A look inside Jackie Kennedy Onassis’ luxurious homes, from sprawling estates to full-floor apartments
Jackie Kennedy walks down the steps from her new home in Georgetown.
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Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis lived all over, from New York apartments to East Coast mansions.
She said her family's "happiest years" were those spent with President John F. Kennedy in the White House.
Here are all of the impressive places she lived in and owned in her lifetime.
Throughout her life, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis has lived in grand estates and luxury apartments, including the White House when her husband, President John F. Kennedy, served as president.
She grew up in spacious New York apartments and several-acre estates, and after her marriage, she spent her summers at the famed Kennedy Compound and winters on the family's estate in Palm Beach. Though out of all the impressive properties she has resided in, she said her family's "happiest years" were those spent with her husband in the White House.
Here are all of the impressive places she lived in and owned in her lifetime.
Before she was a Kennedy or an Onassis, Jacqueline Lee Bouvier spent her early years in New York City.
The apartment building at 740 Park Avenue.
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In 1932, the Bouviers moved into an apartment on the sixth and seventh floors of 740 Park Avenue.
The apartment building was developed by her grandfather, James T. Lee. At least for a period, her father couldn't afford to furnish it so Jackie and her sister could roller skate from room to room.
The apartment building later became a home for billionaires and was once considered one of the most iconic apartment buildings in the city.
In 2017, her old apartment sold for $25.25 million.
In the 1940s, Bouvier's mother remarried, and they left New York.
The exterior of the Merrywood mansion.
Gordon Beall/Sotheby’s International Realty
They moved into a Georgian-style mansion called "Merrywood" in McLean, Virginia, in Washington, DC.
The mansion, which was built in 1919, sits on the edge of the Potomac River and covers 23,000 square feet.
The interior of Merrywood mansion.
Gordon Beall/Sotheby’s International Realty
Bouvier's mother had married an oil magnate named Hugh D. Auchincloss, who owned the mansion.
At the time, it had nine bedrooms and 13 bathrooms, as well as an extensive garden.
Bouvier wrote fondly about the house in her diary, saying, "I always love it so at Merrywood — so peaceful … with the river and those great steep hills."
Bouvier spent her summers at her paternal grandfather's East Hampton estate called "Lasata," which means "place of peace," in the native Algonquian language.
Jackie Bouvier and her mother at their East Hampton home.
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The house, which was 8,500 square feet, was built in 1917 and sat on about seven acres.
She also spent some of her summers at her maternal grandfather's house in East Hampton called "Wildmoor."
Jacqueline Bouvier rides horseback as her dad, John, walks at her side in East Hampton.
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The 18th-century home, covering about 5,700 square feet, was a shingle-and-clapboard wooden house with a view of fields, a swamp, and the sea, The Wall Street Journal reported.
In 2021, the house was sold for $6.8 million.
Her next notable property was the Kennedy family's summer home in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts.
Then-Sen. John F. Kennedy and Jackie Bouvier were on vacation at the Kennedy compound in Hyannis Port.
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Joseph Kennedy Sr., John F. Kennedy's father, bought a white-shingled cottage in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, for $25,000 — about $450,000 today. The coastal Massachusetts cottage became the Kennedy family's home base for years to come.
Before they were married, Bouvier and John F. Kennedy spent some time together there, which later became known as the "Kennedy Compound."
Jackie Bouvier was on vacation at the Kennedy compound in Hyannis Port.
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The Kennedys bought the house in 1928, Town and Country reported.
In 1953, Bouvier became a Kennedy when the couple married in Newport, Rhode Island.
Jackie Kennedy poses for a portrait at the staircase in Hammersmith Farm.
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They had the wedding reception at her mother's husband's sprawling estate, known as "Hammersmith Farm," anchored by a grand, 28-room Victorian-era mansion.
The property was last sold in 1999 for just over $8 million.
The estate became a part-time summer home for the Kennedys, along with the Kennedy Compound.
