What It’s Like to Live in a Pop Culture Landmark

Welcome to The Trend Times, a column that explores design fads in the age of doomscrolling.

Despite sitting on a quiet, residential street in Albuquerque, New Mexico, Joanne Quintana’s home sees around 300 cars a day. Used as a shooting location for the hit drama Breaking Bad starting in 2008, the four-bedroom ranch-style dwelling still attracts rabid fans, some of whom try to re-create an iconic scene where the chemistry teacher turned meth dealer throws a pizza on the roof. “We’ve had pizzas on our roof. We’ve had pizzas on our driveway; pizzas until we’re sick of looking at pizzas,” Quintana’s mother told NPR in 2015.

After frequently talking to the press about the terrible experience of living in the home—which necessitated the construction of a six-foot fence and increased police patrols in the area—Quintana officially said “we’re done” early this year. The price tag to take on this harrowing experience? Four million dollars—almost 10 times the area’s median house price. “From the explosive opening to pivotal scenes that captured audiences around the world, this Albuquerque home became more than a house—it became a character in its own right,” reads walterwhiteshouse.com.

Unlike owners of, say, an architectural wonder, which might beckon a small cadre of appreciators, owners of pop culture pads deal with hordes of fans who are diverse and unpredictable. To the owners, the residence is home; to fans, it inspires the same intense range of emotions as a beloved actor might. And whether ownership is the explicit objective of a fan, a moneymaking proposition, or somewhat of an accident, the experience of owning a “famous” house is hard to put a price tag on. Here, the owners of three celebrated properties speak to Dwell about what it’s like to live in a tourist attraction.

After Twilight

In 2018, Twilight appreciators Dean and Amber Neufeld were thrilled that the four-bedroom 1930s house in St. Helens, Oregon, used as main character Bella Swan’s home in the 2008 movie, was put on the market for $349,900. The data scientist and retired teacher were living about an hour from the property when they saw a familiar dwelling pop up online. Amber, who had been nurturing a hobby of identifying props in movies, recognized it immediately. The couple, who have an eight-year-old son, requested a tour, with no serious intention of buying it. “This is a really cool house,” Amber remembers thinking once they got inside. “What could we do to possibly save this?

“I was involved in some Twilight groups online at the time, and there was lots of chatter about the house being on the market, wondering if it was gonna be a Twilight fan that was gonna buy it,” she explains. “We just couldn’t stand the idea of somebody coming in and remodeling it, changing it,” Dean adds.

Because the house is in a residential zone, it would have been challenging to turn it into a museum, as the couple were limited to using no more than 25 percent of the property for business and having fewer than six customers a day. Dean says they “didn’t buy it with the business mindset,” but the goal was always to give fans a chance to experience it; renting it out as a vacation spot quickly made the most sense. But it was in rough shape: Not a single window opened, the water heater was leaking, and the floorboard nails were sticking out. Luckily, Dean is a handy guy, and Amber, thanks to years of fandom, was qualified to “bring the Twilight back to it.” The family moved into the house for three months to renovate it themselves, with Dean doing most of the labor (after spending eight hours at his day job). Amber was tasked with making the furnishings as screen accurate as possible, even securing the bedding used in the film, sent to her by fellow fans she met online.

The couple began the rental process on Airbnb, but they now book primarily through their own website. They had a slow start, but a viral tweet that read “What if we kissed in Bella’s bedroom?” had a domino effect, and an onslaught of media coverage means the place now books out immediately. “It’s kind of like throwing fish out in the fish farm,” Dean says, noting that a stay goes for around $450 a night (plus taxes and cleaning fees)—less than what they could get for the “famous” house—in an attempt to keep it accessible.

Though he says the experience of the previous owner was a “mixed bag,” the couple is thrilled by how respectful other fans are—and shocked by their desire to contribute in some way. “We had lots of things that were sent, whether it be artwork hanging on the wall or screen-accurate items.… The fandom hadn’t had anything new in a decade. Everybody wanted to just be a part of it,” Amber says. To wit: When they were outside refreshing the exterior paint job, a fan stopped by and asked if she could help; getting to paint the Twilight house—and getting a photo doing it—was the highlight of her trip.

Saving the Goondocks

Purchasing the Goonies house—a Victorian overlooking the Columbia River in Astoria, Oregon—wasn’t a business move for serial entrepreneur Behman Zakeri. “It was more for the love of the game,” he says, noting that it’s been a dream of his to own the property since he first saw the movie in the theaters in 1985. “I wanted to help the Goonies save the Goondocks [neighborhood] as a child.”

The adventure comedy’s superfan first visited the house in 2013 from his home base in Kansas City, Missouri. He was disappointed to learn it was a private residence, so all he could do was respectfully sneak around the property and drop 10 bucks in a donation box. Unsatisfied, he returned a couple years later with his family for Goonies Day, a multiday celebration hosted by the Oregon Film Museum, the only time of the year the house was open for a tour. Once inside, Zakeri was frustrated with how the owner had updated it over the years, stripping it of the 1980s Gooniesness: “Where’s the Rube Goldberg contraption in the front yard? Where’s the chicken? Where’s the football? Where’s the bowling ball? Where was the boat?”