PRINCE Andrew has partied across the world, drives a £220,000 Bentley, and has expensive lawyers reportedly costing him up to £2,000 an hour – but where does his money come from?
Once dubbed “Air Miles Andy” and the “Playboy Prince” for his penchant for luxury travel and reputation for living it up, fresh questions are being asked about the Duke’s seemingly extraordinary wealth.
With a watch collection believed to be worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, a jet-set life that has seen him party everywhere from St Tropez to New York, and until recently a £17million ski chalet in the Alps, Andy’s millionaire lifestyle appears to eclipse that of the other Royals.
And yet despite all this glamourous globetrotting, his official annual income is believed to be just £248,000 pocket money from The Queen and a Royal Navy pension of just under £20,000.
With that allowance intended to cover the costs of his duties, including his team of staff, it seemingly would not stretch far enough to also cover his extravagant lifestyle.
The rest of Andrew’s private wealth remains – as royal finances expert David McClure put it – “shrouded in mystery”, with the Royal stipend and his pension being his only official sources of income for the last 20 years.
His apparent hidden fortune has come back into the spotlight as he faces a potentially multimillion-pound legal battle against his sex accuser Virginia Giuffre.
Andrew has a collection of luxury watches and cars, including several Rolexes, pieces from Cartier, and a Patek Philippe watch worth almost £150,000.
And he is also known to have a love for expensive cars, including a £220,000 Bentley and a brand-new £80,000 Range Rover.
Last year, Andrew’s former Bentley Flying Spur went up for sale for £94,450.
Bought brand-new in July 2015 for an estimated £150,000, it was later sold by the Duke before its new owner also sold it.
Andrew also spent the 2000s being a regular member of the transatlantic jet set social scene as he chummed up with Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
And just some of his holidays included a trip to Phuket in 2000 where he stayed at an “ultra-exclusive” £4,000-a-night resort and was pictured to topless women on a private yacht.
The Duke also partied a number of times in St Tropez – and was pictured attending social events in the US, such as in New York and Florida.
Throughout the noughties, Andrew was working as a trade ambassador until he stepped down in 2011.
During this time he is thought to have schmoozed with the rich and powerful, including going hunting with Kazakh leader Nursultan Nazarbayev and having a meeting with Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi.
Andrew is reported to have always travelled in style – including taking his own massage mattress with him, having a personal pedicurist, and having a valet armed with an ironing board.
And it’s during this period it was claimed the teetotal Andrew would pop £300 bottles of champagne for his pals as he frequented nightclubs and went on “holiday after holiday”.
David McClure, whose book The Queen’s True Worth was released in 2020, told The Celeb Report Online: “The answers behind Andrew’s sources of wealth are shrouded in mystery.”
The royal expert said that questions have been raised about Andrew’s wealth “for at least 15 to 20 years”.
EXPENSIVE LAWYERS
Fighting his legal case against Virginia has been previously estimated to cost him up to £4.4million.
Bloomberg has reported his team headed by Los Angeles power lawyer Andrew Brettler, would be costing him up to £220,000 a month – with Brettler alone reported to command fees of up to £2,000 an hour.
And should he lose, Andrew could face having to pay up to £10million in damages – or face the bailiffs if he refuses to stump up.
While this can likely be in part funded by the recent sale of his ski chalet, there remain questions as to where all this money is going to come from.
The chalet was originally paid for a £13million mortgage taken out by Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, with a promise to pay the final £5million in cash.
LUXURY HOMES
The Duke earlier this year was reported to have paid £6.6m – the £5m plus interest – to French socialite Isabelle de Rouvre after a legal battle over the outstanding fee.
And previously, the Duke sold his home Sunninghill Park – a marital gift from The Queen – for £15million in 2007, which has likely gone some way to funding his lifestyle.
Mr McClure added that even though the Duke is selling his Swiss ski chalet to cover some of his costs, he is “unlikely to get more than £2-3 million from the sale”.
Andrew and Fergie share the Royal Lodge, the former home to the Queen Mother, after moving into the 30-room grace-and-favour mansion when she passed away in 2001.
The couple only pays a “peppercorn rent” for the house, according to David, although the exact amount isn’t known.
“We wouldn’t comment on the details of any individual’s lease,” a spokesman for the Crown Estate told The Celeb Report Online.
In 2003, Andrew reportedly spent around £7.5m renovating the property, and once again, the source of this money is also unclear.
Despite his favourable rental situation from his mother, he still has to pay for staff and upkeep, estimated to be as much as £1m a year.
Mr McClure speculated that Andrew “mixed with rich people” while he was the UK’s trade ambassador which may have helped him build up a “valuable portfolio of shares”.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the wealthy people he met, such as Jeffrey Epstein, gave him useful financial advice,” said David.
Norman Baker, a former Lib Dem minister who wrote the book “… And What Do You Do?” probing the Royal Family’s spending, has also raised questions about Andy’s wealth.
He told The Celeb Report Online: “Andrew has accumulated a lot of money over the years that we don’t know about.”
The ex-minister went on: “He has clearly been getting money from elsewhere for decades.”
Mr Baker said he believes many of the Duke’s luxury items could be gifts from business associates, but this still wouldn’t go close to covering his expenses.
“Andrew undoubtedly liked to live high on the hog,” David McClure said.
“He doesn’t have a lot to do and he seems to have been deeply bored since leaving the navy.
“Other than his job as trade ambassador, he hasn’t had a proper role, and he cuts rather a sad figure.”
MONEY WOES
Mr Baker added that Prince Andrew is also “likely” still supporting his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, who has previously had well-documented money woes.
“Fergie spends money like pouring water into a sieve,” Norman said.
The Duchess of York has had cash troubles over the years, including racking up a mammoth estimated £5m overdraft from Coutts, the Queen’s bank, in the mid-1990s, before getting into financial difficulties again in 2011, building up debts of £2m.
And she even accepted £15,000 from Andrew’s paedo pal Epstein to clear a personal debt.
A year earlier, she was caught in a sting trying to sell access to Andrew, then a trade envoy, for £500,000.
Mr Baker said that with Andrew’s mounting legal woes, he would now be seen by many of his former contacts as “damaged goods”, and would be “up against it” to find a new source of money.
“Andrew will need to cut his cloth accordingly from now on,” he said.
David agreed, adding: “Inevitably if he loses, he will have to accept a restriction in his lifestyle.
“We’re already seeing that to some extent with him selling off his Bentley and his ski chalet, which I’m sure he wouldn’t have wanted to do.”
If Andrew does lose his civil case, David believes the Queen will step in to cover her favourite son’s legal costs, “if only to save the Royal Family from further embarrassment”.
A precedent exists for this, as when Prince Charles divorced Diana in 1996, Her Majesty is believed to have given her son a loan to help cover the £17million settlement.
The anti-monarchy campaign group Republic has called for Parliament to investigate Andrew’s sources of wealth.
CEO Graham Smith told The Celeb Report Online: “There certainly needs to be full disclosure, and if necessary, a parliamentary inquiry into Andrew’s financial situation.
“The glaring discrepancy between his lifestyle and any discernible income is a serious cause for concern because it raises suspicion that he might be receiving funding from sources that would expect something in return.
“Despite everything, Prince Andrew remains well connected and a part of the royal family.
“That means any doubts about his financial liabilities become a question of public interest.”
The Celeb Report has approached Prince Andrew’s representatives for comment.
