Trigger Happy TV star Dom Joly regrets selling his apartment to author Salman Rushdie

Comedian and writer Dom Joly is best known for Trigger Happy TV, a hidden camera prank series that has been broadcast on Channel 4 since 2000, writes York Membery.

More recently, the 56-year-old, who has written several travel books, has appeared on reality TV shows such as Celebrity Island with Bear Grylls and Pilgrimage.

He and his Canadian wife Stacey live in Cheltenham and have a son and a daughter in their 20s.

What did your parents teach you about money?

Nothing that's really annoying, so I'm financially illiterate.

I had a blessed childhood, growing up in the Christian part of Lebanon where my late father, a Fleet Air Arm pilot during World War II, ran a business.

But at the age of seven I was sent to boarding school in England, and from then on I lived something of a divided life between Britain and war-torn Lebanon. I still feel a huge emotional attachment to Lebanon.

After my parents divorced when I was 18, I was separated from my dad for a dozen years, so although we reconnected towards the end of his life, he was a different person when he died in the mid-1980s. My mother died last year at the age of 93.

Have you ever struggled to make ends meet?

I had no idea what I would do when I left university in London and spent most of my 20s jumping from one thing to another – whether it was driving delivery vans or working as a producer at ITN – before entering the world of comedy. But even now, one minute I'm doing great financially and the next minute I'm like, “Oh crap!” However, I think it was the ups and downs in my career that gave me the motivation to succeed.

Have you ever been paid stupid money?

Trigger Happy TV is a real money making business and I've made well over £1m from DVD sales – it's the gift that keeps on giving. That's why I'm going on the Trigger Happy tour next year to celebrate its 25th anniversary.

Even now, after all these years, people still shout, “Hello, I can't hear you” – a phrase of mine that I used to shout into my giant cell phone whenever they saw me – but not that it bothered me.

My second high earner was paid six figures – a crazy amount – to shoot two TV commercials for a telecommunications company. It was never used because the company was bought out, but the money covered my children's school fees.

What was the best year of your financial life?

Any year that I can afford to travel, eat well and have fun is my best year.

Most expensive thing you bought for fun?

I bought the Riva Aquarama wooden motorboat 20 years ago when I vacationed every summer with my family in a lake-surrounded “summer cottage” in Ontario. It's simply the coolest boat, although I found myself going crazy on the water from time to time. As the kids got older, we stopped going to Canada regularly, so I sold it after a few years.

What was your biggest financial mistake?

In 2005, I sold the flat I had in Notting Hill, London, to Salman Rushdie for a lot of money. If I kept it (it's now worth over £12 million) I'd never have to work again. In hindsight, I shouldn't have closed Trigger Happy TV after doing several series and Christmas specials. But after working so hard on the show, I was exhausted and wanted a change.

I should have “sat on” this before making such a rash decision.

Best money decision you've made?

Buying real estate in the right place and at the right time, before a given area becomes fashionable.

I bought my first flat in Notting Hill for £117,000 in 1992, when it was still a no-go zone.

Then in 2001 I bought the flat below for £220,000, put it together and sold the property to Salman Rushdie for £1.3 million.

Opportunity: Dom sold his apartment to Salman Rushdie

Similarly, I later bought – and sold – a house in the Cotswolds before it became full of Londoners and completely unbearable. But I'm sure people said the same thing when I moved there. Apparently the writer Joanna Trollope moved away when Alex James and I from Blur arrived in the nineties!

Do you have a pension?

No, because I don't really trust people who work in finance. It was probably my dad's fault because he didn't trust the stock market and called it a “casino.” I don't see myself retiring anyway – I'd be totally bored. I'm going to work until I drop.

Do you own any property?

I own a Regency townhouse in Cheltenham where I have lived with my wife and family for the last five years.

When I was growing up, the city was an old people's home, but it has changed and now there are nice restaurants and many cultural attractions.

I have visited many cities of a similar size and there is nowhere else

I prefer to live. However, I still consider myself a digital nomad – wherever I put my hat is home.

If you were chancellor, what would you do?

I would make sure big corporations pay their fair share of tax, introduce a 20% flat tax for everyone and impose a 1% super tax on anyone worth more than £5 million, just to give the country a boost.

What is your number one financial priority?

Saving money – to make up for all those decades of not saving!

• Conspiracy Tourist: Journeys Through a Strange World by Dom Joly is available now. The Dom Joly: The Conspiracy Tour will last until November 7 (domjoly.tv/dom-joly-tour).