HOME FREE

The Royals Paying Nothing for a Chunk of London’s Most Elite Real Estate

A new report into the royal family’s property portfolio demands action—and evictions.

opinion

Follow Tom Sykes’ royal reporting at The Royalist on Substack, and get exclusive insight on everything going down behind the palace gates.

A new report published by the U.K.’s National Audit Office makes clear the living situations of the York princesses, Beatrice and Eugenie, and confirms the way the British royal family feathers its own nest with complete disregard for the niceties of the open property market. Beatrice, now 37 and married to Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, was in 2008 given a four-bedroom, three-bathroom apartment at St. James’s Palace when she was 19 years old and about to start university. She lived there rent-free until 2012, when it was decided that she should start paying for her accommodations. The bill? Twenty thousand pounds a year. In 2018, her sister Eugenie was given her own place: Ivy Cottage, a three-bedroom house in the grounds of Kensington Palace, where she moved in with her husband, Jack Brooksbank. In other words, both sisters are living in some of the most exclusive real estate on the planet for a fraction of the market rate. And here’s the kicker. They do not pay the rent! Their entire bill is quietly picked up by a benefactor with incredibly deep pockets—and even deeper family ties. Guess who?

Want more royal gossip, scoops and scandal? Follow all Tom Sykes’ reporting at The Royalist on Substack or listen to The Royalist podcast on YouTube.