Ian Somerhalder has opened up about the financial crisis that forced him to walk away from one of TV’s most lucrative careers and sell houses, paintings, cars and watches to make ends meet.
The The Vampire Diaries star told E! News that fraud and a poorly built business left him and his wife Nikki Reed in an eight-figure hole, which meant the debt ran to at least $10 million.
“I left an insanely lucrative career in TV after financial upheaval from building a business that I didn’t build properly. And because of the fraud, it put my wife and I in an eight-figure hole. Eight figures is a hard hole to climb out of. But Nikki and I did it. You know, she really talked us out of this business of houses, watches, cars, cars, but we sold everything.
He was honest about the painful irony of the situation.
“I should have retired from one of the biggest TV shows in the world [instead of] starting businesses that would never pay me,” he said.
Somerhalder retired from acting seven years ago after his Netflix series V wars was canceled in 2020.
Before that, he had spent years as one of television’s most recognizable faces, first as Boone Carlyle on Lostthen as vampire Damon Salvatore across all eight seasons of The Vampire Diaries on CW.
He previously credited Reed, whom he married in 2015, with saving him from what he called a “true nightmare.”
In an Instagram post at the time, he wrote that she had “dedicated her life to getting me out of that mess and it nearly killed her along the way. I am where I am BECAUSE of this woman.”
Looking back on the decision to leave acting, Somerhalder expressed no regrets.
“I remember sitting with my management and talking about this and saying, ‘Hey, this is the only thing I’ve ever known that’s sustained my family, and I’m walking away from it,’ at those kinds of high points. I’d much rather do this than go spend two months in a city and shoot a TV show away from my family. When you get to a certain level, you’re like, ‘Oka’s food and future energy and future energy and family. big thing.’ I don’t need to chase awards and anything that would make me feel better about myself.”
