Vanessa Amorosi’s net worth: How pop star went from a highly paid international musician to ‘struggling’ to pay the bills as she forces her mother onto the streets in bitter court win

Former pop star Vanessa Amorosi can’t afford to pay her mother without evicting her and selling her house.

Amorosi’s mother Joyleen Robinson may have lost her ugly battle in the Victorian Supreme Court to keep her “dream home”, but her daughter is still entitled to $870,000 in damages, a sum she is unable to pay, the court has ruled.

In 2001, when Amorosi was at the height of her stardom, her tax returns showed she had earned $862,000 in one year.

On Monday, Judge Steven Moore ruled that Amorosi’s mother had 60 days to vacate the Narre Warren North home where she had lived since 2001.

The house in Melbourne’s south-east, perched atop a leafy hill on Boundary Road, was at the centre of a court case after Amorosi allegedly gave it to her mother during a conversation in the kitchen that same year.

The $870,000 owed by Mrs. Robinson was intended to repay $650,000 plus interest her mother had previously given her as payment for what she claimed was the “dream house.”

The court ruled that Amorosi not only could not pay the money, but he also could not get a loan to pay the amount.

“Ms Amorosi’s lawyer has stated that she does not believe she will be able to obtain a loan to finance the payment of the sum of $650,000 plus interest and that she instead intends to sell the property on Boundary Road to raise the funds necessary to pay Ms Robinson,” Judge Moore said.

“Without the sale of the Boundary Road property, she does not have the means to make the payment.”

The singer made her breakthrough in 1999 with the release of her debut single ‘Have a Look’, which achieved gold status in Australia.

The following year, she achieved international success with her debut studio album, The Power.

Amorosi performed at the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games.

Her performance of ‘Heroes Live Forever’ during the opening ceremony received international acclaim.

But it was her song ‘Absolutely Everybody’ that became the unofficial anthem of the Games and was a huge hit in Australia and many European countries, including Britain and Germany.

She has sold more than two million albums and singles worldwide.

Amorosi, who flew to Australia from Los Angeles last year to attend the trial, had become suspicious of her mother’s handling of her assets in 2014, and hired forensic accountants to investigate how her mother was handling her assets.

Seven years later, she hired lawyers and filed a 213-paragraph writ with the Supreme Court.

Through mediation between the parties the claim was significantly reduced and the dispute over the property at Narre Warren North was eventually resolved by Judge Moore.

During the trial, Amorosi was forced to take the witness stand, where she was questioned about her personal finances.

Ms Robinson’s lawyer, Daniel Harrison, repeatedly told Amorosi that she had fallen on hard times and described her financial situation as “bad”.

“What I want to tell you is this: the reason there is such a limited amount of money in the Llama Trust now is because what you have earned over the last 20 years has been eaten up over time by what you have spent over the last 20 years. Do you agree with that?” he then asked the star.

“I know my mother suggested that, yes. I don’t agree with it,” Amorosi replied.

“And I want to point out to you that your current poor financial circumstances… are not good, right?” Mr. Harrison continued.

“Why do you suggest that?” Amorosi replied.

“I disagree with that.”

“I believe that your current financial circumstances are the reason that you now have a claim on the property on Boundary Road. Do you agree with that?” he continued.

“I disagree with that,” Amorosi said.

Mr Harrison alleged that Amorosi’s mother had entered into a verbal agreement with her daughter in 2001 allowing her to purchase the Narre Warren property from her daughter at any time for $650,000.

Mrs Robinson, who was on the witness stand, also claimed that her once-famous daughter had struggled financially in the lean years that followed.

Mrs. Robinson once claimed that her daughter was so poor that she could not even buy Christmas presents for her child.

“I love my daughter, I would give her anything, so I gave her money because she needed it,” Mrs Robinson told the court.

“It was a mother helping her daughter who was struggling financially, who was having a hard time. I know she wanted to buy some Christmas presents and that was for her son.”

Mrs. Robinson, who transferred $25,000 to her daughter at the time, claimed her daughter had told her about her money problems.

“She actually told me, she needed money,” she told the court.

The court heard that Amorosi had also been evicted from her original home in the United States due to rising costs.

“Vanessa told me through her business manager in America that she couldn’t afford to stay there because of all the extra costs, the fire insurance and all the bills that were piling up on that property,” Mrs Robinson claimed.

Now that the case is effectively closed, a new battle has begun over who will pay the enormous legal fees Amorosi incurred in pursuing the case.

In addition to losing her home, Mrs Robinson fears that the $870,000 in damages her daughter is ordered to pay will amount to little if she has to pay her legal costs.

Amorosi employed a team of lawyers, including an expensive King’s Counsel – an experienced lawyer.

“That’s my concern now, because I’m waiting to see if I’m going to have to pay half or all of her costs. They haven’t worked that out yet,” Mrs. Robinson said.

‘Every time we went to court she paid a King’s Counsel, a barrister, a junior barrister, her barrister. Silly me goes with one barrister.’

Ms Robinson said that even months after the end of the case, lawyers’ bills are still coming in.

“I’m almost going bankrupt,” she said.

The fight will take place next month in the Supreme Court of Victoria.