President Donald Trump’s childhood home in New York has sold for nearly $2 million following a million-dollar renovation that revived the long-neglected property, once known for its feral cat problem.
An unidentified buyer purchased the five-bedroom house in Queens’ upscale Jamaica Estates neighborhood for $1.93 million in July. The sale price was disclosed Friday, according to The New York Post.
Trump lived in the Tudor-style residence during his earliest years. His father, developer Fred Trump, built the home in 1940, and the family remained there until Trump was four before relocating to a larger nearby house.
For years, neighbors viewed the property as an eyesore after it stood vacant and appeared to suffer a series of setbacks, including burst pipes and an attempted break-in.
‘It brought down the value of all the homes in the neighborhood,’ Spencer Gale, who has lived on the block for the past 25 years, told The Daily Mail last year.
The house has now received an East Wing-style transformation, with designers describing its updated look as a fresh ‘Manhattan modern’ aesthetic.
The nearly $2 million sale represents a substantial gain for seller Tommy Lin, who bought the property for $835,000 last year — nearly $1.1 million less than its eventual sale price.
When Lin acquired it, the home had been listed for $2.3 million despite being characterized as a wreck, with a leaking roof, an overgrown lawn, flooding, block-wide power outages and a colony of feral cats inside.
President Donald Trump’s childhood home in New York has sold for nearly $2 million after a million-dollar makeover transformed the once-neglected property.
Trump spent his earliest years in the Tudor-style home built by his developer father, Fred Trump, in 1940, living there until he was four.
The five-bedroom house in the affluent Jamaica Estates neighborhood of Queens was purchased by an unknown buyer in July for $1.93 million
Lin, a developer, decided the risk was worth taking, previously revealing to Mansion Global: ‘The only reason I took on this project was because it’s Trump’s childhood house.’
He spent $500,000 and eight grueling months gutting and reviving the interior, outfitting the home with a chef’s kitchen, herringbone wood floors and spa-like bathrooms.
On Friday, Joe Zhu of RE/MAX Edge told The Post that the home ultimately sold over the summer for $70,000 below its most recent $1.99 million asking price.
Even after the extensive makeover, the property’s connection to the President remained a major draw for buyers, with some also attracted by the chance to own a piece of history, Zhu said.
‘There were quite a lot of people interested,’ he told the outlet.
But the roughly 3,100sq ft residence at 85-15 Wareham Place is almost unrecognizable from the rundown property Lin found in 2025, after it had changed hands several times in recent years.
In 2016, shortly after the presidential election, a retired engineer who lived in the home sold it to real estate developer Michael Davis for $1.14 million, according to property records.
The following year, just months after Trump was elected president, Davis flipped the property, selling it to an entity called Trump Birth House LLC for $2.14 million.
For years, the property was considered an eyesore by neighbors, seemingly beset by a string of misfortunes, including becoming overrun with feral cats
The home has since undergone its own East Wing-style makeover, now boasting what designers have called a fresh ‘Manhattan modern’ aesthetic
Tommy Lin, who purchased the home last year for $835,000, spent $500,000 and eight grueling months gutting and reviving the interior, as well as adding amenities (pictured: back of house remodeled)
It remains unclear who was actually behind the LLC, which has only been traced to New York-based lawyer Michael X Tang, who signed the paperwork.
Under the LLC’s ownership, the property was listed on Airbnb for about five months, with some renters described as college-age students and Trump supporters who hosted ‘late-night booze-fueled parties,’ a neighbor told the Daily Mail last year.
The bizarre Airbnb charged Trump fans up to $725 a night to stay in his childhood home, with the listing claiming it was where the president was conceived.
Inside, guests were greeted by life-sized cardboard cutouts of Trump, copies of his book The Art of the Deal and a framed People magazine cover featuring the president.
Davis reportedly continued running the business while renting the property from the LLC for $4,000 a month, according to The New York Times.
By mid-2019, Trump Birth House was trying to unload the property, putting it up for auction with Paramount Realty USA for $2.9 million. But the house failed to sell, the outlet reported.
From there, the property sat abandoned for nearly a decade.
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Last year, neighbors exclusively told the Daily Mail they had endured years of flooding, power outages, pests and even intruder scares while living beside the President’s childhood home.
The roughly 3,100-square-foot residence at 85-15 Wareham Place is almost unrecognizable from the rundown property Lin found
In 2017, Davis sold the property to an entity called Trump Birth House LLC for $2.14 million, which then listed it on Airbnb for about five months
Inside, guests were greeted by life-sized cardboard cutouts of Trump
A September 2018 heatwave was made even more miserable for neighbors when an electrical fault at the Trump house knocked out their air-conditioning, television and internet.
In 2020, the auction company behind the property’s 2016 and 2017 sales launched a GoFundMe campaign on behalf of the LLC, dubbed ‘Thank You President Trump.’
The apparent goal was to buy the house and hand it over to the President. ‘What happens to the historic property is up to him!’ the campaign description read.
But the plan went nowhere, as one setback after another continued to trouble the home.
That same year, a burst pipe in the attic bathroom sent water pouring into nearby homes, a neighbor told the Daily Mail. The damage was so severe that hazardous mold eventually spread from floor to ceiling.
Another neighbor told the Daily Mail that two men allegedly attempted to break into the property in August 2024, with security footage showing them walking around the home.
The men appeared to try forcing open the front door after failing to get inside through a window, according to neighbors who witnessed the incident. They eventually fled when they could not gain entry.
The attempted break-in left families in the neighborhood, particularly those with young children, feeling unsafe.
Neighbors claimed there was an attempted burglary at the property in August 2024. They said trespassers tried to break the door – a missing lock and keyhole on the door is shown here
In 2018, a heatwave caused an electrical fault at the Trump house, knocking out the neighborhood’s air-conditioning, television and internet
Photos of notices and citations from the Department of Sanitation, Con Edison and other city agencies plastered across the home’s front door
One fed-up resident was so frustrated by the state of the property that they created an X account to document its decline and attract a buyer who would actually take care of it.
His account featured photos of notices and citations from the Department of Sanitation, Con Edison and other city agencies plastered across the home’s front door.
Other images showed the front yard swallowed by overgrown grass and weeds, twisted branches and piles of leaves. The neglect became so dire that some neighbors resorted to hiring a landscaper themselves.
The property’s 2025 makeover finally brought its long-running saga to a close.
One neighbor who spoke to the Daily Mail last year was ecstatic that the home had been renovated and was heading back on the market.
‘I am happy it has been taken from the absolutely disgusting conditions. It looked like an abandoned, haunted home,’ the neighbor said.
‘It didn’t have the appeal it used to have when owners lived in there. It was sad to see it in the condition it was left in. You had animals living there – raccoons and stray cats. The front yard and back yard became a big litter box,’ they added.
‘Although it is not the look of the neighborhood, it is rentable, sellable and in good shape at this point; I am happy with that.’
Neighbors expressed excitement when the home was renovated and put back on the market
The home’s exterior now features a sleek metal door, replacing the old, weather-worn wooden one, new windows and tiled pathway
The president, now 80, built his fortune in real estate
Another local said the timing was ironic, telling the Daily Mail: ‘Trump’s childhood home is going on the market as he is putting a bulldozer to the East Wing of the White House and removing part of history.’
The home initially returned to the market for $2.3 million before being pulled and later relisted. After another price cut, it was asking just under $2 million when it finally found an unidentified buyer this summer.
The President, now 80, built his fortune in real estate, putting his name atop Manhattan’s Trump Tower and living there for decades before turning his fame and wealth toward politics.