Home Alone House: Inside The McCallister House 30 Years Later!

Table Of Content

• All-cash offers, wealthy buyers push Southern California home prices to a record
• ‘The Circle’ S06 debuts new apartments & a fresh filming location in Atlanta building
• More homes from movies
• 'Home Alone' star Macaulay Culkin honored during Walk of Fame ceremony
• Photos show what the 'Home Alone' house looks like in real life
• Building the Set From Scratch
• Mayor Karen Bass urges L.A.’s wealthy to fund homeless housing
• California is building fewer homes. The state could get even more expensive

The home itself was built in 1920 in the Georgian colonial style—perfectly symmetrical. According to Zillow, the home now boasts 5,398 square feet, 10 bedrooms, and 5 baths. Amy Wilkinson of Vanity Fair reported that the film crew used the house for exterior shots and some interior shots featuring the living room and the staircase. Wilkinson reported that the cast and crew took several months to film at the home and while they filmed on the first floor, the Abendshien family lived in a makeshift apartment on the second floor.

Upper West Side townhouse from ‘Home Alone 2' is up for sale. It's nicer than you remember - NBC New York

Upper West Side townhouse from ‘Home Alone 2' is up for sale. It's nicer than you remember.

Posted: Wed, 20 Dec 2023 08:00:00 GMT [source]

All-cash offers, wealthy buyers push Southern California home prices to a record

The Chicago suburb is one of the wealthiest places in the nation in terms of household income. In 2012, the real-life McCallister home in Winnetka, Illinois sold for $1.585 million, a relative bargain compared to its original listing price of $2.4 million. Now, the property’s value is estimated to be over $2,000,000, but it hasn’t been listed for sale since 2012. And while only four lucky fans got to enjoy the memorable stay, the house’s brief stint on Airbnb gave us a peek inside — and a good idea of how the iconic property has changed over the years. The red-brick, Georgian-style home sits on a half-acre lot and has about 4,200 square feet of living space. All in all, the house has five bedrooms, including a four-room master suite, which spans the entire west wing of the home, and three-and-a-half bathrooms.

‘The Circle’ S06 debuts new apartments & a fresh filming location in Atlanta building

Nevertheless, the owners made sure to redecorate before listing the house on Airbnb, painstakingly recreating many of the original details and the signature interior style. The McCallister house became a character in its own right, with its picture-perfect exterior and festive décor now being synonymous with holiday cheer. News of a new Home Alone movie intrigued fans all over the world, who were all left wondering whether the remake could live up to the original.

More homes from movies

His work has appeared in nine books and his photographs have been exhibited extensively including at the Smithsonian Institute and the Annenberg Space for Photography. Nathan Solis is a Metro reporter covering breaking news at the Los Angeles Times. He previously worked for Courthouse News Service, where he wrote both breaking news and enterprise stories ranging from criminal justice to homelessness and politics. Before that, Solis was at the Redding Record Searchlight as a multimedia journalist, where he anchored coverage of the destructive 2017 fires in Northern California.

The property, which she described as a “time capsule” because of its Midcentury Modern aesthetic, was purchased last year and set for demolition seemingly without reason. In recent weeks, several reports revealed that the Marvel star and Schwarzenegger purchased the lot for $12.5 million and that their new mansion — to be designed by Ken Ungar — was the reason for the teardown. He loved the place so much that he ended up calling his production company Smokehouse Pictures. If you’ve ever revisited the Home Alone films for a dose of nostalgia, you probably asked yourself at some point “how much is the Home Alone house worth? ” Well, after an extensive redecoration, the original owners of the property put up the Mcalister house for sale in May 2011. Gone are the days of green and red wallpaper and red carpeting on the stairs in the foyer – now replaced with modern grey paint and blue & white carpeting.

Photos show what the 'Home Alone' house looks like in real life

The Abendshiens stayed on Lincoln Avenue until 2011, when, as empty nesters, they decided to put the property up for sale. This was no average home, of course, so realtor Marissa Hopkins devised a splashy marketing strategy that included faux movie posters, a national media rollout, and restrictive open house policies. "We live in the area and it’s always fun to drive or walk by and reminisce," one of more than 30 reviews of the house on TripAdvisor read.

Building the Set From Scratch

As a regional attraction, the McCallister house is a unique treasure that stirs regional pride for Chicagoans. Like “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” which spotlighted Chicago’s Wrigley Field, Lake Shore Drive and the Mercantile Exchange trading pits, “Home Alone” is deeply rooted in its sense of place. The film’s cops, cashiers and Santas deliver their dialogue with Midwestern accents. A cardboard cutout of Michael Jordan totters on a train set through the living room. The iconic movie house from Home Alone, at 671 Lincoln Ave., in suburban Winnetka, is still standing today.

Mayor Karen Bass urges L.A.’s wealthy to fund homeless housing

A real family lives there today, and there’s a small fence that keeps out brazen fans. The circular driveway is gone now — a landscaping detail nearly every visitor is quick to point out — depriving fans a look at the place where Kevin was left out of a family head count before the airport. While the home was used for outside shots, the interior scenes were filmed on a set in a gym at an abandoned high school. While a large portion of the movie was filmed on a soundstage, shots of the home’s interior can still be found in the film. The scenes of the foyer’s grand staircase and the living room were the real-life Home Alone house. There were, however, some tiny changes made to facilitate some scenes in the film.

California is building fewer homes. The state could get even more expensive

Hughes, the director, lived in the area during his high school years and graduated from Glenbrook North High School. An acclaimed director who is credited with reinventing the teen movie through his coming-of-age films, he did film some movies elsewhere — but time and time again came back to the Chicago area. John Hughes loved Chicago, and according to the same Netflix special, he also filmed Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Uncle Buck at the abandoned high school. When it comes to the Colonial mansion, there actually may be a connection to the beloved '90s sitcom Friends.

Kevin McAllister's older brother, Buzz, was said to be the guests' lucky host for the evening. Unfortunately for "Home Alone" fans this time around, the house isn't listed on Airbnb this season. In May, more than four months after arriving at the doorstep of 671 Lincoln Avenue, the crew finally packed up their festive wallpaper and klieg lights. Lauren had to army crawl from her parents’ room (where the TV was) to her own bedroom in order to avoid casting any shadows in the window.

At the time of filming, John and Cynthia Abendshien lived in the inviting home. They had reportedly been living in the house for only two years before the movie aired in 1990. A few years ago in 2021, AirBnB opened the mansion doors for a one-night-only stay hosted by none other than Kevin's older brother, Buzz.