A skinny lakefront retreat in Coeur d’Alene, ID, known as “The Stair Home” comes with a superb location and an amazing dock.

However, a few caveats come with this slim, five-level, 936-square-foot building.

The $695,000 structure, with stairs everywhere, is missing a few things—like legal bedrooms and bathrooms.

“There’s nothing else like this home on the lake. The architecture is a very unique design, something that you won’t find very often,” explains the listing agent, Lisa Ciraulo. “It was an idea that the seller had and just wanted to kind of work with it and see it grow.”

The lot size is 1.38 acres, but it is remarkably steep and nearly impossible to build on.

“This is the only building site anywhere on the entire lot,” Ciraulo says.

The narrow building is built on stilts and has a series of outdoor stairs for its five levels. The owner wanted a place for his family to come and be able to escape from it all, the agent says.

“It’s basically like a treehouse in the woods, right on the water,” she adds.

Just a short boat ride from Higgens Point, which has a boat launch, the home is close to the amenities of town and offers 100 feet of lake frontage. The dock is large, at 900 square feet, and comes with a perk.

“It’s bigger than any other dock that’s allowed with a single-family residence. It was grandfathered in, so it has extra space,” Ciraulo explains.

Two big boats can fit in the slips, and four personal watercrafts go on floats. Visiting boats also have room to tie up.

What the Stair Home lacks in bedrooms, it makes up for in deck space. The large side deck that runs the length of the structure and the multiple rooftop decks are set up to soak in the lake views.

Inside, the living situation is spartan, but the house wasn’t built for year-round living.

“There’s a kitchen area that has a refrigerator and a deep freeze—granite countertops, really nice custom cabinets,” Ciraulo explains.

There’s a microwave inside, but no full oven.

Ciraulo says the structure is a perfect home base for the lake life and designed to host gatherings of family and friends.

“It’s a little kind of escape that’s right in town and great for families. It’s good for people that like to entertain and have large parties,” she says.

The people who attend those bashes do have a place to crash for the night. The house has plenty of spaces with spots for mattresses, but since there are no closets in those rooms, they can’t be counted as legal bedrooms.

Some of the rooms are made up of small cubbies, which Ciraulo says kids love. Other rooms are bigger.

“Most of them have a full or queen bed and an area where you can completely stand up.”

As for other conveniences of everyday life, a buyer should be prepared to rough it a bit. There’s no running water, and the toilet is an incinerating model not hooked up to a sewer system.

“To make the property fully functional, a buyer would need to install a [water] system,” Ciraulo explains.

Completing the house in 2019 was the end of a long battle for the owner.

“He’s spent like 15-plus years in court, getting the project approved, making it legal, and making it all happy with the county and the city,” Ciraulo explains. “He designed it and had it reviewed and modified by an engineering company, so it all has been super expertly crafted.”

The engineering could even accommodate another 1.5-story room on the top, if a buyer wanted to keep stacking even more stairs on the structure.

Now the owners are looking to move to another lake and leave this one-of-a-kind “home” behind for someone new to enjoy.

“This is probably the most unique property. The way we have it priced, you could not re-create it for that amount, especially considering the time it took to get it legalized,” Ciraulo says. “There are a couple homes right next to it with docks that tried to build similar projects, but they lost their battles in court, whereas my seller continued on and made his dream happen. It’s just extremely unique, and nothing else like it can never be done on the lake again.”

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