Janet Lee Auchincloss, the mother of Jacqueline Kennedy, is shown at Hammersmith farm in Newport, Rhode Island.
Suzanne Vlamis/AP
Jackie Kennedy spent summers on the estate during her childhood, and the Kennedys later vacationed there in the summer of 1961.
In 1953, not long after the Kennedys were married, they rented a four-story, four-bedroom house in Georgetown at 3321 Dent Place.
Two years later, in 1955, the Kennedys moved to "Hickory Hill," another Georgian-style house.
Hickory Hill was under renovation in 2013.
Melina Mara/The Washington Post/Getty Images
This one was built in 1815 and had a tennis court, a pool, and 12 fireplaces on a 5.6-acre plot in McLean, Virginia.
They bought it from Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson.
Two years later, the Kennedys sold it for $250,000 to John's brother, Robert, who would end up raising his own family there.
Four of Robert F. Kennedy's children pose for a photo on the stairs of the family house, Hickory Hill.
CBS Photo Archive/Getty Images
Jackie didn't want to go back after her daughter was stillborn.
Robert Kennedy was at the house when he heard John had been assassinated, the Baltimore Sun reported. He spent an hour alone, walking around the estate.
In 1956, the Kennedys bought a summer home at 111 Irving Avenue in Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, right beside the original Kennedy summer home.
Then Sen. Ted Kennedy, his wife Joan Kennedy, NBC News' Barbara Walters during an interview at the Kennedy Compound.
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The 4,484-square-foot clapboarded home sat on less than an acre of land and soon became part of the "Kennedy Compound."
In 1957, the Kennedys bought 3307 N Street, an 18th-century brick row house in Georgetown, for $82,000.
NBC News' Dave Garroway interviews Pat McMahon, whom John F. Kennedy saved in World War II, outside Kennedy's home at 3307 N Street in Georgetown.
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Jackie spent about $18,000 on remodeling it, and she decorated the house with armchairs and good porcelain.
Her husband campaigned and was elected president during their years here, Architectural Digest reported.
Though not officially a property she owned, Jackie lived in the White House with her family during her husband's presidency from 1961 to the end of 1963.
Jackie Kennedy stands in a dining room table inside the White House.
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She later described this period as her family's "happiest years," The Daily Beast reported.
During the winters, while they were living in the White House, they vacationed at her father-in-law Joseph Kennedy's Palm Beach estate.
An aerial view of the Kennedy’s home in Palm Beach.
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The Palm Beach estate became known as the Kennedys' "winter White House." In 2020, the house sold for $70 million and underwent extensive renovations by the new owner.
In 1963, after her husband was assassinated, Jackie and her children left the White House and moved into an 18th-century home at 3017 N Street in Georgetown.
The exterior of 3017 N Street Northwest in Washington, D.C.
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She paid around $175,000 for the five-bedroom house but only lived there for about a year. It was too public, and she reportedly became overwhelmed with all of the tourists.
In 1964, Jackie and her children moved back to New York after she discreetly bought a 5,300-square-foot apartment on the 15th floor of 1040 Fifth Avenue for $200,000.
Jackie Kennedy Onassis leaving her Fifth Avenue apartment in New York City.
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The apartment had five bathrooms, three fireplaces, two terraces, and a library.
"It doesn't matter," she said when declining to share details about the new house. "The much more important thing is we both love the property. It's a private valley. It's beautiful."
In 1979, after her second husband died, Jackie decided to build a new house called "Red Gate Farm," on 340 acres of land in Martha's Vineyard.
Workmen and gardeners putting the finishing touches on the new home of Jackie Onassis in Martha's Vineyard.
Bob Dean/Boston Globe/Getty Images
She only spent a little more than $1 million on the land, and then another $3.1 million on building the house, which was finished in 1981. The main building covers 6,456 square feet.
There's also a four-bedroom guest house, a pool, and a tennis court. The property stretches across a mile of beach.
In 2020, it was put up for sale for $65 million.
Editor's note: This story was first published in September 2023 and has been updated with additional information.
