Q. What is it supposed to be on the show? A. A residential house, the home of supposedly retired hit-man, Anthony Moretti (nicknamed  "Mad Dog") , who now runs a fishing charter boat out of a Miami Marina. Q. Where is it supposed to be on the show? A.  At 1682 Sunrise Street, in Miami, Florida. Q. When did we see it on the show? The house shows up twice in episode 4, and once again at the start of episode 5.    The first time is a daylight scene when Dexter arrives, parks across the street, and then crosses over to the house, which is mostly hidden behind foliage. Inside, Dexter checks things out, and discovers a partially-shredded photo which turns out to be of Mad Dog's next target, revealing that the “former” hit-man is still active and killing people. Dexter also finds a small house in the back, which is filled with trophies and an expensive collection of electric guitars, which Moretti bought with his ill-gotten gains.   The second scene is at night, when Mad Dog returns to the house, only to have Dexter smash him over their head with a guitar, knocking him unconscious.

Dexter has prepared a kill room for him in that small house in the back (with the guitars), and has him on his kill table, undressing him, when Mad Dog suddenly wakes up. A struggle ensues between the two, and Mad Dog manages to escape.

He runs out of the house wearing only underwear, and Dexter chases him down the street, only for Mad Dog to meet an unexpected fate at the nearest intersection. 

In the 5th episode, Dexter knows that Miami Metro will be coming soon to investigate the accident, so he hurries to take down his kill room and erase all evidence before they arrive.  
 
But the police show up earlier than expected, and Dexter almost gets caught while hiding. But he lucks out and isn't discovered. 
 

Q. Where can I find it in real life?

A. This scene was filmed at 1008 Mound Ave., in South Pasadena, CA.  
 
That town is a long way from Dexter's usual stomping grounds in Long Beach and the Valley. 
 
As the name would suggest, it is located just south of the larger and more famous city of Pasadena, California, the home of the annual Rose Parade, having separated from their namesake back in 1888.
 
In the opening shot, Dexter parks his truck on the west side what is Mound Ave, just north of Oxley Street. The camera is initially looking west across Mound Avenue as he gets out of the truck.
 
( The two Spanish-style houses you can see (across the street) that he parks in front of, are at 1011 Mound Ave.) 
 
Dexter then walks east across the street, and enters Mad Dog’s house, at 1008 Mound Ave.

The property is described as a 2631 square foot single family home with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms. 
 
There is a separate outbuilding in the back, which serves as Mad Dog's guitar room on the show. One diagram refers to it as “the barn”, and since this house was built in 1903 (when horses still outnumbered automobiles in L.A.), it might have actually started out as exactly that.

Any doubt I might have had about the location was dispelled when I found this Zillow page, which offers tons of great photos of both the large and small house.

Q. How the heck did you figure out where it was?

A.  This was my toughest challenge for this season. It took me until April to finally track it down.

I spent ages searching virtually every residential neighborhood in Long Beach, but came up empty. I then checked out likely locations in the San Fernando Valley and even in the Rancho Park area, but nothing turned up.

I might still be looking for it, if someone from South Pasadena hadn't tipped me that Dexter had been filming in the area.

Even then, it was tricky pinpointing the exact house used on the show because the house is hidden behind a ton of trees and foliage, and there is very little that can be seen on the show or from the most recent StreetView. They even took down the street signs at the corner during the shoot, and there are no street numbers painted on the curb.
 
But fortunately, Google offers older StreetViews from earlier years, and the 2015 version gives you a pretty decent view of the front house and its unusual door (which is glimpsed when Dexter first enters the house).  

I watched the shot of Dexter walking across the street towards the house, and was able to pinpoint the palm tree that he walks past, which allowed me to determine that the house was probably the one at 1008 Mound Ave., and when I Googled that address, I turned up this Zillow page that offered more than enough confirmation that this indeed was the exact same house. They even have great photos of the small house in the back:

 

The Dexter franchise has only filmed twice before in South Pasadena, both times in Season 6, when they shot at a home there that was featured as Peter Grant’s house, and a second home in South Pasadena was used as Jonah Mitchell’s house, in the unique “Nebraska” episode.

( Before that, you have to go way back to Season 2, when they shot two scenes in Pasadena (but not South Pasadena): one with Lila & Dexter breaking into a home, and a poolside murder scene close by in San Marino. )
 
So they went six entire seasons without shooting a single scene in the Pasadena area, restricting almost all of their other scenes to Long Beach and Los Angeles.

So you can understand why I hadn’t seriously considered South Pasadena for the location of this scene. 


But all's well that ends well...


Here is a StreetView from Google:

 
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