Ex-Prince Andrew Not Leaving Royal Lodge Quietly

Sunday Newsletter: The former prince seems in no rush to pack his bags.

Disgraced ex-Prince Andrew is still reeling off demands and ultimatums about his future living arrangements, The Royalist can reveal.

His reluctance to agree to a settlement is thought to be behind a new timeline emerging via leaks to U.K. newspapers that he won’t move out of Royal Lodge for several months. This is even though the king’s office previously said the move would “take place as soon as practicable.”

Incredible as it may seem to those who bought the palace line that he was disgraced and stripped of all privileges, Andrew is demanding a substantial six or seven bedroom house on the Sandringham Estate complete with staff including a cook, gardener, housekeeper, driver and police security, sources have told The Royalist.

A friend of Andrew’s told The Daily Beast: “Andrew has done exactly what has been asked of him and he just wants to be left alone.”

Asked to comment on a report in the British news magazine Private Eye this week which suggested that Andrew is still negotiating about where exactly he will live on the Sandringham Estate, the friend said: “He is giving up the lease on one of England’s finest houses and expects to be treated fairly.”

A former courtier told The Royalist: “Knowing Andrew, this was always going to be about money. Andrew is essentially being bought out of the lease, so he will haggle over every last detail of the deal.”

The palace has previously admitted in background notes made available to members of the U.K. “royal rota” press pool and obtained by The Royalist that Andrew’s lease “has legal force” and that the king had to “respect” it and that “the laws of his own country” required “negotiation” between all parties, and that it is Andrew who must voluntarily surrender the lease.

This seems a fancy way of saying he was being bought out.

Andrew’s reluctance to settle is being blamed in some quarters for a new timeline leaking out of the palace via the U.K. newspapers which suggests Andrew might stay in Royal Lodge for several more months to come.

The math of Royal Lodge explains Andrew’s belligerence.

The former duke prepaid £8.5 million (approximately $10.9 million) for a 75-year lease on the property, effectively purchasing a lifetime tenancy at the bargain rate of around £113,000 ($145,000) per year.

In commercial terms, that is ludicrously cheap: a thirty-room mansion on 90 acres in Windsor Great Park whose open-market rent could easily exceed £1 million ($1.27 million) a year.

Given that he and his heirs stood to enjoy accommodation worth upwards of £50 million ($63 million) on the open market for no further outlay aside from maintenance costs, it is unsurprising that he wasn’t prepared to move without a payout.

Andrew’s side had long pointed to his “iron-clad” lease, meaning that the King cannot simply remove him.

Not helping matters for the king this weekend: the revelation that the king’s other brother Prince Edward has been paying rent of—checks notes—“one peppercorn” for his palatial home, Bagshot Park.

Spacious property Bagshot Park

It all leads one to wonder whether Beatrice and Eugenie are paying in units of condiments for their private pied-a-terre apartments on the king’s London estate?

Newsletter readers: I’ve unlocked this story about Meghan’s mad claim that her being able to take whatever she wants from shoots was totally normal. The reason I unlocked it was that it got a fair few links from legacy media and people kept hitting a paywall, which I thought wasn’t the ideal introduction to The Royalist.

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