These communities offer affordable getaways with some form of lake access within two hours of New York City. In this price range, generally under $150,000 for a non-lakefront home with lake access, both houses and the piece of land they sit on tend to be small. You're not getting acreage and privacy, and a third bedroom or second bath can be hard to come by in the budget range. Note about the "Homes for Sale" by Community links: Some listing agents ignore coding listings with a community or development designator. As a result, the MLS Search Links below may not include all properties for sale in a particular community or development. Please email me if there is a particular community you're interested in to see if there are additional homes available for sale.

Camelot Woods, Sackett Lake (Monticello), NY

Price range: $85,000 to $150,000. Camelot Woods is a turn-key "lock and go" vacation home community near the southern end of Sackett Lake. Homes are mostly 1980's era modular construction, with 3 bedrooms, ranging from 1,000 to 1,400 sq. ft. All exterior maintenance is included in the approx. $300 per month HOA dues. Facilities include a swimming pool, tennis courts, clubhouse and lake access to Sackett Lake. Houses clustered on very small parcels.

Hunter Lake, Parksville, NY

Price range: $60,000+ for a non-lakefront seasonal cottage to $300,000+ for a lakefront home. Hunter Lake is an older lake community, with lake cabins dating back to the 1940's. Many of the non-lakefront cabins here are 'seasonal', meaning they aren't winterized for year round use. Condition varies, particularly among the non-lakefront seasonals, and the less expensive houses here may need quite a bit of work. Lot sizes can be fairly small, less than half an acre, though the heavily wooded setting gives more of a feeling of privacy than you might expect. Lakefront houses typically are more substantial and winterized. Hunter is a motorboat lake, but most non-lakefront houses, while having access to the lake for swimming, fishing and canoeing, do not have dock space to keep a boat moored on the lake (although a boat ramp is available.) No tennis courts, clubhouse or swimming pool. Hunter is all about the lake. Lakefront houses seldom come on the market here.

Lake Louise Marie, Rock Hill, NY

Price range: $125,000 to $175,000 non-lakefront, $250,000 to $350,000 lakefront. Lake Louise Marie is the older, smaller cousin of neighborhing Emerald Green (reviewed under mid range lake commuunities.) Houses here date mostly to the 1960's, and many have a kind of kitsch "Darren and Samantha" look and feel, although the mid-century finish detailing has been upgraded out of most. Houses are on pretty small parcels here, with not a lot of tree separation, so privacy is kind of non-existent. Community facilities include an outdoor swimming pool, tennis courts and a basketball court. But the community recreation area is on Lake Louise Marie Road, which runs parallel to and in view of Route 17, so the setting isn't as quiet as the community recreation areas at Emerald Green.

Lake Muskoday, Roscoe, NY

Price range: $100,000 for a non-lakefront home to $300,000+ for a lakefront home. Lake Muskoday is a smaller non-motorboat lake in the far NW part of Sullivan County, about 10 miles west of Roscoe. Homes here range from a handful of charming older lake cottages from the 1920's (which tend to be the most expensive properties) to simple "vacation ranches" built in the 1980's and 90's. There is a small community beach for non-lakefront homeowners at the northern end of the lake, as well as a tennis court and picnic pavillion set in the woods. Muskoday has a remote, mountain lake feeling, and there is some shared community acreage for hunting (although some of the hunters with homes here have joined together to lease a larger hunting parcel nearby.)

Mohican Lake, Glen Spey, NY

Price range: $80,000 at the low end for a smaller, non-lakefront cottage to $300,000+ for a lakefront home. Mohican Lake is a smaller motorboat lake in the SW part of Sullivan County. Houses here date back to the 1930's. The main area of lakefront homes (on the western side of the lake) have a road running between the houses and the lake, although some homes towards the northern end are direct lakefront without a road split. Non-lakefront homes here gain lake access in one of two ways. Many include a small (10' or 15' parcel) on the lake, large enough for a dock, while some only have lake access at a community access point at the south end of the lake (without dock space.) This is an older style lake community with tightly spaced houses, particularly on the lake. No community facilities apart from the lake. There are few covenant restrictions, so house quality varies widely. Buyers looking for pristine mountain lake privacy may find Mohican not to their taste, but for a more "Budweiser" crowd looking for an affordable motorboat lake option, Mohican can be great.

Presidential Estates, Swan Lake, NY

Price range: $85,000 to $200,000. Presidential Estates is a turn key "lock and go" vacation home community. along the lines of vacation home communities popular in the Sunbelt or Poconos. Exertior maintenance and grounds keeping is included in the community dues, which makes it very popular with snowbirds. Community facilities include a swimming pool, tennis courts and clubhouse, along with lake access to a small section of Swan Lake (that doesn't, however, connect in a navigable way with the larger body of Swan Lake, for kayaking and canoeing on the larger lake.) Houses here, built in the 1980's, are all in the "vacation ranch" style, clustered around open lawn areas.

Smallwood, Bethel, NY

Price range: $60,000 to $100,000 for a seasonal, summer use cottage; $100,000 to $200,000 for a year round cottage; $175,000 and up for a larger, newer non-lakefront home. Smallwood is the "granddaddy" of the older, modest lake communities here. A.N. Smallwood (hence the name) started developing it in 1928 as an affordable summer getaway marketed to New York police and firemen. The original log sided cottages here were small, often less than 800 sq. ft., on 50 x 100 foot parcels. As they were only envisioned for summer use, water to the cottages was provided by a community water system in pipes not buried below the frost line. About half the cottages here still get their water from the unwinterized community system and don't have their own wells, so are seasonal use only (late April through late October.) The seasonal cottages are the most affordable here, most priced between $50,000 and $100,000. The houses here that do have their own wells and can be used year round are typically priced upwards of $100,000. One question often asked is whether a 'seasonal' can be made year round by drilling a well. The answer is generally no, as current codes require a minimum separation between wells and septics, and the parcel sizes are generally too small for that separation.

Many of the original cottages had varnished pine walls and stone fireplaces. Some still have these original details, while many have been renovated or "remuddled" over the years, with paneling or drop ceilings or whatever. Cottages with original detailing has regained popularity, particularly among younger buyers looking for authentic charm, and carry a premium. A newer section, with larger houses on larger parcels (1/2 to 1 acre) was developed in the 1970's and 1980's. There are also some larger houses surrounding the lake, but these seldom come on the market. (They aren't technically 'lakefront', as a road circling the lake runs between the houses and the lake, and the lake side of the road is owned by the community association.)

Smallwood facilities include the lake (non-motorboat), with a community beach, tennis courts, basketball courts, a ball field, outdoor swimming pool and clubhouse with events and entertainment. Membership in the lake (about $300 per year) and the Smallwood Club (with swimming pool, about $500 per year) is optional.

 

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