250-Year-Old Mansion Will Sell For $5K, Become Bed-And-Breakfast In Perry Hall

PERRY HALL, MD — The historic Perry Hall Mansion will be sold for $5,000 with plans to convert the property into a bed-and-breakfast and event space, The Baltimore Sun reported Monday.

Perry Hall Mansion was built in the 1700s, state property records show. The Baltimore County Government bought the 3.9-acre site for $335,000 in 2001. It's now worth almost $854,000, property records estimate.

Baltimore County has never used the decaying mansion, which is Perry Hall's namesake. Repairs would've cost the county at least $1 million to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act and restrictions on the Maryland Historic Trust easement, The Baltimore Banner reported.

"As we prepare for Perry Hall's 250th anniversary in 2025, it is time for Baltimore County to transfer the historic Perry Hall Mansion to a private entity who will complete long-neglected repairs and restore the magnificence of this property," David Marks, the Republican County Council member for the area, said May 31 on Facebook.

The Sun said Kingsville businessman Robert Lehnhoff will be the new mansion owner. The Banner said the County Council approved the sale with a 6 to 0 vote on June 3.

The county will also give Lenhoff a $250,000 grant for repairs, WYPR reported.

Marks said the public will have periodic access as a condition of the sale.

"I helped landmark the mansion and wrote about it in the history of Perry Hall we published in 2000," Marks said. "It deserves to be restored to its former glory, and a private owner can do that."

The Banner said Baltimore businessman Harry Dorsey Gough in the 1770s bought the 1,000-acre estate, then named The Adventure, from Corbin Lee, an ancestor of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

The Banner reported that Gough renamed the estate Perry Hall after his family home in England. Gough enslaved dozens of people on the property, the Banner said, noting that he was also in the Maryland House of Delegates and on a board of one of the state's first orphanages.

WYPR said the mansion in 1784 hosted a gathering to plan a conference in Baltimore that started the American Methodist Church.

Perry Hall Mansion is located at 3930 Perry Hall Road.