When his father died in 1884, Godwin-Austen inherited an estate at Shalford, in Surrey. However, he ran into financial difficulties and was forced to sell his collection of birds, about 3,500 skins collected in Manipur and Assam, to the British Museum. Unable to sell land because of an entail, he was declared bankrupt in 1899, although he had discharged the bankruptcy by 1902. For a time he lived at Nore near Godalming, but by 1916 was again living at Shalford Park.