Franklin County Adirondacks, Town of Franklin
Loon Lake, NY
Private Adirondack Lakefront
The Adirondacks' great lost resort, 18 miles from Saranac Lake: one of the largest private lakes in the Park, where access comes by deed rather than public launch.
Living at Loon Lake in the Adirondacks: A Private Lake in Franklin County
First, a clarification that matters more here than on any other page we publish: this is Loon Lake in the Town of Franklin, Franklin County, in the northeastern Adirondack Park, about 18 miles northeast of Saranac Lake and 27 miles north of Lake Placid. It is not the Loon Lake near Chestertown in Warren County, and not the Loon Lake near Wayland in Steuben County. All three share a name, and search engines routinely confuse them. If you have been looking at listings and the numbers have not made sense, that is very likely why.
The lake runs roughly three miles at an elevation of 1,800 feet, and the community describes it as one of the largest private lakes in the Adirondacks. Private is not marketing language here, it is the legal structure. There is no public access. Lake rights travel with the property through deeded access, a direct legacy of the old Loon Lake House estate of more than 3,000 acres being subdivided and sold with lake-access provisions written into some deeds and not others. The Loon Lake Community Association maintains a boat launch on Blue Spruce Drive and a swimming beach off Loon Lake Terrace, and operates no-wake rules. The practical consequence for a buyer is simple and easy to get wrong: two houses on the same road can carry entirely different rights to the water in front of them.
That makes Loon Lake NY real estate unusual to shop. Deeded lake access, not square footage, is the single biggest driver of value. The market is thin, generally fewer than two dozen listings across every property type, and it splits three ways: vacant land and acreage parcels, which are the deepest segment; off-water camps and cottages along the County Route 26 corridor; and a small, high-value set of lakefront or deeded-access properties, some of them restored buildings surviving from the hotel era. There is no verified median sale price for this hamlet and we will not manufacture one. Ask about lake rights before you ask about anything else.
Loon Lake NY Real Estate Market Snapshot
Sources: Realtor.com and LandSearch published counts for Loon Lake, Franklin County, July 2026; our own MLS search returned 8 active listings on the same date. Read these as descriptive, not statistical. The $389,000 figure is a median LISTING price from one portal, not a median sale price, and no verified median sale price, days on market or appreciation rate exists for this hamlet. Portal counts differ because each draws a different radius. In a market this small, deeded lake access moves price far more than any of these averages.
Loon Lake NY Homes for Sale
Browse current Loon Lake listings in Franklin County: deeded-access and lakefront properties on Loon Lake Terrace and Blue Spruce Drive, camps and cottages along County Route 26, and vacant acreage. Every result below is the Adirondack lake, not the Warren County one.
Why Buyers Choose Loon Lake, Adirondacks
A Private Lake, and What That Actually Means
There is no public launch and no public beach on Loon Lake. Boating, fishing, swimming and paddling happen among people who hold rights to the water, and the Loon Lake Community Association maintains the Blue Spruce Drive launch and the Loon Lake Terrace beach, runs no-wake zones, and charges a nominal annual fee for canoe and kayak storage. The result is a three-mile lake that does not fill with day traffic in July. Understand before you buy that these rights are deed-specific, so verify them property by property.
You Are Buying Inside a Lost Resort
The hamlet sits on the bones of the Loon Lake House. Mary and Ferdinand Chase, from Vermont, built a 31-room log hotel on a bluff over the lake in the late 1870s, then expanded relentlessly: a new wing in 1880, a four-story building in 1882, a three-story annex in 1893. At its height it held roughly 800 guests across 53 buildings, including about 60 private cottages, on more than 3,000 acres, with its own water system, a mile-long sewer line, gas lighting and an electric plant. Cottages and buildings from that era survive today, restored by individual owners with varying fidelity to the originals.
Three Presidents, Oscar Wilde and Gershwin
The Chateaugay Railroad reached the area in the 1880s and put the resort within reach of New York City and Montreal, and the guest book reflects it. Benjamin Harrison came in 1892, Grover Cleveland in 1895 and William McKinley in 1897. Oscar Wilde visited in 1882. So did Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Governor Alfred E. Smith, the composers Irving Berlin and George Gershwin, and the novelist Theodore Dreiser. Very few three-mile lakes anywhere can put that list on the table.
