Replica of Virginia governor’s mansion near Chicago sells after 12 years

It took a dozen years and a huge price cut to sell a St. Charles house designed as a replica of the Virginia Governor’s Mansion.

The five-bedroom house went on the market in 2009 at an asking price of $1.775 million before being reduced in April of this year to $950,000. Marion Wulff of Re/Max of Barrington represented the house and sold it for $915,000 on August 16.

The interior layout for the house mostly resembles the floor plan of the governor’s mansion in Richmond, Virginia. It is the country’s oldest state executive mansion still used for its original purpose. The St. Charles house, built on a 1.25 acre lot in the Hawk Country Club in 1995, sits about 50 miles west of Chicago.

Karla Garica, the Century 21 Affiliated agent who represented the buyers, declined to identify them. Buyers’ names do not yet appear in public records.

Homes in St. Charles sold in an average of 43 days on the market in the first half of 2021, according to a report from Midwest Real Estate Data and the Chicago Association of Realtors.

Chicago’s home bidding wars are more intense than last year. The number of Chicago sales drawing competitive bids jumped more than 20 percent in July from the same period in 2020.

Chicago’s home prices are rising as well. The city’s single-family home prices rose nearly 10 percent in April, the biggest increase for the month in seven years.

[Crain’s] — Connie Kim