The Walton family empire: Inside the lives of the billionaire Walmart heirs

All three of Walmart founder Sam Walton’s surviving children are comfortably in the $100 billion club as the retail giant’s share price continues to deliver strong performance.

Their father’s company continues to make headlines, as it became the first major retailer to announce it planned to raise prices in response to President Donald Trump’s tariffs on imports.

The combined wealth of the Walmart heirs — which includes founder Sam Walton’s children, Rob, Jim, and Alice, as well as his grandson Lukas — is nearly $400 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Together, they’re significantly ahead of the top individual names on the list, such as Jeff Bezos, Larry Ellison, or Mark Zuckerberg — even Elon Musk.

While some have worked in the family business, serving on the company board or working to manage the family’s wealth, others chose to pursue areas of personal passion.

Ahead of his death, Sam Walton, the original man behind the company that now encompasses both Walmart and Sam’s Club, set his family up for financial success when he divided the ownership.

Most recently, the Walton children have expanded voting control to their own, giving eight of Sam’s grandchildren a say in the family holdings.

Sam wasn’t a man of flashy luxury, but you can see how his children are living a slightly more lavish life now. Here’s a look at how the Walton family empire spends its money: 

Sam Walton opened the first Walmart store in Rogers, Arkansas, in 1962.

As he grew his retail empire, Walton, an experienced pilot, would often fly in unannounced to check in on a particular store location.

He married Helen Robson on Valentine’s Day in 1942.

Together, they had four children: Rob, John, Jim, and Alice.

By the time Sam died in 1992, he had set up the company ownership in a way that minimized the estate taxes anyone on the receiving end would have to pay.

Source: Fortune

He set up his ownership of Walmart’s stock in a family partnership.

Each of his children held 20% of Walton Enterprises, while he and Helen each held 10%. Helen inherited Sam’s 10% tax-free when he died.

Samuel Robson “Rob” Walton is the oldest Walton child. He is 80 years old.

Rob Walton’s net worth is $118 billion, according to Bloomberg.

He served as chairman of Walmart from 1992 until 2015 and remained on the board until this year.

Rob retired from Walmart’s board at the end of his term in 2024.

Rob made a splash in 2022 by leading an ownership group to buy the Denver Broncos.

The group purchased the NFL team for $4.65 billion in summer 2022, a record-breaking sale at the time.

Rob has purchased a house in Paradise Valley, Arizona, near the base of Camelback Mountain.

In the past, protesters have rallied outside his Arizona home to advocate for increased wages and added benefits for Walmart workers.

Besides real estate, Rob has a large collection of vintage cars.

In 2013, he ran his Daytona Coupe, which was worth $15 million at the time, off the tracks and wrecked it. The car was one of only five ever made.

Sam Walton’s second-oldest child, John Walton, died in a plane crash in 2005.

John, who was 58 years old, was survived by his wife, Christy, and son, Lukas. He left about 17% of his wealth to Christy and gave the rest to charity and Lukas.

After serving in Vietnam as a Green Beret, John returned and held a series of jobs with Walmart.

Some of John’s roles included Walmart company pilot, crop duster, and owner of a few yachting companies, before becoming a Walmart board member.

In 2013, Christy decided to sell their Jackson Hole mansion.

She also sold the family’s ranch for an undisclosed price in 2016 after listing it for $100 million in 2011, according to Curbed and Ranch Marketing Associates.

James “Jim” Walton is the youngest son of Walmart founder Sam Walton.

Jim is 76 years old and worth $121 billion, according to Bloomberg.

Jim is chairman of the board of the family’s Arvest Bank Group.

One of the state’s largest banks today, Arvest Bank has assets totaling more than $26 billion, according to Bloomberg.

He also served on the Walmart board, starting in 2005 to fill the vacancy after his brother John died.

Jim Walton’s son, Steuart, took over his father’s seat on the board in 2016.

Now, Jim presides over Walton Enterprises.

The private company deals with the investments and finances of the Walton family only, from modest offices in Bentonville, Arkansas.

Alice is the youngest of founder Sam Walton’s children.

Alice Walton is 75 years old and worth $118 billion, according to Bloomberg. She has been divorced twice and has no children.

Alice has never taken an active role in running the family business.

Instead, she became a patron of the arts, which she fell in love with at a young age.

When she was 10, she bought her first work of art: a reproduction of Picasso’s “Blue Nude.”

She told The New Yorker she paid about $2 for the piece.

She now has an immense private art collection.

Alice’s collection has featured original works from Andy Warhol and Georgia O’Keeffe and is estimated to be worth more than $500 million. She also opened a museum in Bentonville called Crystal Bridges in 2011 to house it.

The collection includes a Georgia O’Keeffe painting that Alice spent $44.4 million on in 2014.

The sale represented the highest price for a woman’s piece of art in history, according to The Observer.

Her Millsap, Texas, property, Rocking W Ranch, was sold to the Three Amigos Investment Group of Kermit, Texas, in September 2017 for an undisclosed amount.

It had an initial asking price of $19.75 million, which was reduced to $16.5 million. The working ranch had over 250 acres of pasture and outbuildings for cattle and horses, according to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.

Her other ranch, a 4,416-acre Texas property, was previously listed at a reduced price of $22 million.

The comparatively modest, three-bedroom, two-bathroom home overlooks the Brazos River.

Alice also bought a two-floor condo on New York’s Park Ave. for $25 million in 2014.

It has more than 52 large windows overlooking Central Park, plus a media room, a winding staircase, and more than 6,000 total square feet of space.

In January 2016, Alice donated 3.7 million of her Walmart shares — worth about $225 million at the time — to the family’s nonprofit, the Walton Family Foundation.

The charity awards millions of dollars in grants to causes that align with the foundation’s values.

Sam and Helen started the foundation in 1987.

The Waltons saw the foundation as a way to teach their children how to give back and how to work together.

The foundation’s focus on education was initially led by John.

His brother Jim said John was really interested in being able to give parents choices when it came to their child’s schooling.

Rob spearheaded the foundation’s venture into environmental protection.

One of the first grants the foundation gave helped develop a sustainable fisheries label.

A commitment to the family’s home of Arkansas is another large part of the foundation.

The website says this area of focus is about “advancing our home region of Northwest Arkansas and the Arkansas-Mississippi Delta.”

Walmart Inc., which owns Walmart and Sam’s Club, is the largest retailer in the US in terms of revenue.

The company reported $681 billion in revenue for the past fiscal year, keeping just ahead of Amazon for the top spot in the Fortune 500.

Even though the Walton family is earning billions from the company’s success, they remain relatively under the radar.

Much like their patriarch, Sam, the siblings aren’t flashy about their wealth.

In December, Walmart disclosed that Sam’s children had granted voting rights to eight of their own children.

There are now eight descendants of Sam Walton guiding his fortune and keeping his vision for his legacy.

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