Inside 'favourite' Royal Family home where Prince William and Kate Middleton spend Christmas

The Royal Family are expected to spend Christmas at Sandringham Estate in Norfolk this year, with the Prince and Princess of Wales likely to stay at Anmer Hall with their kids

After a year of ups and downs, the Royal Family are set to celebrate Christmas at the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk. The main house and surrounding properties will be filled with family members.

To ease the crowd in the main house, royals like the Prince and Princess of Wales are expected to stay at their nearby residence, Anmer Hall, with their three children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis. This festive getaway follows Kate's Together At Christmas Carol Service, one of the rare public appearances she made this year to honour those helping the needy.

Anmer Hall, believed to be their favourite property, was a wedding gift from the late Queen and is situated on the Sandringham Estate in Norfolk. Anmer Hall is an 18th-century red-brick house located in the village of Anmer in Norfolk, England.

It's 12 miles northeast of King's Lynn and two miles east of the King's primary residence at Sandringham House. The current house is said to have a late-Georgian design, but it may have been built earlier around a smaller pre-existing house.

King Edward VII purchased Anmer Hall in 1898 from Ernest Terah Hooley. The Coldham Family originally owned it from 1705.

From 1972 to 1990, the Duke and Duchess of Kent were tenants of the house. In between their tenancy and the arrival of the next occupants, two other families rented the property, including the family of Hugh van Cutsem.

The van Cutsem family have a long-standing relationship with the royals and are frequently seen in their company. Hugh van Cutsem was a university friend of Prince Charles, and his four sons (Edward, Hugh, Nicholas and William) have been close companions to Princes William and Harry for many years.

Edward van Cutsem was a pageboy at the wedding of Prince Charles and Diana, Princess of Wales, while his brother Hugh chose Prince William as godfather to his eldest daughter Grace. Nicholas van Cutsem was selected as a godfather to Prince Louis, and William assumed the role at Prince George's christening.

In January 2013, Anmer Hall was given to the then-Duke and Duchess of Cambridge by the Queen as a wedding present. Extensive renovations were undertaken, including a new roof, conservatory, kitchen and a significant tree-planting scheme to provide more privacy for the Royal couple.

The refurbishments cost £1.5 million and were funded by private Royal Family funds. Between 2015 and 2017, the family resided full time in Norfolk, as Prince George attended the nearby Westacre Montessori School.

The Wales family now resides in Adelaide Cottage on the Windsor Estate, a property once occupied by Princess Margaret's ex-fiancée Group Captain Peter Townsend. They also have access to Apartment 1A of Kensington Palace and Tam-Na-Ghar cottage on the Balmoral Estate in Scotland.