Fear of being broke and homeless again keeps Tiffany Haddish careful about how she spends money. Haddish was at one point homeless and living out of her car, and today despite being worth an estimated $6 million, she has “broke PTSD,” Haddish said in a recent interview.
During an interview with Cosmopolitan, she explained that she likes to pay off debts. In fact, she revealed in 2020 that she used her $80,000 paycheck from her breakout role in “Girls Trip” to pay off the house that she’d bought after the first season of “The Carmichael Show” on which she’d appeared.
Building Generational Wealth Through Homeownership
“I started trying to figure out how to create generational wealth. The fastest way to do it and the first way you should do it is to buy some land,” Haddish said. “So before we even got into Season 2 of ‘The Carmichael Show,’ I bought a house. Everybody told me I should wait, but I didn’t care. I just knew I would have to always make enough money to take care of me and the house, and that’s what I did.”
Real estate remains one of the main ways Americans build weath. “Real estate is a proven commodity. There may be down years, but in the long term, real estate constantly appreciates and cash flowing real estate generates consistent income. Trends come and go in other industries and sectors, but real estate continues to be consistent,” reported Forbes.
But African-Americans lag sorely in homeownership due to a number of factors, including systemic racism. Today, the homeownership rate for Black Americans at 43.4 percent is lower than it was in 2010 (44.2 percent) and nearly 30 percentage points less than white homeownership.
Haddish’s Strict Budget
To pay off her mortgage, she also cracked down on her spending.
“Between that show’s next season, the ‘Keanu’ movie, and making sure I can live comfortably off of $500 a month, I was able to pay off half the house,” she said. “The ‘Girls Trip’ check was the final check. People told me to spend it in other ways, but I used it to pay off the house because I was always afraid of being homeless again,” she shared.
Fear Of Being Broke Keeps Haddish on a Budget
On the verge of starting college, the then-South Central Los Angeles-based Haddish found herself homeless at the age of 18. Having spent most of her teen years in foster care, she had just settled with her grandmother. But that proved not to last long as her grandmother kicked her out of her home, she reveled in her 2017 memoir,
“The Last Black Unicorn.”
In 1997, her social worker challenged her to attend the Laugh Factory Comedy Camp. Not long after, she met Kevin Hart, who, when learning Haddish was living out of her car, gave her money for a hotel room.
The experience of being homeless has affected how Haddish views money and spending.
“Now I have a surplus of money,” Haddish said. “But I’m still afraid of being poor again. Every movie I made, I would just buy another piece of land or a house.”
People advised Haddish against real estate, but she told Cosmopolitan she “was always afraid of being homeless again.”
Prepping for the Future and Knowing Her Value
To understand more about business and investing, Haddish said she recently began taking courses at Harvard University courses, courses such as the Business of Entertainment, Media, and Sports.
“I realized in that class that I’ve really been selling myself short all these years. You need the writer to tell the story, to put the story down on paper, but you need the performer to bring it to life,” “The Afterparty” actor said.
Now she says she stresses her value when making deals.
“Give me an opportunity to make you richer, sir,” Haddish said. “I might not know how to keep a man, but I know how to make some money.”
