Matthew Perry’s Will Explained As Bank Account Total Raises Eyebrows

Recent documents have shown Friends star Matthew Perry had a little over $1.5 million in his personal bank account at the time of his death. This shocked some people because the actor was reportedly worth $120 million. At the height of Friends success, he was earning $1 million per episode, and after, about $20 million a year in royalties. 

Jonathan Forster, a probate law expert explained that this is not uncommon and most of Perry’s assets are likely in a trust. Forster said the reason why we use trusts as opposed to wills is that trusts also avoid probate, and probate is a court-supervised transfer of assets, and probate is public.

“When we’re typically doing an estate plan with a will and a trust, the will simply leaves assets to the trust,” Forster said, which explained why there were no properties in Perry’s name. “You would fund [the trust] during your lifetime. The will would be kind of like a catch-all, where if there are any assets owned by the person when they pass away, the will is directed to transfer those assets into the trust.”

One of the trustees listed on Perry’s trust, Lisa Ferguson, is named on the title of his Pacific Palisades home where he died in October 2023. Ferguson was Perry’s business manager and she was named as one of several people in the actor’s will. Others named in the will were his parents, siblings, his ex-girlfriend, and close friend.

For more information see Shannon Power “Matthew Perry’s Will Explained As Bank Account Total Raises Eyebrows“, Newsweek, July 4, 2024.

Special thanks to David S. Luber (Florida Probate Attorney) for bringing this article to my attention.