We Buy Houses in Mount Dora for Cash

Royellou, the railroad, and a town on high ground

When Ross C. Tremain became postmaster in 1880, the settlement was called Royellou, after his children Roy, Ella, and Louis. It took the name Mount Dora in 1883, for an elevation of 184 feet that is rare in Florida, and the lake is named for homesteader Dora Ann Drawdy. The railroad arrived in 1887, the freezes of 1894 and 1895 hit the nearby groves, and in 1910 the town received its charter with Capt. John Philip Donnelly as its first mayor. His Queen Anne-style house, built in 1893, is on the National Register of Historic Places, as is the Lakeside Inn on Alexander Street.

Selling a home in the Mount Dora historic district

The city's historic district is bounded by Eleventh Avenue on the north, Highland Street on the east, First Avenue on the south, and Helen Street on the west. For any building more than 50 years old inside it, exterior alterations, additions, and demolition need the Historic Preservation Board to issue a Certificate of Appropriateness. The board applies the Secretary of the Interior's Standards for Rehabilitation and the city's design guidelines. Applications are due about three weeks before the board meets.

The city notes that National Register listing alone has no regulatory effect; the local review is what a renovating buyer has to plan around. That review adds time and cost for anyone who wants to replace siding, add a room, or tear down a garage. None of that is your job before a sale. We account for the review in our offer and take it on after closing.

What Mount Dora's older houses are

The city's inventory of historic sites reads like a timeline of Florida building. There are frame vernacular houses from the 1880s, such as the Atterberry-Owens House of 1884 and the Gates House of 1886, bungalows from the 1910s and 1920s, and Mediterranean Revival homes from the 1920s boom, including Dickson Villa on North Clayton Street.

Still, the old core is a small share of the city. Mount Dora's comprehensive plan puts about 21 percent of its housing as built before 1970, with most of the rest built since 1989. Whether your house is an 1880s frame cottage with original wiring or a 1990s home due for its second roof, we buy it in its current condition.

Lake Dora, Lake Gertrude, and the smaller lakes

Lake Dora covers about 4,475 acres and is part of the Ocklawaha chain. The city borders its eastern and northern shores, and west of downtown a row of private docks and boathouses lines the base of the steep slope that gave Mount Dora its name. The 2012 flood maps put the lake's 100-year flood elevation at 65 feet above sea level.

Several smaller lakes have homes around them too: Lake Gertrude, about 250 acres, just south of U.S. 441, and Lake John and Lake Nettie near Hilltop Drive. Each has its own 100-year flood elevation, from about 64 feet at Lake Nettie to 72 feet at Lake Gertrude and nearly 82 at Lake John, so two lake houses a mile apart can sit in very different flood situations. We check the flood zone and the condition of any dock or boathouse on every lake property we review.

Golf communities, townhomes, and newer neighborhoods

Mount Dora has a larger share of attached housing than Lake County as a whole. The city's plan, using 2017 Census survey figures, counted about 65 percent of its homes as single-family and 34 percent as multi-family, with mobile homes under 1 percent, against roughly 17 percent mobile homes countywide. Even so, the plan notes two large mobile home parks on the eastern shore of Lake Saunders in the Mount Dora planning area, and we buy homes there as well.

Most of the newer growth is in planned communities. The Country Club of Mount Dora covers about 439 acres along U.S. 441 with frontage on Lake Loch Leven, approved for up to 827 homes around an 18-hole golf course. Lakes of Mount Dora lies south of State Road 44, and newer projects include Loch Leven Park on U.S. 441 and Seasons at Wekiva Ridge on State Road 46. We buy homes in all of them, including ones with HOA balances or tenants in place.

Code compliance and permits in Mount Dora

Inside the city, the Building Division at 308 E. 5th Ave. handles permits and inspections, and all permits can now be filed online. Code Compliance is part of the Planning & Development Department. Cases that are not resolved go to a Special Magistrate, whose hearings are held on the second Thursday of even-numbered months.

The city's process schedules a lien inspection 21 days after an affidavit of non-compliance and, for property that is not homesteaded, a foreclosure inspection 90 days after the lien is recorded. A rental, a second home, or an inherited house that nobody lives in can fall into that second group. If a code lien is part of your situation, selling a house with code violations explains how it is usually cleared.

A Mount Dora address may not mean Lake County

ZIP code 32757 reaches well beyond the city. According to Census boundary files, less than a quarter of its land is inside Mount Dora, and it crosses into Orange County, taking in the Tangerine community and part of Zellwood. A house there has a Mount Dora address but answers to Orange County on permits and code cases, and its estate would usually be opened in Orange County, not in Tavares.

To the east, Sorrento and Mount Plymouth share ZIP 32776 and are unincorporated Lake County. We buy across all of these areas and confirm the county and city for every property before we make an offer.

Inherited houses in Mount Dora

For a Lake County house, the estate is filed with the Lake County Clerk of the Circuit Court & Comptroller in Tavares. Whether you are an heir or the personal representative, we can sign while the case is open and close once the estate can convey the house. For a house in the historic district, the family doesn't need to restore or repaint anything first. The statewide steps are in our Florida inherited house guide, and our comparison of a cash offer versus listing in Florida if you are weighing both.

Sell my house fast in Mount Dora

If selling your house fast in Mount Dora is the goal, tell us the address and a little about the home. We view it, then send a written cash offer that explains the number, including how we handled any historic review or lake-related costs.

Once you accept, a title company does the title and lien work, pays the mortgage and any balances at closing, and sends you the rest. On a clear title, that can be done in as little as 10 days; if you would rather wait, choose a later date.

Frequently asked questions