Lake Forest home on lakefront nabs $6M in second-priciest sale of the year

A lakefront Lake Forest mansion finally drew in a buyer, after 12 years on and off the market.

The home on Lake Michigan’s shore at 55 Stone Gate Road is on nearly two acres and has 170 feet of Lake Michigan shoreline. Built in 2003, the 7,600-square-foot property has six bedrooms and nine bathrooms.

The transaction seemingly happened off-market, as the home wasn’t publicly listed for sale before the deal closed on Jan. 31, according to listing data. The property had been on and off the market between 2011 to 2014, before the listing was removed. It was publicly listed again in 2021 for $6.9 million before a price cut brought the property to $6.5 million in 2022.

William Squires at Real 1 Realty represented the buyer, who is not yet identified in public records, and Dominick Clarizio and Judie Fiandaca with @properties Christie’s International Real Estate represented the seller.

According to Lake County property records, the home was owned by Jack Dempsey, the seller who declined to comment through his real estate agent. Listing data and court records show the property was last sold in 2001 to Dempsey, and the home built on it was completed in 2003.

Dempsey and a former romantic partner were involved in a dispute regarding the property in 2009, and Dempsey prevailed through an appellate court. The former girlfriend, Kate Groff, alleged that Dempsey had asked her to help with his various real estate developments, including the Stone Gate property, and that she had been an equal partner in the business and was entitled to half of Dempsey’s business assets.

In the lawsuit, Groff alleged she was involved in the redevelopment of the house, and had slept overnight at the house “to prevent Dempsey’s wife from burning the house down.”

Lake Forest has been home to some of the biggest recent deals on the North Shore, including the $13.5 million sale of Nancy Hughes’ home.

The Stone Gate Road home is the second-priciest sale of 2023 thus far. The only sale that is higher is the $11.2 million sale of one of Ken Griffin’s holdings at Park Tower.

The North Shore also has several other high end properties sitting on the market, including Michael Jordan’s $14.5 million estate in Highland Park that has sat on the market for years, and the just-relisted $12 million Pabst Brewing estate in Glencoe, as well as an $8.9 million David Adler-designed estate in Lake Forest.