When a famous singer dies, there is understandably an increased interest in their songs. Being that Whitney Houston was one of the most popular performers of her generation, her hits have been all over the radio since her untimely death last Saturday.

In cases like Michael Jackson, this leads to big royalty bucks for their estate. However, this will not happen for Whitney Houston's family. That's because Houston was only a singer, and not a songwriter. Thus, she didn't own the songwriting or publishing rights to many of her biggest songs. 

In fact, Whitney's most famous song, 'I Will Always Love You,' was written by Dolly Parton, who had first scored a number one hit with the tune in 1974.

Dolly earns about eight cents everytime the song is played, making Houston's death ghoulishly lucrative for the country legend.

Since Houston never had the ability to make money off of her publishing rights, she was broke at the time of her death, according to a music industry insider who spoke to The Huffington Post. She does still leave an amazing legacy of beautifully performed songs -- no matter who wrote them.

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