26 Cold Spring Rd

This is a 1954 contemporary of 3,306 square feet on about two acres on Cold Spring Road in the Pensacola township of Yancey County, North Carolina, listed by its owner at $80,000. There is no agent and no MLS number. The house sits on the far side of a creek from the road, and the remarks say there is no bridge to it. The owner quotes a bridge at $35,000 to $75,000 and the whole renovation at $175,000 to $250,000 on Zillow, and at $150,000 to $200,000 on FSBO.com. The photos show ceilings fallen in, walls stained and peeling, and debris on the floors. The remarks say the house is not in a flood plain and had no damage from Hurricane Helene. Both sites show it as pending.

The land and setting

The photos show a long low house at the edge of a lawn under hardwoods, a small outbuilding on posts with its own porch, and a rocky mountain creek with a fall between boulders, a fallen log across it, and one stretch where the bed is bare rock with downed trees and root balls along the bank. The listing gives the lot as wooded and on the water, with the creek as the waterfront feature. The county record gives 2.18 acres on the record card and 2.12 on the county map. The listing says two.

The remarks put the house across the creek from the road with no bridge. Nothing says how wide the crossing is, whether a bridge stood there before, or what happened to it. Pensacola, the township the county puts this parcel in, sits on the Cane River, and public reporting after Hurricane Helene in September 2024 placed it among the hardest hit parts of Yancey County.

The house

The county record card, which the seller posted in the listing gallery, describes a one-story contemporary of frame construction built in 1954 with a full basement, 2,116 square feet on the ground floor and 1,190 finished below, 3,306 in all, six rooms, three bedrooms, three full baths and a half bath. The listing says four bedrooms, four full baths and two half baths, and zero finished square feet below ground. The county’s sketch shows a main block of 80 by 34 feet with three open porches. The card rates the condition as Fair and lists no permit history and no outbuildings.

The photos show two porches along the front, a curved corner at one end, a stone fireplace with a timber mantel in a room where the ceiling has come down to the joists, a second view of the same fireplace from the far side, a kitchen with red cabinets and a refrigerator, a long hall with stained walls, a spiral stair beside a metal flue, and a room where the ceiling and wall coverings hang in sheets and a door is off its hinges. The listing gives hardwood and vinyl floors, an attached garage, an attic fan, heat as other, electric and gas, no cooling, a well, and a washer, dryer and dishwasher included. Sewer is not listed. The listing says no fireplace and then lists a wood-burning one in the living room. The photos show the stone one.

The facts

What to know before you call

Two numbers, both the owner’s, both in Florida. Zillow’s listing line reads Property Owner with 727-871-4259. The remarks on FSBO.com and on Redfin say to call the owner at 727-318-8055. The 727 area code is the St. Petersburg and Clearwater side of Tampa Bay. Neither is an agent, so neither prints as one here. This is a private seller, and there is no brokerage, no MLS and no listing agreement behind the listing. Zillow says as much in its own notice on the page.

The bridge is the price. The house is on the other side of the creek from the road, and the remarks say there is no bridge. The owner’s quote for one is $35,000 to $75,000, depending on whether it carries foot traffic and a small vehicle or ten tons. Until it is built, nothing reaches the house but a person on foot, and no contractor’s truck, no delivery, and no fire engine. Ask what stood there before, whether the abutments remain, what permits a crossing needs from the county and the state, and whether the stream is regulated, because a crossing on a mountain creek in North Carolina can need a permit from the Army Corps and the state’s Division of Water Resources.

The owner’s renovation numbers do not agree with each other. On Zillow the remarks estimate $175,000 to $250,000 to renovate, bridge included, and an after-repair value of $600,000 or more. On FSBO.com the same remarks say $150,000 to $200,000 and $550,000. Against an $80,000 ask, the renovation is the real price of this property, and the seller’s own estimates differ by $50,000 at each end. Treat both as a seller’s guess. Get your own bids, with the bridge priced separately.

