Riess was born in Washington, D.C., one of three children.[1][2] He grew up in Warren, New Jersey, where his father (Naval engineer Michael Riess) owned a frozen-foods distribution company, Bistro International, and his mother (Doris Riess) worked as a clinical psychologist.[3] Michael Riess (1931–2007) immigrated to the United States with his parents (journalist, war correspondent and author Curt Riess and Ilse Posnansky)[4][5] from Germany on the ship SS Europa (1928) in 1936.[6] Adam Riess has two sisters— Gail Saltz, a psychiatrist, and Holly Hagerman, an artist. Riess married Nancy Joy Schondorf in 1998.