EXCLUSIVE Josie Gibson buys million pound mansion in Bath after living in a caravan and working as a cleaner

When Josie Gibson first started working, she lived in a caravan.
As a call centre worker for insurance firm AXA in Bristol she earned around £10,000 and topped her income with a sideline as a cleaner.
But 15 years on and the television presenter is worth around £1m and has splashed out on a stunning £1.1million mansion in Bath - ten miles from where she grew up.
Now a much loved This Morning host and star of the 2023 series of I'm A Celeb, she has spent her riches on the four-bedroom, three-bathroom cottage on the outskirts of the historical city is set on three acres and also has a conservatory and outbuildings where she will live with her seven-year-old son Reggie.
She also has big plans for the property. She has already submitted a planning application for 'erection of two storey side extension, entrance and single storey extension with balcony and new first floor and roof for annex building'.
A friend of the star told The Mail: 'Josie is the fairytale rags to riches story.
'She used to live in caravan, she had very little but she has transformed her life thanks to her bubbly personality. She went out to the jungle so the fee from that would have helped to the house, for sure.'
Josie, 40, rose to fame 15 years ago when she won the reality television show Big Brother.
She won the 11th series in 2010 after getting into a relationship with housemate John James Parton.
The couple later appeared in a one-off fly on the wall show following their lives together called Josie and John James: What Happened Next, before later splitting up.
Josie quickly carved out a career as a TV personality, appearing in 2011 in her own three-part reality TV series There's Something About Josie.
She joined ITV's This Morning as a competition announcer in 2019 and became a presenter in 2021.
Before she became famous after appearing in Big Brother in 2010, she used to earn money by cleaning people's shoes and catching the bus around her local town trying to sell the product.
In a far cry away from her usual glitzy TV appearances, she then moved on to grease the inside of washing machine bins in a factory before landing her job at AXA.
A friend of the star told The Mail: 'Josie is the fairytale rags to riches story. 'She used to live in a caravan, she had very little but she has transformed her life thanks to her bubbly personality. She went out to the jungle so the fee from that would have helped to the house, for sure.'
Josie found love during her time in the Big Brother house with Australian housemate John James Parton but they split a year later.
In 2018 she welcomed her son Reggie with her now ex-partner Terry Bond and bought a £550,000 house in her home city of Bristol where she grew up in 2022.

Try Our AI Features

Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:

Learn with AIFact CheckingText to SpeechAI Summary

Related Articles

Times

42 minutes ago

• Times

‘Glastonbury festival is like Wimbledon — even my dad watches it'

The Glastonbury festival has become as big as Wimbledon and the World Cup on TV, the head of the BBC's coverage has Rothery, who is the BBC's head of popular music for television, said the festival will be getting more coverage on BBC1 than ever this year, as all generations show increased interest in watching extended coverage of the musical acts at Worthy iPlayer viewers will be able to stream continuous coverage of the five main stages at the festival from midday until past midnight on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. 'It's a beast,' Rothery said of the festival. 'The interest in Glastonbury has extended over time, with people wanting more [coverage] leading into the festival and more after it. 'It's almost becoming a Glastonbury season now, more akin to a sporting event like Wimbledon or a World Cup. 'Linear TV is still the main go-to for our broad audience. The numbers continue to be really strong, which I think is partly to do with Glastonbury becoming our sort of Wimbledon of music.' Rothery said he puts the increasing interest down to an evolution in the festival's appeal. 'It's gone from the 1990s, when it was a brilliant festival but had a very specific demographic, to now being a very broad church, reflective of everybody,' he said. 'It's multigenerational. Even my dad watches it and he wasn't aware of it ten years ago.' This year BBC1 is scheduling more coverage of Glastonbury than ever before, Rothery said. 'We are also pushing longer sections of sets and even full sets on linear TV, whereas we used to be more highlights and bitesize bits of sets.'That is a big shift. There is a confidence that we can put a full set out and it will sustain a good audience.' Rothery said in recent years they had been getting 'millions' watching the live streams of the five main stages on each day of the festival. He said ways of reaching a younger demographic — which all broadcasters are chasing as they compete against the likes of YouTube and TikTok — have changed now that younger people consume music differently through sites such as Spotify, where the whole history of popular music sits in one place. 'In the old days, to reach a young audience we would normally want to put a young pop star on a stage to reach that demographic,' he said. 'That has totally changed. My 15-year-old daughter is a massive Billy Joel fan and loves The Clash. Audiences don't know or care how long these songs have been around, they are just great songs. 'Elton John [in 2023] gave us a massive young audience share and one of the youngest of the festival.' Deploying a drone shot at Glastonbury to show the audience the full scale of the record crowd for Elton's closing headline slot, the final show of his touring career, was a highlight for Rothery. Asked what makes a great Glastonbury festival TV moment, he said: 'Some of it is pre-planned, like having the surprise sets that the festival organises, to create those moments of excitement and intrigue, and sometimes it might just be great timing of an act being on. 'I have vivid memories of LCD Soundsystem playing All My Friends and seeing the sun setting, that was a special moment that only Glastonbury can do. 'Jay Z doing Wonderwall was a huge moment, or when Dave [the grime artist] got the guy out of the audience to do a rap, the audience had no expectation of that. 'Sometimes it's the audience's appreciation of the artist. When Dolly Parton did the legends slot, her reaction to seeing the audience know every word to Jolene, in cowboy hats, took her by such surprise and made it really special. 'When Brian Wilson did it, there were surfboards in the audience. It's the lengths Glastonbury people go to show their appreciation. 'It's a magic combo of things that cannot always be pre-planned.'

