Kaitlyn Bristowe Dishes Out 'Bachelorette,' 'Dancing With the Stars' Salary Secrets

Kaitlyn Bristowe
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Bristowe spilled the tea during a candid conversation on the 'Trading Secrets' podcast.

Kaitlyn Bristowe is dishing out the details on her Bachelorette and Dancing With The Stars salaries.

During a candid conversation on her fiancé, Jason Tartick's Trading Secrets podcast, the reality TV star revealed she was living off of $1,500 ABC gave her between season 19 of The Bachelor and season 11 of The Bachelorette in 2015 while negotiating her gig as the show's next potential star.

"I think they offered me $40,000. You’d think I’d be like, 'Jackpot! Sign me up!'" Bristowe said before sharing that she was advised to hire an entertainment lawyer, who her stepdad helped her pay "an upfront retainer of five grand."

She continued, "He changed a lot and negotiated my contract big time for me. One of the executive producers said to me, 'You got an entertainment lawyer, and you’re asking for this amount of money? I’m sorry. I thought this is about love for you.' F**k off! It’s about love and money, OK? They go hand in hand for me right now."

Bachelor Nation fans will recall that Bristowe wasn't guaranteed the gig as the show's leading lady. She was actually up against Britt Nilsson, who was also picked. Contestants voted for the lead on night one and ended up choosing Bristowe.

"Because they said you’re going against Britt, I was like, 'I’m not doing it.' And then I said, 'I’ll only do it if you paid me as much as you paid Chris Soules.' I said I wanted to make the same as he did," the Off the Vine podcast host shared.

And that figure was much higher, with past Bachelors revealing that they were offered anywhere between $75,000 and $100,000 to star on the show.

While Bristowe admitted that she was "worried" she'd lose the gig to Nelson, she shared that she "also negotiated that if it was her, I still got money."

She got what she asked for and ended up finishing the season with a fiancé, Shawn Booth. The pair split in 2018, with Bristowe later falling for fellow franchise fave, Tartick, to whom she got engaged in 2021.

As for DWTS, Bristowe, who competed on and won her season in 2020, the pay came with some performance stipulations.

"You get a bonus every week that you make it," she said of the DWTS salaries, claiming that the runners-up make the same as the winner. "The final four are in the final episode, they all get paid the same... But your signing bonus, I think you can negotiate a bit, like, to sign to say you’re going on the show."

The mirrorball trophy is worth a pretty penny too and costs roughly $10,000 to make.

As for her most lucrative job to date, it would have to be co-hosting seasons 17 and 18 of The Bachelorette with Tayshia Adams after Chris Harrison's exit.  

"They didn’t want to pass what a host would make," she said of her and Adams only earning guest host titles, adding that the pair earned " a little more" for Michelle Young's season than Katie Thurston's season.

While it was a temporary gig, with ABC naming Jesse Palmer the permanent host of The Bachelor franchise, Bristowe said she felt like she "thrived" on live television and would love to host DWTS if the opportunity presented itself in the future.

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