This will always be true, no matter where the land is. Properties up for grabs include a $123million mansion with a trampoline room and a $43million oceanfront mansion with a ten-person jacuzzi. I mean, it is unlikely that one of the richest people in the world would invest in something that wasnt a good investment, right? Raw land is not developed. The Microsoft co-founder and his former wife, Melinda, are the top farmland owners in. It is unclear how cheap biofuels can be but if they are cheap it can solve the aviation and truck emissions.. Our era is dominated by the ultra-rich, the climate crisis and a burgeoning green capitalism. That land is now largely rented out to various farmers. It just seemed like a good thing to do., 2020 THE SUN, US, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED | TERMS OF USE | PRIVACY | YOUR AD CHOICES | SITEMAP, A map has revealed which billionaire owns the most land in the US, and it's not Bill Gates, John Malone owns about 2.2million acres of land across the United States, In comparison, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates owns about 270,000 acres of farmland, Malone is worth an estimated $9.22billion, Meet the largest landowner in the US as map reveals stunning amount of land billionaire owns and its not Bill Gates. With the Washington state acreage and other additions to his portfolio, The Land Report estimates that Gates now owns at least 242,000 acres of American farmland. Bill Gates is best known for revolutionizing personal computing, but lately he's gotten back to the land. Today, Bill Gates owns 242,000 acres of farmland in 19 states. Gates-affiliated ownership covers vast swaths of farm and timberland, estimated to be 69,071 acres in all by niche land ownership publication The Land Repor t. Across the nation, Gates'. Thats where the Gateses began buying land in 2013 through two limited liability corporations registered to an address in Kirkland by Derek Yurosek, then head of agriculture operations for Cascade. There are also growing trends revolving around the purchase of low acreage farmland and noncommercial farming. When Quarterman first heard about Gates firm buying land in the area, he began digging through local property records, linking addresses and business records from registered owners to Kirkland-based companies, until he was able to piece together that the companies buying multiple tracts of land in the Suwannee River Basin were all a shell of a shell of a shell company investing for Bill Gates. NBC News independently confirmed that there were, in fact, shell companies tracing back to Gates firm that purchased 6,021 acres across four counties in Georgia. Bill and Melinda bought this massive mansion in the Coachella Valley for $12.5 million in 1999. The United States is defined by the excesses of its ruling class. The billionaire couple, in less than a. Gates, in an Ask Me Anything session on Reddit last year, said his investment group was behind the purchases, and suggested it was linked to seed and biofuel development. Gates portfolio comprises about 242,000 acres of farmland and nearly 27,000 acres of other land across 19 states, according to The Land Report, a magazine for land investors that tracks the nations biggest landowners. The billionaire Microsoft co-founder has become the largest owner of farmland in the. Renewable energy company Savion has an option to buy the property for what . . The Emmerson family owns and operates Sierra Pacific Industries, a company that logs usable lumber after forest fires and sells it to lumber retailers. 5. In other words, when the economy is struggling, the value of farmland generally doesnt depreciate. Last year, Bill and Melinda purchased a sprawling beachfront 6-bedroom, 4-bath home in Del Mar, Californiaoutside of San Diegofor $43 million. However, his largest land holdings are in Louisiana (69,071 acres), Arkansas (47,927 acres), Nebraska (20,588 acres . Through our professional experience in land acquisition, we have found that people buy and sell land for many different reasons and have learned that it can be an investment for profit, vacation, or any opportunity that suits your needs and desires. The farmland was purchased through a constellation of companies that all link back to the couples investment group, Cascade Investments, based in Kirkland, Washington. Financial titans like Prudential and Hancock have divisions specifically for investors looking to make money on farmland portfolios. The gun and the whip may not accompany land acquisitions this time around. Malone made his fortune as a media tycoon, building the company Tele-Communications, Inc, or TCI, and acting as its CEO before selling it to AT&T for $50 billion in 1999. Both companies were founded in 2012 with the same address as Cascade Investments in Kirkland, which later changed its mailing address to a Louisiana post office box assigned to Oak River Farms, another subsidiary of Cascade. Our exposure to Invitation Homes is owning its stock in mutual funds we manage, not buying houses w/ them,. The biggest chunks of Gates holdings are in Louisiana and Arkansas, where he owns 69,071 acres and 47,927 acres, respectively, the outlets research found. the latest American Housing Survey by the Census Bureau. Much of Turner's land is used as grazing land for over 50,000 head of buffalo the largest private herd of bison in the world. BlackRock is sometimes confused w/ Blackstone, which owned Invitation Homes. The farmland real estate investment trust (REIT) Farmland Partners, which owns 156,500 acres in 16 US states, has seen its traded value more than double since November and is trading near an. Gates' achievement, according to the report, is that he's largest private owner of farmland in the US. While private companies and corporations are increasing . Someone else is building that equity on their back, said Johnathan Hladik, the policy director at the Center for Rural Affairs, who is also a farmer in Nebraska. Almost 300,000 acres is a lot of land for one family or private individual to own, but it's still just a. One per cent of the worlds farms control 70% of the worlds farmlands, one report found. Thanks for contacting us. Purchased fromMadeleine Pickens, the former wife of Texas billionaire T. Boone Pickens, the property deal is one of the largest ever recorded