Daily Mail​

an hour ago

• Daily Mail​

Prince Harry plots family truce to heal feud with King Charlies and Prince William

The Duke of Sussex is to extend an olive branch to the wider royal family, including with dad King Charles and brother Prince William by inviting them to his 2027 multi-sport event the Invictus Games. In the strongest indication yet that Prince Harry is keen for a reconciliation, it is understood that an emailed invite will be sent out later this month, followed by a formal request. Sources said the timing of the invitation was designed to give the senior royals the best possible chance of attending, given that Charles is known to draw up his schedule up to three years in advance. The extraordinary move, which could see Harry photographed with the royal family for the first time since late Queen Elizabeth's funeral in September 2022, has raised eyebrows among some commentators. Ingrid Seward said: 'The King might attend to show support for the Armed Forces and congratulate Harry on the most significant success in his life. 'The only reason the King is wary of associating with his son is that he no longer trusts him not to repeat their private conversations as he has done in the past. This goes for all the working members of the family.' Fellow royal commentator Katie Nicholl said: 'The King absolutely wants a relationship with his youngest son and with his grandchildren. 'He has an incredible capacity for forgiveness and he wants to be magnanimous in all of this and therefore there's certainly a possibility that the King might consider attending Invictus.' Despite the royals' previous strong support for Invictus, the invitation - should anyone choose to accept it - is likely to cause some headaches for royal aides as it involves a major scheduling conflict. The Games are set to open in the UK at Birmingham's NEC on July 12, 2027, and would conclude on Queen Camilla's 80th birthday on July 17, for which there would likely already be celebrations planned. It also remains to be seen whether Harry would risk bringing Meghan and their children Archie and Lilibet to the UK for the event, having previously insisted he could not do so unless his family was offered 'full police protection'. A source said: 'Harry has agreed that Invictus should extend an invitation to his family. Invictus hopes the royal family will come along to support the wounded veterans taking part. Harry is hopeful his father will set aside their differences to attend the Invictus Games and support veterans. 'The royals have always been hugely supportive of Invictus and proud of what Harry has achieved in that arena. This is one olive branch from him that might be reciprocated.' The Invictus invitations are thought to represent the first time Harry has publicly reached out in a bid to gather his family together. Harry made it clear in a BBC interview last month that he would welcome a rapprochement with his father and the wider family, despite acknowledging the hurt caused by his brutally honest memoir Spare. The Duke said: 'There's no point in continuing to fight any more. Life is precious. Forgiveness is 100 per cent a possibility because I would like to get my father and brother back.' The invitees and the wording of the invitations are said to have been approved by Harry, with the emails being sent to private secretaries at Buckingham Palace. A spokesman for Invictus said: 'No formal invitations have been issued as preparations are in the early stages.'

