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The Wealth Of U.S. Presidents: An In-Depth Look At Their Financial Legacies

Author Dalboyy

There have been 45 individual Presidents of the United States, starting with George Washington in 1789 and going up to Joe Biden today. Joe Biden is technically the 46th Presidency because Grover Cleveland held the office for two non-consecutive terms, first from 1885 to 1889 and then from 1893 to 1897. But there have only been 45 individual Presidents in the history of the United States.

As you may have noticed, our Presidents have not been a particularly diverse group of people. Every single President has been male, and only one wasn't white. But that doesn't mean every President has been extremely rich—at least not before they got elected.

In terms of wealth and net worth, American Presidents have come from very wide and diverse backgrounds. We’ve had Presidents who were extremely wealthy and some who had no money at all. We’ve had Presidents who died penniless, and others who have earned fortunes after leaving office thanks to book deals, consulting jobs, speaking events, and more.

Side note: We want to acknowledge the morbid (but true) fact that some early Presidents owned slaves, and those slaves were counted as assets when accounting for their wealth. Whenever we publish an article about early Presidential wealth, we receive a handful of complaints from people who think we are making light of slavery by including it as part of someone's net worth. We are not making light of slavery. The reality is that owning hundreds of slaves was an extremely valuable asset, sometimes the most valuable asset someone had in the 1700s and 1800s.

The Role and Responsibilities of the President

Being the President of the United States is definitely one of the greatest jobs in the world. Not only are you the most powerful person in the free world, but you get paid a hefty salary plus incredible perks like access to Air Force One, Camp David, and, of course, The White House.

Since 2001, The President has been paid an annual salary of $400,000. The President also has access to a $200,000 travel and entertainment expense account. Between 1789 and 1873, the President's salary was $25,000, which is equal to $673,000 in today's inflation-adjusted dollars. In 1873, the salary was increased to $50,000 ($992,000 today). In 1909 it was bumped up to $75,000 ($1.9 million), then in 1949 it was raised to $100,000 ($967,000), and then in 1969 the salary was set at $200,000 ($1.2 million).

A final perk of being President is that once you leave office, you are paid an annual pension of $199,000. You are also entitled to Secret Service protection for life plus $100,000 per year for staff, an office space, and medical insurance. This last perk only became available to Presidents after 1958. Enough dilly-dallying; let's take a look at the inflation-adjusted net worth of each American President, listed from richest to poorest!

The Richest Presidents of All Time: Inflation-Adjusted Net Worth

#1: Donald J. Trump – $2.3 billion (Real estate investments, reality television, endorsements, licensing)

#2: George Washington – $525 million (Owned 8,000 acres of Virginia farmland and 300 slaves)

#3: Thomas Jefferson – $212 million (Owned 5,000 acres of Virginia farmland plus dozens of slaves. Technically speaking, though, Jefferson was flat broke when he died after living far beyond his means for over a decade. Jefferson was known to spend inflation-adjusted $1 million per year just on wine. He also spent lavishly on art, books, and musical instruments, racking up large personal debts. At the time of his death, Jefferson's debts far exceeded the value of his estate, Monticello, which was also his primary source of wealth.)

#4: Theodore Roosevelt – $125 million (Inherited a large trust fund and more than 200 acres of land on Long Island)

#5: Andrew Jackson – $120 million (Real estate, 300 slaves, inheritance, plus he married into money.)

#6: Bill Clinton – $120 million (Bill's net worth was just $700,000 on his first day in office. Since re-entering private life, Clinton has earned more than $100 million from speaking engagements alone. He also has made a fortune from book sales)

#7: James Madison – $100 million (Owned 5,000 acres of Virginia farmland and dozens of slaves)

#8: John F. Kennedy – $100 million (Father Joseph was worth $1 billion from liquor importation, real estate, and more)

#9: Lyndon B. Johnson – $100 million (Owned a radio and TV station plus a 1,500-acre ranch in Texas)

#10: Barack Obama – $70 million

#11: Herbert Hoover – $75 million (Made millions in the mining industry, owned millions in valuable real estate)

#12: Franklin Delano Roosevelt – $60 million (Inherited millions, owned hundreds of acres of valuable real estate on the East Coast)

#13: John Tyler – $50 million (Owned thousands of acres of tobacco plantations)

#14: George W. Bush – $50 million (Texas Rangers, oil investments, stocks, book sales, and speaking engagements)

#15: James Monroe – $30 million

#16: Martin Van Buren – $25 million

#17: George H. W. Bush – $25 million

#18: Grover Cleveland – $25 million

#19: John Adams – $20 million

#20: John Quincy Adams – $20 million

#21: Richard Nixon – $15 million

#22: Ronald Reagan – $13 million (This was Reagan's net worth at the time of his death in 2004. When his wife Nancy died 12 years later, the value of their estate had grown to $25 million, thanks mostly to the appreciation of their Bel Air mansion.)

#23: James K. Polk – $10 million

#24: Joseph R. Biden – $9 million

#25: Dwight D. Eisenhower – $8 million

#26: Gerald Ford – $7 million

#27: Jimmy Carter – $7 million

#28: Zachary Taylor – $6 million

#29: William Henry Harrison – $5 million

#30: Benjamin Harrison – $5 million

#31: Millard Fillmore – $4 million

#32: Rutherford B. Hayes – $3 million

#33: William Howard Taft – $3 million

#34: Franklin Pierce – $2 million

#35: Chester A. Arthur – $1 million

#36: William McKinley – $1 million

#37: Warren G. Harding – $1 million

#38: Calvin Coolidge – $500 thousand

#39: Woodrow Wilson – $400 thousand

#40: Harry S. Truman – $300 thousand

#41: James Buchanan – $250 thousand

#42: Abraham Lincoln – $250 thousand

#43: Andrew Johnson – $200 thousand

#44: Ulysses S. Grant – $50 thousand

#45: James A. Garfield – $10 thousand

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