Who Received Chester Bennington’s Linkin Park Royalties? Did His Family Inherit His Money And Estate?

Known for its unusual combination of the sounds from heavy metal and hip hop music, Linkin Park has faced an inutterable challenge when they lost their beloved frontman, Chester Bennington. The tragic story behind his death saddened millions of people around the world and affected his family deeply.

One of the best-selling bands in history, Linkin Park was initially founded by Mike Shinoda, Brad Delson, and Rob Bourdon back in 1996. However, the band gained worldwide fame when they released their iconic album, ‘Hybrid Theory,’ in 2000. Since then, they released seven successful studio albums, which brought them several award winnings, including two Grammy Awards.

However, everything changed for Linkin Park in 2017, when they lost one of the integral parts of the band. As you may know, the talented vocalist Bennington was found dead at his home in California on July 20, 2017. The cause of his death was later announced as suicide by hanging himself. His bandmates and fans around the world were devastated by the news of Chester’s tragic death.

Since then, Bennington’s fans all around the world have been following the updates related to the late musician’s death and the status of his legacy in Linkin Park. His sudden death was found questionable by some of his family members and fans since they thought Chester wasn’t suicidal at the time of his death. In addition to the controversies about his passing, the status of Bennington’s Linkin Park royalties, his money and estate are also widely wondered about by his fans.

Chester Bennington Net Worth $30 Million

The multitalented musician, Chester Bennington’s net worth is estimated as $30 million at the time of his death in 2017. Besides his bank accounts, properties, or any other sorts of income, Chester had around  $8.1 million only from his music rights.

Who Received Chester Bennington’s Linkin Park Royalties

The court report filed by his widow, Talinda Bentley, revealed the real values of Chester Bennington’s music rights. The music rights of the lead singer and songwriter of Linkin Park was around $8.1 million. The report also showed that the estimated value of his future music royalties was $5 million.

According to the report Talinda provided, her late husband left his music royalties to her and their children together. However, back in 2019, Chester’s ex-wife, Samantha Olit, who was married to him between 1996 and 2005, filed a claim with Bennington Estate to receive half of his royalties and child support for their son, Draven Sebastian.

Did His Family Inherit His Money And Estate?  

Linkin Park icon has six children from his three different relationships. Bennington had his first child, a son named Jaime, from his relationship with Elka Brand. He also adopted Elka’s son, Isaiah.

Later in 1996, Chester got married to Samantha Olit and the couple’s only kid Draven Sebastian was born in 2002. He and Samantha got divorced after a nine years of marriage in 2005. Following his divorce, Bennington got married to his second wife Talinda Bentley. The couple had three children, Tyler Lee and twins Lily and Lila.

Prior to his tragic death, Chester made his decision about the future of his assests when he created the Chester and Talinda Bennington Family Trust back in 2007. The late musician left some assests, such as his retirement account, solely to his wife Talinda while leaving everything else to the Family Trust so that his wife and kids could benefit from them. Talinda also has the control of Chester’s music rights.

Moreoever, according to the official reports, Bennington wanted all of his children to keep in touch and spend time together. In order to make this happen, he also set certain funds aside to be used by his kids to visit each other.