The Golf Course That Is Not There Anymore
The original nine holes opened in 1895, making it one of the very earliest golf courses in the Adirondacks, and a back nine designed by the noted architect Seymour Dunn was added in 1926. It closed in 2003 after 108 years, and the land has since gone back to raspberries, Scotch pines and brush. Walking it now is the clearest way to understand what this place was. It is also, for the right buyer, a large piece of open former fairway land in a town that is otherwise dense forest.
Blacksville, 1848
Before the resort, this site was Blacksville, a settlement founded in 1848 near Hodges Bay by Willis Hodges as an experimental community for freed African Americans, sponsored by the abolitionist Gerrit Smith. Two hard winters discouraged most of the settlers, though some stayed and became part of the community that followed. It is a genuine and consequential piece of Adirondack history that almost no page about this lake mentions, and it is worth knowing whose ground you are standing on.
Quiet by Design, With Town Twenty Minutes Off
There is no downtown here, no commercial strip and no public beach, and that absence is the product rather than a shortcoming. Saranac Lake is roughly 18 miles for the hospital, grocery and restaurants, with Lake Placid about 27 miles and Adirondack Regional Airport at Lake Clear for commercial flights. Paul Smith's College and its VIC trail network, the St. Regis canoe country and Rainbow Lake are all a short drive. On rentals, see the FAQ below: the answer here involves your deed and the community association, not only the town.
The Shoreline, the Route 26 Corridor and the Hamlets Nearby
On a lake where rights come by deed, which road you buy on is a legal question as much as a lifestyle one.
Loon Lake Terrace and Blue Spruce Drive
These two streets are the top of the market and the heart of the community: the swimming beach sits off Loon Lake Terrace and the boat launch is on Blue Spruce Drive, both maintained by the community association. Properties here are the ones most likely to carry deeded lake rights, and they include some of the surviving resort-era architecture, restored to varying degrees. When something with genuine lake rights comes available on either road, it does not stay quiet for long, because the pool of buyers who understand what deeded access is worth already knows the lake.
Ask about deeded-access properties →
The County Route 26 Corridor
County Route 26, the former NY Route 99, is the hamlet's main road and carries most Loon Lake addresses, running from the historic core out toward Vermontville. This is the accessible end of the market: off-water camps, cottages and acreage, generally without lake rights attached. For a buyer who wants to be at Loon Lake rather than on it, and who will use the association's common facilities where their deed allows, this corridor is where the math works. It is also where most of the actual listing inventory sits at any given moment.
Vermontville, the Postal Parent
Loon Lake addresses carry ZIP 12989, which is Vermontville and the Town of Franklin seat, and Zillow files Loon Lake listings under Vermontville for exactly that reason. If you are searching portals and finding Loon Lake results filed elsewhere, the ZIP is why. Vermontville itself holds the town hall, Kate Mountain Park and the Norman Ridge farmland, and offers land at a materially lower entry point than lakefront here.
Search Vermontville listings →
Onchiota, Rainbow Lake and Paul Smiths
Onchiota lies toward Buck Pond and the Six Nations Indian Museum, with the deepest land inventory of the group. Rainbow Lake is the other private-feeling water nearby, 588 acres and loon-certified, where frontage trades in seven figures. Paul Smiths brings the college, the VIC trail network and the St. Regis chain. Buyers drawn to Loon Lake almost always look at all four before deciding, and the differences between them are real.
Why Work With Tina Leonard Real Estate
Tina Leonard Real Estate was founded in June 2016 by the late Tina Leonard, a Lake Placid native, a REALTOR since 1991, and a past president of the Northern Adirondack Board of Realtors. After her passing in 2021, the brokerage she built stayed rooted in the community where it started. Today it is led by Broker Chase Jermano from the office at 2577 Main St in downtown Lake Placid, and it has been voted Best Real Estate Office of the Adirondacks in 2020, 2023, 2024 and 2025.
Loon Lake is the clearest case in our whole service area for working with someone local. The single most valuable thing about a property here, its deeded right to the lake, does not appear reliably in a portal listing, and two neighbors can hold completely different rights. Add three unrelated New York lakes sharing the name and portals filing this one under a different hamlet's ZIP, and a remote buyer can spend months looking at the wrong market entirely. Chase and the team work the Town of Franklin year-round and will read the deed situation with you before you fall for the view.
