The Victorian author and his family spent summer holidays at the cliff-top residence for 22 years and he wrote the novel David Copperfield there. He called it “our little watering place.”
The sea views of the English Channel from the study also inspired his 1852 book Bleak House.
After his death in 1870 the six-bed mansion in Broadstairs, Kent, was renamed from Fort House to Bleak House in his honour.
The building was damaged by fire in 2006 but has undergone a £40,000 restoration. It is not known why the house has been put up for sale although it is owned by local jewellery tycoon Richard Hilton, whose family business is currently in difficulty for mis-labelling their wares.