Family buys, sells cave house

 Five years ago, Jefferson County residents, Curt and Deborah Sleeper decided to move their family into a cave they purchased on eBay.

“My wife and I are adventurous,” Curt Sleeper said. “I’ve always been kind of a freelance person and we saw the cave and we fell in love with it.”

The cave, which is housed in a massive sandstone bluff along Highway 61/67 in Festus, is well known to locals.

The Sleepers purchased the cave and began the task of turning a massive, hollowed out sandstone bluff into a family home.

The family spent four years living in large, heated tents while painstakingly turning the cave into a 17,000 square feet living space.

Though it sits just a few hundred yards from a major thoroughfare, the area feels secluded.

The Sleepers use three professional-grade dehumidifiers to keep the massive cave interior livable.

Because the interior of the cave is in the 60 degree to 70 degree range year-round, the cost to heat and cool the place is minimal.

Though the Sleeper family loves their home, they recently made a decision to list the property for sale on eBay for financial reasons.