Daily Record

an hour ago

• Daily Record

Abandoned baby found in holdall in car park traces parents on ITV Long Lost Family

ITV Long Lost Family: Born Without A Trace will focus on the 'Baby in Pink' Sarah Meyers, its youngest ever searcher. Sarah Meyer will be remembered by many as the 'baby in Pink'. The 24-year-old was abandoned by her mother when she was a newborn baby and hit the headlines after being found in a holdall sitting in a multi-story carpark when she was just an hour old, wrapped up in pink towel and a white shawl. Sarah is now the youngest person to search for a relative on ITV Long Lost Family: Born Without A Trace. ‌ Dubbed 'Baby in Pink' by the press at the time, Sarah's discovery was a huge national news story and led to a nationwide search for the mother of the tot. Sarah even appeared on This Morning with a police sergeant, as cops went to desperate measures to locate her family. ‌ Then host of the ITV show, Judy Finnegan, told viewers at the time: 'This little sprog was abandoned in a multi-story carpark. She was barely an hour old, weighing just 7lbs.' However all efforts led to dead ends despite many public appeals and Sarah's birth mum didn't come forward. She was adopted at the age of three months old by mum and dad Jo and Pierre, who already had another adopted daughter, Jess. Viewers of the Long Lost Family spin off will see the emotional journey everyone ends up on when Sarah attempts to find out the truth behind her birth story. The programme, hosted by Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell, attempts to help foundlings, which means people who were abandoned by their birth family as babies, sometimes in unusual places including a phone box, a cardboard box or church steps. The upcoming instalment will reveal that Sarah's umbilical cord had been cut when she was found, but not clamped, meaning it could have been a home birth. Baby Sarah was then sent to hospital where she was under the care of a host of nurses who took her under their wing. ‌ Sarah says: 'On the news, I was the Baby in Pink because I was in the pink towel wrapped in the blanket. 'I was named Caroline after the nurse who looked after me and Pembrooke after my car park. It's like a little secret identity of mine. Now my middle name is Caroline." ‌ Sarah, who still owns the town and holdall she was found in, opens up about her close relationship with her own family and says that she and sister Jess were always told they were adopted, as writes the Mirror. She went on: 'I want my birth parents to know that they shouldn't feel any remorse because I've had a wonderful life. But I'd like an explanation because it is something that is missing, to know where I come from. Why was I abandoned?' Sarah goes back to the car park she was found in as part of the episode and is left wondering who would leave a baby in such a busy area. ‌ She said: 'I was an evening baby and 30 minutes to an hour old. So I was literally fresh out of the womb.' She also gets a letter from a police evidence box, which was sent to investigating officers 10 days after she was discovered in the car park. The letter gives no clues, and is typed and unstamped. ‌ It reads: 'Please look after my little girl. I love her so much, but just can't cope with another baby. Thank you to all the police officers involved, hospital staff, and the members of the public for their help. Thank you.' As part of the episode, Sarah is reintroduced to Police Sergeant Wendy Whiting, the first on the scene when she was found and someone who stayed with her case for the duration of its development. Wendy reveals when the baby was found, the person who discovered her thought she'd found a bomb at first. ‌ Wendy says: 'I remember the radio message coming out and thinking, 'Did I just hear that right?' An abandoned baby, no clothes on, we were concerned.' The ITV research team are helped by Sarah's young age and are able to access documents quickly compared to more historical investigations. They soon establish who her birth parents are and find out that her mum was in her late teens when Sarah was born, and already had a child. ‌ However, Sarah's birth mum is not as easy to track down, and doesn't respond to an approach by researchers. Sarah, who now lives in Northern Ireland with her partner Shannon and has a cybersecurity degree, says: 'It's good to hear that she's at least alive and is out there. It leaves the door open for her to come and meet me if she wants to. I'll never close that door. I respect that it's such a big thing for her. I understand that she might not be ready. I want her to see that I've lived a good life and that I'm not angry with her.' There is good news also as Sarah's birth father, who has a partner and a daughter, reveals he never knew of her existence but is keen to get to know her. He stays anonymous to protect the birth mum's identity but is overcome with emotion as he says: 'It's very upsetting to know that my daughter was just left there in that situation. Anything could have happened to her.' ‌ Sarah's birth dad then wonders if his late mum would have seen her baby granddaughter and not known, as she'd worked at the hospital unit where Sarah was taken to. As Long Lost Family fans are accustomed to, there's then an emotional reunion and exchanging of photos as Sarah meets her father and they note their similar physical attributes, and common interests. He says: 'My daughters can get to know each other and we can all be a family together.' Sarah adds: 'I've been waiting a long time, I just didn't think it would be possible. He was as I imagined and more, beyond what I expected. I can't wait to get to know him more. The past is in the past and the adventure is only beginning.' Join the Daily Record WhatsApp community!