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A suburban feel in an urban surrounding, Beverly has long been known as one of Chicago's safest and most stable middle class neighborhoods, proud of its quiet tree-lined streets and cultural diversity. Residences in Beverly are prized for their wide open lots and large countryside-style homes (the kind you're likely to see a tire swing hanging from the backyard tree). While portions of Beverly are characterized by stately manors with circular front drives, the majority of the neighborhood offers attractive two-story redbrick houses, raised 1940s ranches, and cottage-like split-levels with side drives and good-sized lawns. The bulk of Beverly's businesses are found on Western Avenue, where most of Beverly's residents go to grab a bite and hang out with friends. A legion of restaurants, pizzerias, takeout places, and cafés edge the street, a few with a noticeable Irish tinge that pays tribute the area's ancestry.
Beverly is a truly tranquil neighborhood, the kind that sets your mind at ease as soon as you turn down your street. Practically the opposite of a cookie-cutter subdivision, each house is unique, bringing a little bit of personality and architectural character to the long, curving neighborhood avenues.
Many of the homes in Beverly sit on large lots and provide ample living space, offering Chicagoans an ideal place to raise a family. Over the years, the Beverly Area Planning Association has worked hard to promote the neighborhood. The group was successful in getting the city to grant landmark status to a section of Beverly’s many Prairie-style bungalows, and organized home tours have encouraged numerous potential homebuyers to purchase property in the area.
Residents fall in love with this neighborhood in the south side of Chicago for its wide variety of housing options and quiet serenity that can be welcome respite after a long day of work downtown. Sprawling country homes, the kind with a tire swing out in the side yard and a wrap-around porch, are scattered throughout Beverly. While the price tag on these massive, estate-type properties can reach into the millions, there are plenty of beautiful homes that are more reasonably priced and just as lovely.
Grand Tudor-style houses with circular front drives and stately manors with manicured landscaping give many of the neighborhood streets an affluent appeal without pretentiousness. There are even Spanish-style villas with terra cotta roof tiles. These homes often sell for between $500,000-880,000.
The rest of Beverly is characterized by raised ranches, one- and two-story frame houses with little porches and side drives, split-levels, and some two-story brick homes. Generally the price range is between the low $200,000s to the low to mid $400,000s. And, with the Dan Ryan Woods forest preserve so close by, a number of the properties boast a thick growth of pine trees, almost like an extension of the nearby woods. And when you see one of those two-story redbrick homes with peaked rooflines and exterior stone detailing flanked on either side by a grove of pines, it almost as if you’ve stepped into a fairly tale … It is almost makes you wonder: could Little Red Riding Hood be a Beverly resident?
In the mid-1800s, Beverly was an unnamed subdivision in the sparsely populated Washington Heights settlement. Even with the annexation of Washington Heights to Chicago in 1874 the area was slow to gain any distinction or community identity.
It wasn’t until the 1890s, when the Rock Island Railroad designated its 91st Street Station as 'Beverly Hills' that the neighborhood finally took on a name of its own. It is the subject of some debate among Beverly residents whether this name is in direct reference to Beverly Hills, California, or to Beverly, Massachusetts. What isn’t in doubt is that the 'Hills' part is a reference to the glacial ridge that runs through the neighborhood. Once the shore line of a glacial lake, this ridge is one of the few areas of the city that is not flat; in fact the highest point in Chicago is in the Beverly neighborhood at 91st Street and Western Avenue.
When it was still considered part of Washington Heights, the Beverly area was settled by white European Protestants, followed by Irish and African Americans in the 1920s. Within the next decade, the number of inhabitants increased 80% and then, due to the post World War II Baby Boom, the population grew substantially again from 1940 to 1960, as it did throughout Chicago and the United States. Today the neighborhood is racially integrated, sustaining its reputation as a middle class community that boasts many public parks and some architectural relics such as an Irish castle. Now that’s one thing in Chicago you don’t see everyday!
As Chicago neighborhood experts, Dream Town has successfully sold properties in Beverly. Dream Town holds a well-earned reputation for its impressive sales volume and dedication to personal, attentive service. Benefit from the Dream Town advantage when selling your Beverly home. Utilizing state-of-the-art technology, Dream Town drives more sales than any other Chicago brokerage.
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