Murder houses make up just a small niche in today’s real estate market, which becomes even narrower when you eliminate structures that have only been hosts to pretend-atrocities. Still, there appears to be a competitive market for real-life horror homes, which presumably come with a shit ton of sage at closing. At least, we hope the people who recently bought the Dutch Colonial of both Amityville murder and Amityville Horror will ask for some when they’re handed the keys. Newsday reports that the granddaddy of verifiably scary abodes has just been sold for the second time in six years. The price tag was just $850,000, which is less than the $950,000 the previous owner paid for it. But even that was a bargain compared to the 2010 listing price of $1.15 million. We can’t imagine why anyone would be practically trying to give away this 5-bedroom, 5,000-square-foot Ocean Avenue home that the realtor couldn’t bring herself to walk into, even for a guided web tour.
Oh, wait, now we remember: The house was the scene of a mass murder. Ronald DeFeo, Jr. was convicted of killing his parents and four siblings in 1974, but the supernatural stuff supposedly happened after George and Kathy Lutz bought the house in 1976. Their accounts of the paranormal goings-on made up Jay Anson’s book, The Amityville Horror, which eventually led to James Brolin and Ryan Reynolds taking turns playing George Lutz in a couple of movies in the franchise. The murders and related stories continue to prompt new entries in the series, including next year’s Amityville: The Awakening.