Is your house on the list? Here is the list.

What each status means

National Register Historic District. Listed in 1977 for the Prairie School work of Wright and his circle, it runs from Harlem to the Des Plaines with extensions north of Chicago Avenue and south of Lake Street, about 860 properties. Listing is honorary. It restricts nothing unless federal funds or licenses are involved, and it makes owner-occupied houses eligible for the Illinois property tax assessment freeze after a qualifying rehabilitation.

Significant Property. The Village’s own list, 298 properties by the Village’s count, drawn from the 2013 survey. Under Section 13-1-7 of the Village Code, no permit issues for work involving more than 20 percent of any street facade, or any street-visible window replacement, until the Historic Preservation Commission has had 30 days (7 for windows) to review and advise. You are required to attend the meeting. The recommendations are advisory; the work may proceed once the period expires. A demolition application triggers a public hearing and can be delayed up to six months, or up to twelve months for significant properties zoned PRI.

Local landmark. Designated by the Village under its historic preservation ordinance, Ordinance 3589 (March 14, 2016), amended by Ordinance 3850 (December 13, 2021). Same 20 percent and window triggers, but here a certificate of appropriateness is required, not just advice. As of the 2013 survey there were two.

Contributing. Roughly 600 more district houses that keep the district intact but carry no individual review. Nothing changes for your permit.

Incentives, and who they are for

The Village publishes a summary of financial incentives for historic preservation work. Read it carefully: the federal 20 percent rehabilitation tax credit and the Cook County Class L assessment reduction apply to income-producing buildings, and the grants listed go to nonprofits and public agencies. Owner-occupied houses have one real lever, the Illinois property tax assessment freeze, which freezes your assessed value for eight years, followed by a four-year step-up to the new value, after a rehabilitation costing at least 25 percent of the assessor’s fair cash value before the work, done to state standards. There is no local grant for repointing your own Tudor. What a designated house gets is review, and a commission that knows lime mortar from Portland.

Researching your house

The Village publishes a two-page guide to researching a River Forest home: permit records at the Building Department, the historic property survey and its searchable database (log in as Guest), Sanborn fire insurance maps, and the River Forest Public Library’s local history collection. A survey modification form lets you correct the record if the survey has your house wrong. It is a pleasant afternoon, and it sometimes turns up the original architect, which changes how you think about the next project.