated. “We had at the Signature Hotel in Vegas, we had two places on the 38th floor. Two suites up there that we bought and we really lost out on that when we got rid of it. So, that was most of that $100k+.”
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While some of this was self-inflicted, you can’t help but feel for Smith for how things just kept going from worse to worse in his life. His message to future NBA and NFL players is to be careful with their money and to be aware of where all of it is going.
Joe Smith Says His Ex-Girlfriend Forged Checks Worth $109K
The properties, expensive cars, and divorce weren’t the only ways in which Smith lost a lot of his money. In 2012, he attempted to file charges against his ex-girlfriend, “Love and Hip Hop Hollywood” star Moniece Slaughter, claiming that she had forged checks worth $109k when they were dating. Smith shared how he found out about it during this episode.
“I get a call from my financial advisor, this is like you say after I retired, so they can see the money being withdrawn quickly now because there’s not as much there in as it would be before,” Smith said. “So I get a call from my financial advisor and she’s asking why am I writing all these checks.”
Smith was confused, as he wasn’t one to write checks back then, preferring to pay via cash or card. That was what alerted his advisor as well, who then showed him just how much money had been withdrawn from his account. He then hired a private investigator who found out that Slaughter was the one behind it.
“Immediately I go to try to file charges,” Smith said. “But in L.A. they wouldn’t allow me to file charges because they said it’s a he say she say matter because she was saying I gave her blank checks to write the checks and I’m coming in saying that I’ve never given her checks. So they said they couldn’t bring a charge or charge her with anything because it’s he said, she said.”
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Smith says he hasn’t gotten a penny back from what he lost back then and is no longer expecting to get anything. He claims the signatures on them weren’t a great match, but still, the police didn’t bring charges on Slaughter and he lost $109k.
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