During the drought, the lake dropped to just 8% full, making it much harder to sell homes built around the water. Now, with levels much closer to normal, more homeowners are listing their properties and trying to use the recover ing lake as a selling point. Lake Corpus Christi home sales surge as water levels reboundHomeowner Mark Schons said the drought changed the view he had planned for his retirement."We actually tried to put our house in the market last year. We probably priced our little lid out of the market what it was for the market at the time and with the 8% actually went down from it was about 12% at that time, and we realized that we were going to take it off the market," Schons said.After the water came back, so did his plans to sell. Schons has listed his home at 100 Vista 11 Lane."So we decided to go put it back on the market again and see if we couldn't sell it this time," Schons said.Schons said he recently checked online and found far more homes for sale around the lake than there were a year ago sellers apparently trying to use the recovering lake levels as a value-added feature."So our property values obviously are affected by that too. So I looked up on Realtor.com just yesterday and there's over 100 properties along the border of this lake that are for sale right now. A year ago maybe 15," Schons said.A check of LakeHomes.com confirms the trend, currently showing more than 100 Lake Corpus Christi listings. The site notes the market typically carries around 70 lake home listings.For Schons, the water coming back means more than just a better shot at selling. It means the lifestyle he moved there for in the first place."It's just a perfect opportunity to live in a pristine wilderness area. You get up in the morning and you can watch the sunrise, but you're still able to work out here," Schons said.Real estate agents say buyers should look at more than just the view including the property's access to the water and how lake levels have historically affected the market.For the latest local news updates, click here, or download the KRIS 6 News App. ...read more read less