Ian Somerhalder Details How He Escaped 8-Figure Debt With Nikki Reed’s Help, Including Selling Cars

Ian Somerhalder revealed that he and wife Nikki Reed sank their teeth into crushing debt and found a way to bounce back — but not without putting in some serious work.

“I retired from acting seven years ago,” the Vampire Diaries alum, 47, told E! News at the Beverage Forum in Manhattan Beach, California, on Tuesday, April 28. “I left an insanely lucrative career in television after financial upheaval from building a business that I didn’t build properly. And due to fraud, it put my wife and I into an eight-figure hole.”

Somerhalder admitted that the debt was “a hard hole to climb out of,” going on to reveal that Reed’s help was essential to him getting back on track.

“But Nikki and I did it,” he added. “You know, she really negotiated us out of this deal but we sold houses, paintings, cars, watches, everything.”

Prior to getting in a relationship with the Twilight actress, 37, Somerhalder built a clean energy company while starring as Damon on The Vampire Diaries, revealing in May 2021 that it was a business venture he invested into “heavily” while making “huge personal guarantees to banks.” (The Vampire Diaries ran for eight seasons from 2009 to 2017.)