I trust you enjoyed your Memorial Day weekend. I had a busy weekend to say the least, and for a Realtor the true weekend begins this week today. Tuesday. The weekend wasn’t without its share of excitement, with my listing in Summer Haven receiving two contracts (yes, two, and no it wasn’t a distressed sale), and accepting one of them, that was undoubtedly the climax of my weekend. I met several nice folks at my open houses, several of whom I hope I can help turn into vacation home owners in this lovely little market of ours. The lakefront home market has continued its active pace, with several lakefront sales in the past several weeks. Just this past week a listing that I first wrote about 3 months ago closed for $1.99MM. The asking price? $1.99MM. Now, don’t get me wrong, I question the sale at full price as well, and as a rule of thumb would never really expect or want a buyer to pay full price in this market, but it does lend considerable credibility to what I write about all the time. People don’t always buy for the dollars and cents aspect, they buy because they’re looking for a lifestyle that can most easily be accomplished by executing that purchase. This buyer will now enjoy what I enjoy, and they’ll live a different life from here on out. A life where weekends are meant for escaping, a life where everything will prove to be better at the lake. While it may have just been the sun on my skin, and the cool lake breezes in my face, the market certainly appears to have more life in it now than at any other point in the past 12 months. For my star watching market bottom friends, do you think it’s cruel or inappropriate for me to tell you that you might have missed it already?
There are at least 2 other lakefront homes pending sale right now, and I have little doubt that there will be at least two or three more in the upcoming week or two. The new lakefront inventory in Fontana is a blessing for the market, with one dynamite home in particular coming to market last week. It’ll sell, and I won’t be shy to write I told you so when it does. One of the interesting things I gleened from this weekend’s interaction with potential buyers is that people are still looking for distressed sales on Geneva Lake. They just don’t exist right now, and I doubt they will. If you broaden your search and look for distressed (short sales, REO sales) property on the market on roughly 10 of the area lakes, you’ll find, to my knowledge, just one such property and it’s on Lake Elizabeth. While there is indeed a new search method in our MLS to help identify distressed sales, it’s not known about by enough agents to trust that search as the sole method for finding distressed sales.
Overall, a great weekend to be in Lake Geneva, and the start of another great summer. If you or anyone you know should be owning a vacation property here, be it a $120k condo in Geneva National or a $4MM home on the lake, I’d absolutely love to help.
