Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie have properties within royal palaces as part of a long-standing deal agreed with their father, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.
He has been forced to move out of his home at Royal Lodge and has not had an office at Buckingham Palace since 2022. However, under a deal struck for his daughters, Beatrice and Eugenie can still use the palaces as their second homes despite having primary residences elsewhere.
Beatrice has an apartment in St James’s Palace and Eugenie has Ivy Cottage, a three-bedroom property at Kensington Palace.
The deal, a private arrangement between the Yorks and the King, requires them to pay an undisclosed sum in rent.
A source said: “The [rental] deal was made with their father as he wanted them to have a foothold in the royal palaces.”
These serve as London boltholes for the princesses.
Beatrice, 37, is married to Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi and the couple live in a £3 million home in Oxfordshire with their daughters Sienna, four, and Athena, one. Beatrice is also stepmother to Wolfie, nine, her husband’s son from a previous relationship.
Eugenie, 35, and her husband Jack Brooksbank have a home in Portugal where they live with their two children: August, five, and Ernest, two.
Andrew remains eighth in line to the throne, which means all his four grandchildren rank higher in the order of succession than the Duke of Edinburgh or the Princess Royal. However, none have royal titles or roles.
Previously, Andrew paid £1,600-a-month to rent a four-bedroom apartment in St James’s Palace for his daughters, a rate which was considered far below market value.
Estate agents in the area estimated that the market rent for such a property in Kensington would range from between £4,000 and £15,000 per month depending on the condition and size of the rooms.
A two-bedroom apartment near St James’s Palace, where Beatrice still has a home, was recently on the market for £19,000 a month.
While Mountbatten-Windsor was initially responsible for covering his daughters’ rent, it is not clear if they are now responsible for covering their own costs.
Private rental agreements within royal palaces are not made public, but it is understood that the rent goes back into the sovereign grant, which funds the official work of the royal family.
Andrew lost his office at Buckingham Palace when his brother came to the throne in 2022.
In October Andrew was forced to give up the lease on Royal Lodge, the Crown Estate property on which he paid a peppercorn rent for 20 years after further information came to light about his friendship with the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.
Earlier this month, the Crown Estate confirmed that Andrew had given an undertaking to relinquish another lease on East Lodge, a property rented on behalf of his staff near his former home of Sunninghill Park.
Andrew is now living at Wood Farm on the Sandringham Estate while a more permanent home is prepared for him.
Police officers arrived at the property on his 66th birthday to arrest him on suspicion of misconduct in public office. He was released without charge under investigation. He has denied all wrongdoing.
Police are investigating a link between Andrew and Epstein.
Documents released by the US Department of Justice last year also suggested a close connection between Epstein and Andrew’s former wife, Sarah Ferguson who, until recently, lived with him at Royal Lodge.
Emails appear to show that Ferguson had taken Beatrice and Eugenie to meet Epstein weeks after he was released from prison for a conviction for sex trafficking.
Eugenie has since stepped down as patron of the charity Anti-Slavery International, a role she held for seven years. It came after the Charity Commission said that it was “assessing concerns” about a separate charity, the Anti-Slavery Collective, which the princess co-founded in 2017.
Royal properties will face further scrutiny later this year when the public accounts committee investigates rental agreements between members of the royal family and the Crown Estate, the public body whose profits are returned to the UK exchequer.
As well as rental agreements with the Crown Estate, the royal family also has the use of official royal residences, including Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, the Palace of Holyroodhouse and Kensington Palace. Within the royal residences, grace and favour homes are provided to staff and relatives.
Buckingham Palace declined to comment on private rental agreements. Beatrice and Eugenie could not be reached for comment.
