Keith Urban Net Worth 2018 – How Rich is the Country Singer Now?

Compared to other forms of popular music, country music has a surprising amount of fan loyalty. In pop music, for instance, a few years without a bonafide hit can result in an artist being forgotten by the masses and relegated to obscurity. Keith Urban first achieved mainstream radio success in 1999—around the same time that boybands like The Backstreet Boys were in their heyday—and so it’s remarkable that he has remained a successful artist within the public eye during that time. Urban is known for much more than just his music, though. There’s his high-profile marriage, his interesting past, and his presence on television shows. Over the course of his career, Keith Urban has racked up a substantial net worth. Let’s take a look at how he did it.

Keith Urban Net Worth 2018 – $75 Million

How Did Keith Urban Make His Money & Wealth?

Keith Urban was born in Whangarei, Northland, New Zealand on October 26th, 1967, which makes him forty-nine years old at time of writing. He was the youngest child of parents Marienne and Bob Urban in South Auckland, but the family moved to Australia by the time he was in his late teens. While in his teens, Urban took guitar lessons and would play in local music competitions and act in youth theatre productions. Contrary to the style of country music that he would end up becoming famous for, Urban has said in interviews that as a youth he was primarily influenced by two rock guitarists: Fleetwood Mac’s Lindsey Buckingham and Dire Straits’ Mark Knopfler. It is easy to trace Urban’s clean, plucking style in many of his songs to the influence of these two legends.

When he was sixteen years old, Keith Urban appeared on an Australian TV talent show, and following that he toured around in Australia, playing in small clubs. Four years later, he signed his first major label contract with EMI. He toured as a backing musician with Slim Dusty, and sang backing vocals for INXS. After that, he moved to Nashville. In 1997, he formed a band called The Ranch—who released one moderately successful album on Capitol Records—and spent time playing guitar for other artists. Two years later, in 1999, he released his self-titled debut American release which lead to his major success in America.

The album spawned hit singles “Where the Blacktop Ends”, “Your Everything”, and “But for the Grace of God.” He released his second album, “Golden Road”  two years later. Unlike his first album, he wrote and produced the majority of the songs himself. The album’s first single was “Somebody Like You” which remains one of his best-known songs to date. The single spent six weeks at number one in the country charts. Other songs from his second album included “Raining on Sunday”, “Who Wouldn’t Wanna Be Me” and “You’ll Think of Me,” which won a Grammy award in 2005. “Golden Road” ended up performing extremely well, selling three million copies and gaining triple platinum certification.

After the success of “Golden Road” Keith Urban would go on to release many more albums. He released “Be Here” in 2004, “Love, Pain & the Whole Crazy Thing” in 2006, “Defying Gravity” in 2009, “Get Closer” in 2010, “Fuse” in 2013, and “Ripcord” in 2016. Admittedly, I have not listened to most of these records. He has also released four compilation albums, and has scored over twenty number one hits, so there will surely be no shortage of greatest hits albums put out when he decides to retire. He has embarked on a number of world tours, most recently the ripCORD tour last year, where he shared headlining slots with fellow country music star Carrie Underwood. He was one of four judges on the Australian version of The Voice in 2011, but stepped down after one season. After that, he replaced Steven Tyler as a judge of American Idol in 2012. He judged the show for the 12th and 13th seasons, and judged the show’s final season last year as well.

Keith Urban Personal Life and FAQ

Is Keith Urban Married?

One of the best-known things about Keith Urban is that he is married to actress Nicole Kidman, who has a net worth nearly double Urban’s at $130 million. Kidman has won many of acting’s highest awards, including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe. They represent one of the few instances of two extremely wealthy and famous people who were able to make a relationship work long-term, with seemingly few hiccups.

The pair reportedly met back in 2005—four years after Kidman’s divorce from Tom Cruise—well into both of their careers, at an event in Hollywood that was celebrating Australians. They began dating six months later, and were married a year and a half after that in Sydney.

Does Keith Urban Have Kids?

On the 7th of January in 2008, around a year and a half into their marriage, the couple announced that they were expecting a child. She gave birth to Sunday Rose Kidman Urban—not a very catchy name—on July 7th of that year, and had a second daughter—Faith Margaret—two years later, via surrogate.

Where Does Keith Urban Live? Picture of Keith Urban’s House

As a wealthy, high-profile couple with a growing family, it makes sense that Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman have invested in some pricey real estate over the years. They sold a house in Nashville that was over seven thousand square feet back in 2007. Their permanent home is now said to be on a forty acre farm just outside of Nashville. In 2008, they bought a house in Beverly Hills for around $5 million, and in 2013 they sold their New York penthouse apartment for around $13 million. It has recently been in the news that Urban purchased Nicole Kidman’s childhood home, which is in Hawaii. Kidman lived in Hawaii until she was four while her father was getting his PhD. The purchase of the house was said to be an impulse buy as a present for her fiftieth birthday. Kidman’s father passed away three years ago.

How Much Did Keith Urban Earn Last Year?

While Keith Urban’s earnings from 2016 are not readily available online, it seems to have been another successful one for the musician as he released a received album and toured extensively over the course of the year. The last year with a detailed record of Urban’s earnings that is publicly available reports that the star pulled in a whopping $28 million in 2014, which represents a third of his overall net worth. That would have included record sales, touring earnings, as well as his salary for American Idol which is said to have been $5 million per year.

Keith Urban’s Charity Work and Philanthropy

As an artist, Keith Urban has a reputation for being personable and down to earth, so it is no surprise that he has done a fair amount of charity work. He has raised nearly three million dollars in benefit concerts for the Country Music Hall of Fame, which isn’t a big deal to me but may be to others. More importantly, he’s an advisory board member for St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital. He performed at Live Earth in New York, and donates to a number of cancer-related charities.

Battle With Drugs

Part of what has made Keith Urban interesting in comparison to other country music stars—besides the fact that he isn’t American and therefore doesn’t parrot the same right-wing political views as many of them seem to hold—is that he doesn’t have the same squeaky clean image as your Alan Jacksons or George Straits. He harkens back to a different era of country music: guys like Waylon Jennings who could back up the themes they sang about in their songs.

Early in his career, while living and trying to make something of himself in Nashville, Urban became a cocaine addict. By 1998, he decided to kick the habit and checked himself into a rehab facility for treatment. He is said to have had a relapse in 2006, when he once again checked himself into rehab. At this time, he issued a public statement in which he commented upon how much he regretted the relapse and the negative effect it had on his marriage. He completed his rehabilitation the next year and announced a new tour.

Other Information about Keith Urban

An embarrassing legal situation emerged for Keith Urban back in 2007, when he tried to sue a painter of the same name for the rights to the website www.keithurban.com. Urban lost the legal battle, and the site still belongs to the relatively unknown painter, while Urban has had to settle for the domain www.keithurban.net.

That same year, in a further string of bad luck, Urban crashed his motorcycle while being followed home by a paparazzo. Urban, however, was unfazed by the incident, saying that it was simply the reporter trying to do his job while Urban was trying to maintain his privacy.

In 2013, Keith Urban launched his own line of guitars and guitar accessories.

He is a dual citizen of the United States and Australia.