Here's the deal ... this property currently operates as a tourist attraction in Cleveland, giving people a chance to tour the place as a museum and stay overnight -- which has been the case for a while ... that is, until they announced (as a company) last year they planned to unload it.

The plan, at the time, was to sell the entire lot to somebody new ... and, presumably, that meant the new would-be owner could either continue running it as a museum, or just move in and live in it as a regular home. Remember -- there was interest from a group of the actors from the OG film, spearheaded by Yano Anaya, to snap it up and keep the ticket sales going.

After a lot of drama and back-and-forth ... it appeared Yano and a group he was working with were in line to score the place -- but now, it would seem that totally fell through.

The business page for the 'A Christmas Story House' just said they have their new "owner" ... and it's none other than their current CEO, Joshua Dickerson, who's gonna take the reins.

They write, "While the face of the company has long been the founder, Brian Jones, the true work, and performance has been borne by Mr. Dickerson behind the scenes. It seemed only fitting that he should take the final step and become an owner."

In terms of how they're framing his new "ownership," the 'Christmas Story' house folks say Josh is taking an equity stake in the company and will become its managing partner. So, in other words, he's running the show and running the house.

Whether they actually "sold" anything to him remains unclear -- last year, we were told the company selling the house (the same company Josh works for) expected to fetch around 8 figures for this place.

Of course, this is probably a bummer for Yano ... who made peace with Brian and seemed primed to inherit the property, which he thought was fitting considering his history with it.

It wasn't meant to be though ... at least not for right now.