Queen Elizabeth Sees $700 Million Property Value Drop Across Post-Lockdown U.K.

The value of the Crown Estate, which manages swaths of London’s West End and rural England for the Queen and the British government, has seen its value written down by $716 million following the U.K.’s Covid-19 pandemic lockdown.

The Crown Estate’s Annual Report for 2019/20, published today, saw the Royal portfolio fall in value by 1.2% to $17.4 billion as London locked down for summer, leaving shops empty and retail rents unpaid. Today’s report cites the “challenging” conditions for the Crown’s retail customers later “accelerated by Covid-19” across the U.K.

However, despite unprecedented trading conditions, the Crown Estate still turned a small profit last year. Dan Labbad, chief executive, reported growth of 0.4%, delivering a revenue profit of $447 million, “reflecting the underlying strength of our portfolio and the active approach of our team,” he said in the report.

Covid-19 And The Crown

The Crown Estate—officially referred to as the “the sovereign’s public estate” by the U.K. Parliament’s Treasury Committee since 2010—includes chunks of London’s West End shopping district, alongside Windsor Estate and Ascot Racecourse.

Since 1961 the Crown Estate has been an independent commercial business, which sends its profit to the Treasury, and reports to have generated $3.7 billion for the U.K.’s finances over the last decade. It is not considered a part of the Queen’s personal net worth.

Giving the clearest sense yet that they expect more “economic and market disruption” will come, the Crown will stagger its payments to the Treasury this year in a “staged process,” in which the $447 million payment will be divided up. The first $113 million payment to the U.K. Treasury was paid in July “with further payments to follow as trading conditions develop.” The Queen normally receives 25% of the income from the Crown Estate back from the British government as the “sovereign grant,” but with a two-year delay.

The Crown Estates has also deferred (not cancelled) the “distribution of bonuses for all staff” for the year with board members and senior leadership taking a “temporary” 20% pay reduction.

In May 2019, Forbes estimated the Queen’s personal net worth to be $500 million, while the combined value of the British Monarch’s holdings with the Crown Estate, the Duchy of Lancaster (a real estate trust), were worth an estimated $25 billion.