Helene, as the owner tells it. The remarks say the house is not in a flood plain and sustained no damage from Hurricane Helene. That is the owner’s statement and nothing in the listing or the county record confirms or contradicts it. What the sources do show: Pensacola township was among the hardest hit parts of Yancey County in the storm, the house is reached only across a creek and the bridge is gone, one creek photo shows a bed scoured to bare rock with downed trees and root balls on the bank, and the interior photos show ceilings fallen in and walls stained from above. Those could be a storm, or years of a bad roof, or both. The county’s condition rating was Fair, and the county sketch shows no permit history at all. Ask the owner directly when the bridge was lost and why, whether the county inspected the property after the storm, and whether any FEMA or insurance claim was filed. Check the county’s Helene damage assessment records for the parcel yourself. Then ask an insurer whether they will write a policy on a house with no vehicle access.

The county record card is in the gallery. The seller posted three screenshots of the Yancey County record: the map, the building sketch and the record card. We left them out of our gallery and used what they show. The card gives Fair condition, three bedrooms against the listing’s four, three and a half baths against the listing’s six, 1,190 finished square feet in the basement against the listing’s zero, no outbuildings, and an empty permit history. A blank permit history on a 1954 house means either nothing was ever pulled or the county’s card does not go back far enough. Either way, the spiral stair and the finished basement are not documented.

Beds, baths and the basement. The listing’s four bedrooms and six baths exceed what the county records by one bedroom and two and a half baths. The photos show no bathroom at all and no bedroom that reads as one. The listing says zero finished square feet below ground while the county says 1,190. Do not count on any of the numbers until you have walked the house.

A building the county does not know about. One photo shows a small outbuilding on posts with a porch. The county record card lists no outbuildings. Ask what it is, whether it is on this parcel, and whether it was permitted.

Six price cuts across three listings and two years. The house came to market with an agent in April 2024 at $270,000 and was pulled in December at $193,000. It came back with another agent in September 2025 at $199,000, went to $150,000 and pending, and was removed in November. The owner listed it at $90,000 in May 2026, saw it go pending twice, and cut it to $80,000 in August. It sold for $60,000 in March 2020. Ask what fell through, twice.

North Carolina taxes and the 2024 reappraisal. North Carolina counties reappraise at least every eight years. Yancey reappraised effective January 1, 2024, and the assessment on this parcel rose from $137,340 to $205,600, which is two and a half times the ask. The next scheduled reappraisal is 2032. A $1,234 bill on a $205,600 value is what the new owner inherits, and a buyer who thinks the value overstates a gutted house can appeal to the county board of equalization in the spring. The county does not lower a value between reappraisals because a house has deteriorated unless the owner asks.

Present-use value. North Carolina’s present-use program needs at least ten acres in agriculture, five in horticulture or twenty in forestry. At about two acres this parcel cannot qualify, and there is no rollback to inherit.

Access and the road. Cold Spring Road’s maintenance is not listed. Ask whether it is a state road or a private one, who keeps it, and whether it washed out in the storm. Then ask again about the creek crossing, because the road only gets you to the bank.

Utilities on the far side of a creek. The listing gives a well and says nothing about sewer or power. A house with no bridge still needs a power line and a septic system, and both would have to cross or sit on land near the creek. Ask where the septic is, whether it was inspected, where the power comes in, and whether any of it crosses a neighbor.

Eighteen photographs, and that is all there is. Zillow carries 21 images, of which 18 are photographs and three are county screenshots. Redfin carries one thumbnail. FSBO.com carries four copies of the Zillow images. There is no MLS gallery. The photographs are small, most of them 480 to 768 pixels on the long side, and we could not find larger ones. Nothing is virtually staged. Not shown: any bathroom, any bedroom as such, the basement, the garage, the roof, the well, the creek crossing itself, the road, and the house from the road side.

You can see everything else we have listed on the properties page. For another western North Carolina property in the path of the same storm we have a house on Hardison Falls Trail in Hendersonville, and for another gutted building offered at land value, a 1914 bank in Poplar Bluff, Missouri.

To ask about this one, call the owner. Zillow prints 727-871-4259 and FSBO.com prints 727-318-8055. There is no agent and no MLS number. Tell them where you saw it.