Aaron Hernandez’s Massachusetts home has finally sold for $1million.
The 5,647 sq ft home in North Attleboro has been listed for sale since long before the NFL star took his own life in jail and despite several reported attempts, a deal to sell it was never finalized.
This week, it was finally sold to 23-year-old Arif Khan, a budding real estate investor who could not resist the potential of ‘one of the most famous homes in Massachusetts’.
Khan snapped up the property for $500,000 less than its original asking price but hopes to add $1.4million to its value through renovations before selling it on again.
Hernandez first listed it for sale in March 2016 for $1.5million after he was convicted of murdering his friend Odin Lloyd three years earlier.
Aaron Hernandez’s five-bedroom, 5,647 sq ft home in North Attleboro, Massachusetts, has sold for $1million
It is not clear what he initially paid for the home when he moved in not long after signing with the New England Patriots in 2010 but it was where Hernandez lived when he killed Lloyd and became a focal point of his murder trial.
Jurors were shown surveillance footage taken on the very cameras he owned in which he was seen walking around the home with a gun.
It was also where Shaynna Jenkins, his loyal fiancee, was filmed removing a box wrapped in a garbage bag at his request after he was arrested for Lloyd’s murder in 2014.
The house languished on the market for more than a year. When Hernandez was charged with additional murders, those of Safiro Furtado and Daniel de Abreu who were shot to death in 2012, his attorneys lowered the price to $1.3million.
It went down again to $1.2million earlier this year.
Hernandez killed himself at the Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center in Massachusetts in April this year after being cleared of Furtado and de Abreau’s bloody murders.
Doctors have since determined that he was suffering from one of the worst cases of CTE – a brain condition widely suffered by NFL players which is caused by repeated blows to the head – when he died.
The sprawling home features an enormous lobby entrance with double staircases leading to the second floor
There are rooms to either side of the grand staircase which were used as entertainment areas when the footballer lived there
One of several entertainment rooms inside the home where Hernandez lived until 2014 when he was arrested
The kitchen is family style and features tiled floors, wooden cabinets and intricate tiling on the walls
Another of the huge entertainment rooms which was enjoyed by the footballer. All of the furniture was removed after his arrest
An entertainment room in the home where a chalkboard still had a game of knots and crosses on it when the house was staged
Another entertainment room in the house which Hernandez enjoyed with his friends and associates
A dark movie theater with a plush red carpet remains in the home. The new owner plans to make considerable changes
A study inside the home where Hernandez lived after joining the Patriots in 2010. He played three seasons for the team
Outside there is a large pool and poolhouse which is also fitted with a sauna
He had also smoked synthetic marijuana and was found hanging in his cell next to an open bible verse.
Hernandez’s spectacular fall from grace – which began with his arrest for Lloyd’s murder in 2014 and continued as his extensive drug use and gangster lifestyle were poured over in court – put many buyers off the home.
Khan, who also owns a nearby hotel, is not one of them.
‘Nobody wants to buy a house with Aaron Hernandez’s name on it, but I feel a name change and a little upgrade on the property will increase its value.
‘It has a bad name to it, but it’s probably one of the most famous houses in Massachusetts,’ he told The Boston Herald of his purchase this week.
The house has five bedrooms, a sauna, swimming pool, movie theater and grand lobby entrance but Hernandez’s legal troubles are literally written on the walls.
‘It was honestly in pretty bad condition. There were doors broken down, I assume by the police.
‘There was also a big water leak in the garage. The garage has to be gutted,’ Khan continued.
He is not daunted by the prospect and hopes to add another $1.4million to its price tag by the time he has finished restoring and improving it. It just seems like there’s so much upside there,’ he said.
The issue of who will get the money from the sale is a thorny one.
When Hernandez died, he had just $200,000 in retirement accounts.
Hernandez lived in the home until June 2014 when he was arrested for the murder of Odin Lloyd which took place a year earlier
During his trial, jurors were shown surveillance footage of him walking around the home with a gun in his hand before and after Odin’s murder on June 17, 2013
The day after Odin’s murder, Shayanna Jenkins, his fiancee, was filmed removing a large box from inside the home which was later destroyed. She said she did not know what was inside it but had been told by Hernandez to remove it
The back exterior of the home where there is also a grill. The new owner said he would not be put off by all that has happened there
There are five large bedrooms in the home including this one which leads on to a balcony overlooking the backyard
Another of the bedrooms is painted in a girly purple and likely belonged to Hernandez’s four-year-old daughter Avielle
The master bathroom with a large hot tub bath and his and her sinks. It features the same cabinets as the kitchen
He planned to appeal his murder conviction and wanted to reclaim $6million which the Patriots refused to give him when he was arrested.
Hernandez (above during his first trial in 2015) killed himself in April this year
The $6million was part of his salary from the Superbowl-winning team.
In May, his lawyers successfully appealed to have his murder conviction vacated on the grounds that he was planning to appeal it when he died.
It does not mean that he was not guilty of the crime itself but rather that the conviction no longer stands because he is dead and because he had not yet had his appeal heard when he died.
The vacation however undermined an existing wrongful death lawsuit filed against the 28-year-old’s family by the family of Odin Lloyd, his victim.
They wanted $6million on the grounds that Hernandez had killed their son. With his conviction now vacated, his estate has stronger grounds to have it thrown out.
Ursula Ward, Odin Lloyd’s mother, said she was prepared to go after the NFL for the money if she had to.
Since his death, Shaynna has also sued the NFL which she claims is responsible for her fiance’s severe CTE. In a lawsuit filed in September, she demanded $20million from the league but she later dropped.
In October, lawyers she was working with said they planned to refile.
Hernandez’s fiancee Shayanna Jenkins is pictured with his daughter at his funeral in April. It is not clear if they will receive the money from the sale or if they will have to use it to settle a wrongful death suit filed against the footballer by Odin Lloyd’s family