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Maria Noyen and Jordan Pandy
- Before he entered politics, Sen. JD Vance was best known as the author of "Hillbilly Elegy."
- Vance, who is former President Donald Trump's running mate, grew up in the Rust Belt.
- Here's a look at homes the former Marine, Yale graduate, and Ohio senator is linked to.
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If former President Donald Trump wins in November, he'll be back in Washington DC full-time —along with his vice presidential pick, JD Vance.
Vance, 39, was elected to the Senate in 2022 as the representative of Ohio.
Before politics, the Republican was best known as the author of "Hillbilly Elegy," a memoir of his childhood in the Rust Belt. Vance made thousands in royalties after it became a New York Times bestseller in 2016. It was adapted into a 2020 film of the same name starring Amy Adams and Glenn Close.
Vance attended Yale Law School after a four-year stint in the Marines and getting his bachelor's degree at The Ohio State University.
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His rise to fame also cast a spotlight on his wife, Usha Vance, whom he met at Yale and married in 2014.
Since tying the knot, the couple has welcomed three children and relocated several times.
When Vance worked at a venture capital firm connected to former PayPal CEO Peter Thiel, they lived in San Francisco. Nowadays, the Vances' primary residence is in Cincinnati.
From the house that inspired "Hillbilly Elegy" to where he would live if elected vice president, here's a closer look at Vance's real-estate journey. Representatives for Vance declined a request for comment.
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Vance's childhood home is a two-story detached property with a porch in Middletown, Ohio.
The steelworks town of Middletown, Ohio, was thrust into the spotlight thanks to "Hillbilly Elegy."
It's a relatively small city, less than an hour's drive from Cincinnati, with an estimated population of around 51,000. Vance was born and raised in Middletown but has roots in Kentucky, where his family still owns a small cemetery on the side of a mountain.
Vance lived at the light blue house on McKinley Street with his mom, whose struggle with addiction was documented in his memoir.
According to Realtor.com, the 2,000-square-foot house with three bedrooms and two bathrooms underwent an extensive renovation in 2017. The real-estate website also said that the property, which it estimates has a current value of $223,400, was considered "middle class" when Vance grew up there.
Zillow, however, reported that a house with the same square footage — that appears to match Vance's childhood home based on recent photographs — has four bedrooms, not three, and is currently valued at $219,300.
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Vance and his wife purchased a historic home in a fairly liberal neighborhood of Cincinnati in 2018.
In 2017, Vance sold his rights to his memoir to Imagine Entertainment, an entertainment production company.
The move laid the foundation for the Ron Howard-directed film adaptation. While it wasn't considered a box-office hit, "Hillbilly Elegy" has seen a spike in interest following Vance's VP nomination. In early July, it was one of the 10 most-watched films on Netflix, with over 4.8 million views.
Shortly after his deal with Imagine Entertainment, Vance and his wife bought a historic home on William Howard Taft Road in East Walnut Hills, Cincinnati.
In contrast to Vance's political beliefs, the neighborhood is left-leaning. The New York Times reported that 85% of voters in the area voted for President Joe Biden during the 2020 election.
The five-bedroom property is described on the real-estate website Redfin as over 6,000 square feet set on 2.29 acres overlooking the Ohio River. Vance bought it in 2018 for just under $1.4 million.
Before the sale, a local historian told local TV station WCPO that the house was a "rustic" blend of "mid-century Gothic Revival" and "High Victorian Gothic" design.
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In 2014, the Vances purchased a townhouse in Washington DC's Capitol Hill neighborhood, which they now rent to a tenant — who gives them good reviews as landlords.
As many senators and politicians do, Vance owns a home in Washington, DC's Capitol Hill neighborhood — about a mile from the US Capitol.
Property records show that Vance and his wife purchased the white-brick rowhouse in 2014 for $590,000. The two were recently married. Usha was a clerk for Brett Kavanaugh, then on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, around that time.
The house is located on a quiet, tree-lined street. On a recent Friday, when a BI reporter paid a visit, many of the homes' small yards were decorated with red, white, and blue for the Olympics as well as tiny rainbow Pride flags — including one in Vance's yard.
Currently, the couple does not occupy the home and instead rents it out. According to Redfin, the house was listed for rent in October 2023 for $3,700 a month.
The current tenant told the Washington Post in July that she plans to stay there for a while and that her landlords are nice and responsive.
"I love this house. I love this block. I want to be here for a long time," she said. "So I want to be a good tenant. And I have great landlords — Usha's great."
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After Vance became a senator, he bought a $1.64 million house in a DC suburb.
According to Politico and local publication the Washingtonian, Vance purchased another DC-area home in February 2023.
The house in Alexandria, Virginia —a city across the Potomac River from DC — sold for $1.64 million to an LLC, property records show.
Del Ray, the Alexandria neighborhood where Vance reportedly bought a home, is a fairly left-leaning neighborhood with Pride flags and other rainbow decorations in many local businesses on the main road. Biden captured 81% of the vote in Alexandria during the 2020 election.
The more than 2,500-square-foot, five-bedroom house is near a small park.
Residents of the liberal neighborhood are mostly indifferent about the Vances' presence, according to the Washingtonian, but a local artist did "yarn-bomb" an area outside the home, hanging crocheted Pride, bi flags, trans flags, and a pink sign that read "Respect our Rights."
"I'm not the only person who was sort of baffled and, to be honest, a bit dismayed that someone who had so vocally expressed contempt for the kinds of people who live here and the kind of values that we hold had decided to be our neighbor," the yarn artist told the Washingtonian. "Knowing that this person has been really publicly antagonistic to LGBTQ people, to immigrants, to women's rights—it felt appropriate to publicly declare what we stand for in this community."
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If the Trump-Vance ticket wins in November, the Vances would move into the Vice President's official residence.
The Vice President's mansion is a property that Vance could add to his collection.
Located in Northwest Washington, DC, on the grounds of the US Naval Observatory, the Vice President's residence has been occupied by the second in command since Walter Mondale lived there in 1977.
The home was originally built in 1893 and has been through several renovations since — the most recent renovations took place in 2021. Current vice president and presumptive Democratic nominee Kamala Harris waited over two months before moving in.
The 9,000-square-foot house sits on a 72-acre plot of land and is not open to the public.
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