My neighbor and I are both on a lake, but he as a small 1 acre lot that is situated much closer to the water (mines over 70 acres, so I have a lot more flexibility and can get away from the flood plane).  

So my husband and I have enough to put 25% down on a lake house that is about an hour and a half away from where we currently live.

I’ll keep my eye out for investors as many people in Chicago have or look to have investments across the Lake.

Currently I've been looking in the northern part of Illinois mainly lake county area, that's going to be my back yard.

Does anyone know of a real estate investing group in or near Lake Norman, North Carolina?

The avg sales price in Lake Forest is $660K so you are looking at the difference of paying 6% vs 3.5% - $39,600 vs. $23,100 - regardless of the sales price Redfin offers a better value. 

"the attractions" because it's 10-20 miles SSW of what to us is "real" Orlando) are outside of the city proper and are in Orange County (non-City of Orlando annexed), Osceola Co, and to a far lesser extent Lake and even Polk Cos. so be sure that you're up to speed on any local developments that might limit renting out the whole property and not living there.

HVAC in South Bend, I have Great Lakes which is a bit pricey but they have always done a great job.

It is listed as a lakefront property, but the lake it is on is only 4 feet deep, and doesn't hold any fish, nor could you really boat on it (that doesn't really count as a lake in MN if you ask me).My feeling is that this place is really worth about $325K (tax assessed value for this year is $304K).Am I a jerk for wanting to offer $270K less than their asking price (pending our walkthrough tonight goes well and we like the property)? 

We have a very mixed market for our small community, there are people with very low incomes and then we have beautiful lakes that attract people with really high incomes.