Houston Vs. Brown Family Feud History

Despite being one of the most successful and best-selling artist of all time, Whitney Houston was no stranger to financial problems. As a matter of fact, just months before her untimely death on February 11, 2012, Houston was reportedly broke and owed more than $20 million.

Although it may seem impossible that a singer of her talent and popularity died millions of dollars in debt, at the time of her divorce from Bobby Brown in 2007, Houston had no more than $10 million in assets and almost $5 million in debt.

It was also the time when family feuds started to emerge, all of them apparently revolving around the late diva’s money.

In 2008, Whitney’s step-mother Barbara sued the singer for keeping one million dollars in life insurance that she had inherited from her late father, claiming they rightfully belonged to her. To cut a long story short, Barbara said that Whitney should receive $700,000 for a mortgage she held over her father’s property and give Barbara the rest.

As it turned out, Barbara was right. Whitney’s father had intended to repay Whitney and leave the remainder of the money to his wife. Whitney, however, decided to counter-sue, determined to take everything away from Barbara, including her house and the insurance money with interest.

Pointing out to the fact that Barbara was 40 years younger than her father, worked as his cleaning maid and married him days after the divorce between her parents was finalized, Whitney Houston won the lawsuit. She died before Barbara left the house.

However, it was not until after Houston’s funeral that the real feud started. The very first incident occurred at the ceremony, when Bobby Brown and his family were asked to relocate three times.

Houston’s family obviously didn’t want him there and came up with a way to annoy him and make him leave the funeral – which he did. According to TMZ, Whitney’s mother Cissy was determined to keep Bobby as far away from her granddaughter Bobbi Kristina as possible because she was concerned he would try to get his hands on some of Houston’s money.

Speaking of her money, the rise in record sales after Whitney’s death earned her estate millions of dollars and paid off Houston’s debt, leaving Bobbi Kristina an incredibly wealthy young woman.

Signed one month before Bobbi Kristina was born, Whitney’s will stated that her entire wealth would go to her children – seeing as she only had one child, and went through a divorce, Whitney had no other options than to update her will.

However, not only did Whitney fail to update her will, but she also failed to set up a trust, leaving her only daughter completely unprotected.

According to her 1993 will, Bobbi Kristina was to receive 10% of her mother’s wealth at age 21, one-sixth at age 25, and the rest at age 30.

Seeing as Bobbi Kristina was so young and just buried her mother, Whitney’s mother was concerned that she was neither mature nor responsible enough to deal with millions of dollars at age 21. She was certain that Whitney wouldn’t have wanted Bobbi Kristina to receive so much money at such an early age and she, along with Whitney’s sister-in-law Pat, started legal actions to prevent Bobbi Kristina from inheriting all those millions on her 21^st birthday.

Since their efforts proved futile, Houston’s family wanted to keep Nick Gordon away from Bobbi Kristina and Pat even filed a restraining order against him.

As far as Nick Gordon is concerned, he and Bobbi Kristina grew up together (he had lived in Houston’s house since he was 12 years old), behaved like siblings and Whitney’s daughter even referred to him as her ‘big brother.’

All of that changed when the two announced their engagement in 2012, less than 9 months after Whitney Houston’s death. Their announcement shocked everyone in the family, with Cissy Houston calling the relationship ‘incestuous.’

Although Brown later claimed everyone agreed with their relationship, it seems that she was unaware that both the Brown and the Houston family had their doubts when it comes to Gordon’s sincerity. They believed he was only in it for the money and were certain he didn’t really love Bobbi Kristina. Things only got worse when the couple said they got married on January 9, 2014, only two months before Bobbi Kristina was to become a millionaire.

One year later, on January 31, 2015, Bobbi Kristina was found unresponsive in her bathtub. This happened just three years after her mother was found dead, also in a bathtub.

Bobbi Kristina, who suffered severe brain damage, was placed in a medically-induced coma. During the following six months, her family continued to fight. They gave contradictory statements to the press and attacked each other, although they somehow managed to agree on her medical care.

Her father Bobbi Brown and her aunt Pat Houston served as her co-guardians, making all the decision during the period Bobbi Kristina was in a coma. However, the court in charge of her case didn’t allow family members to be her conservators, instead appointing an Atlanta attorney named Bedelia Hargrove to take care of everything money-related.

Apart from managing her finances, Hargrove sued Nick Gordon on behalf of Bobbi Kristina. He accused Gordon of assault and battery, stalking, fraud and god-knows-what-else, claiming that he only wanted to benefit from Bobbi Kristina’s wealth.

He stated that Gordon “routinely transferred a large portion of Brown’s funds” into his own bank account, without her knowledge or permission. Moreover, the lawsuit stated that he stalked one of the trustees (leading to a restraining order) and even took more than $10,000 out of her account while she was in coma. To make things worse, Hargrove alleged that Gordon was violent towards Bobbi Kristina and that he was the one who assaulted her and placed her in a bathtub to die.

Reportedly heartbroken, Gordon begged Brown’s father and aunt to attend her funeral, sending a long email in which he humbly asked them to allow him to say goodbye to her. We don’t know if they replied, but Gordon was not present at her funeral.

Although Gordon was not present at Bobbi Kristina’s funeral, the ceremony was overshadowed by another family fight. Namely, Bobby Brown’s sister Leolah was asked to leave the funeral because of her disrespectful behavior towards Houston’s sister-in-law. She apparently told Pat that Whitney is ‘going to haunt her from her grave.’

If all of this wasn’t enough, someone who had access to Bobbi Kristina’s hospice room sold a picture of her taken just moment before her death to the National Enquirer. The tabloid featured the picture from Bobbi Kristina’s deathbed on their cover, along with an image of Whitney Houston in her casket.

It seems the family feud is far from over, even though Whitney Houston and her daughter Bobbi Kristina are no longer among the living. As to where the rest of the money will go (much was spent on Brown’s medical bills), Whitney’s will states that any money left from her estate will go to her mother and two brothers.