Somewhat hilariously, the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh were “implicated” in the National Audit Office’s report on royal residences and royal leases. There were very few headlines about Prince Edward and Sophie’s situation because, well… they can’t even pay people to complain at this point. The outrage was almost entirely directed at the House of York and all of their rent-free apartments and multiple leases on various prime real estate. But Sophie and Edward’s situation is pretty awful too. They have a “peppercorn” lease on Bagshot Park, an enormous, 120-room mansion on a 51-acre estate. While Edward “paid” £5 million in 2007, he has barely paid anything since then. Not only that, part of Edward’s Crown Estate lease says that he can sublet part of the Bagshot property and pocket the profits. Which is probably why the Daily Mail eagerly reported this: all is well and good, because Edward and Sophie rented out some of the property to the Royal Collection Trust, you guys! Please.
The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh pocketed rental income from a royal charity by sub-letting a stable block at their Surrey home that they leased from the Crown Estate. Prince Edward and wife Sophie earned an undisclosed sum after renting out a unit in the grounds of their Bagshot Park mansion to the Royal Collection Trust.
The RCT is the registered charity that cares for the Royal Collection, one of the world’s greatest troves of art and antiquities that is held in trust by the sovereign on behalf of the nation.
Sources insisted last night that the arrangement was only for a short period of time and is not unusual, since the Royal Household also charges rent to the same charity for expenses such as office space.
But while the move was entirely within the terms of the Edinburghs’ lease, the arrangement is likely to be carefully examined by MPs as part of a wider investigation into the Royal Family’s property dealings amid public concern that they have been benefiting from favourable deals.
It can now be revealed that Edward and Sophie have benefited from a similar arrangement to Andrew as regards their Grade II-listed, 120-room mansion 11 miles south of Windsor Castle. The property was first leased to Edward in 1998 via a company, Eclipse Nominees Limited (Bagshot Park), which saw him pay £5 million up front. This means he has only ever had to pay a ‘peppercorn rent’ since – a nominal amount each year for legal purposes. The late Queen’s son has also spent £1.38 million on refurbishment and has a 150-year lease on the property until 2157.
As part of the lease he is entitled to sub-let parts of the estate which, according to the NAO, ‘allows the leaseholder to generate income for themselves, which is not returned to The Crown Estate’.
The report revealed that the Edinburghs invested a ‘significant’ sum doing up an old stable block which was rented out to a third party until six years ago. The lease allows the stables to be used as offices, research and development, for the stabling of horses or residential accommodation. Previous reports suggest he had earned up to £130,000 a year from the scheme. What was not known, until now, is that another unit in the block was also rented out for a ‘short period’ of time to the RCT. A trust spokesman said: ‘We do not disclose details of storage locations or arrangements.’
A few things. First, no one has ever said where Edward got the initial £5 million up front, and I feel certain that it was some sort of arrangement with his mother. As in, Queen Elizabeth paid the £5 million and ensured that Edward got an extremely cushy lease agreement from the Crown Estates. Second of all, they’re still playing fast and loose with how much money Edward and Sophie have pocketed overall by subletting various horse barns or whatever. It actually sounds like they’ve been collecting hundreds of thousands of pounds a year from sublets for more than a decade, but they also rented out some space for the Royal Collection Trust. Also: why is the RCT renting out storage space on Edward and Sophie’s country home?
