Historic Argentine castle near the sea listed for the price of a two-room Buenos Aires apartment

For $150,000, a buyer in Buenos Aires might purchase a two-room apartment. In Quequén, the same amount could buy a more than century-old castle near the sea, complete with a panoramic tower, more than a dozen rooms and almost 3,000 square meters of land.

The property, known as Chalet Astelarra or Astelarra Castle, has returned to the market at that price. It stands a few blocks from Quequén beach, about 500 kilometers from Buenos Aires. Built in 1904, the house has approximately 639 square meters of covered space on a 2,920-square-meter plot.

The comparison with Buenos Aires real estate is striking but supported by current figures. A 50-square-meter two-room apartment in the capital averages about $131,000. The average rises to around $145,000 in Recoleta and exceeds $165,000 in Belgrano.

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Talking about the castle means talking about part of Quequén’s history, its golden past.

The castle’s value lies not only in its size but in the history preserved in its unusual architecture. The property dates from a period when Quequén attracted affluent families from Buenos Aires for summer holidays, before Mar del Plata fully established itself as Argentina’s leading resort. Many residences were built around the old Quequén Hotel, the center of that social life.

Argentine writer, poet, journalist and playwright Martín Coronado commissioned the house around 1904 and used it as a summer residence until his death in 1919. Doctor José Astelarra acquired it in 1936 and continued using it for family holidays. The property has carried his name ever since.

“Talking about the castle means talking about part of Quequén’s history, its golden past,” said Soledad Rey, who is marketing the property. She said it was more than an old house because it had passed through different eras of Quequén while retaining an architecture that would be extremely difficult to reproduce today.

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What is interesting is that we are not simply talking about an old house, but a property that passed through different eras of Quequén and still preserves an absolutely distinctive architecture.