While Britons grapple with soaring mortgages and rents, members of the Royal Family enjoy access to some of the nation's finest homes, often for a fraction of the market rate or even for free. A complex web of leases, private gifts, and Crown Estate arrangements governs where senior royals live, sparking public fascination and occasional controversy.
Palatial Homes for a Peppercorn
The most striking deals involve so-called 'peppercorn rents', where royals pay a nominal sum for vast properties. Prince Andrew secured a 75-year lease on the 30-room Royal Lodge in Windsor Great Park in 2003 for just £1 million, with an annual rent of 'one peppercorn, if demanded'. He later invested £7.5 million in renovations. Following his association with Jeffrey Epstein, he has been ordered to leave and will move to a smaller home on the Sandringham estate.
His brother, Prince Edward, and Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, enjoy a similar arrangement at the 120-room Bagshot Park in Surrey. The Times reports the couple paid £5 million upfront for a 150-year lease and now pay only a peppercorn rent. The Grade II-listed mansion was a wedding gift from the late Queen Elizabeth II, though Edward initially paid £50,000 a year, later rising to £90,000 after renovations.
Private Estates and Working Farms
Other royals maintain privately funded estates. Princess Anne has lived at the 730-acre Gatcombe Park in Gloucestershire since 1976, a wedding present privately purchased for her by the Queen. Anne does not pay rent but must maintain the estate, which she runs as a working farm and equestrian event centre. Her daughter Zara Tindall and family live rent-free in a converted farmhouse on the estate.
King Charles lived rent-free at Highgrove House for 13 years after the Duchy of Cornwall bought it in 1980. Since 1993, he has paid a market rent, which in 2022 was recorded as £659,285. In an ironic twist, upon becoming Prince of Wales, his son William became his landlord, with Charles now reportedly paying around £700,000 a year to the Duchy for the home.
Gifted Homes and Scandalous Histories
Prince William and Kate's country retreat, Anmer Hall on the Sandringham Estate, was a wedding gift, with a £1.5million refurbishment funded privately. The couple paid no rent. The Norfolk house has a scandalous past, rumoured to have been used by the then-Prince Charles for liaisons with Camilla Parker Bowles. The family has since moved to Forest Lodge in Windsor Great Park, where they are expected to pay a market rent, estimated to be around £30,000 per month.
Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie missed out on a grand home of their own. In 1997, the late Queen bought them the £1.5million Birch Hall in Surrey, but their mother, Sarah Ferguson, feared she couldn't afford the upkeep. The seven-bedroom mansion was sold two years later, never having been occupied by the princesses.
The royal property portfolio reveals a system where private wealth, public funds, and historic leases intertwine. While working royals like the Prince and Princess of Wales now pay market rates for some homes, the legacy of peppercorn rents and gifted estates continues to shape where the monarchy lives.
