(Lake) House Hunters

One of our favorite forms of "mindless" entertainment is to watch House Hunters on HGTV.
And, as you know we are pretty much obsessed with finding a lake house.  It's what we do in our spare time - we look at lake property for sale.
Ideally we would find a place on Cedar Creek Lake as it meets most of our criteria:

1. EZ commute to/from Dallas
2. Large Recreational Lake/Area
3. Close proximity to Canton as First Monday is a big part of Lakehouse Outfitters sales and marketing strategy.

As we looked back over the past 30-60 days it occurred to me, we are living our own version of House Hunters; Lake House Hunters. 

Here's the three most recent properties we have considered:

House #1 is an adorable cottage style home, very close to Gun Barrel City on a private street all on a very nice, shaded waterfront lot with boathouse in place.

We love the location, the lot and the basic cosmetics of the home.  It's smaller than ideal, yet we could make it work.

Drawback - no garage and it's not on the market for sale yet the owner will sell for "the right price"

House #2 is a beautiful piece of property in need a lot of updates and improvements just to make the waterfront/home safe to occupy.  It is also located close to GBC and sits on another very small street.  The home is actually located on a point which added to the value and the VIEW!

Drawbacks - retaining wall is collapsing into the lake.  Boat dock needs replaced and roof over garage is in serious need of repair, which has caused other damage to the home/roof system.  Estimates on dock and retaining wall alone were close to $70K

This property could be a show stopper if someone is looking to take on a project.  (probably too big of a project for us).

House #3 was appealing as it showed move in ready.  The home is more "house like" than "Cabin/Lake house like" which might be nice should we decide to make this our full time residence.  This property is located on the west side of the lake which was not where we had been looking previously, but we do like the fact that it's easy to/from Dallas, in a gated community and the home sits on two lots with trees and landscaping.  And the floor plan is perfect for our lifestyle!  We especially liked the upstairs family room with a wall of windows to the lake view.

Drawbacks:  Not as convenient to Canton.  Does not have the open water view the others have but both of those we thought we could live with.  Biggest drawback was the inspection report showing roof damage, skylights broken and lots of evidence that water damage is taking it's toll on this home.

Bottom line to this episode of Lake House Hunters is that we are still looking!