They already own more of London than the Crown Estate.
And Qatar’s royal family are now planning their own British palace in the capital as well.
The Gulf state’s rulers have submitted plans to convert three prime properties in London’s Regent’s Park into a huge mansion, set to become the UK’s first £200 million home.
Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned, 55, one of the three wives of Qatar’s former emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, bought the homes for an estimated £120million last year.
The Arab royal, who met the Queen at Windsor Palace in 2010, has now hired architects and lawyers to oversee a transformation of the properties into one 33,000 sq ft mansion, boasting a spa, heated swimming pool, beauty salon, butler and nanny quarters, a children’s floor, games rooms, powder rooms, massage areas, two lifts and a gymnasium.
Her family also own the Shard, the tallest skyscraper in Europe, Harrods and the Olympic Village.
The 13 bedroom palace will be the London home of Sheikh Hamad’s son and Qatar’s current emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, 34, who was educated at Harrow and Sandhurst.
There, he will be able to relax in the mansion’s spa and sauna and dip in the pool, which is set in Portland stone.
Heated kitchen seats will keep the family warm in the English winter and, for the summer, there are Italianate gardens dramatically lit to look like a ballroom.
Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Missned (right), with husband Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani's (left)
Guests are treated to a selection of bedrooms and can smoke with their host in a cigar room, and select drinks from a ‘wine cave’.
Lights are controlled by an iPad and staff live in their own quarters in part of the building, which comprises of the two end properties on the terrace.
When completed, the mansion is expected to be the most valuable residential property in London in private hands.
It is likely to be worth more than the most high profile investments of recent times in the capital – including Dudley House on Park Lane, a grade II-listed mansion which was also bought and renovated by Sheikh Hamad, 62, and is valued at £200 million.
It is expected to be worth about double the highest selling residential property in the UK - a penthouse at One Hyde Park in Knightsbridge, which sold in May this year for about £140 million.
The Qatari royal family bought the three properties - 1, 2 and 3 Cornwall Terrace - last year.
The Grade 1 listed buildings were designed and built in the 1820s by Decimus Burton, the protégé of John Nash, the architect who designed Buckingham Palace. It was named after King George IV, whose titles included the Duke of Cornwall.
The homes were badly damaged in the Blitz. After refurbishment, one of the properties was the official residence of the New Zealand High Commissioner from 1955 until the seventies, with lavish parties for royalty, celebrities and ambassadors.
It was subsequently overtaken by hippy squatters in 1975 and was hailed as a ‘temple’ for the ‘Rainbow People’ and ‘Divine Light Mission’ - before being redeveloped in 2007 by a property company and sold.
By Paul Bentley
