The estate had been bought by the Macmillan family in 1956 for £89,000 and was put up for sale by the Conservative politician and businessman Maurice Macmillan, the son of former Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, for £730,000 in 1980. Macmillan sold Highgrove so he could spend more time at Birch Grove, his father's Sussex home. At the time of its sale Highgrove was described as a "distinguished Georgian house standing in superb parkland in the Duke of Beaufort's hunt" and possessing 347 acres, with nine bedrooms and six bathrooms.