Meghan Markle's net worth has been soaring since she left the U.K. Back in July 2020, Duchess Meghan and Prince Harry made headlines when they bought a $14.65 million Montecito property.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00From Hollywood actress to British royalty,
00:02Meghan Markle's journey has been nothing short of extraordinary.
00:06Today we're delving into the finances of the Duchess of Sussex
00:09to explore how she has built her impressive net worth.
00:12Because the girl is rich.
00:14Meghan Markle and Prince Harry made headlines back in 2020
00:16when they purchased a $14.65 million Montecito mansion.
00:21The home is over 18,000 square feet
00:23and has nine bedrooms and 19 bathrooms, according to Zillow.
00:27Am I crazy or is that an insane number of bathrooms?
00:30Think of the cleaning.
00:32Although I do assume that Prince Harry
00:33has never cleaned a toilet a day in his life, so...
00:36Anyway, when news broke of the couple's big home purchase,
00:39it did give royal watchers pause.
00:41I mean, how are they affording all that house?
00:44Lucky for them, home prices have absolutely skyrocketed in California
00:48since they purchased and Montecito prices have gone up even more so.
00:52Their home is now worth almost double what they paid.
00:55$27,643,300, a solid investment.
01:00Let's get into how she got multi-million dollar home level rich.
01:04Before meeting Prince Harry and stepping into the global spotlight,
01:07Meghan Markle carved out a successful acting career for herself.
01:10She was best known for her role as Rachel Zane on the legal drama Suits,
01:14which has since become quite a cult favorite.
01:17She reportedly earned roughly $46,000 per episode
01:21and was a part of 100 shows per the sun.
01:23A little fast math there means she would have made
01:26over $4 million from her tenure on Suits.
01:29She also made about $360,000 from her roles
01:32in the 2010 movies Remember Me and The Candidate.
01:35This doesn't classify as acting per se,
01:37but Meghan did famously play a role in Deal or No Deal as a suitcase model.
01:41She was in more than 30 episodes of the game show
01:44where she made $800 per episode.
01:46Small potatoes when you compare it to an acting gig,
01:48but it did help pay the bills.
01:50And I would end up leaving with this pit in my stomach
01:53knowing that I was so much more than what was being objectified on the stage.
01:58I didn't like feeling forced to be all looks and little substance.
02:02And that's how it felt for me at the time,
02:04being reduced to this specific archetype.
02:08Suffice it to say she wasn't a fan of the show.
02:11Outside of acting, Meghan also ran a lifestyle blog called The Tig,
02:14short for the Italian wine Tignanello.
02:17On that blog, she wrote about her life as a whole,
02:19but primarily focused on her love of food and travel.
02:22She made an estimated $80,000 per year from sponsorships related to the blog.
02:27Unfortunately, once things started getting serious
02:29on her relationship with Prince Harry,
02:31she had to shut the Tig down.
02:32Alas, Prince Harry was pretty loaded himself prior to his relationship with Meghan.
02:37His net worth as of 2018 was an estimated $25 to $40 million.
02:42This is thanks to his inheritances from his late mother,
02:44Princess Diana and his great grandmother, the Queen Mother.
02:47He also made $50,000 a year as a captain in the British Army.
02:51Meghan Markle and Prince Harry chose to step away from their duties
02:54as senior royals in January of 2020.
02:56This meant they were no longer funded by the Sovereign Grant,
02:59otherwise known as the pot of money paid annually to the monarch
03:02to fund his family's official duties.
03:04It used to account for 5% of the Sussex's administrative and household costs.
03:08They also had to pay back £2.4 million,
03:11otherwise known as $3 million of US taxpayers' money
03:14that was spent on renovating their former home, Frogmore Cottage.
03:17Now that they're on their own financially,
03:19Meghan and Harry have had to start hustling a bit.
03:21They signed with the high-profile Harry Walker agency,
03:24which also represents the Obamas and the Clintons.
03:26It's estimated that their fee for a speech is $1 million.
03:30Do that 15 times and you'll pay off your Montecito mansion.
03:34Another lucrative method of adding to the Sussex's income has been through writing.
03:38Meghan Markle's book The Bench came out in June 2021,
03:41and The Sun estimates that she received a $700,000 advance for it.
03:45Her husband Prince Harry's, however, came with a rumored $20 million windfall.
03:50Makes sense, since he did talk about nearly freezing off the family jewels.
03:55Speaking of millions of dollars, Meghan and Harry reportedly made another
03:59insane $20 million to sign with Spotify for their podcast series, Archwell Audio.
04:04Meghan released 12 podcasts,
04:05speaking with big-time celebs like Serena Williams and Mariah Carey for her Archetypes podcast.
04:10Then, in the summer of 2023, it was announced that the duo was parting ways with Spotify.
04:15Who knows if they were paid out for the entirety of their $20 million contract or not.
04:19In September 2020, Meghan and Harry announced that they had a new contract with Netflix.
04:24Our focus will be on creating content that informs but also gives hope,
04:28as new parents making inspirational family programming is also important to us,
04:32the couple said in a statement.
04:33At one point in time, they were rumored to be making $150 million from the deal,
04:38but later insiders said that was a grossly high and highly unlikely number.
04:43While someone like Shonda Rhimes can and has pulled a nine-figure contract from Netflix,
04:47the Sussexes are listed as producers, not creators, for their future series.
04:52A.K.A. there's less money in it.
04:54But still, it was the Netflix deal that a spokesperson confirmed
04:57gave them the liquidity to pay back the taxpayers' dollars for Frogmore Cottage.
05:02Overall, Meghan Markle and Prince Harry are worth a combined $60 million as of 2025,
05:07so they're doing just fine.
05:12For more stories, visit nyseagrant.org