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
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- The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh at the opening of the Plants with Purpose Garden, at the Royal Windsor Flower Show in Windsor Great Park, Berkshire Featuring: Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh Where: Windsor, United Kingdom When: 05 Jun 2026 Credit: Aaron Chown/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- Prince Edward – The Duke of Edinburgh arrives for an Easter Service at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, London, England, UK on Sunday 5 April, 2026.,Image: 1088789887, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: Please credit photographer and agency when publishing as Justin Ng/UPPA/Avalon., Model Release: no, Credit line: Justin Ng/Avalon
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- Prince Edward depart an Easter Service at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, London, England, UK on Sunday 5 April, 2026.,Image: 1088832566, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: Please credit photographer and agency when publishing as Justin Ng/UPPA/Avalon., Model Release: no, Credit line: Justin Ng/Avalon
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- Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh and Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh arrive for the Royal wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling at All Saints’ Church on June 06, 2026 in Kemble, England. Peter Phillips, the son of Princess Anne, Princess Royal and eldest grandchild of Queen Elizabeth II, will marry NHS Nurse and writer Harriet Sperling during a ceremony at All Saints’ Church in Kemble,Image: 1108326257, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no , Credit line: Jules Annan/Avalon
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- Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh and Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh arrive for the Royal wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling at All Saints’ Church on June 06, 2026 in Kemble, England. Peter Phillips, the son of Princess Anne, Princess Royal and eldest grandchild of Queen Elizabeth II, will marry NHS Nurse and writer Harriet Sperling during a ceremony at All Saints’ Church in Kemble,Image: 1108326305, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no , Credit line: Jules Annan/Avalon
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- The Duke of Edinburgh poses with a model tram while taking a tram ride across Lisbon, as part of his and the Duchess of Edinburgh’s visit to Portugal Featuring: Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh, Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh Where: Lisbon, Portugal When: 01 Jun 2026 Credit: Aaron Chown/PA Images/INSTARimages **NORTH AMERICA RIGHTS ONLY**
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- The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh attend The Royal Windsor Flower Show where the Duchess of Edinburgh unveiled the garden that she designed with Alan Williams Featuring: Sophie, Duchess Of Edinburgh, Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh Where: Windsor, United Kingdom When: 05 Jun 2026 Credit: Cover Images **NOT AVAILABLE FOR HELLO MAGAZINE**
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- Royal wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling at All Saints’ Church in Kemble, England Featuring: Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh Where: Kemble, United Kingdom When: 06 Jun 2026 Credit: Cover Images **NOT AVAILABLE FOR HELLO MAGAZINE**
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- Royal wedding of Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling at All Saints’ Church in Kemble, England Featuring: Sophie, Duchess of Edinburgh Where: Kemble, United Kingdom When: 06 Jun 2026 Credit: Cover Images **NOT AVAILABLE FOR HELLO MAGAZINE**
So not only did his mummy stump up for his down payment on an absurdly generous lease, she also gave him a contract to provide storage space for the royal collection, on his leased property, for which he was paid by the royal household? That’s not a conflict of interest at all…… eye roll. Here’s the problem: the late Queen was right when she said you’re in our you’re out. This is half-azzed in the worst way and it’s oozing out through the seams. If you just gave everyone in the extended family housing, on royal residence terms, that is, you work, you get housing, you show up to do these events, you get a pad in London, you do international travel, you get a pad in the country, cool — I’d totally stump for that as a taxpayer in the UK. They have a million houses. Let them share amongst their own family. But financially engineering a leasehold so that the leaseholder not only gets a sweetheart deal *off* royal property, in the private market, which is rigged to his benefit, *and* gets another sweetheart deal, from mummy, to pocket royal money in exchange for storing royal property on his grounds, when there are *a million* other places they already own, for storage, for which they pay nothing, ……that is just chicanery.
Are Edward & Sophie “working royals”, & which charities are they involved with, & how has their involvement helped those organizations? ( Have never heard of any of them, which is unsurprising, since I’ve never heard of any news items about their “work”!)
I think with these long term leases, the tenant has to pay all the maintenance costs rather than the Crown Estates. So if Edward needs new windows, he has to come up with the money. So are the subleases a way to pay for those costs over the 75 year leases? And day to day costs like maintaining the grounds?
I’m a renter, but my landlord pays to fix my roof, fixes my plumbing, etc.
Do the tabloids want a royal family or not? If they are going to pay more than “peppercorn” rent then that money is going to have to come from somewhere. Expecting all the members of the RF to somehow have jobs that will support the lifestyle one expects of a royal is ridiculous. And imagine Charlotte or Louis in a flat with roommates working at some posh job, the press constantly hounding them.
Either cut the whole lot loose (what I would advise) or admit that some sort of plan for paying for all this needs to be made.
