Sir Rod Stewart has put his £7.5million Essex mansion up for sale.

Rod Stewart and Penny Lancaster

Rod Stewart and Penny Lancaster

The 71-year-old singer - who bought Wood House for £1.2 million in 1986 - has put the Grade-II listed property on the market in order to move closer to the school his sons Alastair, 10, and Aiden, five, attend, according to The Sunday Times.

Rod and his wife Penny Lancaster, 45, are currently renovating Durrington House in Essex, which they splashed out £4.65 million for in 2013.

Wood House, once owned by Sir Winston Churchill, sits on 25 acres and has six bedrooms, a lake, tennis courts, swimming pool, stables, along with a two-bedroom cottage on the grounds of the estate.

It also has a full-sized football pitch, on which Newcastle, Liverpool and Celtic have all trained.

Rod owns homes in Palm Beach, Florida, and Los Angeles, California.

He moved to Los Angeles over 40 years ago to avoid a higher rate of tax in the UK but revealed in 2014 that he was planning to move his family home because he wanted his children to be educated in Britain.

He said: "This place is still in my heart. We are planning hopefully on moving back in about 18 months so my kids can grow up here. It's not definite.

"But this is where me and Penny, this is where we come from."

Penny added: "Rod and I would like to move back permanently. It would be lovely for our kids to go to schools in England.

"We were both educated here. The children would be better off being educated here."

"Four months of the year the kids are on holiday so we'll travel to the US."