For about a year in 1970, heavyweight boxing legend Muhammad Ali lived at a home in the Overbrook Park neighborhood of West Philadelphia with his second wife, Belinda, and their young children. Three years later, the property was purchased by the grandparents of Kobe Bryant before the future NBA superstar was born in 1978.
The split-level home at 1835 N. 72nd St., sitting on nearly half an acre, was listed for sale this week for $600,000. Pamela Bryant, Kobe's mother, put the property on the market after her mother, Mildred Cox, recently died.
"The fact that two Hall of Fame athletes are tied to this one property in Philadelphia, I think that's pretty unusual," said Nicole Klein of eXp Realty, the listing agent for the home. "When Kobe's grandparents purchased the property, nobody would ever have known that Kobe would be Kobe. We probably see a lot of celebrities buying other celebrities' houses in different areas because of who they are, but this happened naturally."
The three-bedroom home, shown in the photos below, covers 2,823 square feet and still has many of its original features that were popular during the era when Ali lived there. Bryant's grandparents never did major renovations during the decades they spent there, apart from some interior changes and the addition of a back porch.
Kobe Bryant's grandparents added a back porch to the property after purchasing the home from Muhammad Ali's father in 1973.
The Overbrook Park home was one of several properties Ali owned in the region, including a house in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and a training compound in Deer Lake, Pennsylvania.
Ali lived in Philly during a transitional period in his life and boxing career. He had been stripped of his world heavyweight title in 1967 for refusing to fight in the Vietnam War and was banned from boxing nationwide. When he moved to Philly, he was settling into a family life and beginning to train for his eventual return to the ring against Jerry Quarry in 1970, a bout he won in Atlanta.
"It was really the time that he came back as a boxer," Klein said.
The mainstream media largely spurned Ali during his hiatus from boxing, but Ebony magazine visited his West Philly home for a feature story that ran in January 1971. Ali and his wife were pictured on the cover with three of their four children, including identical twins Reeshemah and Jamillah Ali. The story included photographs of Ali at the home sitting by the fireplace, in the driveway and taking a phone call beneath a portrait of Elijah Muhammad, who had given Ali his Muslim name when he changed it from his birth name, Cassius Clay. Esquire Magazine also photographed Ali at the home in Philly in February 1970, a collection that wasn't published until 2016.
"The kitchen is almost exactly the same as when Muhammad Ali owned it," Klein said. "... A lot of it still feels like he was just there."
Ali moved his growing family to another home in Cherry Hill in 1971, which inspired another visit from Ebony magazine to feature his New Jersey digs. Klein said it was a coincidence that Ali sold his Overbrook Park home to Bryant's maternal grandparents. Pamela Bryant told Klein that Ali once came back and knocked on the door to show his old home to his third wife, Veronica Porche, after they had married in 1977.
Pam's late husband and Kobe's father, Joe "Jellybean" Bryant, played basketball locally at John Bartram High School in the early 1970s before suiting up for La Salle University. Joe Bryant spent eight seasons in the NBA and then played professionally in Italy, where Kobe spent part of his early childhood. During the offseason months, the Bryant family often visited the home in Overbrook Park.
"All of Pam's children spent a lot of time at the property," Klein said. "They swam in the pool. They had a lot of barbecues."
Kobe went on to star at Lower Merion High School after his parents had moved back to the Philly area in Bala Cynwyd. Bryant was drafted out of high school by the Los Angeles Lakers, winning five NBA championships over his 20-year career with the team. He was 41 when he died in a helicopter crash in California in 2020. Joe Bryant died in July after suffering a stroke. He was 69.
Ali's former five-bedroom home in Cherry Hill, at 1121 Winding Drive, has been on and off the market over the years, including a stint as an Airbnb. It was last listed in January for $1.89 million, according to Realtor.com.
At the home in Overbrook Park, the aura of sports history hasn't been baked into the price. Klein said a fully renovated home behind it recently sold for $800,000 and the market will decide whether the home's past creates competition among bidders. She ordered a copy of the Ebony magazine edition featuring Ali at the home and plans to present it to the buyer to hang at the property.
"Because of the history, if there's people that really want to be in the house, then they'll drive the price up," Klein said, adding that the neighborhood is a draw in its own right. "The thing that people who live (in Overbrook Park) love is that they still have a very strong sense of community. That area, Greenhill, has a very active civic association. There's a lot of passion and they have a really strong sense of pride for that community."
