The King Settles Andrew’s £1.5m Royal Lodge Bill
The Crown Estate assessed £1.8m of dilapidations on Royal Lodge when Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor surrendered his lease, against about £302,000 of compensation he was owed for leaving early — a net £1.5m. It is understood the King paid that sum from private income. The estate says it has given him nothing and has received what it was owed.
The arrangement that produced this is the part worth understanding. In 2003 he took a seventy-five-year lease on the ninety-eight-acre estate and paid about £7.5m up front for repairs, which meant he owed no rent thereafter and earned a right to compensation if he surrendered within the first twenty-five years, on a sum falling each year. Leaving in October 2026 was worth about £302,000 to him. Set against that, the Crown Estate’s assessment of the property’s condition came to £1.8m, covering the whole estate including several properties, gardens and large outbuildings; recouping dilapidations on exit is standard practice. The two figures net off, and the balance fell on him. A Crown Estate spokesman: “The lease for Royal Lodge has ended and our focus now is firmly on its future use and the opportunities to generate additional financial value for the nation from its early return.” It will be marketed by two national agents. Whether Andrew repays his brother is described as a private matter. Context from a National Audit Office report this year: he had been subletting three cottages on the estate while paying a peppercorn rent for more than two decades. The payment is said to have no connection to the King’s position this week that his private support should not fund Andrew’s legal costs.