423 Wisconsin Ave

This is a single family house of 1,940 square feet with three bedrooms and two baths on 0.38 acres in the City of Rhinelander, Oneida County, Wisconsin, with 96 feet of frontage on Boom Lake where the Wisconsin River narrows toward the Rhinelander dam. The remarks say the lot is the site of the city’s original sawmill, that the water connects to the Rhinelander chain of lakes, and that the house has a second-story playroom, an unfinished basement, an apple tree, a shed and an oversized one-car garage. It was listed on September 11, 2026 at $390,000. It last sold in August 2002 for $140,000. Neither the listing nor the county record gives a year built. This is the third Wisconsin property we have written up, after the off-grid cabin near Long Lake and the unfinished compound in Wausaukee.

What kind of property this is

A house, in the city, on the water. Reverse geocoding the coordinates confirms the City of Rhinelander in Oneida County, and the county record carries it in the Pautz Riverview Addition, lot 3, block 1, with a residential use code. The listing gives residential zoning and single family residence as the type. It is not marketed as a rental or an investment, and the remarks say nothing about rents. Public water and public sewer serve it. The address is on the west side of town near Hodag Park, not in the downtown blocks along Brown and Davenport Streets where Rhinelander’s older commercial buildings stand, and nothing in the listing or the county record places it in a historic district.

The lot and the water

The photos show a lawn sloping from the house to a rocky shore with a sectional dock, a shed at the top of the bank, a paved drive to a detached garage, and mature maples and pines. The listing gives 0.38 acres, 96 feet of lake and river frontage, a gravel and rocky shoreline, a dock, a water view and lake front, and names the water as Boom Lake and the Wisconsin River. The county record gives 0.38 acres and a legal description that includes lot 3 plus the abutting part of a 50-foot Chicago and North Western right of way west of the lot. A rail line and the Rhinelander dam both lie within a quarter mile on the map.

The house

The listing gives one and a half stories, 1,940 square feet all above grade, three bedrooms with the primary on the first floor at 9 feet 7 by 12 feet 6, two full baths, a living room of about 19 by 19, a kitchen of about 16 by 11, a dining room, a foyer, a second-floor recreation room of 9 feet 5 by 35 feet 2, electric and natural gas forced-air heat, a gas water heater, an electric range and a dishwasher, carpet and vinyl floors, no fireplace, a partial unfinished basement with an interior entry and laundry hookups, a block foundation with a cellar, frame and wood siding, a composition shingle roof, a deck and a detached one-car garage. The photos show a living room with a wood ceiling and wood walls and a wide window on the lake, a kitchen with oak cabinets and a wood-fronted bar, three carpeted bedrooms, a bath with a tub and a bath with a shower stall, a carpeted stair to a long upstairs room with a sky painted on its sloped ceiling, and a basement with block walls, a painted floor, a furnace, a water heater, two electrical panels and a laundry sink. The rooms are empty and nothing is virtually staged.

The county record gives no year built, no square footage and no bedroom count. The listing gives no year built either. The assessment has stood at $155,100 since 2014.

The facts

What to know before you call

No year built, anywhere. The listing leaves the year built blank and the county record has none, along with no square footage and no bedroom count. The house in the photos has a 1960s or 1970s look, with a wood ceiling and paneled walls in the living room, but that is a guess. Ask the agent and the city assessor for the year, and read the furnace, water heater and panel labels in the basement photos for dates, because the ages of the systems are not listed either.

An assessment frozen since 2014, at 59 percent of value. The county record shows $155,100 every year from 2014 through 2025, and Zillow’s history matches. Wisconsin cities assess at their own level and the state equalizes each year. The Department of Revenue’s 2025 statement of assessment gives the City of Rhinelander a ratio of 0.5897, which puts this assessment at about $263,000 in full value. The ask is 48 percent above that. Ask the Rhinelander assessor when the last citywide revaluation was and whether one is scheduled, and expect the bill to move after a sale at $390,000, because a sale price is the assessor’s best evidence and Wisconsin has no cap.

Zone X at the house, Zone AE at the shore. The federal flood layer puts the house point in Zone X with minimal hazard, and finds a Zone AE special flood hazard area within 60 meters, which is the lake edge on a lot of this depth. Boom Lake is an impoundment held by the Rhinelander dam a quarter mile downstream. Ask how high the water has come on the lawn, how the dam operator manages the level, and get a flood quote even though a lender will not require one for the house.

The right of way in the deed. The legal description includes the part of a 50-foot Chicago and North Western right of way that abuts the lot on the west. A former railroad strip in a residential deed can carry reversion language, utility easements or a rail-trail claim, and a rail line still runs within a quarter mile. Ask the title company what the strip conveys with, whether any easement runs along it, and whether the garage or the drive sits on it.

Shoreland zoning. Wisconsin’s shoreland rules apply within 1,000 feet of a lake and the city has its own shoreland provisions in its zoning code. They set a structure setback from the ordinary high water mark and limit clearing along the bank. The house sits well back on the lot and the shed is near the top of the bank. Ask the city zoning office what the setback is here and whether the shed and the dock are permitted.

Three bedrooms and a 35-foot playroom. The listing counts three bedrooms and the photos show three carpeted rooms plus a long finished attic room that the listing calls recreation. An attic room with a sloped ceiling counts toward square footage only where the ceiling clears a set height, and the 1,940 figure is the listing’s. Ask what was measured, and whether the upstairs was finished under a permit.

Systems. The basement photos show a forced-air furnace, a gas water heater, two electrical panels and a laundry sink. The listing says electric and natural gas heat and lists no cooling. Ask the age of each, ask for the last furnace service, and ask whether the second panel serves the garage.

The sawmill. The remarks say the lot is the site of Rhinelander’s original sawmill. Rhinelander’s first dam went in on the Wisconsin River in 1882 to hold logs for the mills along Boom Lake. A sawmill site can leave sawdust fill, old pilings and buried debris along the shore. Ask what the seller knows about fill on the lot and what the shore looks like in low water.

Twenty-four years, one owner, one price. The house sold for $140,000 in August 2002 and has not been listed since. The ask is $390,000, or $201 a square foot, on a lot with 96 feet of water. Ask for comparable lakefront sales in the city, because the price is the frontage.

Thirty-five of 65 photos. Zillow and Redfin each carry the same 65 photographs in the same order, confirmed by perceptual hash. Zillow’s are larger and we used 35: the house and garage outside, the deck, the shed, the shore and dock, the living room, kitchen, bedrooms and baths, the upstairs room, and the basement with its systems. Left out: 30 repeated frames of the same rooms and the same shore. Not shown: the attic room’s window end, the inside of the garage, the roof, and the shore at low water.

You can see everything else we have listed on the properties page. For other houses on the water we have a house on 5.3 acres above the Obey River in Celina, Tennessee and a chalet above the Moose River falls in Lyons Falls, New York.

To ask about this one, call Benjamin Parsons at 715-550-5683 at RE/MAX Property Pros in Tomahawk, and reference MLS 219542. The listing prints no number for the brokerage. Tell them where you saw it.