How Do The Royal Family Get Money

Here's where the royal family gets their money

Updated

2020-04-21T18:09:00Z

Queen Elizabeth II smiles as she arrives in Scotland in 2015.

Every year, the Queen gets a chunk of cash from taxpayers called the Sovereign Grant.

Queen Elizabeth II during a walkabout after a church service at St Peter and St Paul West Newton in Norfolk, as the Queen is to make history when she becomes the first British monarch to reach their Sapphire Jubilee

It comes from the treasury and it's funded by taxpayers, according to the BBC.

The basic agreement is that the Queen gets the grant in exchange for surrendering all profits from the Crown Estate — the family's massive portfolio of properties — to the government. Every year, the Queen is given an amount of money equivalent to 25% of the Crown Estate's profits.

The Grant totaled $107.1 million (£82.2 million) in 2019, The Wall Street Journal reported.

The Sovereign Grant pays for the family's travel, palace upkeep and utilities, and royal employee payroll, according to official royal family financial reports. But The Telegraph notes that the grant doesn't cover costs of security and royal ceremonies — that money comes from a few other places.

The Queen's private income is called the Privy Purse.

London's Savoy Hotel sits atop land controlled by the Duchy of Lancaster.

That money comes from the Duchy of Lancaster — a portfolio of land and other assets that's been in the royal family for hundreds of years. It contains $715 million (£548.6 million) worth of net assets (including 18,433 hectares of land) and is made up of residential, commercial, and agricultural properties, Wall Street Journal UK correspondent Max Colchester reported.

It brought in $27 million (£20.7 million) in 2019, according to The Journal. According to the royal family website, this sum helps with costs not covered by the Sovereign Grant — namely, it's used to pay "expenses incurred by other members of the royal family."

The Queen also has other valuable assets that add to her net worth.

The Queen also outright owns Balmoral and Sandringham Estates, an expansive art collection, and other valuable assets that have been passed down from earlier monarchs, Wall Street Journal's Colchester said on a January 14 episode of The Journal's What's News podcast.

The unknown total value of Her Royal Highness' property makes it difficult to estimate her total net worth, according to The Journal. A royal finance expert did tell The Journal that the royal family members are "millionaires, not billionaires."

In 2016, The Sunday Times estimated the Queen's net worth to be $442.92 million (£340 million).

Prince Charles has a major income stream of his own.

The Duchy of Cornwall — yet another suite of properties owned by the royal family — covers the expenses of Prince Charles and his heirs. That means Harry and Meghan, William and Kate, and their children are all covered by the Duchy of Cornwall, too. Charles paid them a combined $6.5 million (£5 million) in 2019, according to The Journal.

The Duchy paid Charles $28.1 million (£21.6 million), The Journal reported. Its total value is $1.2 billion (£923.8 million).

The Queen and the Prince of Wales effectively control most of the royal family's fortune and divvy out payments to support other family members, The Journal reported.

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