Thinking about selling at Loon Lake? Start with a free home value estimate. Buying? Reach out, or read more about the brokerage.
Credentials and Recognition
- ✔ Voted Best Real Estate Office of the Adirondacks 2020, 2023, 2024 and 2025
- ✔ Best Real Estate Agent of the Adirondacks 2024 and 2025
- ✔ Founded June 2016 by the late Tina Leonard, Lake Placid native and REALTOR since 1991
- ✔ Led by Broker Chase Jermano (NY License 10491211719)
- ✔ Office at 2577 Main St, Lake Placid, NY 12946
- ✔ Full service: sales, first-time buyers, second homes, relocation, long-term rental management
- ✔ Team designations: Seller Representative Specialist, Accredited Buyer Representative, Pricing Strategy Advisor, Resort and Second Home Property Specialist
Loon Lake NY Real Estate: Frequently Asked Questions
Where is Loon Lake, NY?
Loon Lake is a hamlet in the Town of Franklin, Franklin County, inside the Adirondack Park, at an elevation of 1,800 feet. It sits about 18 miles northeast of Saranac Lake and about 27 miles north of Lake Placid, near Vermontville, Onchiota, Rainbow Lake and Paul Smiths. It should not be confused with the Loon Lake near Chestertown in Warren County or the Loon Lake near Wayland in Steuben County.
Is Loon Lake a private lake?
Yes. Loon Lake is described by its own community as one of the largest private lakes in the Adirondacks. There is no public access. Lake rights come with the property, through deeded access that dates back to the subdivision of the old Loon Lake House estate, and a boat launch on Blue Spruce Drive and a swimming beach off Loon Lake Terrace are maintained by the Loon Lake Community Association. Because access is deed-specific, confirm the lake rights on any individual property before you buy.
What was the Loon Lake House?
One of the Adirondacks' great Gilded Age resorts. Mary and Ferdinand Chase built a 31-room log hotel overlooking the lake in the late 1870s. It grew to hold roughly 800 guests across 53 buildings and about 60 cottages on more than 3,000 acres, with its own golf course, tennis courts, bowling alley, water system and electric plant. Presidents Benjamin Harrison, Grover Cleveland and William McKinley all stayed there, as did Oscar Wilde, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Irving Berlin and George Gershwin. The main hotel burned to the ground on September 19, 1956.
Is there still a golf course at Loon Lake?
No. The original nine holes opened in 1895, among the earliest courses in the Adirondacks, and a back nine designed by Seymour Dunn followed in 1926. The course closed in 2003 after 108 years and the land has since grown back to brush and pine.
What do properties cost at Loon Lake, NY?
It is a very small market, so counts and ranges are more honest than a median. In July 2026 Realtor.com listed 21 properties in Loon Lake with a median listing price of $389,000, of which 6 were waterfront, and LandSearch listed 15 land parcels averaging $263,225, or about $31,723 per acre. Our own MLS search returned 8 active listings. Prices turn on deeded lake access more than on square footage, so ask about lake rights first.
What school district serves Loon Lake, NY?
The Saranac Lake Central School District, which runs a Vermontville and Bloomingdale bus route with a stop at Loon Lake.
Can I run a short-term rental at Loon Lake, NY?
Confirm before you buy. No Town of Franklin short-term rental law for Franklin County was verified in our research, and a Town of Franklin short-term rental law that circulates online actually belongs to a different Town of Franklin in Delaware County and does not apply here. New York State separately operates a statewide short-term rental registry. On top of any town rule, a guest's right to use the lake, the beach and the boat launch depends on the property's deeded rights and on Loon Lake Community Association rules. Check with the Town of Franklin town clerk in Vermontville and with the association.
Loon Lake, NY Location and Map
Talk to a Loon Lake, NY Real Estate Broker
Whether you are trying to work out which properties actually carry lake rights, watching for a resort-era cottage to come available, or simply making sure you are looking at the right Loon Lake, start with a conversation. Broker Chase Jermano and the Tina Leonard Real Estate team work the Town of Franklin year-round from the office at 2577 Main St, Lake Placid, NY 12946.
Prefer email? chasejrealestate@gmail.com
