Meghan Markle blasted by Montecito neighbor: She’s not ‘an asset to our community’
Meghan Markle has rubbed one of her Montecito, Calif., neighbors the wrong way.
Richard Mineards, a man who lives close to the Duchess of Sussex, told the Daily Mail Friday, “‘I personally don’t think that Meghan is an asset to our community.”
“She doesn’t really go out or get involved with the community,” he added.
However, Mineards said he has slightly different feelings about Markle’s husband, Prince Harry, whom he described as “quite jolly.”
He concluded, “Meghan doesn’t seem to get seen anywhere,” before pointing out about Harry, “And you don’t see him either.”
Page Six has reached out to the Sussexes’ reps for comment but did not immediately hear back.
This is not the first time the royal couple has upset one of their Californian neighbors.
In July 2023, Frank McGinity, an 88-year-old US Navy veteran, claimed he was snubbed when he tried to give Markle and Harry some films he made about the history of the area when they first moved in.
“I have a big house next to Harry and Meghan’s property and I live in the guest house while renting the main house out on Airbnb,” he reportedly explained in his memoir, “Get Off Your Street.”
“Harry and Meghan live on old McCormick property and I went up to their gate with the films on a CD, but they weren’t interested.”
McGinity claimed he was turned away by a man at the gate, who “wouldn’t take the film, just saying, ‘They’re not interested.’ I was trying to be neighborly.”
The author, like Mineards, opined at the time, “We don’t see them very much around here.”
McGinity concluded, “It’s surprising they came here. People are typically older. It’s where the elephants come to die.”
Markle, 43, and Harry, 40, moved to California after they quit their duties as senior members of the British royal family in January 2020.
They bought a beautiful $14 million mansion in Montecito that boasts nine bedrooms and 16-bathrooms across the 18,000-square-foot property.
The outdoor area also features a pool, tennis court, tea house, rose garden, olive trees, two-bed guest house and children’s cottage.
Markle appears to prefer socializing with the Hollywood social scene than with her local neighbors.
She befriended Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi, who only recently left Montecito for the United Kingdom reportedly because Donald Trump won the 2024 presidential election.
The duchess has also been spending time with Katy Perry, Orlando Bloom and Oprah Winfrey, according to gossip blogger Perez Hilton.
It’s been rumored that Harry misses living in the UK, but he has said that he still thinks it is too dangerous for Markle and their two children — Prince Archie, 5, and Princess Lilibet, 3 — to reside there given the lack of police security.
The “Spare” author also said this week he believes his late mom, Princess Diana, would have wanted him to raise his kids in the US “to be able to do the things” he “undoubtedly wouldn’t be able to do in the UK.”
