If you’re buying a regular house and want a full survey before taking the plunge with a mortgage, you can often expect to begrudgingly pay about £1,000. But for a castle you need to think bigger. Much bigger.

When Ann Kaplan Mulholland - a hugely successful businesswoman and star of Canadian reality TV show Real Housewives of Toronto - decided she wanted to buy Lympne Castle, near Hythe, she was keen to ensure it was structurally sound.

The medieval Grade I-listed castle - the first buildings of which date back to 1080 - sits within more than 130 acres. When it originally went on the market, it did so with an eye-watering £15 million price tag.

The cost of surveying the castle and its grounds? £40,000. And there was a sting in the tail.

“The report came back and it was massive,” the 63-year-old told KentOnline this week. “I was practically hyperventilating.

“The original asking price was £15 million but by the time we had enquired about it, it was £11 million. We’d put in an offer for £6.5m.

“Then when we got that Bible back of everything that had to be done, I phoned the agent and said we're only paying £5.5 million as it was going to cost us much more than a million just to fix the deficiencies.

“I sent them over this ‘book’ of a survey we’d received as I think they didn’t believe me. I said we’d pay £5.5m the following morning at 10am if they took it.

“The word I got back was that they had another offer. I said, ‘Good. If you've got another offer, take it because somebody else could spend that money.’ They accepted our offer that night.”

On reflection, that £40,000 was probably money well spent.

A year on, and the castle is being reborn - thanks, primarily, to around £15 million being invested in it by Ann and her husband Stephen - a former professional ice hockey player in their native Canada who has gone on to bigger fame and fortune as a renowned plastic surgeon.

But make no mistake, the couple did not buy a castle just to have it as their own private Camelot. This is business and they are sinking a great deal of their money into making it a success and restoring it within all the super-strict guidelines that such a historical property demands.

A year on from those purchasing negotiations and the castle’s wedding business is set to turnover £1 million this year alone. There’s already a bar and restaurant open to the public; a number of cottages within the grounds to rent and an events space; while a bistro, complete with olive trees in the courtyard, will open in July. And, if all goes to plan, 20 hotel rooms on the second floor of the castle will open around September or October. It’s also planning to construct greenhouses in order to grow its own vegetables, with future plans for farm-to-table cooking classes.

In short, it’s shaping up to be one of Kent’s must-visit swanky destinations.

There are plans for a (Canadian) TV documentary to chart its transformation later this year

Ann, who is spearheading the rejuvenation of the place, is a rather disarming character. She’s amusing, self-deprecating and clearly a shrewd businesswoman who doesn’t suffer fools gladly.

If you believed the extravagant photographs and media image of her you’d assume she was something of a party animal, forever on Instagram to boast about her lifestyle.

The reality, however, is something quite different.

“When I filmed Real Housewives, they told me I had to do social media. I said I didn’t want to,” she explains.

“So I had to start doing it but I didn’t like it. I felt very exposed. I'm a business person, so I would prefer to just talk about business, but nobody's interested in me talking about finance or numbers.

“People on the show told me people were interested in what I wore - but I've never really cared. I've had fun with what I wear, but not really cared to share it.

“It got to the point where I hired someone to manage my social media. She's a millennial. And she wants me to walk up to the camera, hold up an outfit and say, what do you think I should wear today? Hold up a £6,000 shirt and ask people’s opinion? That’s not relatable.

“There's no way I could do this. Or show people how to put mascara on. My eyesight’s so gone, I can't even put it on myself,” she laughs.

“So I try to do something with a sense of humour because I refuse to tell people what to wear or what to do. No, I don’t like social media.”

But the level of public interest in her - she’s a famous face in North America - demands she must. Just don’t expect debauched partying.

“I’ve learned the English love their beer - on tap. I don't have anything but maybe the occasional glass of wine. My husband doesn't drink.

“I'm a gluten-free vegan and we don't party. In fact, in my whole life, I've never gone as a single woman to a bar or anything like that. From what I've read, people were expecting us to be party animals. We're not that exciting.

“But we do like a good event and we do like a good conversation. I have to say I do love a good game of Scrabble.

“We’ve raised a lot of children and we had to be responsible. That meant being home at night and cooking dinners. I think the castle is our next iteration of being empty nesters.”

