At the time of Adolf Hitler's birth, the building was a modest guest house, where Hitler's parents rented rooms in connection with his father's job as a minor customs official at the nearby Austrian–German border. The Hitlers lived in the building only until Adolf was three years old, when his father was transferred to
Passau. After World War II, the building was rented by the Austrian Republic in 1952 and obtained heritage protection as part of the historic city centre. Until 1965, it was the home of the public library and later a bank. From 1970 to 1976, several classes from the technical high school were held in the house, until the school was rebuilt. The house then for many years accommodated a branch of the charity "Lebenshilfe", and operated as a day centre and workshops for people with learning difficulties. After the charity left the building in 2011, it remained empty. As of 2016, the Austrian government intends to
expropriate the owner and to demolish the building. A special expropriation law was adopted. Suggestions regarding making Hitler's birthplace a place of remembrance for the victims of
Nazism had already been made in the early years after the war. For a long time, the council discussed putting up a memorial tablet on the house, and in 1983 the decision was made by the then mayor Hermann Fuchs, with intervention from Culture Advisor Wolfgang Simböck. However, the memorial tablet was not attached, because the owner (who had no connection to Hitler) felt that it would be an intrusion on her rights of ownership. She successfully opposed it in court because of her fear of unwelcome attention or attacks from
anti- or
Neonazis. The building will be transformed into a
police station, police personnel is expected to move in and starts service in the second quarter of 2026. == Installation of the stone ==