Lifestyle buyers step up as speculators flee investment-home market

The Superior at LaSalle, 150 W. Superior

The September issue of New Homes Magazine takes the temperature of Chicago’s market for investment homes. Mostly gone are the rash of speculators “flipping” condos for a quick buck. In their place: mom and pop and just plain folks, who are buying investment homes to enjoy them.

The label “real estate investor” might conjure images of slick-haired, power-lunching alpha males in monogrammed shirts and pinstripe suits, but these days, residential investors are as likely to look like Kathleen and James Nolan as they are Donald Trump.

Kathleen Nolan, a 52-year-old interior decorator, and her husband, James, an executive at Sara Lee, recently purchased their third home, a two-bedroom split-level condo at the top of the 14-story Superior at LaSalle, a new tower at 150 W. Superior St., in River North. The Nolans’ primary residence, a four-bedroom single-family house in Barrington Hills, has become a hub for their four globetrotting children – two of whom have returned home after moving away – and four grandkids.

Read more at New Homes Magazine online.

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