If you play your cards right, you could technically be in possession of two of the most famous childhood homes in music history: Eminem’s and Kurt Cobain’s. The only difference is that Eminem’s Detroit house starts bidding at $1, while Kurt Cobain’s is listed at $500,000.
Wendy O’Connor, the late Nirvana frontman’s mom, put the 1.5-story bungalow in Aberdeen, WA up for sale this week. The house, built in 1923, was last assessed for $67,000, but it’s obviously priced to attract diehard Nirvana fans. Kurt lived in the house twice: from age 2 to nine, when his parents divorced, and then again from 16 to 20 when he moved back in with his mother. His bedroom walls still have holes he punched into the them, and the Iron Maiden and Led Zeppelin logos he stenciled on them. Kurt’s mattress is still in a crawl space in the home, and it still has the dining room table and hutch from when Kurt lived there. The last time someone lived in the house was when a family friend stayed there four years ago.
“We’ve decided to sell the home to create a legacy for Kurt, and yes, there are some mixed feelings since we have all loved the home and it carries so many great memories,” his sister Kim said in a statement. “But our family has moved on from Washington, and [we] feel it’s time to let go of the home.”
The asking price definitely isn’t crazy. A couple who bought a house Kurt lived in with his father (from age 11 to 15) for $42,500 were able to sell it for $210,000 in 2002. Kurt actually lived in about 11 different houses growing up, but these two are the ones he spent the most time in.
If $500,000 plus upkeep and property taxes is a bit much for a piece of rock-n-roll history, the 20th Anniversary edition of In Utero, Nirvana’s last studio album, also went on sale this week.
