Tiger Lily's inheritance: The mystery over how much she'll get - and from where (2024)

The youngster is soon to turn 21 and receive a winfall...

She is about to turn 21 years-old. And, if reports are true, Michael Hutchence and Paula Yates' daughter - Heavenly Hiraani Tiger Lily - is set to receive millions of pounds from her late father's estate, this week.

The 20 year-old, whose birthday is on 22 July, is said to get a lump sum that's been accruing royalties in a trust fund for nearly two decades.

Yet there's still confusion over how much she could possibly get - and from where?

When Hutchence died in November 1997, his family were told he was virtually penniless.

Despite an estimated worth of £16 million, the managers of his estate said any cash left in Hutchence's account was minimal - and had been swallowed up by a £295,000 Greenpeace donation in his will.

They also said that his property portfolio, which he'd long talked about, wasn't actually his to sell or bequeath, leaving relatives with virtually nothing. Including Tiger Lily.

As a result, some say the impending windfall is far more modest than people imagine, while others believe it will transform her life. So what's the reality?

Although INXS haven't been shifting many records lately, the band's back-catalogue still contains classic tracks such as Never Tear Us Apart and Suicide Blonde, which remain popular with die-hard fans and new recruits.

Both of these songs, plus other hits such as I Need You Tonight, continue to sell in digital versions thanks to the band's newly-acquired status as a nostalgia act.

Contemporary artists have also sampled the band's music, including Snow Patrol and Professor Green, who hit Number 1 in 2010 with I Need You Tonight.

The surviving band also still tour the world with a replacement lead singer at festivals and solo shows, which regularly sell-out.

Tickets sales from these will likely generate a handsome sum, of which Tiger Lily will almost certainly get a share.

Cashing in on this, the official INXS website sells a variety of merchandise which - even if split between all performers - will steadily help generate cash for Tiger Lily over 20 years.

Another source of income is the Australian TV mini-series, INXS: Never Tear Us Apart, which told the story of the band.

Speaking around its release in 2013, the band's manager, Chris Murphy, revealed that one of the main reasons behind it was to generate money for Tiger Lily.

She will not only receive her father's share of the domestic royalties, but Murphy - a lifelong friend of Hutchence - also sold the series to a number of international buyers, including the UK, Canada, France and Latin America, where INXS had huge hits in their hey-day.

He also devised a business plan that would see the band's story turned into a movie and/or a stage musical, similar to Queen's We Will Rock You and ABBA's Mamma Mia!.

Although nothing has materialised yet, such projects often take years to materialise, so could well be in the making.

And, if successful, it could rake in a fortune. For example, the ABBA musical Mamma Mia! has cashed-in more than £500 million since it launched in 1999.

However, the stakes are high in London's expensive West End and one-time chart hits do not guarantee success.

Despite being written by Jennifer Saunders, the Spice Girl musical Viva Forever was a certified flop, closing just months after it opened.

Fortunately, there is one sum of money which Tiger Lily will definitely receive - and that's the £14,000 her mother Paula left in her will.

Although she had assets worth nearly £800,000, debts reduced the sum to £14,000, which was left entirely to Tiger Lily, excluding her half-sisters.

But is money really enough to heal such a dysfunctional set of parents?

INXS star Hutchence and TV ­presenter Paula famously began their romance when she interviewed him in flirty fashion on her bed on Channel 4’s Big Breakfast show in January 1995.

Tiger Lily was born 18 months later.

However, she was just 16-months-old when her father was found dead in a hotel room, and was four when her mother, Paula Yates, lost her life to an overdose, with Tiger Lilly in the house at the time.

Then, on the cusp of her 18th birthday, she became tangled-up in a bitter family feud between her adoptive father, Bob Geldof, and her real father’s family in Australia.

She then suffered more loss when her half-sister, Peaches Geldof, died of an overdose in April 2014.