Creekside was a nice house. A really nice house. It had a swimming pool and a boat slip and a beautiful lot and a sexy design. It was brand new. It was, without a doubt, the nicest off-water home to have sold here perhaps since the beginning of time. I was glad to have sold it, but the sale wasn’t all sunshine and lollipops. I tried to get the market to compare the home to something in the back of the South Shore Club. I figured the market would see the proximity and amenities and count those somewhat comparable. But I was wrong. Quite wrong, in fact. The back homes in the South Shore Club are in the $7-9M range right now, as proven by the recent sale in the upper $8s and my sale last fall at $7M. The upper $8 sale might not represent repeatable value, but it’s still a print and it matters to the market. If those homes can achieve that range, why not something right next door that’s about the same proximity to the water, but is unencumbered by the South Shore Club fees?
The answer is rather simple, and there’s a lesson in it. The Creekside modern sold at $5.6M ultimately and not in the $7M+ South Shore Club range because the market doesn’t see those properties as being comparable. I wanted to convince the market that they were comparable, but when the dust settled the market gets to make these decisions, not me. The lesson here is for me, sure, but it’s mostly a reminder for everyone. Markets function by grouping like kind things together. The market thinks Cedar Point Park and Knollwood are somewhat similar. It thinks Country Club Estates is similar to those two as well. But it doesn’t think Sunset Hills is Country Club Estates, and it doesn’t think The Lindens is at all similar to Edgewater Terrace. Ownership around the lake tends to wish that these comparisons were not true in the eyes of the market, and at times, those comparisons make exceptions. But market behavior follows patterns, and in the case of Creekside Lane and the South Shore Club it sees one of those as being similar to lakefront valuations (South Shore Club) and one of those similar to lake access valuations (Academy Estates).
To the seller who allowed me to work on this sale, I’m grateful. And to the buyer who purchased this amazing home at a price that more closely aligns with off-water comps and not South Shore Club comps, the market won.