in the area,The Wall Street Journalreported. The report on US Land Ownership ("Land Ownership Report" / 1-21-22) indicates that Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft and holder of 45% of its shares, is the main owner of North American land, owner of an area of more than 250,000 acres (101,171.4 hectares) deployed throughout the immense US territory, the fourth in the world in order of . But those working on projects with both investors and farmers to create ecologically sustainable farming methods and support diverse and disadvantaged farming communities say rethinking agriculture and working to avert a climate crisis go hand in hand. One of the Gates' favorite vacation homes is in the Yellowstone Club in Big Sky, Montana. He also owns three hotels in Dublin, Ireland, and a fourth in Limerick. But Zehren of Cascade noted that the firm has been working in Florida and elsewhere to promote ecologically conscious agriculture and that it plans to continue to evaluate its farmland portfolio to improve its overall sustainability. Bill Gates' $13.5 million investment in 2,100 sprawling acres of North Dakota land has raised questions as the purchase coincided with a controversial Chinese company buying 370 acres of. While Gates owns nearly 270,000 acres of farmland across the US, he isnt the largest landowner in the country. So if now the best farmers can do if you want to stay in farming is rent this land, you're not going to get the benefits that come with land ownership.. We've received your submission. These states include: Arizona - 25,750 acres; Arkansas - 47,927 acres In this country, enslaved Black labor first built US wealth atop stolen Native land. The 13,573-square-foot home has six bedrooms, 11 bedrooms and more luxury features than you can count. Cascade did not immediately respond to a phone message Friday, and the company declined to comment to The Land Report other than to say that Cascade is very supportive of sustainable farming, the outlet said. The Gates Foundation said in a statement that its agriculture efforts do not extend to farming in the U.S. The opportunities are virtually endless. BlackRock also suggested it was being confused for the similarly-named investment management firm Blackstone, which until recently owned Invitation Homes. Malone continued, the forestry part of it in the Northeast is a pretty good business, with very low return on capital, but very stable and leverageable. Bill and Melinda Gates also cracked the Land Report's Top 100 Landowners for the first time coming in at number 49. The Microsoft co-founder faced several claims that he owned a majority of Americas farmland earlier this year. As more and more land gets developed, if you own land that is in the path of the plan, you could have buyers offering you big money to take hold of the property. But billionaire class assertions that they are philosopher kings and climate-conscious investors who know better than the original caretakers are little more than ruses for what amounts to a 21st century land grab with big payouts in a for-profit economy seeking green solutions. In fact it is so big that it is a little hard to conceptualize. It also allows you to keep a portion of the land for personal use so you do not have to give up your weekend home or relaxation property. Xanadu 2.0 in Medina, Washington: Estimated $140-170 Million, Source: Steve Ringman / The Seattle Times. So why did the Land Report, Our History Is the Future: Standing Rock Versus the Dakota Access Pipeline, and the Long Tradition of Indigenous Resistance. | Photo by Wikimedia Commons . Since then, weve sold to dozens of people from ATV weekend warriors to camping enthusiasts to retired truck drivers. The third richest man on the planet doesnt have a green thumb. Investors bought a record 18.4% of the homes purchased in the fourth quarter of 2021 three-quarters of which were single-family homes. Cascade Investments declined to comment on its interest in acquiring so much American farmland, but a spokesperson for the firm, Charles V. Zehren said it is very supportive of sustainable farming. He pointed out that in 2020, the acreage that Bill Gates firm owns was all enrolled in a sustainability program. More surprising, however, was the fact that Bill and Melinda Gates own more private farmland . Bill Gates acquired six parcels of land in Pembina County. Some raw land may even be as affordable as a few thousand dollars, which can be an affordable and cost-effective investment strategy (or just a place to use for personal reasons). Cascade declined to comment on its specific land holdings. This is part of APs effort to address widely shared misinformation, including work with outside companies and organizations to add factual context to misleading content that is circulating online. If they purchased the rest of their farmland for similar prices, that would put the value of their 242,000 acres at almost $3 billion. The billionaire media mogul Ted Turner epitomizes such disparities. In total he owns 268,984 acres of land of all types in 19 states, including a suburb up for development - as a so-called 'smart city' - outside Phoenix, Arizona. Bill Gates now owns almost 242,000 acres of the continguous USA. if(typeof ez_ad_units!='undefined'){ez_ad_units.push([[300,250],'askbamland_com-large-leaderboard-2','ezslot_5',106,'0','0'])};__ez_fad_position('div-gpt-ad-askbamland_com-large-leaderboard-2-0'); While farmland, and land in general, will undergo economic factors and changes to demand, it is very likely to increase in value as the years roll by. According to landreport.com, the Gates family has a total of 242,000 in farmland acreage in the United States. According to 2021 article from the Land Report, a magazine about land ownership, Gates owns approximately 242,000 . Like wealth, land ownership is becoming concentrated into fewer and fewer hands, resulting in a greater push for monocultures and more intensive industrial farming techniques to generate greater returns. As more and more land becomes developed, less and less raw land is available, which potentially increases the value as demand remains the same or even increases. They own the soil where the potatoes in McDonalds french fries grow, the carrots from the worlds largest producer and the onions that Americans saut every night for dinner.