Meghan Markle and Prince Harry are making secret moves as their family looks set to change in 2024.
Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex has a secret talent, I’m guessing, a light she is hiding under her ethically sourced farm-to-table bushel. I think the duchess must be one hell of a packer. (‘Meghan meticulously folds clothes’ – the ASMR we never knew we needed.)
In barely three-and-a-half years, between 2017 and mid 2020, the former Suits star moved six times, including three times internationally, which is why I reckon that the duchess must be the Rembrandt of the Rimowa set.
However, could Meghan be gearing up for move number seven? She and husband Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex just might be moving house, according to reports, thus leaving them to stumble about in the dark trying to find the light switches in an even bigger and more mansion-y mansion.
That’s not all, with even bigger changes for the Sussexes – two people who seem chronically incapable of sitting still – doing the rumour mill in Los Angeles.
What’s that I hear? The sound of a stork stuck on the roof of a Bel Air estate, futilely trying to find its way inside the hermetically sealed security perimeter of Casa Sussex?
That’s right. There has now also been the first skerrick of a rumour of the possibility of the couple adding to their brood and to their future British Airways bills.
Then next came a journalist for the Daily Mail reporting from Los Angeles in November, who wrote that the duke and duchess have “been viewing properties in the LA area as they want to have a base closer to Hollywood’s studios”.
The plot thickens.
Not to be left out, the venerable Times then got in on the action in December, sending off an intrepid reporter armed with their trusty pad to interview Montecitans where they found that “locals suggested the duke and duchess may be looking to move from their mansion”.
“I heard they’re moving to LA,” Michaela Gaston Morgan, member of the same polo club as Harry, told the paper. “I think they’re looking for real estate, if they haven’t already found it.”
Hear that? That’s the sound of 101 overly-fillered Beverly Hills real estate agents, all failed Selling Sunset cast members, sharpening their nails on their clawing posts in preparation for the commission of a lifetime.
So, would the Duke and Duchess of Sussex be looking to trade in their Montecito estate or to add to their current portfolio?
What I can say is that back in 2020, when the Sussexes bought their current home, and long before interest rates started rising, the Mail put their mortgage alone at about $716,000-a-year. Earlier this year their property taxes, similar to council rates, surged past the $200,000 mark, according to columnist Richard Eden.
Their total estimated running costs including security, staff and utilities came in at $6.5 million a year, in the Mail’s 2020 estimate. (Or to put it another way, the same cost as buying more than 187,000 copies of Spare.)
Another possible motivation for Harry and Meghan to move: their current home is a good 90 minutes to two-hour drive away from Los Angeles.
The Sussexes’ most lucrative remaining contract is with Netflix, the duchess is now represented by Hollywood mega agency WME, and Meghan’s recent appearance on the red carpet for the Variety Power of Women event all point to her especially throwing herself back into the Hollywood game.
It’s not just work either, with the couple seeming to spend plenty of their downtime in LA. In April they took in an LA Lakers game, Meghan twice went to see Beyoncé shows, Harry watched on when Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami played Los Angeles FC and they have been papped heading out for dinner at San Vicente Bungalows.
Given that all of these outings represent three to four hour round trips from Montecito, the petrol bills for the 4WDs they seem to chug around must be eye watering. (A Page Six story from earlier this year was titled “Why Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are driving four hours to hang out in Hollywood”.)
Here we return to the warm embrace of the Mail which also reported in late 2023 that “there are rumours they would love to have a third child”.
Again, this is hardly a shocker. The duke and duchess have suffered many slings and arrows in recent years, including from my quiver, but they are unquestionably two people utterly devoted to their children and who are deeply committed to parenthood.
The sticky wicket here is not their lack of bedrooms (they could adopt quintuplets and still be able to have Harry’s old rugger team stay over) but something the duke said. Back in 2019, when Meghan guest edited British Vogue, he interviewed legendary environmentalist Jane Goodall and told her that they planned to have “two, maximum” for the sake of the planet.
But hey, given the hot and cold Range Rovers and the private jet flights, I don’t think giving the world another adorable wee Sussex to coo over would be that much of an extra burden on our sweltering, suffering planet.
Also, Harry and Meghan backtracking on a former firm statement would hardly shock anyone now would it?
Will 2024 be a year of big change for the Sussexes? Will they be loading up moving trucks or getting bassinets out of storage or sending change of address cards to Clarence House?
And will Harry, in packing mode, ever stop just balling up his T-shirts and punting them across the length of his walk-in wardrobe in the vague vicinity of a dinged old Samsonite that still has the remnants of a peeling ‘Vegas’ sticker?
The only thing I know for sure: I really, desperately want to watch a Meghan packing show.
Daniela Elser is a writer, editor and a royal commentator with more than 15 years’ experience working with a number of Australia’s leading media titles.
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