520 E Moorestown Rd

This is a square-log cabin of 1,368 square feet built in 2003 on 20.02 acres of hardwoods in two parcels in Norwich Township, Missaukee County, Michigan, about eleven miles from Lake City. The listing gives three bedrooms and three full baths, a walkout basement, a covered porch, two balconies, a metal roof, forced-air propane and wood heat, a private well and septic, and 20 acres of sloped woods with state land not far. The remarks call it an estate property sold in its current condition for cash only, with unfinished construction, cleanup needed, storm damage to trees and the driveway, a long hilly private drive that needs work, an easement drive a quarter mile off the road, and three older campers that stay without titles or keys. It was listed on August 10, 2026 at $189,000 and cut to $175,000 on September 9. Neither Zillow nor Redfin holds a tax record for it.

Getting there

The remarks say the driveway is an easement that goes down to an unimproved two-track a quarter mile off the main road, that four-wheel drive is recommended, and to stay right at every Y. They say spring storms damaged trees and the driveway and that the drive will require improvement for more reliable access. The listing gives the road surface as asphalt, which is Moorestown Road, and the parking as none, dirt and private. The photos show the two-track climbing through the hardwoods to the cabin and nothing of the road, the easement or the Ys.

The cabin

The photos show a cabin of square manufactured logs with rough-sawn shakes in the gables, a green metal roof, a covered porch on log posts across the front with a walkout level beneath it, and two balconies on posts at the upper level. Inside, the great room runs the width of the house under a paneled ceiling with ceiling fans, a stair of peeled logs to the loft, a barn door and a blue door. The kitchen has wood cabinets, a round table, a black dishwasher and a stainless refrigerator. A laundry room holds a washer, a dryer and a sink. The main-level bedroom is paneled in log. The main bathroom has a long vanity, a mirror and a tub and shower. Upstairs, a log rail runs along the loft and two bedrooms each hold a mattress on the floor and a sliding door to a balcony. The basement has a barrel stove with its pipe run through a plywood panel in the window, a water heater and a blue pressure tank in a corner, and a propane furnace with a portable air conditioner beside it.

The land

The listing gives 20.02 acres, wooded hardwoods, sloped, metes and bounds, in a lot of 1,290 by 675 feet, with two parcel numbers. The last photo is a county plat map with two square parcels outlined side by side, each about ten acres, with the neighbors’ parcel numbers around them and no road along any side. Reverse geocoding the coordinates gives Norwich Township in Missaukee County, at the hamlet of Stittsville, about 1,317 feet above sea level. The federal protected areas database shows the Cadillac State Forest Area, state land, within a mile of the coordinates and none within a third of a mile, which fits the remark that state land is not far.

The facts

What to know before you call

The drive is an easement, and it is broken. The remarks say the driveway is an easement to a two-track a quarter mile off the road, that storms damaged it, that it needs improvement, and to take the right fork at every Y. The plat map shows two parcels with no road on any side, so every foot of the drive from Moorestown Road crosses someone else’s land. Ask for the recorded easement and read what it allows: a width, a right to improve and grade, a right to plow, a right to bring in a truck or a well drill. An easement that says ingress and egress only is a right to drive on whatever the neighbor’s land is like. Ask who the neighbor is and whether the electric line and any propane delivery come the same way, because the remarks say the electric is hooked up and do not say how it got there.

Cash only, as an estate, in its current condition. The listing terms are cash. The remarks say estate sale, sold in current condition, property, improvements, campers and remaining contents included. An estate seller has never lived in the house and will not fill in a disclosure from experience, which is why the remarks say property records indicate a well and septic rather than saying there is one. Ask for the personal representative’s authority, ask whether the estate has been opened in Missaukee County probate, and ask for any permit, well log or septic record the county has, because the seller does not.

Three full baths, one finished. The listing counts three full baths. The remarks say a full bath on each level and a third bath started in the basement. The listing’s own basement field says bath stubbed. The photos show one bathroom with a tub, and a laundry with a sink. No photo shows the second bath upstairs or anything in the basement but the stove, the furnace and the pressure tank. Ask which baths have a toilet, a drain and water, and count the finished ones before you count three.

No tank on the furnace, a barrel stove in the basement. The remarks say an LP furnace is installed and no propane tank is set. The photos show the furnace in the basement beside a portable air conditioner, and a barrel stove with its flue run through a plywood panel in a window well. Ask whether the furnace has ever run, whether it was inspected, and whether the stove was permitted, because a stove vented through plywood is what an insurer’s inspector photographs before declining the policy. Heating a log house on 20 acres in Missaukee County through a winter on that stove is not a plan.

A taxable value of $25,672, and a sale that uncaps it. The listing prints a tax assessed value of $25,672 and taxes of $1,120. Michigan caps the growth of taxable value each year and uncaps it when the property changes hands, so the first bill after a sale resets to the state equalized value, which is half of market value. A sale at $175,000 puts the equalized value near $87,500, more than three times the taxable value on the listing, and the bill follows it. A house that is not a principal residence also pays the 18 school operating mills a homestead does not. Ask the Norwich Township assessor for the equalized and taxable values of both parcels now and figure your bill at the equalized value.

Two parcels and no county record. Neither Zillow nor Redfin carries a county record for this property, and the county’s online records sit behind a security check we could not pass. The acreage, the split, the year built and the square footage are as the listing states them. Ask the assessor for both parcels with their legal descriptions, whether the house sits on one or straddles the line, and whether either parcel is in the Commercial Forest or Qualified Forest programs, though the $1,120 bill says the land is on the regular roll.

A living room the size of the house. The listing gives the living room at 29.33 by 29.08 feet, which is 853 square feet, and the three bedrooms at another 475, in a house of 1,368. Those numbers leave nothing for the kitchen, the baths and the laundry, so the living room figure is the main floor. Ask for the measured plan.

Three campers, no titles, no keys. The remarks say three older campers stay, without titles or keys, as candidates for cleanup, use or scrap. Without titles they cannot be registered or sold as vehicles, and hauling three campers a quarter mile up a damaged two-track to a scrap yard is your cost. No photo shows them.

Cleanup, storm damage, unfinished work. The remarks say substantial property cleanup is needed, unfinished construction remains, and spring storms took down trees. The photos show mattresses on floors, furniture stacked along walls, weathered deck boards on the balconies, and the basement work not begun beyond the stub-outs. Price the cleanup and the driveway before the house.

Thirty-five photos, the listing’s full set. Zillow and Redfin carry the same 35 in the same order and we used all of them, with the listing’s first photo as the cover. There is no photo of the road, the easement, the campers, the sheds, the septic field, the well head, the second upstairs bath or the balconies from inside. Nothing is virtually staged.

You can see everything else we have listed on the properties page. For other northern Michigan properties with an access question we have a camp on 40 acres inside the Ottawa National Forest near Ewen and an island cabin on Lake Winyah near Alpena with no county record on either site.

To ask about this one, call Daniella Bell at Coldwell Banker Schmidt-Cadillac on 231-920-3264 and reference MLS 1949104. Tell them where you saw it.