Aurora is located just outside Chicago and it is the second most populated city in Illinois with a population of 142,990. It is one of the most rapidly growing areas in the state too. It is distinguished by the fact the downtown area is actually situated on the Stolp Island in the middle of the Fox River. The city has two main regions, the West Side (on the west side of the river) and the East Side (on the east side of the River.)
Aurora is quite well known for its incredible examples of architecture including structures by Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van de Rohe, Bruce Golf and George Grant Elmslie. Another very unusual thing about Aurora is that there are seven Lustron all-steel homes and over fifty build-by-number Sears Catalog Homes from the mid-century era in the area, according to our Aurora gay realtor. The Sears Houses were sold by mail order by the Sears Roebuck and Company from 1908 to 1940 and many of these pastel colored chalet style structures are found in the northeast and midwest of the city.
The downtown has many architectural landmarks including a huge Hindu temple, a movie theater built in the 1920s called the Paramount and the glittering Hollywood Casino. The campus of the Waubonsee Community College is also down here and expanded down to the riverbanks where the city has recently put in many new parks with walking paths and bike trails. A fun fact about this city is that it was the home of Wayne Campbell and Garth Algar in the 1992 movie Wayne’s World.
Aurora is very traditional and middle class America in nature so there are no gay bars downtown. The nearest one is jus a five minute drive northwest nearer Chicago in Elk Grove Village and called Mark Hunters Ltd. Gay residents can make the forty-minute trip into Chicago to hang out in popular LGBT hangouts such as the Martini Club, the Prop House, the Crobar Nightclub and the Laughing Chameleon and Little Joes Circle Lounge.
Aurora also funds many special events and exhibitions in the name of public art and annually commissions new public sculptures. There are always many interesting architectural restorations of its older buildings going on as well. As it was the first city to use electric street lights in 1881, earning it the nickname of “The City of lights”, Aurora celebrates this with several Festivals of Light during the year.
Aurora housing prices have been dropping since last fall with housing prices falling 28.7% since the third quarter of 2012. The average price per square foot in Aurora for that time period was $117. The average listing price of a home here was $180,373 for the week ending October 16, 2013. There are also some opportunities for short sales available in Aurora with 2,505 homes going through the foreclosure process as of October 16, 2013.
For more information about the many features and attractions of this pleasant prairie city go to the Aurora, Illinois official website at http://www.aurora-il.org/.
