Whatever Happened To Chris Watts' House?

When Chris and Shanann Watts moved into a newly built 6,200 square-foot home in Frederick, Colorado in May 2013, they were newlyweds with their first baby on the way. Five years later, Chris told Shanann he didn't love her anymore and wanted a divorce. Amid the heated argument, he strangled her to death in the primary bedroom, dragging her body downstairs in front of his then 4-year-old daughter, Bella. At least, according to what he confessed to police in 2019, per The New York Times. 

He put Shanann's body, 15 weeks pregnant with their third child, in his truck. Next, Chris loaded up Bella and her 3-year-old sister, Celeste, into the vehicle and drove them all to the oil fields where he worked. He suffocated the girls in the truck with their blankets — first Celeste, then Bella — and stuffed their small bodies into two different oil tanks, where they were submerged in crude oil. Chris buried his wife in a shallow grave closeby, then he went home and reported them all missing.

Police searched the house for clues, and Chris gave an interview to Denver7 from the porch early on in the investigation when he was playing the part of the concerned husband whose wife and daughters were allegedly missing. Authorities learned he'd been having an affair, and about a week later, he was formally charged with the killings. After he was arrested, he never went home again, and the residence sat empty for four years. 

In September 2018, shortly after Chris Watts was arrested for killing his wife and daughters, Shanann's father and an unidentified woman went to the home to collect her belongings, per People. They loaded furniture and boxes into a truck, with a police officer in place to make sure things went smoothly. Then, the house went quiet. For a while, no one wanted to buy a property marred by such a heinous crime. According to Zillow, the five-bedroom, four-bath house on Saratoga Trail was put on the market in May 2019 but was removed again in July of that year. 

In November 2020, news station Denver 7 published an update on the house, describing the home as "deteriorating," with the swing set in the backyard untouched, a yard full of dead grass, and vacancy notes stuck to the door. The lending company eventually foreclosed on the property, but the county revoked it. The home eventually sold on November 22, 2022 to its second-ever owner for $600,000, which was $200,000 more than Chris and Shanann Watts paid for it brand-new nine years earlier. According to what real estate appraiser Orell Anderson told Denver 7, it's typically hard to sell homes where murders have occurred, and they are usually sold at a steep discount. It was also challenging to sell the house because of liens placed on it. 

Back in 2020, Anderson said of Zillow estimating the home's value at $600,000: "It's way too high — as if this never occurred. I think that the property has been mismanaged." In his opinion, adding that a 40% discount would price the place to sell. "You see a pattern that tells you that when there are children involved in the murder, the discounts go higher," Anderson said.

The house has been sold twice since the murders at this point, with the 2022 buyer putting the home back on the market just about a year and a half after they bought it. That owner's original asking price in April 2024 was $775,000, but the price steadily dropped over the months. In September 2024, the pending sale price was $699,000, but when the house was finally sold on October 17, it went for $650,000. 

According to Redfin, the median cost of homes in Weld County, where the Watts' lived, was about $500,000 in 2025. So the home is priced higher than the average. But one would expect that due to the two-story house's ample square footage, high ceilings, open floor plan, gas fireplace, mud room, jack and jill bathroom, granite countertops, center island, double ovens, and three-car garage. Zillow shows other homes on Saratoga Trail as comparable, ranging from around $600,000 to $800,000. That said, it doesn't seem like the fact that Shanann Watts was murdered in the house put as much of a dent in the price as Orell Anderson suggested it could. With that said, Realtor.com reported that the home sold at a "steep discount." 

While some neighbors told Denver 7 they thought the house should be knocked down, it's finding a new life with new owners. But the only home Chris Watts will ever know again is prison. After pleading guilty to killing his pregnant wife and two daughters, he was sentenced to five life sentences with no possibility of parole in November 2018.