Hoover Estate Sold For $10 Million In Glencoe, Subdivision Likely

GLENCOE, IL — The mansion built by a vacuum-making fortune could soon be swept aside by new construction on subdivided lots, as the vast estate bought by the longtime chief of the Hoover Company more than 90 years ago was sold last week for almost $6 million below its asking price. The new owner intends to turn the expansive north Glencoe property – nestled south of Turnbull Woods and east of the Glencoe Golf Club – into a residential development of single-family homes, according to Crain's Chicago Business.

Sold on Dec. 28 for $10 million, according to Realtor.com, the 12.22-acre property at 1801 Green Bay Road had never been publicly listed since being purchased as farmland by the H. Earl Hoover, a nephew of the founder of the vacuum cleaner company. He developed many vacuum-related patents and retired as Hoover chairman in 1974 before dying in 1985 at the age of 94.

Featuring a 10,000 square-foot mansion, a coach house, a greenhouse was listed Aug. 21 for nearly $16 million, the highest asking price in the Chicago suburbs, on behalf of the estate of Miriam Hoover, Mr. Hoover's former housekeeper and third wife, who died last March at the age of 104. Then 20-year-old Mariam met the multi-millionaire vacuum magnate in the mid-1930s and the pair married in 1951, the Chicago Tribune reported, back when the property included 14 acres, a dozen live-in servants and two fish ponds.

Real estate agent Hadley Rue represented both the the Hoover estate and the buyers. He told Crain's the new buyers intend to subdivide the property and could develop about two dozen single-family homes on the site. The new construction would probably be aimed at empty-nesters, with the 1925 Tudor mansion potentially demolished.

In August, Rue described the mansion as "whimsical," "magical" and "just stunning." He said Friday demolition of the existing houses was not a certainty and declined to confirm the buyers' plans to subdivide the property or further comment on the transaction. The new owners have not yet been identified in public records.

According to the Cook County Assessor's Office, the estimated market value of the property for taxing purposes is $8,486,510. Its 2017 property tax bill was nearly $210,000.

Earlier: Vacuum Magnate's Glencoe Estate Listed For $15.9 Million