Massive lakefront mansion in Wilmette sells for $7.5M

After nearly two and half years on the market, a lakefront estate in Wilmette has sold for $7.5 million—$1.5 million less than what its current owners paid in 2008. The gated stone mansion at 15 Linden includes five bedrooms, eight bathrooms, a home theater, sauna, elevator, private boat launch, and a sprawling one-acre lawn. According to its listing notes, the home is one of just 25 properties in the North Shore suburb with a private Lake Michigan frontage.

Built in 1941, the spacious home was listed for just under $11 million in 2015 before taking a cut down to $8.5 million this summer. Despite an additional reduction, this week’s $7.5 million sale price means the property has tied with a heavily renovated Gold Coast mansion (which appears to have sold to a Thai heir to the Red Bull fortune) for 2017’s priciest Chicago area residential transaction.

While the identity of the buyer is unknown and the name of the previous owner was obscured by a land trust, Crain’s notes that the home at one time belonged to Louis and Bobbie Goldblatt of the Chicago-based Goldblatt's department store chain.

• Wilmette mansion sells for $7.5 million, tying year's highest price [Crain’s]
• Lakefront mansion in Wilmette knocks $2.4M off 2015 asking price [Curbed Chicago]
• $10.9M Linden Avenue Estate Offers Drama on the Lakefront [Curbed Chicago]