Prince Harry and Meghan have been married since 2018. Two years later, the couple decided to step down as working Royals and moved across the ocean to live in Montecito, California, USA. They have remained in their mansion ever since, raising their two children, Prince Archie, 5 and Princess Lilibet, who may soon go to an private expensive school.
Discover our latest podcast
Since leaving the UK, the Duke and Duchess rarely visit, and if they do, they generally don’t bring their children, who reportedly want to visit the UK. It has been suggested that Prince Harry is looking for a home in the UK for several reasons.
Prince Harry allegedly looking for a UK home
As mentioned above, there are rumours that the Duke of Sussex is looking for a UK residence. According to royal author, Tom Quinn, the Duke could be missing his life in the UK especially given that he's now spent a significant amount of time in the US. He said:
As time goes by, Harry misses some aspects of his old life in the UK. Inevitably, the honeymoon period where everything in the States is new and exciting is coming to an end and Harry is looking back at the past through rose-tinted spectacles.
Quinn also claims that the father of two misses his old friends as they refuse to visit him in the US, because they reportedly ‘don’t get on’ with Meghan. Moreover, the Duke would like to have a base in London to visit instead of booking a hotel for each visit.
However, it has been claimed that Meghan has one strict condition that must be met if she and Prince Harry seriously consider having a UK residence once again.
Meghan Markle’s strict condition
In another discussion with Mirror, Tom Quinn claims that Meghan will only return to the UK if they have a place of their own and if they have sufficient security. He adds that the former Suits actress likely doesn’t want to stay with relatives.
Quinn told the tabloid:
Meghan has said she’s only prepared to return to England if she and Harry have a place of their own and the security they both feel is essential. Meghan will never return to the UK and stay with her husband‘s relatives.
The author adds that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex would like to bring Archie and Lilibet to the UK if they manage to sort out the security issue.
If the couple manage to find a permanent home and sort out the security issue they will certainly want to bring their children to the UK
However, if the couple want their children to have a relationship with their cousins, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis, it would take a ‘lot of diplomacy’.
But it’s going to take a lot of diplomacy to get to the point where Archie and Lili are able to develop a genuine and warm relationship with their cousins George, Charlotte and Louis.
The question of security comes after Prince Harry won the opportunity to appeal the court’s decision to strip him of taxpayer-funded security.
Prince Harry and Meghan used to have Frogmore Cottage
Up until June 2023, Prince Harry and Meghan’s UK residence was Frogmore Cottage. However, King Charles decided to evict his son and daughter-in-law from the Windsor home. The eviction came not long after Prince Harry published his memoir Spare, some believe the book is the reason.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex had used £2.4m of taxpayer money, which they paid back after leaving the Royal Family, to renovate the 10-bedroom home, as reported by House & Garden. The cottage was featured in the couple’s Netflix docu-series.
Shortly after Meghan and Prince Harry moved to the US, the cottage was briefly lived in by Princess Eugenie and her husband, Jack Brooksbank. Nonetheless, since then, the home has been sitting vacant and it is believed that King Charles would like his brother, Prince Andrew to take residence.
Despite no longer having Frogmore Cottage as a UK residence, it has been reported that Prince Harry and Meghan had a second home in the Duke’s home country but they had to give it up.
Prince Harry and Meghan’s second UK home
According to Express, Prince Harry and Meghan had signed a two-year lease for a £2.5m property in Cotswolds, a renowned area in the southwest of the UK. They reportedly signed the lease before tying the knot in 2018.
This property was used as an ‘in-between’ home while the Duke and Duchess of Sussex waited for the renovations at Frogmore Cottage to be over. Frogmore had been gifted to the couple by the late Queen Elizabeth shortly after their wedding.
As per Express, the Cotswold property is an 18th-century Grade II-listed building, with three main structures: the main farmhouse, a separate two-bedroom cottage for staff and guests. The property also featured a converted 2-storey barn with two kitchens, one on each floor.
The main property boasts four bedrooms with one converted into a dressing room. A friend of Prince Harry and Meghan had allegedly said that they both ‘loved walking the dogs there and entertaining their friends in complete solitude’.
The tabloid also reported that the couple was no stranger to hosting their A-list friends. Indeed, Express revealed that Prince Harry and Meghan hosted Doria Ragland - Meghan’s mother - as well as George and Amal Clooney and Serena Williams and Alexis Ohanian.
Moreover, the £2.5m property is situated near Soho Farmhouse as well as near David and Victoria Beckham’s country home.
Despite the beauty of the property and the fact it isn’t close to London, it didn’t have security. In his memoir, Prince Harry revealed that he was disappointed to leave the property after he was alerted to breaches of their privacy.
Prince Harry wrote:
A helicopter was hovering above the property, a pap hanging out of the door, aiming telephoto lenses at every window, including our bedroom. Thus ended the dream of Oxfordshire.
Read more:
Prince Harry & Meghan: Could their children, Archie and Lilibet become working royals in the future?
Prince Andrew: The Duke starts new Royal Lodge renovations with £20,000 paint job
Sources used:
Mirror: ‘Meghan Markle has 'major condition for Prince Harry if she’s to return to the UK'
New York Post: ‘Prince Harry searching for a UK home as his friends are not visiting over ‘rifts’ with Meghan Markle: report’
Mirror: ‘Prince Harry 'determined to find his own permanent home in the UK for sad reason'
Express: ‘Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's secret UK home worth £2.5m they had to give up’
Garden & Home: ‘Everything we know about Frogmore Cottage, Harry and Meghan's former UK home’
