Where does local.properties go for android project?

Getting this complaint from IntelliJ 13:

8:15:48 PM Gradle '<project>' project refresh failed:
           SDK location not found. Define location with sdk.dir in the local.properties file or with an ANDROID_HOME environment variable.
           Build file '/<project>/build.gradle' line: 20
           : Gradle settings

I have tried to spam my local.properties in every directory I can think of but still getting this error. What gives?

The local.properties file goes in the project's root level, in the same folder as the gradlew, gradlew.bat, settings.gradle and other files.

This file should not be included in source control. After (incorrectly) including this in source control, then deleting the file locally, Android Studio re-created the file for me automatically.

Here is the example content of this file:

## This file is automatically generated by Android Studio.
# Do not modify this file -- YOUR CHANGES WILL BE ERASED!
#
# This file must *NOT* be checked into Version Control Systems,
# as it contains information specific to your local configuration.
#
# Location of the SDK. This is only used by Gradle.
# For customization when using a Version Control System, please read the
# header note.
#Thu Aug 14 14:49:26 PDT 2014
sdk.dir=C\:\\Program Files (x86)\\Android\\android-studio\\sdk

Note the sdk.dir= reference to the location of the Android Studio SDK installation (which may be different on different machines).

For MAC create file local.properties inside android/ and paste this line inside the file

> sdk.dir = /Users/USERNAME/Library/Android/sdk

For MacOS, put your file gradle.properties in these 2 places:

1. ~/.gradle/
2. /Users/<your_user>/Library/sdk/