For the kind of money your talking about is it possible to find a beautiful lake in your area and buy you a nice home right on the water. Put in a nice boat slip right out your back door. I'm just a simple hillbilly from Tennessee so if this is a bad post please accept my apologies.
Simple is good. I am too. Tenessee has a lot of awesome lakes. However, central IL is quite a bit different. The only lake where you could build a house is about 1 hr away but it is way too busy for skiing unless you are a very early morning riser. There are a couple of strip mine lakes but none of the few people who own them wants to sell. We do also have the Illinois River but it is usually pretty rough too. Ski lake communities are become much more common.
