Tony Grunsfeld-Designed Glencoe Home Is Year's Priciest To Date

GLENCOE, IL — A blufftop Glencoe mansion with more than 133 feet of private Lake Michigan shoreline became the most expensive private residential home sale of the year to date Monday when it sold for $5.15 million.

Built in 1997, the contemporary five-bedroom home on a 0.87-acre lot was designed by prolific local modernist architect Tony Grunsfeld. Two stories of floor-to-ceiling windows line the lake-facing side of the cedar-lined structure, which appears mostly closed off from the road.

Grunfeld designed over 130 homes for many notable families around the Chicago suburbs during a career that spanned nearly six decades, including more than 30 lakefront properties on the North Shore, according to an oral history compiled by the Art Institute of Chicago.

The exterior of the 10,800-square foot structure is cedar, and the property includes slate patios, a screened-in porch and steps down to the private beach, which appeared to contain little sand beneath the wooded bluff.

The interior of the 14-room home includes a master suite on the first floor, a pair of fireplaces, a paneled library, a finished lower level and an attached four-car garage, according the its listing, which described the property as "true treasure."

According to property records, the seller was Yothin Dumnemchanvanit, managing director of the Double A Public Company Limited, a Thai pulp and paper mill company. He bought the property in December 2009 for $5 million from a trust following the divorce of the home's previous owner, a lawyer and author of legal thrillers who had purchased it from its original owners.

The home was publicly listed in February with an asking price of $5.5 million. The listing agent on the sale told Crain's Chicago Business, which first reported the sale, that the home was under contract with a buyer within a week of hitting the market. Public records do not yet identify the buyer.

Closing at 6.4% below asking price, the home sold for the equivalent of just one year's property tax bill above its the price Dumnemchanvanit paid for it a decade ago. According to the Cook County Assessor's Office, the property's estimated 2018 market value for taxing purposes was $5 million and its annual property tax bill was around $150,000 last year.

This week's home sale eclipses another Glencoe home for the year's most expensive to date. Last month, a mid-century ranch on Wentworth Avenue designed by Henry L. Newhouse and built in 1955 sold for $4,950,000.

Last year, the 10 most expensive suburban home sales in the Chicago region were on the North Shore. Six of them were lakefront properties.

Read More: Lakefront Tony Grunsfeld Design In Glencoe Listed At $5.5 Million

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