Something that isn’t well understood in our market is how the approach to your lake house might impact your property value. For instance, if I have a marvelous lakefront home, you might wish to congratulate me. But if my fabulous lakefront home is at the end of a lane filled to the brim with cottages, is that the same as if my fabulous lakefront home is off of Snake Road? When I sold the old Pikewood estate on the north shore of the lake I made a point to reference the fact that the property immediately across the street was a large woods with a conservation easement over it. Did that make the property more valuable than had their been lake access cottages in those woods? The answer is obvious and firm: Yes.
In the same way, it’s part of the magic of my Snake Road legacy estate offering. The 20 acres is unique enough, but across the street you have a large section of undulating countryside. Compare that to the property in Lake Geneva now pending sale at $12.9M which features not only a fraction of the acreage but residential neighborhood housing immediately adjacent the approach. And along those lines, now you consider Bonnie Brae. It’s a lovely lane in its own right, but now consider that the approach to Bonnie Brae is off of Snake Road. Should that command a premium? You bet it should.
My latest sale is of N2201 Bonnie Brae, a large home with 100+ feel of dead level lakefront and 2.7+ acres of wooded depth. I facilitated this sale on behalf of a buyer and seller in an off market fashion, so if you didn’t know about this property you shouldn’t feel bad. You had no way to know if you weren’t working with me. For now, I simply want to wish the best to the terrific new buyers and welcome them to the lakefront. We all know this summer is going to be more enjoyable than last summer, but for this new owner, that statement couldn’t possibly be more true. $4.13M, closed.