It’s easy to assume that all royals, especially heirs to the throne, are so well off, they don’t need to work. But you may be surprised to learn that, until recently, Prince William was earning a yearly salary just like the rest of us.
William was making between $68,000 and $74,000 during his stint as a helicopter pilot in the RAF Search and Rescue Force, according to Forbes. His service with the armed forces ended in 2013. Two years later, he took a job as an ambulance pilot for East Anglian Air Ambulance, a role he held until 2017. According to Showbiz CheatSheet, he earned $62,000 a year, which he donated to charity.
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In 2011 when William wed Kate Middleton and became Duke of Cambridge, he collected the inheritance from his later mother, Princess Diana, who left Will about $12.5 million.
William is estimated to be worth a cool $40 million, much of which is drawn from the Duchy of Cornwall, run by his father, Prince Charles. From March 2017 to March 2018, William made $28.6 million off the Duchy, which is valued at more than a billion dollars and pays for the living (and travel) costs of Charles, his sons, and his daughter-in-laws Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle. It’s nice to be one-degree away from the future King.
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And William is only going to get richer. Once Prince Charles takes the throne, William will be entitled to the profits from the Duchy of Cornwall, so says the Cheat Sheet.
The Duchy is nothing to sneeze at. It’s basically 135,000 acres of land in England that includes residential and commercial properties, forests and other natural resources, and it acts as a source of income for William. Sorry, Harry. Only the eldest sone of the monarch (in this case Prince Charles) gets a grab at it.
