The Queen lived a royal life, paid for by British taxpayers, and also enjoyed the proceeds of a huge private fortune, the details of which are not fully known.
The Queen Elizabeth II she had amassed a personal fortune during her 70-year reign, which the Sunday Times estimates at £370m, part of which is known and managed by the government, but another is private.
The Queen lived a royal life, paid for by British taxpayers, and also enjoyed the proceeds of a huge private fortune, the details of which are not fully known.
The royal patronage
The costs associated with the official activities of representing the Queen or members of her family are covered by an annual sovereign grant from the Ministry of Finance, which for 2021-2022 reached 86 million pounds (€99m) – includes an amount granted over ten years for the refurbishment of Buckingham Palace (£34m).
Without calculating the additional amount, this grant corresponds to 15% of the income from the property of the British Crown (“The crown estate”), which includes, among other things, areas of land, other properties, licenses for wind farms, and whose revenue attributed to the Treasury under a 1760 law.
Royal patronage serves mainly to pay most of 500 Windsor workers.
The private wallet
The Queen’s private income is characterized as a private purse. They come from the receipts of approximately £650 million from the assets (land, financial securities…) of the Duchy of Lancaster, which has been the property of the royal house since the Middle Ages.
It includes approximately 315 luxury properties, residential and commercial properties, as well as tens of thousands of acres of agricultural land.
The income from this colossal fortune amounted in the last financial year to about £24 million, an amount which the Queen distributes in part to her relatives. This private income is taxed as long as it is not used for official duties.
“The Queen uses this money for the upkeep of her properties of Balmoral and Sandringham, two very expensive private residences” which she owns, says David McClure, author of a book on Crown finances (The Queen’s True worth’).
“He also uses this money to subsidize other members of the royal family who do not receive public money,” he continued when asked by AFP.
Although some of the money is being redistributed to her children, Andrew, who has fallen out of favor because of his relationship with stockbroker Jeffrey Epstein, who has been accused of sex crimes and child molestation, will no longer receive any of the money. these, as it has been excluded from the monarchy.
Private properties
THE Balmoral Tower is estimated at around 100 million pounds and her country house in Sandringham to 50 million.
Some items in the Royal Collection are also privately owned by the Queen, such as a stamp collection started by King George V
Queen Elizabeth also had one known passion for horses and her personal stable has earned her more than £7 million over the years, according to horse racing website myracing.com.
The famous Crown Jewels, whose value is estimated at approx £3 billionsymbolically belong to the queen, but are automatically passed on to the next monarch.
Tax heavens
The Queen’s fortunes have been marred by the Paradise Papers scandal, an investigation into large-scale tax avoidance practices by the powerful and famous.
According to these revelations made in 2017 by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), Elizabeth II owned, through the Duchy of Lancaster, around ten million sterling to funds in the Cayman Islands and Bermuda, UK tax haven territories.
Not so rich
With £370m, Elizabeth II was not at the top of the Times Rich List, which is dominated by brothers Sri and Gopi Induja (£28bn).
She is also significantly less wealthy than the King of Thailand, whose fortune is estimated at $30 billion, the Sultan of Brunei ($20 billion) or Saudi Arabia’s King Salman ($5 billion, according to celebritynetworth.com ).
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I am currently a news writer for News Bulletin247 where I mostly cover sports news. I have always been interested in writing and it is something I am very passionate about. In my spare time, I enjoy reading and spending time with my family and friends.
