Why The Real 'Conjuring' House Is Even Scarier Than The One In The Movie (2024)

Explore The Conjuring house of Rhode Island made famous by the movie based on the Perron hauntings — that keeps chasing away its owners.

The Conjuring is one of the most iconic horror films of the 2010s, spawning two direct sequels and several spin-off movies. The film’s continued success is largely thanks to its eerie opening text, which promises viewers that the scenes they’re about to witness are based on true events that happened in a haunted home.

So, it’s little surprise that many fans want to explore The Conjuring house — the real property that inspired the movie.

Located at 1677 Round Top Road in Harrisville, Burrillville, Rhode Island, the home is a small, humble farmhouse that dates back to the 18th century. The Conjuring was not filmed at this house, but the events that take place in the movie allegedly happened to a real family who lived there in the 1970s.

Ever since The Conjuring was released in 2013, paranormal buffs and skeptics alike have flocked to the house in the hopes of seeing something remarkable. In 2019, a couple named Cory and Jennifer Heinzen bought The Conjuring house and turned it into an official tourist attraction.

Under the Heinzens, visitors were welcome to explore the home via day tours, night investigations, and live-streamed events. However, the couple soon became overwhelmed with the business of running a popular haunted house, so they decided to put it up for sale. Then in May 2022, as reported by the Associated Press, the Heinzens sold the property to Jacqueline Nuñez, a Boston-based developer who strongly believes in the paranormal.

Fortunately for fans, Nuñez has continued the Heinzens’ original mission of paranormal business at the home, still offering tours, investigations, and even private events there. But Nuñez agreed with the Heinzens that she would not live at the house full-time, because the “energy is so powerful.”

Go inside The Conjuring house in the photo gallery below — and then learn more about the disturbing history behind the centuries-old home.

The Eerie History Of The Conjuring House And The Events That Inspired The Film

The story of The Conjuring is based in part on the experiences of paranormal investigator couple Ed and Lorraine Warren at the infamous Rhode Island house. But it's also deeply rooted in a series of three books written by Andrea Perron, whose family lived in the house from 1971 to 1980.

Shortly after the Perron family — a couple named Carolyn and Roger and their five daughters — moved into the home, they noticed eerie things happening inside. At first, a broom would move from place to place on its own, and small piles of dirt would appear on freshly cleaned floors.

But by 1974, when the Warrens were called in to investigate, the situation had become far more frightening. The five Perron daughters — the eldest of whom was Andrea — were even being awoken at 5:15 a.m. some mornings by alleged spirits, who smelled like rotting flesh and lifted the girls' beds.

The mother of the family, Carolyn Perron, reportedly researched the home and learned that it had once belonged to the same family for eight generations. Chillingly, many children in this family had purportedly died in or near the house under strange and disturbing circ*mstances. According to Carolyn's research, some of the children drowned in a nearby creek, others hanged themselves in the attic, and at least one was murdered.

Although the Perrons allegedly encountered numerous spirits while living in the farmhouse, one of the angriest was a spirit named Bathsheba. So, it's little wonder why Bathsheba was the main focus of The Conjuring. Perhaps most terrifying, there was actually a real woman named Bathsheba Sherman who was said to live on the property in the 19th century. And some believed that Sherman had been a Satan worshipper or a child murderer.

"The things that went on [in the house] were just so incredibly frightening," Lorraine Warren later told USA Today in 2013, nearly four decades after her paranormal investigation. "It still affects me to talk about it today."

Though Ed Warren died in 2006 and never got to see The Conjuring unfold on the silver screen, Lorraine served as a consultant on the film and continued to work as a paranormal investigator up until her death in 2019.

But while many find the Warrens' investigation of The Conjuring house to be compelling, it should be noted that the Warrens themselves have not been free from criticism.

They were also involved in the investigation of the infamous Amityville Horror House in Long Island, New York. The story of this "haunted" house was also eventually turned into a famous film following the alleged paranormal experiences of the Lutz family, who had moved into the home about a year after Ronald DeFeo Jr. murdered his family inside it.

The Lutzes have, over the years, been called frauds and accused of fabricating the story of their experience in the Amityville home for profit.

And, as The Hollywood Reporter covered in detail, allegations that Ed Warren initiated an inappropriate relationship with an underage girl in the early 1960s, with Lorraine's knowledge, have surfaced in recent years, in stark contrast to the Warrens' public image as a wholesome Catholic couple.

Additionally, the couple has also been accused of being fake paranormal investigators. "The Warrens are good at telling ghost stories," said neurologist Steven Novella, the president of the New England Skeptical Society. "You could do a lot of movies based on the stories they have spun. But there's absolutely no reason to believe there is any legitimacy to them."

That said, there's no doubt that The Conjuring sparked worldwide interest in not just the Warrens, but in the paranormal cases they investigated — including the former Perron family home in Rhode Island.

So, when the Heinzens, a family strongly interested in the paranormal, purchased the property in 2019, they officially marketed the home as The Conjuring house and opened its doors to paranormal investigators.

How The Conjuring House Became A Tourist Destination For Ghost-Hunters

When Cory and Jennifer Heinzen purchased The Conjuring house in 2019, they obtained the property for less than $440,000. They fixed up the home and decided to allow paranormal investigators — or anyone who was interested in the house — to visit the supposedly haunted location.

Of course, just months after they purchased the property, the COVID-19 pandemic began. But despite the temporary drop in tourism, the Heinzens still found themselves overwhelmed with requests from visitors to tour The Conjuring house. Some guests even spent the night in the home.

Eventually, the Heinzens realized they had bit off more than they could chew. When they listed the house for sale in September 2021, they said they wanted to meet with prospective buyers, hoping to find someone with similar interests who would keep the paranormal business going.

That's when they met Jacqueline Nuñez, a property developer from Boston who, like the Heinzens, has a fervent belief in the paranormal.

"I came to visit and thought, 'I have to have this house,'" Nuñez told The Boston Globe. "This purchase is personal for me. It's not a real estate development. It's around my own beliefs."

Nuñez ultimately bought the property for over $1.5 million, pledging to continue the paranormal business that the Heinzens had started. At night, guests can partake in paranormal investigations. During the day, they can tour the home. The Heinzens, too, remain involved in operations.

There was a catch, though — the Heinzens only sold the property under the condition that Nuñez would not live there year-round because of the "energy" in the house, as Nuñez told The Boston Globe.

For Nuñez, purchasing The Conjuring house was strongly driven by her desire to learn more about the property's haunted history.

"I'm a deeply spiritual person. It's a very important part of me," Nuñez said. "I believe we are conscious beings having a human experience, and that our consciousness continues on, we are here to learn things in lifetime and help our species evolve morally and culturally... This house is an opportunity to connect with people who've moved on and died, that's the interactivity here and the engagement with the people who have passed."

After reading about the home that inspired "The Conjuring," learn more about the true story of Ed and Lorraine Warren. Or, discover the story that inspired "The Conjuring 3: The Devil Made Me Do It" and the trial at its center.