What is Athina Onassis' Net Worth?
Athina Onassis is a French-Greek heiress and equestrian who has a net worth of $1 billion. She is the sole surviving heir to the Aristotle Onassis shipping fortune, and her net worth is largely a result of her famously wealthy family, but Onassis has made a name for herself as a competitive show jumper. Her career in the world of equestrian sport began as a teenager, when she was still known as Athina Roussel. Since then, Athina has attempted to reconnect with her Greek heritage by reinstating her Greek last name and learning the Greek language.
She has also been involved in some legal problems involving her inheritance, which was locked up in a trust fund controlled by a board of directors at the Onassis Company. Even her net worth has been called into question by those in the media, with some asserting that she is not a "billionaire heiress" as she is often referred to. Still, Onassis continues to be considered a billionaire by most of those "in the know," and it's a sure thing that her financial future is secure barring some kind of unforeseen catastrophic economic collapse.
Early Life
Athina Onassis was born Athina Hélène Onassis on January 29, 1985, in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. Her mother, Christina, was a Greek heiress, socialite, and businesswoman, and her father, Thierry Roussel, is a French pharmaceutical heir. Christina and Thierry divorced in 1987 after Roussel fathered two children with model Marianne "Gaby" Landhage. The following year, Christina sadly passed away from pulmonary edema when Athina was just 3 years old. Onassis was then raised by her father and Landhage, who he married in 1990. Athina attended school in Lussy-sur-Morges, Switzerland and took a preparatory course in Brussels, Belgium, then in 2003, she passed her baccalauréat exam. Onassis has a half-brother, Erik, and two half-sisters, Sandrine and Johanna. Her grandfather, Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis, was one of the richest men in the world; he was married to Jacqueline Kennedy at the time of his death, and she reportedly received $26 million from his estate.
Equestrian Career
Athina began riding horses during her childhood, and in 2001, she was the runner-up at an event in Jerez, Spain. She has participated in the Global Champions Tour as a competitive show jumper, and she has also served as a patroness of the competition. She established the Athina Onassis International Horse Show in São Paulo in 2007, and it moved to Rio de Janeiro two years later and to Saint-Tropez in 2014. In 2012, Onassis fell off her horse and suffered a spinal injury, but the following year she competed in the European Show Jumping Championships. She also took part in the 2014 World Championships. Athina and her former husband, Álvaro de Miranda Neto, co-owned AD Sport Horses, a Belgium-based business dedicated to breeding and training horses.
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Personal Life
Athina began a relationship with Brazilian show jumper/Olympic medalist Álvaro de Miranda Neto in 2003, and she bought an $8.6 million, 10,600 square foot home in São Paulo. The couple married on December 3, 2005, and they legally separated in 2016 after allegations arose that Álvaro was involved with another woman for eight years of their 11-year marriage. Miranda reportedly asked for 11 million euros in the divorce (based on their prenuptial agreement) and "350,000 euros for alimony, payment for their joint ventures, as well as custody of their horses and properties with a total value of 400,000,000 dollars." The divorce was finalized in late 2017, with Álvaro getting "almost nothing." During the marriage, Onassis was stepmother to Viviane, Miranda's daughter with model/actress Cibele Dorsa, and Fernando, Dorsa's son from a previous relationship. Cibele had agreed to let her children live with Athina and Álvaro so they could have a "very simple and healthy lifestyle." After Cibele's fiancé, Gilberto Scarpa, died in an apparent suicide in early 2011, Dorsa posted on social media, "To live without my two children and without the love of my life has wounded my whole self." Tragically, in March 2011, Cibele jumped to her death from a window of her São Paulo apartment building.
Onassis Estate
Athina's mother, Christina, inherited 55% of the Onassis fortune, and the remaining 45% of the estate (minus Jackie Kennedy Onassis's portion of $26 million ) was bequeathed to the Alexander S. Onassis Foundation, which was founded in honor of Aristotle's son, who died of injuries resulting from a plane crash in 1973. Since Christina didn't fully trust Thierry Roussel, the family arranged for the Onassis estate to be controlled by a board of administrators until Athina was of legal age. Christina appointed Paul Ioannidis, Theodore Gabrielides, Stelio Papadimitriou, and Apostolos Zabelas as trustees, and during Athina's youth, the board had to approve any expenditures that Roussel made on her behalf. In 1999, a court in Vaduz, Liechtenstein, ruled that the management of Athina's inheritance be transferred to the Switzerland auditing firm KPMG Fides.
Athina took control of the inheritance on her 18th birthday, and after she turned 21, her lawyers tried to have her instated as President of the Onassis Foundation to no avail. The foundation's then-President, Stelio Papadimitriou, stated, "This is the most prominent foundation in Greece. We are not going to turn it over to someone who has no connection with our culture, our religion, our language, or our shared experiences, and who never went to college or worked a day in her life. There's nothing we would want more than to have a descendant of Onassis become president of the foundation, but Athina's qualifications for the job are nil." According to her stepmother, Gaby Landhage, Athina had once told her that "if she could burn all the Onassis money, she would do it."
Real Estate
In 2014, Onassis paid $12 million for a horse farm in Wellington, Florida, and she sold the 5.62-acre property for $12.75 million in 2017. In 2013, Athina sold the Greek island of Skorpios to Russian billionaire Ekaterina Rybolovleva. Though the exact sale price is unknown, it is rumored to be around $150 million. Aristotle bought Skorpios for 3.5 million drachmas (which is equivalent to around $12,000 today) in 1963, and he is buried on the island, as are Christina and Alexander.
