1622 Lakeside Lane

When I listed and then sold the house at 1621 East Lakeside Lane last spring, I didn’t do so because of some remarkable, inspired sales job. It wasn’t that I properly highlighted the make of the kitchen faucet or the serial number on the back of home theater projector. I sold the house because the price fit the market, and because my explanation of the market was accurate. I serve buyers and sellers, yes, but moreover I serve the market. That’s why I’m not good at talking people into overpriced homes that buck the context of their individual market, and that’s the same reason I’m good at directing buyers towards value- both the immediate kind and the lasting sort. It’s because I serve the market that I can tell you without hesitation that 1622 Lakeside Lane is worth your time.

From the exterior and at first blush, all of the homes in the South Shore Club are both large and fancy. But this glance test doesn’t matter much once the home is no longer just some piece of lakefront inventory and is, instead, the target of your vacation home desire. Once this transformation occurs, the home is subjected to great scrutiny. At this point, the finishes must not only be beautiful but they must be intact, and polished, well maintained and cleaned and ready for the next owner and the next chapter. This is where many homes fail. They look pretty, but behind all that slate and copper lies so much dust, and plenty of dings too. This is the norm, but 1622 Lakeside is as that boat that rests in the Esplanade at Marco- Far From Normal.

If the location was all we cared about, this home will take that cake and then greedily devour it. The home is positioned right up front in the Club, with a lakefront presence and an easterly tilt to the design that offers up huge lake views and shields the level, lakeside stone patio from the blistering afternoon sun. This home is a pleasant perch lakeside, with no inconveniences blotting the view of water and woods, offering the rare ability to live exactly in the same manner as a lakefront home in another location might. Just house, manicured lawns, and a few steps to the pier. The difference here, of course, is that you don’t have to nag the lawn guy to mow the lawn and once you’re at the pier you have little to do except decide which water chariot will host your next ride. These conveniences are part of the pampered life within the South Shore Club, a rare assault of luxury that requires no monetary consideration aside from the monthly association fees. Those fees, it should be noted, are so much cheaper than those expenses that would be incurred by a lakefront owner elsewhere, and that lakefront owner elsewhere wouldn’t have a fleet of boats, a swimming pool, a clubhouse, a tennis court, and concierge at their disposal.

The house itself is a Pickell built home of superior finishes and style. It has none of the odd indulgences that have come to mark some of the homes in the Club. There are only the highest end of finishes built into a home on this extra wide lakefront lot. The great room opens onto a generous lakeside patio, level and pleasing, with nothing between that patio and the water except a swath of green. There is a lakeside screened porch, a necessary element for any true lakefront experience. The kitchen will stand out as impressive in a line up of impressive kitchens, with Viking appliances and marble counters and a most pleasing layout that will easily host many cooks at once.

Outside of the club, positioned on a typical 100′ lakefront lot, this home would easily fetch $5MM, perhaps more, and then the home would be flanked by lesser homes of lesser appeal. As it sits now, this lakefront home at $3.485MM is positioned to be the next sale in the South Shore Club, especially now that the neighboring home (the one further from the water) is under contract with an asking price of $3.395MM. If you come to see this home, expect to tour a most amazing home that will appear as though you are about to become its first owner. And expect to be surprised by the lakefront location that competes with any lakefront home you’ve ever seen.