Lakewood Open House Set for Saturday

During the past few years, Lakewood has been featured in Business Week, This Old House and Travel + Leisure magazines as the best place to raise kids, coolest suburb and best place to buy and old house.

This Saturday, a number of Lakewood organizations are coming together to highlight some of the reasons why.

From 1 to 5 p.m., more than 45 homes for sale near the city’s downtown district will be available for tours, as part of the second-annual Lakewood Downtown Open House.

LakewoodAlive, the city’s nonprofit economic development organization, is hosting the event along with the city’s real estate brokerage community, the , First Federal of Lakewood, Cleveland Home Title and .

“We’re really coming together to help sell this community,” said event co-organizer Eric Lowery.

He said the homes on open for the tour range in architectural style, as well as price range. Participating properties are posted on the event website www.lakewoodopen.com.

“Most of these homes are very affordable,” Lowery said. “This is a great city for first-time home-buyers.”

This is the third event of its kind in two years. Last year, organizers wanted to take advantage of a federal tax credit offered to those buying their first home. Another open house took place in September.

Lowery said the event has been a success.

“This is a good thing for the city,” he added. “I am a big promoter of Lakewood because I really like it here. I thought this is a great event to show off these homes.”

Lowery encourages those attending the event to visit the website on Saturday, because late additions to the tour are expected.

Mary Anne Crampton, executive director of LakewoodAlive, said that Downtown Lakewood’s revitalization effort, using the Ohio Main Street model, continues to realize significant reinvestment in the face of challenging economic conditions.  

“We are finding that more and more people are attracted to Lakewood’s affordable, active and sustainable quality of life with easy access to retail, educational and recreational amenities,” she said.