North Shore Views

Lake Forest Real Estate Trends

Lake Forest has had some of the most extreme changes over the past couple of years. Home sales (single family houses, condos and townhomes) have improved dramatically but have been accompanied by large decreases in average pricing. In fact, average prices for December of 2009 were about 50% of prices during the market’s peak, back in late 2007.

Lake Forest Home Sales

December sales showed a 29% jump from November and 100% from December of last year. Total year sales of 187 are 4.5% ahead of 2008. Consistent with other markets, Lake Forest had a weak 1st quarter after which sales rebounded and have held relatively steady since May.

Home Prices

The average sales price was $857,166 in December down 6% vs. November and down 27% vs. December 2008. Pricing in Lake Forest has been consistently trending downward from its high of $1,800,000 in late 2007. While other markets appear to be stabilizing, it’s not clear that Lake Forest prices have hit bottom yet.

Inventory and Months Supply

The total inventory of homes for sale as of December was 347, down 11% from November and down 8% from December of last year. This is the lowest level of inventory in Lake Forest since March 2007. Months supply, a measure of how long it would take to sell all of the inventory at the current rate of sale, was 15.8 months in December, its lowest since August 2007. Lower inventory and months supply should ultimately help bolster prices.

Market Time

The average days on market, which shows how many days a home is on the market before it sells, was 113 days as of December, down 3% vs. November and down 29% vs. December 2008. The combination of low prices and reduced supply is causing buyers to get off the fence and buy.

Read my 2010 outlook for North Shore real estate here.

Tags: Lake Forest, North Shore Chicago home sales trends, North Shore market data, North Shore real estate trends

Wedding Crasher No More

What’s the most elegant wedding venue on the North Shore?

Vince Vaughn would tell you it’s the Armour House at Lake Forest Academy. At least that’s where the star of “Wedding Crashers” chose to tie the knot this past weekend. The Armour House was built between 1904 and 1908 at a cost of $10 million by J. Ogden Armour (heir to the Armour Meat Packing fortune). It was purchased by Lake Forest Academy in 1947 and is now on the National Register of Historic Places.
You can read more about Vaughn’s wedding here and here.

Tags: Armour House, Lake Forest, Vince Vaughn, Wedding Crasher

North Shore Market Update – December 2009

In December 2009 sales of single family homes on the North Shore were up 32% vs. December 2008, while average prices were down 8%. Market time increased 21% to 200 days for sold properties.

Average prices declined in all towns except Glenview and Glencoe. Winnetka and Northfield had the largest price declines AND the largest increase in units sold, so price does seem to be the biggest driver in the market today.

Wilmette was the only town were there were fewer units sold in 2009 than 2008.

December 2009 vs. Year Ago*

	Units Sold	Avg. Price	Market Time
Town	% Change	% Chg	% Chg
Evanston	6%	-24%	20%
Wilmette	-22%	-14%	28%
Glenview	25%	16%	19%
Northfield	200%	-73%	159%
Winnetka	138%	-39%	-1%
Glencoe	38%	15%	69%
Highland Park	22%	-4%	-18%
Lake Forest	67%	-1%	25%
North Shore	32%	-8%	21%

* Single family homes (Source: MRED – Deemed reliable but not guaranteed)

Tags: Evanston, Glencoe, Glenview, Highland Park, Kenilworth, Lake Forest, North Shore market data, North Shore real estate trends, North Shore sales trends, Northfield, Wilmette, Winnetka

North Shore Housing Inventory Snapshot – December 1, 2009

Here’s a snapshot of what’s on the market right now, including list prices and time on market. Not surprisingly, there seems to be a direct correlation between price level and time on market, with Winnetka, Kenilworth and Lake Forest being the priciest markets and also the ones where market time is longest, at well over 300 days.

Town	# Units for Sale*	Median List Price	Average List Price	Average D.O.M.
Evanston	225	$514,000	$695,154	240
Wilmette	155	$710,000	$887,632	280
Glenview	380	$664,950	$792,208	263
Northfield	64	$732,000	$885,750	314
Kenilworth	43	$1,899,000	$2,183,942	336
Winnetka	176	$1,499,000	$1,970,967	339
Glencoe	98	$1,099,450	$1,813,779	259
Highland Park	345	$679,000	$1,027,431	287
Lake Forest	316	$1,250,000	$1,911,778	320
North Shore	1802	$799,000	$1,236,879	288

* Detached single family houses (Source: MRED)

Tags: Glencoe, Glenview, Kenilworth, Lake Forest, North Shore market data, North Shore real estate trends, Northfield, Real estate, Wilmette, Winnetka

North Shore Market Update for October-November 2009

The market continues to show signs of improvement, driven by the expansion of the tax credit, continued low interest rates and attractive prices. Sales of detached single family homes on the North Shore were up 34% in October-November over the same period last year, an even stronger performance than last month’s report. Another positive sign is that the number of active listings at the end of October decreased by 11% vs. the end of July, suggesting that we are starting to work through the high inventory of homes on the market. Prices, on the other hand, continue to be soft, down 14% on average vs. year

October-November 2009 vs. Year Ago*

Town	Units Sold % Change	Avg. Price % Change	Days on Mkt% Change
Evanston	+19%	-34%	+40%
Wilmette	+65%	-12%	+2%
Glenview	+36%	-16%	+12%
Northfield	+14%	+17%	+70%
Winnetka	=	+9%	-26%
Glencoe	+46%	+27%	+30%
Highland Park	+26%	-16%	-4%
Lake Forest	+72%	-47%	+76%
North Shore	+34%	-14%	+18%

* Detached single family homes (Source: MRED)

Although the numbers vary by town, there is a consistent trend, and that is that most of the buying activity is happening at the lower end of the price range. Lake Forest showed a dramatic 72% increase in sales, but it was not in the multi-million dollar homes people associate with Lake Forest. In fact almost 20% of the homes sold in Oct.-Nov of this year were in the $600,000-699,000 price range and 77% were below $1,000,000;  in 2008 only 55% of the homes sold in Lake Forest were below $1,000,000.

Glencoe also showed a healthy increase in units sold but  42% of homes sold under $600,000 in 2009 vs. 31% in 2008. The increase in average price for Glencoe this year was driven by one sale over $5,000,000.

Tags: Glencoe, Lake Forest, North Shore market data, North Shore real estate trends, North Shore sales trends