How Carole Middleton went from tiny council home to £4.7m Bucklebury mansion via tower block flat in ‘UK’s ugliest town’
IT MAY not be a royal palace but Kate Middleton’s parents’ £4.7million countryside home is fit for a queen.
Carole and Michael Middleton bought the grade-II listed Georgian Bucklebury Manor in 2012 - and it boasts grand features including seven bedrooms, tennis courts and an outdoor swimming pool.
But the sprawling 18-acre estate is worlds away from the tiny council house where Carole, who recently celebrated her 70th birthday, grew up.
Inspired by the grit and determination of her working class parents, Carole has risen through the echelons of society to become the royal’s secret weapon.
And, she has graduated from modest abodes to a grand mansion befitting her new status along the way.
Here, we play Middleton Monopoly and delve into Carole’s increasingly impressive property portfolio through the years.
Scottie dog token at the ready!
HUMBLE BEGINNINGS: EALING COUNCIL HOUSE
Carole - nee Goldsmith - came from humble stock - beginning her life in a quaint pebble-dashed council terrace in Ealing, West London.
The bustling, multi-cultural district boasts a variety of shops and Asian restaurants, reflecting the different waves of immigrants that have settled there.
Famed for Victorian-style housing, the majority of properties sold in Ealing during the last year were flats. The average selling price was £471,725, according to Rightmove.
Carole lived with her parents Ron - a builder - and Dorothy Goldsmith - whose family were miners and labourers from County Durham.
ON THE LADDER: £5k SOUTHALL SEMI
Carole’s parents were “hardworking and ambitious”, according to royal expert Sarah Hewson, which meant they could buy their own home.
They relocated to a three bedroom house in Norwood Green, Southall in 1966, costing the family £4,950 - the equivalent of £135,000 today.
“It was a largely working class area at the time and a far cry from the life Carole has made for herself and her family now,” Sarah explains.
The West London area has been a South Asian hub since the 1950s and is often referred to as Little Punjab or Little India.
It has the largest Sikh temple outside of India, as well as a famous high-street market abundant in spices, jewellery and antiques.
Parts of the 2002 film Bend It Like Beckham were filmed in the area.
Carole and her brother Gary, who is a decade her junior, spent most of their childhood in Southall, where the average house price today is £435,909.
MEETING MICHAEL: SLOUGH FLAT
The Middletons met in the 1970s while they were both working at British Airways - Carole as a flight attendant and Michael as a flight dispatcher.
Before long they were living together in a leasehold flat in a cul-de-sac in Slough, conveniently located close to Heathrow Airport.
House prices in the street have averaged at £205,000 over the last year.
Sarah explains, “Their backgrounds were very different - where Carole’s ancestors were working class miners, Michael came from a family of wealthy Yorkshire wool merchants with links to the aristocracy.”
The Berkshire town, 20 miles west of Central London, has faced an abundance of criticism.
Ricky Gervais set The Office in Slough because of the town’s reputation for being a miserable place to live.
And, in 2025, a Rightmove survey ranked Slough as the unhappiest place to live in the UK.
The year before, it was judged the UK's ugliest town by The Telegraph, receiving a score of just two points out of a possible 50.
But it’s not all bad - Slough brought the world the TV show Thunderbirds, the iconic Ford GT40 racing car, wheelie bins and the Mars bar.
Carole and Michael married in 1980 and welcomed daughter Kate in 1982, closely followed by her sister Pippa a year later.
LIFE OVERSEAS: JORDAN
In 1984, with two young children, Carole and Michael embarked on an international adventure, relocating to Jordan.
There, the family led a seemingly comfortable life, with Princess Kate attending nursery school.
Whilst little is known about the almost three years they spent in Amman, Kate has previously said she “remembers very fondly” their time there.
The pair made their way back to the UK while expecting their third child, James.
BACK TO BERKSHIRE: £158K ‘SWEET COTTAGE’
Carole and Michael bought West View, a two-bedroom cottage in Bradfield Southend, a small rural village in Berkshire, for £34,700.
Carole has described the house as “a very sweet semi-detached cottage”.
She added, “We stayed there until Catherine was 13, so the children spent a lot of their youth there.”
It is here, from her kitchen table, where she started the party supplies business Party Pieces in 1987.
“It proved so successful,” Sarah says. “Michael left his job to join the firm and at the time of their daughter’s marriage to Prince William it was said to be worth around £30 million.”
Located opposite the village green, the Victorian house boasted a huge garden and was eventually converted into two semi-detached homes.
The pair sold it in 1995 for £158,000.
OAK ACRE: £250K TUDOR PAD
The Middleton’s fortune meant they could buy Oak Acre, an 18 acre Tudor-style manor house in Bucklebury in 1995.
Sarah says, “They had a large garden to play in, instilling a love of the outdoors which is now at the heart of the Princess of Wales’ work on early years and also mental health."
The £250,000 red brick house had five bedrooms and is where Kate went home to during her years at St Andrews University.
In 2008, Prince William is reported to have landed a Chinook helicopter next door to Oak Acre.
Bucklebury has a population of just 2,116, according to the 2011 census, with famous residents Kate Bush and George Clooney reportedly owning houses down the road.
The Old Boot Inn is a local favourite, plus there’s a butcher and annual duck race in the village.
Marlborough College, the co-ed independent boarding school that boasts Kate as a former pupil and charges £20k a term isn’t far, over the border in Wiltshire.
MIDDLETON MANOR: £4.7 MILLION 18-ACRE HOME
In 2012, a year after Kate married Prince William, the Middletons moved into a more private home called Bucklebury Manor.
It features five reception rooms including a drawing room, a library and an open-plan kitchen - Carole’s favourite room and the “heart” of the home.
The £4.7million property served as the venue for Pippa’s wedding reception in 2017, and James has also spent time living there during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Throughout the past year, as Princess Kate faced the trials of chemotherapy, Carole's abode reportedly became a sanctuary for the future Queen, offering her moments of pampering and solace.
Meanwhile, the Middleton matriarch has long been a strong mother figure for Prince William bringing him the grounding, nurturing and stability his own late mother, Princess Diana, did.
She also ensures her grandchildren Prince George, 11, Princess Charlotte, nine and six year old Prince Louis, have as normal upbringing as they possibly can, making their childhood as carefree and fun as possible.
Sarah explains, “It’s not easy being the mother of a future Queen and Carole must surely have been concerned that she would lose her daughter to the institution.
“But the Middletons have been central to William and Kate’s life - providing them with an escape from the formalities of royal life, a sense of balance and normality.
“For William, the taste of ordinary family life is a revelation and it has been particularly important to them that their own children, George, Charlotte and Louis get to be a part of that too.”
Carole is so adored that rumours have swirled that her son-in-law The Prince of Wales may bequeath her and Michael an official royal title when he eventually takes the throne.
While the Middletons are currently the first grandparents of a future sovereign without a title since the 11th Century, Sarah Hewson says, “It is clear they will play a crucial role in shaping our future monarchy.”
CHELSEA GIRLS: £780K LONDON FLAT
In 2002, Carole and Michael bought a three-bedroom apartment in London’s exclusive Chelsea district for £780,000.
Kate and Pippa lived there while pursuing careers in their 20s, with Kate moving out once she married William in April 2011.
The property was put up for sale for £1.95million in 2018, but it sold for under the guide price at £1.88million in September 2019.
Set across three floors, snaps from the listing show neutral interiors, traditional furniture and oriental rugs.
-original.jpeg)
-original.jpeg)