I’m with you on this. These people weren’t raised and educated to be self-supporting. They were raised to be incurious royals, capable of endless small talk and ribbon cutting, allowing their lives to become focal points for projection and cultural relevance. After a certain point, it’s cruel and unrealistic to change the expectations and agreements. Edward and Sophie at least seem to be raising their kids to have a wider array of options and perhaps a different set of expectations than Edward himself had.
I wonder if that got this ridiculous long lease so that their children/grandchildren can live there
They want them but not these ones.
This stupid arrangement is one of the reasons Fergie and Andrew were so easily lured into Epsteins wicked world.
Their insatiable lust for money was fed by the paltry earnings Andrew got after retiring from the military. For a while, Sarah had to keep working. I bet if she had known how broke Andrew really was she might not have married him.
Meanwhile Charles was rolling in the funds from the Duchy of Cornwall. Andrew is still a sleazy.character but I doubt he wound have so easily run behind Epstein if he didn’t feel somewhat aggrieved bout his status and low (for a blood prince) income.
Their way of divying up the dough is a recipe for disaster.
🎯
Just house them all in one castle, either Buckingham Palace or Kensington Palace. They can all use Windsor Castle as a country home if they really need a second place to live. I guess since Sandringham is privately owned they can keep that, too. Everything else gets returned to the state for public use. And put them on an annual salary so the duchies can also be returned to the state.
There’s still been zero tabloid outrage about the public stumping up £400k (at least) to renovate Forest Lodge. And that’s before getting into the super-secret security upgrades that must have cost millions, and the 150-acre land-grab for £0.
I mean, it’s pretty bad that Eddie and Sophie have this little arrangement where they pay peppercorn rents so they can earn income by subletting parts of the same property.
But the big story is how the Waleses’ people lied for months about how the Waleses were personally paying for the £400k renovations. Where’s the tabloid outrage?
This seems like a distraction story. Of course he has to make money. It’s a huge property and probably costs at least six figures in basic maintenance every year.
F-in greedy grifters all of them
Isn’t a grace and favour home meant to balance out the fact that these people don’t receive a salary for working for the Crown? How about paying a wage and then let them pay market rent out of that salary? All those Ladies in Waiting through the centuries were never paid either. It was duty/ service that they did for King and Country.
Harry may still be there if he received a living wage. But no, he was dependent on handouts from Charles. I recall an article where Kate and William were alleged to say… don’t think you can come running to us when you want money… Hence the need to leave so they could make a living.
Yes, @Cathy, the whole point of providing housing (grace and favour, I think is what it’s called when it’s for non-family members of the household, I could be wrong) for your extended family, if you are the head of state, is so they can help carry the load, of public engagements. Because everyone agrees it would be tacky (and probably “American”) to pay them for appearances. How much is it worth to cut the ribbon on a new children’s centre in Surbiton? I mean… it kind of undercuts the whole argument for “service” if you’re being financially rewarded. I mean, say you receive housing, you are being rewarded, but it’s not a transaction in which money changes hands, so it’s more like…. Feudal liege loyalty. You’re there if you’re needed. The problem is, really, if you wanted to pay these people a wage for what they do — which is mostly philanthropy or community organising — you’d have to benchmark their compensation with respect to what other people earn in that sector. And even if they were to garner wages in the top bracket (say, £400,000 to the head of Oxfam, for instance), it *still* wouldn’t be enough to procure the housing to which they have become accustomed, at market rates. Nowhere near it. They expect to live like billionaires — quite literally — whilst paying derisory sums for their upkeep.
The problem is that crown estate properties aren’t available for grace and favor arrangements. The apartments and offices in Buckingham, St. James, Kensington, and Windsor Castle are through the grace and favor arrangement
Yikes. I was going to comment on the monstrosity that is the blouse and pants in the first picture, and then I saw the lilac horror. Even a better bra that raises the girls higher couldn’t save that , that … words fail me.
lol. I can respect dowdy and “appropriate “….that split tho! Quelle horreur doesn’t even begin to address that trail of buttons and that split on what should be a harmlessly dowdy dress. Nice color?
