The modest suburban home used as Walter White’s family abode in Breaking Bad is officially on the market for US$4m – almost 10 times the median sale price in its neighbourhood.
The ranch-style house in Albuquerque, New Mexico has four bedrooms, two bathrooms and a back yard pool, which featured in crucial scenes in the show. The median price of a house in the same postcode is $421,000, according to real estate company Zillow.
Homeowner Joanne Quintana said that the house’s popularity among tourists who were fans of the acclaimed TV series had come at a cost to her family’s quality of life.
“This was our family home from 1973, almost 52 years,” she told local TV station KOB4. “So we’re going to walk away with just our memories. It’s time to move on. We’re done. There’s no reason to fight any more.”
The house was first scouted by the Breaking Bad crew in 2006. “They introduced themselves and handed [my mother] a card and said, ‘We would like to use your house for a pilot’,” Quintana said.
Over five seasons of the show, which aired between 2008 and 2013, the exteriors and back yard of the house – though not the interiors – were used extensively to portray the home of White, a chemistry teacher who turns to manufacturing methamphetamine after a cancer diagnosis.
For more than a decade, the house has seen droves of fans visit – sometimes with intrusive consequences.
Quintana said that an average of 300 cars come past the house each day. In 2015, Quintana’s late mother, Fran Padilla, said that they had been besieged by visitors attempting to recreate a scene from Breaking Bad where White 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,” Padilla told NPR.
That same year, Breaking Bad creator Vince Gilligan issued a call for fans to stop bombarding the house. “There is nothing original or funny or cool about throwing a pizza on this lady’s roof,” he said.
After an incident where one visitor left a package addressed to Walter White on their doorstep, Quintana and her siblings decided to erect more security.
“My brothers said, that’s it, we’re done, fence is going up,” Quintana told KOB4. “That’s too close for comfort.”
The listing’s high price reflects its likely future as a prized artefact or tourist destination, instead of a family dwelling.
“I hope they make it what the fans want,” Quintana said. “They want a B&B. They want a museum. They want access to it. Go for it!”
