Lake Forest Foreclosure Is a Sign of the Times

List Price: $2,695,000
Sale Price: $2,037,750
The Property: This 12-room mansion on two and a half acres in Lake Forest sold at foreclosure on December 22nd. Built in 1996 on a cul-de-sac of seven homes carved out of an old Green Bay Road estate, the house mimics English country styles with its tall brick peaks and ornamented limestone bay. Photos that accompanied the listing show…

Easier Loans for Veterans, First-time Buyers

It’s been a quandary most of the year: real-estate prices are tantalizing now, but getting a mortgage is rough. The Illinois Housing Development Authority (IHDA) has a little-known program that makes borrowing easier for state residents; it offers interest rates lower than the prevailing norm for conventional loans, accepts borrowers with credit scores lower than most big lenders now require…

Wild and Woodsy—Glenview

List Price: $1.525 million
The Property: From its jaunty Z-shaped façade to its show-stopping red and chrome kitchen, this exuberant four-bedroom Glenview house doesn’t hold back. It even comes with a built-in exclamation point—made of wood inlay and situated on the master bedroom floor.

Grandparents Save Highland Park Landmark

List Price: $3,595,000
Sale Price: $3,000,000
The Property: Two unnamed grandparents have bought the landmark 134-year-old Cornelius Field House in Highland Park. “The buyers’ plans are to appreciate everything about it and keep it all together,” says Blanche Romey Egan, who handled the sale of the house for the estate of Martha Ferguson MacLeod.“They are going to build a…

Whistling “Dixie” in St. Charles

List Price: $1.775 million
The Property: Some people bring home pictures of picturesque old homes they admired while traveling. Ted and Ellen Roberts of St. Charles went one better: they built a replica of the governor’s mansion in Richmond, Virginia, a Federal-style home that they happened upon on when visiting the onetime Confederate capital in the early 1990s.

Retro Chic: Old new look, falling prices spur converted-condo sales in Lake View

LAKE VIEW FROM $209,000 TO $359,900 When it opened in 1958, the 23-story apartment building at 2930 North Sheridan Road had a distinctly “now” look, from its façade of strip windows to a swooping driveway canopy punctured by big, bulbous skylights. Its conversion to condos in the past two years came at the right time, … Read more