Property expert Sarah Beeny has become a much-loved star after being on our screens for decades. Best known for shows including Property Ladder, Britain’s Best Home and How to Live Mortgage Free with Sarah Beeny, she is back on our screens tonight with her family for the Channel 4 show Sarah Beeny’s New Life in the Country, marking five years since the presenter moved to Somerset.
Away from her TV career, she has faced several personal challenges, including being diagnosed with breast cancer in August 2022. The star was given the all clear in April 2023 after undergoing a mastectomy and gruelling radiotherapy and chemotherapy.
But what else do we know about her life away from her career? Below we look at the heartbreaking loss she suffered aged just 10 that changed her life, and her relationship with husband Graham.
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Sarah Beeny’s tragic loss aged 10
Sarah tragically lost her mother when she was just 10 years old. Her mum Ann died aged 39 after being diagnosed with breast cancer.
After the loss, Sarah was educated as a weekly boarder at the all-girls Luckley-Oakfield School in Wokingham. Speaking about her mother’s death, she confessed the loss at such a tender age had led her to become a mild harder, clinging on to sentimental items.
She told OK!: “Home is really important for me. But it’s not about how it looks, it’s about how it makes people feel. My mum died when I was quite young and I’ve been sentimental since then. I’ve released myself from some of it now – and I’ve realised that my kids aren’t sentimental at all.”
Sarah Beeny’s relationship with husband
Sarah met her husband and property-developing business partner, Graham Swift, when she was 19 years old. Her brother is married to her husband’s sister, Caroline.
The couple share four boys – Billy, 20, Charlie, 18, Laurie, 16, and Rafferty, 15. But Sarah has previously opened up about why they still haven’t officially said ‘I love you’ to one another after 22 years of marriage.
She admitted saying ‘I love you’ became a sort of ‘inside joke’ for the high school lovebirds, who used to ridicule friends who would say that – and break up shortly afterwards.
Talking to Prima magazine she said: £I’m married to my best friend. I don’t know what our secret is, but I think having a spark of the child in you helps. I met Graham when I was 19 and he was 18.
“We used to laugh at friends who would say ‘I love you’ after one date and then dump them the next day, so not saying it became an inside joke. To this day, we’ve never officially said it,” she admitted.
Sarah Beeny’s New Life in the Country airs tonight (Saturday, Jnauary 4) on Channel 4 at 5.10 pm on Saturday, January 4, for a run of special episodes.