Some houses feel more familiar than places we’ve actually lived, simply because we’ve watched a family move through their rooms and hallways a dozen times on screen. What’s easy to forget is that most of these homes are not sets built on a studio backlot. They’re real properties, with real owners, real mail carriers, and real neighbors who’ve gotten used to strangers taking photos from the sidewalk.
Below are nine such houses, all still standing, all still visitable in some form, whether that means a guided tour or simply a respectful drive-by.
1. The Home Alone house in Winnetka, Illinois
The home is located at 671 Lincoln Ave in Winnetka, Illinois and was used primarily for exterior shots. Because the production found it too small for equipment, only a few interior scenes were filmed there, most notably the hallway and staircase. Most of the interior scenes fans remember, including the enlarged staircase and foyer, were actually built on a soundstage.
Most of the house’s interiors were recreated or duplicated on a soundstage built in the gymnasium of the former campus of New Trier Township High School. The Georgian brick home has become something of a pilgrimage site every December, and in 2021 it even briefly appeared on Airbnb for a one night stay, complete with booby traps and a nod to Buzz McCallister himself.
2. The A Christmas Story house in Cleveland
The house sits at 3159 W. 11th Street in Cleveland, Ohio, and in 2004 it was purchased on eBay for $150,000. That sale turned a modest yellow bungalow into a full blown attraction, and the current owners have leaned into it rather than shying away.
The iconic home used during filming is located just outside downtown Cleveland, and visitors can tour the landmark and the nearby museum, exploring the home of Ralphie set up just as fans remember it, alongside original props and memorabilia. It remains one of the few movie houses where fans can actually walk through the front door rather than just admire it from the curb.
3. The Brady Bunch house in Studio City
The Brady Bunch house is located at 11222 Dilling Street in North Hollywood, California. Producers specifically chose this Studio City home for filming because it looked like a relatable, middle class family residence that audiences across the country could identify with.
It remains a popular stop for fans of classic television who want to see the real world setting of the show. The exterior is instantly recognizable even to people who’ve never seen a full episode, which says something about how deeply that split level facade burrowed into American pop culture.
4. The Family Stone house in Riverside, Connecticut
This private residence sits at 144 Riverside Ave in Riverside, Connecticut, and while filming there Luke Wilson chipped a tooth and asked Diane Keaton to recommend a dentist. She apparently gave him the number of a psychologist instead, a small anecdote that’s stuck around in behind the scenes trivia ever since.
Fans can visit the real life house, which was used for exterior film shots, though it is a private residence that can only be looked at by driving by. It’s a quieter stop compared to some of the more heavily trafficked movie houses, which suits the understated New England charm of the property itself.
5. The Poltergeist house in Simi Valley, California
In the 1982 film Poltergeist, the Freeling family is terrorized by ghosts after moving into a house built on top of a cemetery, and the movie was filmed in Simi Valley, California. The suburban setting was chosen precisely because it looked so unremarkable, which made the horror underneath it land harder.
Scary movie fans can visit the house where little Carol Anne was sucked into a TV, as it still exists today on Roxbury Street. The neighborhood has changed little since the early eighties, so the visual contrast between suburban calm and cinematic terror still holds up.
6. The Ferris Bueller house in Long Beach, California
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off placed its hero’s family home in the Chicago suburbs, at least according to the story. The real house is located a long drive away in Long Beach, California, a 1920s home with seven bedrooms and five bathrooms.
With roughly 4,900 square feet to lounge around in, it’s easy to see why Ferris wasn’t in a hurry to get to school. The house occasionally opens for private tours or events, though most fans simply admire it from outside, since it remains a privately owned residence.
7. The Mrs. Doubtfire house in San Francisco
The Doubtfire house sits at 2640 Steiner Street, a location well known to fans of Robin Williams. Sally Field’s character memorably gave the home’s real address away within the film itself, which made it one of the easiest movie houses to track down long before the internet made everything searchable.
You can’t go inside, but standing out front delivers an instant sense of movie recognition, and the surrounding Pacific Heights streets add to the atmosphere. After Robin Williams’ death in 2014, fans left flowers, notes, and costumes outside, turning it into one of San Francisco’s more organic pop culture memorials.
8. The Ennis House in Los Feliz, Los Angeles
The Ennis House, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and used in Blade Runner, is located at 2607 Glendower Avenue in Los Feliz, Los Angeles. Its imposing concrete block construction made it a natural fit for the film’s dystopian mood, even though the house itself predates the movie by more than sixty years.
The Ennis House is one of the more architecturally significant stops on any movie house tour, since it’s as celebrated among architecture enthusiasts as it is among film fans. It occasionally opens for guided tours, though access has historically been limited given the building’s fragile, historic status.
9. The Cullen house near Portland, Oregon
The Cullen house from the Twilight film series is a private home in Portland, Oregon, built specifically for the production. Unlike most entries on this list, the house wasn’t repurposed from an existing residence, it was designed with the films in mind from the start.
Fans of the series regularly make the trip to Portland to see it in person. The surrounding forested landscape adds to the effect, since the moody, evergreen scenery was as central to the Twilight aesthetic as any single building.
Visiting any of these homes comes with a simple courtesy that fans generally respect: most are private residences, not museums, and the people living there didn’t necessarily sign up for a steady stream of visitors. A photo from the sidewalk tends to go a lot further than knocking on the door. Still, there’s something quietly satisfying about standing in front of a place you’ve only ever seen through a screen, proof that even the most memorable movie settings usually started out as somebody’s ordinary front yard.
