How About This For Memorabilia: J.K. Rowling’s Childhood Home For Sale

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If you’ve already got withdrawal symptoms due to the final Harry Potter movie being released, help is at hand. That is, if your hand contains the best part of $650,000.

Sadly, saving a few bucks by only watching Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 2 in 2-D probably isn’t going to be the difference in your deciding to take the plunge and get as close to sleeping in the same room as Harry Potter‘s author as is legally possible. The British author’s childhood home, Church Cottage in Tutshill, near Chepstow (which is a former gothic style schoolhouse built in the  mid-19th century), has gone on the market for around £400,000.

If this name is already starting to ring a few bells, die hard Potter fans will surely be aware that the village name was used by Rowling for the Tutshill Tornadoes Quidditch team.

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But it’s not merely being in the village that places you closer to Rowling. There are numerous highlights from purchasing this historic house. How about an actual cupboard under the stairs (what other property would even contemplate such a thing?), a trapdoor leading to a cellar (ditto!) and the following message in an inscription on a window frame in “bedroom 3”:  ‘Joanne Rowling slept here circa 1982’ (actually, that is pretty freaking cool).

The current owner of the home is a BBC producer called Julian Mercer, who bought it from the Rowling family in 1995. “J.K. Rowling would have been here in her formative years and could have taken inspiration from the cottage,” he said, cleverly hedging his bets by using the word ‘could.’ “The architecture is very Hogwarts-like. It has vaulted ceilings, stone windows and oozes gothic spirit.”

Mercer’s timing has been pretty much spot on throughout. “When we first moved in J.K. Rowling was not a known name and it was a couple of years later that the Philosopher’s Stone (aka The Sorcerer’s Stone) came out,” he explained. “It was then that we knew the significance of the name written on the windowsill. We have redecorated the house completely since moving in but we always painted around it.”

Wise words, Mr. Mercer, and that redecorating decision should certainly see you make a healthy profit on the property. But if we’re assessing the true value of words, a certain child inhabitant of the house in question has got us all beat. The. End. (via The Guardian)

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Glen Levy is an Executive Producer at TIME. Find him on Twitter at @glenjl. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.