List Price: $2,275,000

The Property: Situated in a neighborhood of new, high-end homes on a parcel of land in Lake View that was, until six years ago, entirely industrial, this 11-room house has a clean-cut limestone façade, bamboo floors, steel and glass stair rails, and a super-sleek kitchen. But what really grabs the eye is the solid-core wood doors faced with a vertical-striped zebrawood veneer that are used throughout the house, providing a dark accent to an otherwise light interior.

The house has five outdoor decks on four levels, including a spacious party deck atop the garage and two more private decks on opposite sides of a third-floor den with outdoor stairs up to the rooftop. Glass walls extending out to the decks and lots of well-placed windows keep the interior surprisingly sunny for an east-west house with a tall neighbor to its immediate south. The red-brick north side of the house isn’t nearly as elegant as the façade: the cutouts and pop-ups that make the sunny interior layout possible give that side a humpy look. But when the vacant lot to the north is built up, that side won’t be visible anymore.

The developer Dave Dvorak and his wife, the real-estate agent Lena Pospisilova, bought an empty lot four years ago and built this house intending to move in. With help from the kitchen and bath retailer Unico Chicago, Pospisilova picked many of the interior finishes, including some cool tile combinations, floating vanities, and sculptural sinks in the bathrooms.

But with the downturn in the local real-estate market, Dvorak and his wife plan to spend a few years building homes in Europe. Romania, a recent entrant into the European Union, and Croatia, a candidate for future membership, have seen numerous western European banks open branches there, sparking a building boom. “They’re like the real-estate market in Chicago five or six years ago,” Dvorak says. Because of their travel plans, the couple opted to put this house on the market three months ago.

Price Points: The eight-square-block area from Diversey Parkway to Wellington Avenue and from Paulina Street to the Metra railroad tracks is an “instant neighborhood” that has sprung up in just a few years on an old industrial parcel of land. It is a magnetic location, with all of the retail and dining assets of Roscoe Village and Lake View nearby. At least six new houses within two blocks of this house have sold for $2 million or more since 2005, the most recent a house right around the corner that went for $2.49 million in October.

Listing Agent: Lena Pospisilova, Lencorp Realty, (888) 700-1500

Deal Estate: The Blog is on break for the holidays and will return on January 3rd with more real-estate news.