List Price: $979,000
Sold Price: $949,000
The Property: This Riverwoods house sold on May 5th for 9.6 percent less than the sellers had paid for it just 14 months earlier. The sellers—Janice Ferri Esser, a writer for TV soap operas, and her husband, Robert Esser—were not able to sell their prior home, according to the listing sheet for this property, so they put this one back on the market just eight months after they bought it.

Built twenty years ago on a one-acre lot near the beautiful Ryerson Woods forest preserve, the house has 12 rooms, five of them bedrooms, and four-plus baths. Listing sheets say that it has large rooms, a well-appointed gourmet kitchen, “enviable closets” in the master suite, and a basement fitted out with a wet bar, a media room, and an exercise room. From 1998 to 2002, it was the home of Jim Flanigan, a defensive tackle who played for the Chicago Bears from 1994 to 2000 before leaving for the Green Bay Packers.

The Essers got married in January 2006 and bought this house in March 2007. Three months later, Janice Ferri Esser left the writing team of The Young and the Restless, which had won four writing Daytime Emmys during her tenure; she now writes for The Bold and the Beautiful. Robert Esser is a CPA.

Price Points: The Essers bought the house for $1,050,000, agreeing to pay $1,000 more than the asking price after the house had been on the market for only ten days. When they listed it for sale again in November 2007, they were already asking $25,000 less then they had paid. They later cut the asking price to $979,000. They reached a deal at $949,000 in mid-April with buyers whose names do not yet appear in public records. The sale closed on May 5th.

Listing Agent: Michelle Vold of Coldwell Banker, (847) 945-7100