Between them, the couple have raised eight children - two are hers, two are his, two they’ve had together during their 23 years of marriage and two are the children of Ann’s sister, Joan, who died of cancer in 2014.

She made her name and fortune by starting up a finance company in Canada which made her a multi-millionaire and made the world sit up and take notice. She has since gone to write books, deliver talks and win a host of awards for her business endeavours. Add to that, she’s also got a host of qualifications which affords her the title ‘Dr’ and a slew of letters after her name.

She is, you suspect, to be underestimated at your peril.

“My husband and I both work as hard or harder than anybody else in the room,” she says. “We don't walk in and say ‘do this’ if we're not working equally as hard.

“We're very, very hard workers and I think anybody, if they put their mind to it and work hard can achieve whatever they like.”

She’s not afraid to roll her sleeves up either - relying last summer on the waitressing skills she developed to help pay her way through university - when working at the castle.

The couple currently rent a place in London as their main UK home - they have a “real estate portfolio” they run as a business (in addition to various other on-going ventures), as well as homes in the likes of Hawaii and Las Vegas - but Ann admits “around 80%” of her time in the UK is at the castle.

Her knowledge of Kent, however, is rather limited - she admits she’s strayed into Folkestone but has yet to discover the charms of the likes of Whitstable or the bright lights of Margate.

So has she been embraced by the local community?

“They have somewhat. There’s sometimes hype around our wealth or how how much work I have had done on my aesthetic personal front,” she smiles, choosing her words carefully, “and I think that becomes the story, so I'm hoping we get through all that and we can concentrate on the castle.”

Most of her time, it seems, is spent discussing how to modernise a medieval castle without impacting on its historic significance. And it’s rarely cheap.

“We had to replace a sink,” she explains, “but when we removed it we discovered we had to replace all the piping. That cost £70,000.

“I am trying to keep everything that is historic intact,” she explains, “but in a modern age there are some things that are very difficult. So, for example, we can't change window panes. So you do have a breeze that comes in which makes it challenging to heat a castle.

“We're not changing the feel or look of the history of the castle. We're just trying to modernise behind the scenes; the plumbing, the wiring - things you wouldn't notice.”

It’s become something of a labour of love for the TV personality. And one which she may not have taken on at all had a recent political decision been made before she entered negotiations to buy the place.

“I'm really questioning England right now,” she says, “and I'm going to say this even though I shouldn't.

“But with your new rules for non-domicile residents, I'm really wonderful what is the government thinking?”

After much political pressure, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced his government was to scrap the non-dom tax status - which allows people to live in the UK but be registered for tax purposes overseas. In short, it means they are only taxed on UK income rather than their global wealth. Dr Kaplan Mulholland isn’t a fan.

“Of all the places in the world, we chose England,” she adds. “That's because my mother is English. We have an ancestry visa, and it's a tax preferable place to live as a non-domicile resident.

“We invested in buying a castle, so we've invested heavily in England.

“But now they’re changing all the rules. I think the government is going to see an exodus of all non-domicile, very wealthy, residents.”

Did it make her question her commitment to the castle?

“Yes, absolutely, I questioned it,” she admits, frankly. “Our residency status no longer makes sense.

“There’s no longer an incentive to live here because non-doms will be taxed on their worldwide income as of April 2025.”

They remain, however, dedicated to Lympne Castle, adding: “We're committed. We bought a castle - we have a business. We’re not as wealthy as a lot of the people that are impacted. So we have a little bit of a different situation, but there are some very high-net-worth individuals that are leaving this country because of the impact.

“The thought of the government is that they would get more income - which is not going to be the case.

“So we have to think of how it impacts us, but we're not planning on leaving. We'll be here at least 90 days a year after that.”

For now, though, the focus is on turning the castle into a thriving enterprise and developing its wedding business.

All of which begs one last question… given the cost to purchase and renovate the place, is she still enjoying it?

“You have a choice,” she says. “You have to do something with joy, or you don't do it.

“So once I made the commitment to do it, I'm going to do it with a smile on my face because I certainly don't want to spend one day frowning. You know, what's the point of complaining about anything?

“We only have so many days to live on this earth and you might as well like what you're doing.”