Mention Elvis Presley’s home and almost everyone thinks of Graceland.
But before the gates, Jungle Room and 13-acre estate, Elvis lived in public housing, a modest Memphis family home and several surprising California properties.
Those addresses tell his rise from struggling teenager to superstar almost as clearly as his music does.
When the Presley family moved to Memphis, money was tight. In 1949, Elvis, Vernon and Gladys moved into Lauderdale Courts at 185 Winchester Street. Records place them in Apartment 328, a two-bedroom unit in the public housing development. Elvis spent important teenage years there, practicing guitar and absorbing the music surrounding him in Memphis.
Then everything changed.
After “Heartbreak Hotel” became a breakthrough hit, Elvis finally had enough money to buy his parents a real home.
In March 1956, he purchased 1034 Audubon Drive for $29,500. It was the first house the Presley family owned in Memphis. Elvis added a swimming pool and eventually a fence as his fame grew.
But Audubon Drive quickly created a new problem.
Fans knew exactly where Elvis lived.
As his popularity exploded, people gathered around the property and privacy became increasingly difficult. The family stayed there for only about a year before searching for somewhere larger and more secluded.
Homes Fit for the King of Rock ’n’ Roll
Graceland solved the Memphis privacy problem, but Elvis also spent significant time living in California as his movie career expanded.
Before buying a Los Angeles home, he stayed in rented properties, including a house on Perugia Way in Bel Air, where the famous 1965 meeting between Elvis and The Beatles took place.
Later, Elvis purchased a house on Hillcrest Road in Beverly Hills. Jerry Schilling recalled that Priscilla helped choose the property, partly because the smaller number of bedrooms meant fewer members of Elvis’s entourage could stay there, giving the couple a better chance at normal family life.
Then there was one of his most unusual homes.
In 1966, Elvis leased the futuristic Alexander Estate in Palm Springs, later nicknamed the Elvis Honeymoon Hideaway.
The circular mid-century house became famous as the place where Elvis and Priscilla spent their honeymoon after marrying in Las Vegas on May 1, 1967. Despite often being described as one of Elvis’s houses, he never owned it. He rented the property.
Of course, none of these places ever replaced Graceland.
Elvis purchased Graceland in March 1957 for $102,500, and it remained his primary home for the rest of his life.
But the lesser-known addresses reveal something Graceland alone cannot.
At Lauderdale Courts, Elvis was a teenager practicing guitar.
At Audubon Drive, he was becoming famous faster than his neighborhood could handle.
In California and Palm Springs, he was a movie star trying to create some kind of private life.
Graceland became the house everyone remembers, but Elvis Presley’s other homes show the remarkable journey that brought him there.