NSYNC’s Joey Fatone had to auction his house to avoid bankruptcy

*NSYNC star Joey Fatone has lifted the lid on his brutal financial problems in the wake of the boy band’s sudden hiatus – revealing that his money problems became so severe that he was forced to sell his Florida home and move back into his parents’ home with his wife and children.

Fatone, 49, spoke candidly about his sudden fall from financial grace in a new Investigation Discovery documentary “Boy Band Confidential: A Hollywood Demons Event,” which explained how the shocking decision to indefinitely pause *NSYNC left him in a desperate situation.

The singer confessed that the news of the band’s hiatus in 2002 came as a total surprise to him, explaining that there was “never a conversation” between himself and his fellow members.Justin Timberlake, JC Chasez, Lance BassAnd Chris Kirkpatrick.

“There was never a conversation per se. There was never a goodbye. There was never anything,” he says in the documentary.

Before the band broke up, Fatone had felt incredibly comfortable financially. He even invested some of his hard-earned money in a massive 10,000-square-foot home in Orlando, Florida, which offered all kinds of luxurious amenities, including a movie theater, gym, and mini golf course.

The singer says he regularly contacted his accountant at the time to make sure his finances were in order. He noted that he asked for permission before buying the house for $2.7 million in 2001 because he was afraid of spending too much money.

“Money was coming in. I asked my accountant, ‘Hey, are we doing OK?’ “Yes, we’re great.” “I’m okay with buying this house, right?” He says, ‘Your kids’ kids are going to be okay,'” Fatone recalled in a clip obtained by Entertainment Weekly.

However, Fatone notes that in retrospect, his accountant probably didn’t know that his regular revenue stream would be cut off almost overnight.

By 2011, his financial situation was in a much more serious state, leading to his new accountant urging him to sell his sprawling mansion as quickly as possible to avoid impending bankruptcy.

“10 years later… when I go to a new accountant, I say, ‘Hey man, can you look at my finances and what’s going on?’ And he says, ‘You have to leave that house or you’ll go bankrupt.’ I said, ‘I’m sorry, what?'” Fatone reveals.

The extent of his financial problems was made painfully clear to him at Christmas, when his electricity was suddenly cut off because he couldn’t pay the bill – just as his family was getting ready to open presents and sit down to their festive meal.

Fatone was married to at the time Kelly Baldwinwith whom he shares two children – and the two had invited several members of his extended family to a party.

“There was a moment at Christmas when they turned off the lights in my house because I hadn’t paid the bill,” he says in the documentary. “I would almost go bankrupt. And I have a family. When I get married, I will have two children.”

While he admitted that these types of financial hardships happen every day, Fatone added that he faced further complications because of his fame – and his desire to keep his situation out of the public eye.

“These are certain things that happen in normal people’s lives too, but then for me you have to figure out, how can I do this without the public even looking at what’s going on?” he explains.

Fatone said he quickly swallowed his pride and turned to the people in his life who “had the most money” to ask them for financial help — but had the door slammed in his face more than once, leaving him little choice but to move his family in with his parents in Las Vegas.

Meanwhile, property records show that his Florida home was put on the market for $5.9 million in 2009, before that price was increased to $6.5 million in June 2010. Having failed to find a buyer by the following February, Fatone was forced to auction the property for the much lower price of $3.3 million.

Although humble, he admits that this experience encouraged him to embrace a new role in life; a role that didn’t rely on his past fame or *NSYNC successes, but instead focused on a career he forged himself, even if that meant taking on jobs he hadn’t previously considered.

“I lived in Vegas for almost a year and worked my ass off to slowly build some sort of career again in a sense,” he explains. “I went from playing stadium gigs to, a year later, two years later, to Broadway and then, suddenly, when things were bad, I was doing ‘The Price Is Right’ at Bally’s, a live show for maybe 100 people.”

In conversation with People magazineFatone said this low point in his life also taught him another important lesson: that ultimately it was his choice how he dealt with the disappointment.

“When I talk about going bankrupt myself and going down that path, when you had millions of dollars… to have almost nothing, it’s like, what do you do?” he said.

“Do you go off the deep end, as some people have done, and become addicted to trying to numb your body without thinking about it? Or do you get a positive attitude and say, ‘You know what? I can do it.'”

Fatone also experienced a newfound love for music and performing, explaining that this helped him stay positive even in the toughest of times.

“I love performing and I loved hosting. Honestly, I and [fellow executive producer Joe Mulvihill] I’ve always talked about this,” he said. “I’ve always had a positive attitude no matter what. You just have to think and realize that there is always light on the other side, in whatever form it takes.”

He explained that although his sense of “normality” was taken away from him after the end of the boy band, he knew he couldn’t let it take over his life.

“You may not get there right away. It may not happen overnight, but you will get there. Like I said in the doc, living with my parents with a wife and two kids and not knowing when I’m actually going to go out and go to my own house and have some normalcy… it was kind of taken away, because I didn’t know financial stuff and I didn’t know what I was doing,” he added.

Although Fatone’s life did not go as planned, he was grateful that some of his other boy band members did not suffer the same fate.

“It’s amazing to see the clarity. That’s a really cool thing, to look at someone where it’s cloudy during the day and then see their face and see them come to clarity, which is absolutely amazing,” he revealed.