While reporting a feature about Leelanau County’s red-hot real estate market this week, one special property stood out from the rest.

Every realtor the Leelanau Ticker spoke with referenced a “unicorn” Stony Point listing — a cottage at 12271 East Lovers Lane, near the tip of highly sought after Stony Point in Suttons Bay, that hit the market last week for an unheard of $220,000. (The county’s home inventory below $300,000 has been notoriously scarce.)

The 1,120 square foot, 70s-era family home, has what was billed as “a compact kitchen in need of updates.”

Check it out here.

Meanwhile, via a letter to the editor, the Leelanau Ticker discovered the backstory on the pending sale of the cottage, which reads much like the “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” fairy tale — not too hot, not too cold, but just right.

Here is more from the buyers, and soon-to-be Leelanau County residents:

“Hello Leelanau Ticker: This morning I read your real estate article about the Unicorn Cottage. My husband and I are the ones who bought it! Imagine my surprise as I was reading your article over my morning cup of coffee, and seeing our new purchase listed as an example of the area’s extreme real estate market! Your article was certainly spot on. We had been looking for a home in the area for 3 years now. We’ve seen many homes large and small with the extraordinary patience of our wonderful realtor Elizabeth Schaub. As time went on, we whittled down our wish list. Last year we even bought a parcel in hopes of building. That has proved difficult with builders booked out a year or more and costs quickly rising. From the buyers’ side it’s been really tough. We check the MLS each morning, we’ve driven up on a moment’s notice to see homes and have dealt with multiple offers.

The morning the Unicorn Cottage came up, we jumped in the car (dogs and all) drove 3 hours and waited for our appointment at 4:30pm. The cottage was being shown all day with 1/2 hour appointments — 15 minutes inside; 15 outside — and then a quick decision had to be made with no idea if anything worked. Not the way to buy a house, but that is what the market is like now.

With expert help from our realtor we arrived an offer just minutes before the cutoff of 7pm. We put our offer in and drove home exhausted. Our realtor called a couple hours later and told us that our offer had been accepted. Now that the dust has settled, we are so happy and grateful that we have been given the chance to live and play on Stony Point. Today my husband called the Suttons Bay Planning Department and talked to Kathy. When my husband told them we bought a place on Stony Point, she said 'you bought the Unicorn Cottage!' Suttons Bay and the Leelanau Ticker has named our little place and from now on it will known as the Unicorn Cottage.”