You can buy the new pope’s childhood home for $199,000

On 212 E 141st Place in Dolton, Illinois—just a few blocks from Andy’s hot dogs and Chuck’s Gun Shop & Pistol—resides a typical 5 bed, 3 bath, 1,200 sqft brick home that is about to become a landmark. Because it’s the childhood home of Robert Prevost, the cardinal who has just been elected to become the next Pope.

Listed on Redfin for $199,000 at the time of publishing, the home matches an address and tax records first reported by South Cook News. It also aligns with Prevost’s personal history. Born and raised in the south suburbs of Chicago, he spent most of his life in the region.

The home, constructed in 1949, is typical of this neighborhood, which is filled with single family homes built in the mid century as families were attracted to lawn life and nearby train lines that could bring them into the city. Dolton is an area that HBO’s show Southside once perfectly dubbed, the “southside of the southside.”

Bordering Chicago, it’s part of a few suburban communities that still share the city’s grid before golf courses and cul-de-sacs take over. These areas housed much of Chicago’s Irish Catholic community before white flight in the 1990s dispersed them north, south, or east into Indiana. Prevost himself kicked around several south suburban cities, having lived in Homewood, New Lenox, and Olympia Fields.

Notably, the home was purchased in May 2024 for $66,000 by a flipper who renovated it to include granite and subway tile in the kitchen, and what looks to be refinished wood (or new vinyl) flooring throughout. The property has been on the market for over 100 days and has been through one price reduction already. But if its rehabbers had had any clue about the coming results of the Conclave, perhaps they could have saved the effort.

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