Everyone wants to know what President Donald Trump’s net worth is, and the truth behind it may surprise you.
It’s the question that no one seems to have the answer to: what on Earth is President Donald Trump’s net worth? If you ask the man himself, he’ll tell you he’s worth north of $10 billion. But as we all know, The Donald is prone to embellishment.
The real answer is actually pretty surprising, and very difficult to unravel. Forbes has made the biggest effort to solve the mystery, publishing an article titled “The Definitive Net Worth of Donald Trump.” In the piece, they argue that Trump’s net worth is about a third of what Trump himself claims at $3.5 billion.
What’s shocking about that is not really the total amount of Donald Trump’s net worth, but where it all falls. While we all know Trump made a lot of his money in real estate, we tend to think of the Trump brand as more valuable than it is. But as the constant failures of Trump-branded products like Trump Steaks, Trump Vodka, and the widely ridiculed Tour de Trump tell us, his brand is a lot of bark and not nearly as much bite. That’s why just $230 million of his $3.5 billion — less than tenth of his net worth — comes from brand businesses.
He actually has slightly more money from just cash and personal assets than he does from the Trump brand at $270 million. And his golf clubs and resorts make up $620 million. The vast majority of his remaining net worth, more than $2.3 billion, come his real estate holdings. Which means as much as Trump wants to bill himself as an expert businessman who knows how to create products that make money, at the end of the day he’s just a guy who owns a lot of real estate.
Of course, Trump has often bragged about his wealth. “It’s very simple. If I call five guys about Trump Tower, [and tell them] I want $2 billion,” he once said according to Forbes, “I’d have checks on my desk in ten minutes.”
Daniel J. Brown
Daniel J. Brown (Editor-in-Chief) is a recently retired data analyst who gets a kick out of reading and writing the news. He enjoys good music, great food, and sports, with a slant towards Southern college football, basketball and professional baseball.