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The Real Housewives may live large on-screen, but according to RHONY star Brynn Whitfield, the Bravo paycheck isn’t quite as glamorous as fans might think. The 39-year-old reality star opened up about her salary, career, and life behind the scenes during an appearance on Jason Tartick’s Trading Secrets podcast — and what she shared may surprise you.
Brynn Whitfield didn’t hold back when talking about how much she actually made filming The Real Housewives of New York City.
“It’s grocery money. It’s my DoorDash money,” Brynn Whitfield confessed on the April 14 episode. “I spend more on DoorDash per week than what I made for a season. [I spend a] lot … I spend like $2,000 to $3,000 a week on DoorDash.”
But despite her reality TV paycheck not covering much more than takeout, Brynn has managed to build an incredibly successful career away from the cameras. In fact, she revealed she made seven figures this year.
“It was seven figures. Below … barely. I barely made seven figures,” she clarified.
While RHONY viewers might not have seen much of Brynn Whitfield’s work life on-screen, she explained why — and what she actually does for a living.
“I have gotten to the place in my career where the clients that I had and the brands that I worked with, and the agencies that I worked at, were so well known that I’m able to step back, not be in the day-to-day office. Basically, they call me for advice or to work on a deck or create a campaign idea, and they pay me very well for it. Very well. I make as much as a lawyer does per hour,” she said, hinting that she brings in around $600 per hour.
She painted a picture of her high-pressure creative consulting style, adding:
“The value they’re getting me is, like, 60 minutes of me on Adderall and just, like, Don Drapering the fck out of them. Like, genius sht, like, literally 60 minutes of me at my best and just, like, taglines, creative ideas, something for the ad campaign. It’s kind of like standup comedy, but standup creative.”
Because much of her consulting work is white-labeled, Brynn explained she wasn’t allowed to showcase it on the show, leading to speculation about how she really makes her money.
“There’s actually one publication, I think it was Nylon or something, that mentioned my company that I work with and the brand director was like, ‘We love you so much and we adore you, but we don’t want to be associated with the show … or our competitor has advise with the network,’” she shared. “I had to be hush hush about everything … and when you don’t share everything and every detail and the reason why, people label you, and they’re like, ‘Why? How?’ And they create their own story of what you are. ‘She’s a sugar baby. She gets money from dudes.’ I’m like, ‘I wish.’”
Brynn also pointed out that, unlike most of her fellow Housewives, she holds down a full-time job.
“I’m the only one that works a full-time job,” she said. “We have influencers, we have models, we have art curators, we have people that did work at J. Crew three years ago, but now they’re just honorary positions, we have a real estate agent that hasn’t sold a house in seven years.”
Though she praised her co-stars for their entrepreneurial ventures, Brynn was candid about how different her day-to-day life really is.
“They’re not doing the boring a job that most of America, we all do, which is 9 to 5. I sit at a desk and I make decks and I go on Zoom calls,”** she said.
As for how she landed her spot on RHONY, Brynn Whitfield revealed it all started with a DM.
“They had gotten my name from a mutual friend who’s a fashion publicist … and I was properly f*cking off in the South of France, with girlfriends. I was chugging rosé … I thought it was a scam,” she recalled.
Brynn Whitfield’s honest take just highlights what many fans suspected — the RHONY reboot was less about fresh storylines and more about Bravo cutting costs with a new, cheaper cast. And if Brynn’s pay wasn’t even enough to cover her DoorDash, it seems like those budget rumors may have had some truth to them.