A family living in a luxury mansion on the Sandringham Estate were shocked by the news that their lease was being cut short, so that Prince William and Kate Middleton would be moving in
12:48, 01 Oct 2025Updated 14:23, 01 Oct 2025
Catherine, Princess of Wales and Prince William used Anmer Hall as their main residence until 2017(Image: POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
A royal expert has confessed that he called one of the late Queen’s tenants on the Sandringham Estate and broke the unwelcome news that they were about to be evicted in favour of Prince William and Kate Middleton. .
Veteran royal correspondent Richard Eden described on the Daily Mail Royals podcast how delivering the bombshell revelation was one his “favourite stories.”
“We got wind that Queen Elizabeth was going to be giving a new house to William and Catherine as, I think, a belated wedding gift,” he recalled.
But the issue was that the new home selected for the royal couple – Anmer Hall – already had sitting tenants.
James Everett, owner of kitchen timber company, Norfolk Oak, had moved with his family into the 10-bedroom Georgian country mansion in the early 2000s, with a lease extending to 2017, but one of the conditions of the lease was that it could be terminated at short notice if the property was needed by a member of the royal family.
The late Queen gifted the luxury 10-bedroom mansion to her grandson and his wife(Image: POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Richard recalled: “I remember ringing up the the the man whose family they were living at this house and said, ‘Actually we’ve heard that your house is about to be given to William and Catherine.’ I’ll be honest with you, he wasn’t that happy.”
Richard added that the Everetts had “loved” living in Anmer Hall, but regretfully moved out: “They moved to another property, and I think, in the end, they were they were perfectly happy.”
Anmer Hall has a long, and sometimes scandalous royal history. It’s rumoured to be where the King, then Prince Charles, enjoyed illicit trysts with Camilla Parker Bowles during his marriage to Princess Diana.
The tenants of the huge mansion were surprised to learn their lease was being cut short(Image: Getty Images)
The secluded country bolt-hole, which was being rented by Charles’s close friend Hugh van Cutsem at the time, reportedly provided the perfect place for the lovers to get together, away from the eyes of palace staff and the paparazzi’s lenses.
One royal insider, who remembers the couple using the property, claimed to the Express: “Hugh van Cutsem is one of the prince’s oldest friends. There weren’t many people he could trust at the time but Hugh was certainly one of them.
“Meeting Camilla in London was far too risky. Because Anmer Hall was on the Sandringham estate, it didn’t look odd for the prince to be up there.”
Anmer continues to be the royal couple’s private country home, and they often spend weekends and school holidays at Anmer(Image: PA)
Prince William also had a close association with the house, long before eventually moving in with his wife in 2015. He and Harry were close to Hugh van Cutsem’s four sons while growing up, and were regular visitors to Anmer. William was especially close to Edward, Hugh’s eldest son and a fellow pupil at Ludgrove, who accompanied him on his first Antipodean tour.
The house that the royal couple eventually moved into was very different to the family home he remembered. A £1.5 million refurbishment programme was put in place, paid for by private royal family funds.
Renovations included a new roof, new kitchen, the addition of a conservatory, complete internal redecoration; and an extensive tree-planting programme to afford the Duke and Duchess greater privacy.
Anmer Hall is no longer their principal residence though. After a tough 18 months marked by the stress of the Princess’s battle with cancer, the royal couple have decided to move to a more secluded new home at Forest Lodge in Windsor Great Park