Kate Middleton and Prince William have a moving date.
The Prince and Princess of Wales and their children, Prince George, 12, Princess Charlotte, 10, and Prince Louis, 7, are hoping to settle into their new “forever home” — Forest Lodge in Windsor — by early November.
That would mean they may well have moved in time for festivities on Guy Fawkes night — which lands on Nov. 5 — the holiday traditionally set aside for bonfires, fireworks and parties.
When it was announced that the couple had chosen to move to the eight-bedroom home on the Windsor Great Park estate from their current Adelaide Cottage home, palace sources told PEOPLE they hoped to be in by Christmas. But it appears that things have moved more quickly. Renovations have been undertaken faster than expected and a 150-acre security cordon has been created around the home, in agreement with the Home Office. The Daily Mail, which first reported the story, says that staff have started moving in belongings.
The royal couple’s children are on half term break from their Lambrook School from Oct. 17, while William, 43, will be in Brazil from Nov. 3 to Nov. 7 with his Earthshot Prize event and the COP30 climate conference.
Princess Kate, 43, has been sourcing furniture and furnishings for the new home and will not be joining William for the week in Rio de Janeiro and the city of Belém, where he will attend the COP30 gathering.
Forest Lodge in Windsor Great Park, Berkshire, U.K.
English Heritage/Heritage Images/Getty
Forest Lodge is a significant upgrade on their current home, the nearby four-bedroom Adelaide Cottage. Like Adelaide, the couple will not have any live-in staff and the Prince and Princess have funded the move themselves and will be paying a market rent to the Crown Estate.
Prince William and Princess Kate, pictured in Scotland in 2021, enjoy the outdoors life of Windsor and their other home, Anmer Hall, Norfolk.
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The move marks a fresh start for the couple after a challenging few years. Those close to them say that while they have enjoyed living at Adelaide Cottage, it is also associated with some of the most traumatic and difficult times of their adult lives.
Prince William and Kate Middleton with their children Prince Louis, Prince George and Princess Charlotte at Trooping the Colour in June, 2025.
Karwai Tang/WireImage
Within weeks of moving into Adelaide Cottage, in August 2022, they suffered the loss of William’s grandmother Queen Elizabeth on Sept. 8, 2022. That came a day after the children had started their new school.
Then, in the first weeks of 2024, the family suffered the double blow of cancer diagnoses for Princess Kate and William’s father, King Charles. While Kate announced in January 2025 that she is in remission, Charles, 76, continues to receive treatment. Last year, William spoke of it being a “brutal” 12 months and, during his recent interview with Eugene Levy on the actor’s Apple TV+ series, The Reluctant Traveler, he added, “Worry or stress around the family side of things does overwhelm me quite a bit. Because it’s more personal — it’s more about feeling, it’s more about upsetting the rhythm.”
Sources say being in Adelaide Cottage also presented a perfect opportunity to assess whether or not they enjoyed living in Windsor — with the children at school in nearby Ascot.
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Prince William and Princess Kate’s current home, Adelaide Cottage, Windsor.
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That has been a resounding affirmative, and Forest Lodge is talked of now as their hoped-for long-term home – and they plan to stay even when William accedes to the throne. The couple’s staff like the children’s nanny, Maria Turrion Borrallo, who has been with the family since George was a baby, and the housekeepers are expected to live on other smaller properties on the estate.
The Wales family also has a country home, Anmer Hall, in Norfolk in the East of England, and a London base, Kensington Palace.