That blouse does not go with those pants! They’re not the same blue or even a nice contrasting blue. And those pants need a belt or something to cover up that waistband!
Edward and Sophie receive $217,000 per year as working royals from the Sovereign Grant, which is intended to cover their expenses. I don’t know what the market rate would be for Bagshot Park, but they would probably have to rent out all the properties on the estate to pay for it. I’m assuming that QEII gave them the $5 million dollars for the lease.
So, @Elizabeth, I just did a quick calculation, and by my reckoning, Edward and Sophie paid £5 million for a 150-year lease, which equates to £33,333 per annum, which is equivalent to £2,750 per month. Which will fetch you a two bedroom semidetached house at the end of a toastrack in a leafy southwest borough of London, or, would have done, circa 2018, when we signed our lease. We’re still here, in the same house. We pay slightly more now, to account for inflation. But we have a normal house on a normal street. And — this is the big picture — Ed & Sophie’s lease does not account for inflation. The net present value of £5 million, if you account for 3% annual inflation, would compel you to project a monthly figure of £424,875 in 150 years’ time. So — whoever holds that lease in 150, will be getting a monthly discount, in real terms, of £422,125. That’s where the real money is. And that’s not accounting for their stipend, which is £217,000 now. If you account for net present value, the lucky leaseholder in 150 years can expect to receive £33,526,500 annually from the Sovereign Grant, if they’re still on the payroll. The late Queen played the loooooooong game.
And William wants to put an end to such chicanery?! He’s going to have a fight on his hands, for sure!
All these drip drip drip stories about shady royal dealings amongst the late Betty’s offspring.
Much of this is a direct result of her estate only going to Charles as the heir. Dividing her estate equally among all her children would have alleviated some of this. Not all but some.
So it’s only Harry and Meghan who aren’t supposed to financially benefit from their status as royals? Got it.
I don’t see the logic of a 120 room home unless you’ve got millions to burn. It’s wildly impractical even just to heat it.
I just don’t get it either! I mean, I remember watching some of those Million Dollar Listing shows & thinking, huh, I’d have to make a point to spend at least an hour a day in each room, or maybe ten minutes a day in each room, just to get my money out of that house. I cannot imagine 120 rooms! What are they all, anyway? Bedrooms for the fam, bedrooms for the servants, bathrooms for the fam, bathroom down the hall for the servants, dining room, breakfast room, uh, living room, TV room, maybe game room, then, hmm, oh! kitchen, butler’s pantry, box room (whatever that it, but I’ve seen it in British TV shows), library (can’t forget that!), den, let’s see what else?, ballroom? workout room? I don’t think I’m even close to 120 yet.
Prince Edward looks nothing like any of his brothers or sister. Same goes for Andy. I know Liz’ great friend Porchie has been mentioned as perhaps Andrew’s real father (they do look alike), but I have no idea what other lover could have fathered Edward. I know this will enrage the derangers. Eat it.
@JFERBER. Another trusted friend of Elizabeth, Patrick Plunket, who was buried in the royal family’s private cemetery, Frogmore. Or so I read. (Maybe Kitty Kelly’s book?)
Edward now looks like a cross between QE2 and the tabloid Bat Boy, but he was somewhat attractive when young & healthy.
I’ll avoid commenting on the ethics of these rental practice and just focus on what their practices say about who is valued and considered family.
As time passes were being made, aware that the queen made some seriously questionable and outright bad decisions. But one thing is clear within this coat of her power she took care of her children. Or at least make sure they had housing.
The whole thing about Frogmore Cottage just gets more and more distasteful when you see how other members of the British royal family were treated. Compared to everyone else, the Sussexes were treated like they were strangers who just wandered into a real estate office.
They probably would’ve treated Harry way better if they weren’t making sure that Meghan got nothing to make her feel welcome and included.
Yup.
Of course they could sublet, how else could they afford a smidge of the peppercorn rent?
I’m getting elder elfin twink vibes