DID WHITNEY HOUSTON DIE BROKE?

Whitney Houston had frittered away her $100 million fortune on years of drug abuse and high living and was on the skids when she died.

Decades of narcotics use took such a toll on the R&B queen, who once sold more than 170 million albums, that she was reduced to asking friends for $100 handouts. She was leaning heavily on her mentor, music mogul Clive Davis, for financial help to keep her homes in New Jersey and Atlanta out of foreclosure.

And she had struggled through a years-long legal battle with her stepmother over a $1 million life insurance payout - an amount that would once have seemed inconsequential to the superstar.

Houston was pinning her hopes on a movie she just wrapped - "Sparkle," due out in August - to revive her flagging fortunes. She was the film's executive producer, sang two songs on the soundtrack and played the mom of "American Idol" alum Jordin Sparks.

It was her first film in 15 years.

In 2001, at the height of her career, she signed a $100 million Arista recording contract and raked in up to $30 million a year touring. But then there was a stormy 15-year marriage to singer Bobby Brown, during which she notoriously became addicted to cocaine and booze.

In what was then the most-watched TV interview in history, she told ABC News' Diane Sawyer in 2002 that she used drugs, but insisted she was too rich to use crack.

"Crack is cheap," Houston said. "I make too much money to ever smoke crack. Let's get that straight, okay?"

Ten years later, her remaining riches had vanished.

"She's flat broke," RadarOnline quoted a source saying last month. "She might be homeless if not for people saving her."

The Daily Mail reported that Davis had loaned Houston $1.2 million to pay off her debts and get clean. She went back to rehab last May.

"Whitney has admitted that she's had to conquer a drug addiction. That takes all of her energy," Davis, the chief creative officer for Sony Music Entertainment, told a Los Angeles radio station in June. "Right now, she's dealing with that situation, and we're not going to make another record or an album until that golden voice is there and is fully capable to knock everyone out."

Rehab seemed not to have worked.

When Houston died Saturday, submerged in her hotel bathtub, after days of boozing and partying, a large number of sedatives were reportedly found nearby.

On Monday, Los Angeles coroner's assistant chief Ed Winter countered reports that there was an inordinate amount: "There weren't a lot of prescription bottles. You probably have just as many prescription bottles in your medicine cabinet."

That gotta be some

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