I think it would be fun to write about sports. If I were a beat writer for a baseball team, there would be at least 162 games to write about. There would be trades, signings, injuries, firings; all sorts of great topics begging to be written about. And then, once all that’s over if the team makes it to the playoffs then there are playoff games and playoff paralells, and interviews with some old guy who hit some home run in one of those past playoff games. That’d be nice. To write about real estate in a small market isn’t quite the same. There are not sales every day. There aren’t happenings and goings on that beg for words three days a week. This is too bad. With one exception.
The lakefront market is doing its very best to gain inclusion here every other day. There aren’t sales every day in this low volume vacation home market, it’s just that on days like this it seems as though there are in fact this many sales. The lakefront market has moved past the election and into the fiscal cliff unfazed. I have had a couple customers bow out of the market until they have more certainty in their federal liabilities, but those customers appear to be in the minority. This week, the lakefront has been on fire. In December.
There is some antiquated thinking about the market here that I admit to subscribing to for far too long. The idea that we shut down after Thanksgiving and resume activities again in February doesn’t hold much water any more. It may be a function of the mild late fall that we’re experiencing, but whatever the case, there are buyers out now and there will certainly be buyers out tomorrow. Off season? What off season?
Over the last several days, no fewer than four lakefront homes have gone under contract. First, the poorly located lakefront by the boat launch. It’s listed at $999k, and it’s a value problem, so we’re not going to talk about that property anymore, except perhaps to ridicule it when it closes in the event that the print price is too high. Either way, it’s under contract, so that’s good. If the buyer intends to remodel it lightly and keep it as is, that’s probably the best use of that location.
The lakefront in Elgin Club listed at $2.499MM is under contract. That’s a very nice house in a fine location. It’ll never be an estate of any measure, but it’s a fine enough house that doesn’t need much, if any, work. Elgin Club isn’t for everyone, with some rules that some buyers might bristle at, but overall it’s a blue chip location. A lakefront in Geneva Manor ($1.99MM) is under contract as well. That home has 100′ of frontage, but it’s shallow frontage and the shore path is mostly up in at least some of your business. Best not to be an introvert in that location. Get ready to waive at shore path walkers. Why, hello to you too friendly neighbor! The house also has a $40k tax bill, which is the punishment that the city of Lake Geneva inflicts on you if you’re a lakefront buyer within their boundaries.
The new lakefront on South Lakeshore in Fontana is under contract as well. Recently so, but still under contract. This is a great parcel in a highly desirably location, so it’s no surprise at all that it attracted immediate and motivated attention. The home sold last January for $2.5MM before hitting the market again this week for $2.799MM. Buyers on Geneva know what they like and where, so when something comes to market that matches on both accounts, it’s pretty easy for buyers to make quick decisions. That’s just the way it is when buyers know a lake as intimately as some of them do.
To date there have been 21 lakefront sales, including the two in the South Shore Club, which we’re counting today because I say so. There are no less than 8 lakefront properties pending sale as of this morning. That’s an incredible number. Given the tax changes on the horizon, expect all of these properties to close yet during 2012. If that occurs, and we end the year with 27 true lakefront sales, those will be numbers on track with our absolute volume peak of the mid 2000s. Has the market recovered? I don’t know as though it has. Have we found 27 buyers this year that think it’s well on it’s way? Um, yes.