At one point Antoine Walker was worth an upwards of $110million, then he lost it all. Literally, ALL. After signing to the Boston Celtics in 1996, Walker went against everything his financial advisor said, and did what he wanted with his newfound wealth. The former NBA star sat down with Yahoo to discuss how life has been since and credits his arrogance and ignorance as to why he went broke. “Through my young arrogance, being ignorant to a degree and being stubborn and wanting to do my own thing with my money, I went against a lot of his wishes,” Walker said.
Growing up, Walker was the oldest of six children & helped his mother raise his siblings. When he was drafted to the Celtics, between him wanting to take care of his family and becoming accustomed to the finer things, he was quickly burning through his rookie checks. According to Yahoo, Walker upgraded his entire family to live in multi-million dollar homes that he built from the ground up. His driveways were filled with four to five luxury cars — from Bentleys and BMWs, to his prized $350,000 Maybach. And as one of the most fashionable ballers, Walker never wore the same designer suit twice.
He also became very “MC Hammer” with his money and began lavishly spending on not just family, but friends and acquaintances, treating to lavish trips and luxurious gifts.
Let’s not forget Walker’s nasty gambling habit. He lost nearly $650,000 in just two years. In an attempt to invest Walker bought over 140 properties in the South Side of Chicago but we all know what happened with the real estate market and he ended up defaulting on several loans. “I think there were different ways of how I could have saved the bulk of my wealth. I could have been on top of it. I missed a lot of court dates, a lot of default judgments, there’s a lot of properties I could have kept that I thought were good investments,” Walker said.
By 2010 Walker declared bankruptcy, citing $12.74 million in liabilities with $4.28 million in assets. According to Yahoo in the two year bankruptcy process Walker was stripped of his credit cards, his bank accounts were frozen and he had to liquidate many of his priceless possessions, including his NBA championship ring his team, Miami Heat, won in 2006.
Now two years later the process is over and Antoine Walker has made some major life changes. As you can imagine there are no more lavish cars and homes. He now lives in a home in Chicago with him and 5 of his family members. He also offers some sound advice to rookie athletes thinking about entering the NBA, “Get the word ‘No’ in your vocabulary. You’re going to have to say no to a lot of people that are very important to you. Stick to your financial plan and don’t invest until you’re done with your career when you’re able to be hands-on.”
