The water is deep off of the southwestern tip of Cedar Point, but it does not get that deep as quickly as you might think. It is a lingering drop off. The drop off at Black Point is swift and unforgiving. The drop off at Cedar Points wants badly to drop, but it meanders through some boulders before the bottom drifts out of view. This drop off harbors some of the most prolific Walleye spawning grounds on Geneva Lake, and as I write in December I can see the April water and the white fins of spawning giants on the rocky bottom. This is what I think about when I think about Cedar Point Park. I’m pretty sure you think of something different.
2011 was an unbelievable year for Cedar Point. There were sales here in every segment of this large association, and for a stretch the lakefronts on Cedar Point provided most of the liquidity in our broader lakefront market. There were nine sales in Cedar Point this year, and I sold three of those properties. If I worked at another firm that is so proud of their chart making skills, I’d proclaim that I dominated 33% of the Cedar Point Park market this year. But I don’t work there, so I won’t do that. The sales ranged from a most basic ranch that I sold in April for $170k, to a lakefront that sold on the cliff of the point for $2.25MM in August. I count that lakefront as one of the best values of the year, and perhaps if the buyer had known a little more about the personal circumstances of the owner, they might have negotiated a better deal. Or not, whichever. The nine sales during 2011 are particularly impressive when viewed against 2010’s six sales, 2009’s four sales, and the ten sales during the peak year of 2006.
Three of the other sales were also of lakefront homes, and all three of those were also on Circle Parkway. Circle Parkway, by the way, was the road with the most lakefront sales on it during 2011, just in case that matters to you. I was lucky enough to represent one of those buyers in a purchase, and the home they purchased for $1.44MM in September was a solid value in everyone’s eyes. There was a parkway sale this year, which reminds me of a time in the late 1990s when there weren’t ever parkway listings available, and buyers salivated at the mere mention of possible offerings along one of those grassy lawns that trickle towards the water. The parkway sale on Oak Birch closed at $650k, and was a decent value more than it was an outright deal.
Of the remaining three sales, one was my listing at 521 Wilmette. You remember that cottage. It’s the one that I’ve loved so deeply and for so long, and it’s the one that the market overlooked for more than a year. Last spring, a buyer with vision arrived, and returned the cottage to its former glory. That isn’t entirely true, as I doubt its former glory included Viking appliances and Carrera marble. Even so, the cottage has been transformed, and where blight once ruled there is now nothing less than the most pleasing lake home ever imagined by the most romantic of dreamers. This cottage will return to the market this spring, and the transformation will both shock and delight you.
As important as it is to recap the sales, it is important to draw attention to the properties that did not sell. A lakefront on Oak Birch appears to still be in search of its buyer. This is a fantastic piece of property, and I have a feeling that the ultimate sales price will represent a significant reduction off of the list price. If I were an active lakefront buyer in search of an entry level lakefront with an unexpected amount of property, I’d call myself to discuss that property. That listing aside, none of the other eight available properties do much to excite me at the moment. Side note- with nine sales last year and nine available properties, we currently have a year’s worth of inventory on the books in CPP. That’s a nice ratio, and a sign of a healthy market that isn’t weighted particularly in favor of either buyer or seller.
Cedar Point has not been immune to a little foreclosure trouble, but in spite of the foreclosure bug biting once or twice a year here, the market has remained stable. Large associations are not impacted by a little foreclosure action in the same way that a smaller association might be. Look for a 2012 with similar sales volume, and a steady reduction in price of the three available lakefronts priced from $1.799MM to $1.9MM. These will sell in the entry level range, even if the sellers aren’t quite ready to admit that yet. The volume recovery has occurred in Cedar Point Park, and if indexes hold steady, the low interest rates available to solid borrowers should provide a further boost to this venerable association.