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South Valley Riverton Journal

The Family That’s “Up”sessed with Disney

Apr 08, 2016 09:14AM ● By Bryan Scott

By Tori La Rue | [email protected]

South Valley - Besides being a tourist attraction and a place for photo shoots, the “Up” house in Herriman is a home.

“It’s not just a house,” Lynette Hamblin, owner, said. “It’s our family’s dream house, and we live in it.” 

A longtime Disney fanatic, Lynette said she fell in love with the house from Disney Pixar’s “Up,” which made things difficult when she and her husband Clint started house hunting in 2011. 

“I knew that was the fun Victorian style that I wanted,” Lynette said. “We put in offer for $415,000 on a house in Martinez, California, that looked just like the “Up” house, except that was a pink-colored house, but someone beat us to the offer.” 

Lynette said she felt as though “doors kept closing” in their house search, until Clint took an unexpected trip from their home in California to Utah to visit his ill grandmother. 

Clint’s sister, who lived in Draper, suggested that Clint stop by the “Up” house, a house created to look like the home from the movie, before visiting his grandmother. At the time, the “Up” house was open for tours.

Clint knew he wanted to buy the house after stepping into it, according to his wife. He asked Bryce Bangerter, his tour guide, how much they were planning to sell the house for. 

“It’s not for sale,” Bryce said. 

Clint asked what price they would sell it at if it was for sale, and Bryce disclosed that it’d probably go for about $400,000. From that moment on, Clint said he was determined to get that house, and felt like he needed to move to Utah. 

Meanwhile, back in California, Lynette was researching homes on her own. She saved images of what she wanted their future kitchen to look like, so she could show Clint, she said. 

When Clint came home and told Lynette that he was interested in purchasing the “Up” house in Herriman, he said he thought she would be worried, but she had the opposite reaction. 

 “He handed me the brochure about the house, and I saw the kitchen that I wanted in there, and I just got goosebumps and started crying because it seemed perfect,” she said. 

But the Hamblins still had a couple of problems — Clint, a member of the U.S. Coast Guard, was stationed in California, and wouldn’t be able to retire for a few years, and the home they longed for wasn’t for sale.

After a few weeks, Clint headed back to Utah, with his whole family in tow for his grandmother’s funeral. While in Utah, he set up a time to meet with Blair Bangerter of Bangerter Homes, the man behind the ideas, plans and engineering of Herriman Towne Center’s “Up” house. 

“You’ve got to do things for a living, but every once in a while you have to enhance it by doing something enjoyable and fun, and that’s why I built the house,” Blair said. “At the time the market was pretty depressed around here, and my brothers were concerned that we might not get a financial return for the money we put into the house.”

When the Hamblins entered the house their two children, who were under the age of 6, were so excited, Lynette said. Her son, who was in the habit of watching “Up” three times each day, was in his “happy place,” she said. 

Bangerter Homes usually builds custom homes for families; this time they needed a custom family to fit their ready-made home. The Hamblins were the type of family they were seeking, Blair said. 

The house never officially went on the market, but was sold to the Hamblins for $400,000 — the amount it cost to make the house. The Hamblins moved in in January of 2012 after more than 50,000 people had toured the house, Blair said. 

Clint continued to fly into work each week, and spend time at home on the weekends until he retired from the Coast Guard in October 2015.

“Now we live a typical normal lifestyle, besides that people show up at our house on a daily basis,” Lynette said. 

Lynette said she doesn’t mind that people regularly stop at their house. 

“Clint and I would be regulars here if we didn’t own the house,” she said. “Still, it’s interesting that people are just outside your house taking selfies.”  

Last week a young man asked a girl to prom in front of their house, and around 10 people have gotten engaged on the Hamblins’ property. 

To rein in the chaos, Lynette started a website, http://www.therealuphouse.com, where those wishing to tour, take professional photos or propose to their sweetheart at the house can schedule a time to do so. Lynette can also be reached at “The ‘Up’ House” page on Facebook. 

Lynette said she values her house but she values her family, being kind and loving others more than she could love any material object — even her dream home. 

“At the end of the day, it’s just a house, but I love our house,” Lynette said. “I don’t think we could move.”