Real estate news & trends
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Wilmette
Some suburbs are obsessive about preventing their citizens from placing anything in the public parkway abutting their property. That’s not the case in Wilmette, where you’ll see the occasional instance of a resident’s having temporarily or permanently commandeered the space between the sidewalk and the street for an idiosyncratic installation. On Hunter Rd, a few ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on May 21, 2013
Last September, just before it closed, my son and I visited C.J. Arthur’s in Wilmette for the last of the 100s of meals we’d eaten there over a more than 20-year period. Yesterday’s Trib Local brought the sad news that Art Falzer, the “Arthur” in C.J. Arthur’s, had died of ALS at the age of ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on February 21, 2013
Several weeks ago we asserted that Wilmette no longer makes demolition permit data available online. We wrongly relied on looking for the data where we recalled finding it several years ago. A tipster from the Village sent along a link to the list of demolition permits, which has since been updated through December 6. It’s ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on December 28, 2012
The northeast corner of Cleveland and Thornwood in Wilmette is home, once again, to an enchanting display of Christmas lights and music. Wilmette resident Steve Maris has outfitted his home with an array of Christmas figures and more than 50,000 lights computer-controlled by more than 300 separate channels. Maris puts on the show, in part, ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on December 10, 2012
Wilmette no longer makes available an online list of demolition permits, so I don’t have accurate data about the current pace of teardowns in the village. My impression, however, is that the number of teardowns is up this year over recent years, but fewer than in 2005 or 2006. I passed three teardowns last week ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on December 6, 2012
Wilmette dwarfs Kenilworth in land area (5.4 square miles vs 0.6) and population (27,087 vs 2,513). Despite their size differential, these neighboring North Shore villages duel to a draw in their small-town feeling. That sense of living in a small, neighborly town is rarely more on display than on July 3rd when residents of Kenilworth ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on July 5, 2012
There are only a few dozen single-family homes in Wilmette that have private beaches, and it’s extremely rare to see one of them become available for rent. The 6-bedroom home on a 50 x 509 foot lot at 1204 Michigan Ave was just listed as a short-term rental (August 25 to June 14) – just ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on May 10, 2012
618 Central Ave in Wilmette is the setting for a classic side-entrance center-entrance vintage charmer that’s been completely updated. The home has also been expanded to include a first- floor family room with French doors opening to a raised bluestone patio and professionally landscaped yard. The home has four bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths and a ...
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Posted by sponsored post on April 24, 2012
I’m a sucker for a front porch, and the home at 2022 Wilmette Ave in Wilmette has a great south-facing one that wraps around the sides of the home and leads to a pergola on the west. The 5-bedroom, 3 bath farm house has been on the market for a year, and is priced at ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on April 19, 2012
It’s been a while since I spotlighted a North Shore rental pick. This week’s focus falls on 2240 Kenilworth Ave, a 3-bedroom, 2 ½ bath home in Wilmette‘s Kenilworth Gardens offered at $3,300 a month. There isn’t enough information online to determine whether the home qualifies as special in any way, or whether it’s bargain-priced, ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on March 29, 2012
We’ve been following the market for rental homes and condos on the North Shore for several years and the market appears to be as tight as I’ve seen it. There are more properties available than there were in the late spring and early summer of last year but, and this is purely an impressionistic take, ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on March 22, 2012
If you’re shopping for home furnishings and accessories you may find it easier to head for the Old Orchard mall in Skokie rather than the traffic-clogged streets of the Clybourn Corridor. Old Orchard mall is home to Crate & Barrel, Pottery Barn, Restoration Hardware, Toms-Price and Williams-Sonoma. Just north of the mall you’ll find Ethan ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on March 5, 2012
Looking back to 2007 it’s now clear that a cottage industry of home builders overbuilt the market for new single-family homes in the $1 million and up range. Prices collapsed for a while, and speculative new construction – homes built without a buyer in hand – came to a virtual halt. We’re now seeing a ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 24, 2012
If you guessed that no one would want to visit open houses on New Year’s Day, you would have guessed wrong. Within 50 minutes of the time it opened, nine couples had visited the newly-built 5-bedroom, 4 ½ bath home at 1148 Isabella St in Wilmette, and several more arrived before I left. They came ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on January 2, 2012
Isabella St defines a large part of Wilmette’s southern border with Evanston. On the north side of the street west of Green Bay Rd, in Wilmette, there has been quite a bit of teardown activity and new homes built over the past decade. On the south side of the street, in Evanston, there’s been nowhere ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on December 30, 2011
On Christmas Eve my daughter Val and I headed over to the corner of Cleveland St and Thornwood Ave in Wilmette, planning to spend a few minutes seeing the Christmas lights. We stayed nearly an hour, repeatedly saying “let’s see what’s next” and “just one more.” What held our interest was more than 30,000 dancing ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on December 25, 2011
If you would like to try on life in Wilmette before making a commitment to it, a short-term furnished rental might be the way to go. There’s a newly-listed rental at 327-C Greenleaf Ave in Wilmette, offered furnished from December to June for just $1,495 a month. Assuming the 3-bedroom, 2 ½ bath townhome is ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on November 10, 2011
A 4-bedroom, 2-bath ranch home at 537 Romona Rd in Wilmette is being offered for rent at $1,900 a month. That’s an unusually low price for a 4-bedroom home in Wilmette. It’s also available for purchase for $399,000. The home, which last sold for $459,000 in 2004, is on a 63 x 132 lot almost ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on November 3, 2011
When it comes to pompous pronouncements, Chicago architects have many peers but few superiors. Consider this quote from John Shelette Van Bergen, a protégé of Frank Lloyd Wright: Since the American architect has a great opportunity as a leader of the people toward honesty, simplicity and directness, he can educate their tastes and control, to ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on September 29, 2011
The 4-bedroom, 3-bath home at 3016 Wilmette Ave in Wilmette was “expanded and totally renovated in 2004,” according to the listing that recently came on the market. The home has a number of features that are unusual for this part of Wilmette and this price point – $2,500 a month. For starters, all 4 bedrooms ...
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Posted by Joe Zekas on September 28, 2011
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