America’s Top Brokerages and Auction Houses: Farmers National Company

Farmers National Company was begun in 1929—historically not a banner year for starting new businesses, but over 80 years have passed and the company is thriving. Originally, the company’s core business was farm management, and today it’s the largest, fastest-growing and most successful farm management company in the U.S. The full-service real estate company offers traditional listing services as well as auction services.

Where: Headquartered in Omaha, Nebraska. Operates in 23 states, covering a wide swath of the middle of the country. Its newest office was just added in Washington state.

Why: “We completed nearly 200 successful auctions of over 41,000 acres in 2010,” say Lee Vermeer, VP of Real Estate Operations. The sheer reach of Farmers and impressive closed sale numbers are overwhelming.

Wow: “Farmers National Company has sold over 2,600 farms and ranches and completed 750 successful auctions, resulting in over $1.25 billion in sales in the last four years,” says Vermeer. “We have over 200 licensed agents, all of whom can offer full auction services.”

Farmers National Company
$135 million (2010 auction revenues)
www.farmersnational.com

$5 Million Hilton Head Easement Acquisition

Several funding entities, including Beaufort County and the U.S. Department of Agriculture, have pooled resources to acquire several key conservation easements on St. Helena Island as well as outright ownership of 19 acres on Hilton Head. According to news releases, these acquisitions will keep these lands from being turned into developments that would include some 300+ homes. In addition, the three easements allow the current property owners to continue farming the historic Beaufort County lands. More details of the transaction are available HERE.

Market Watch: JOE Announces New COO

The St. Joe Company (NYSE: JOE) has appointed veteran real estate executive Park Brady to be its chief operating officer. Brady will report to the  executive committee of the company’s board of directors, which includes Chairman Bruce Berkowitz and Interim CEO Hugh Durden.

Brady’s appointment is the latest in a series of steps taken since the late February resignation of President and CEO Britt Greene.

Also stepping down were board members Michael Ainslie, John Lord, and Walter  Revell. Among the new directors proposed by the company’s largest shareholder, The Fairholme Fund, were Berkowitz, Durden, and former Florida Governor Charles J. Crist.

The St. Joe Company is one of Florida’s largest real estate development companies and Northwest Florida’s largest private landowner with approximately 576,000 acres of land, concentrated primarily between Tallahassee and Destin.

Bank of America Buys Kluge’s Virginia Estate

Bank of America paid $15+ million for Patricia Kluge’s legendary Virginia horse country estate at a foreclosure auction on the steps of the Albemarle Circuit Court House in February. The lender filed a foreclosure lawsuit last month after Kluge defaulted on $23 million in loans.

Among the bidders were representatives of Donald Trump from the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. Trump has already acquired 200 acres abutting the 100-acre estate and is rumored to be negotiating for Kluge’s 900-acre winery.

Completed in 1985, Albemarle is an eight-bedroom, thirteen-bath manor and was originally listed with Sotheby’s International Realty for $100 million in 2009. The price subsequently dropped to $24 million.

State of Georgia Acquires 10,015 Acres

In December, the Georgia State Properties Commission unanimously approved the acquisition of 10,015 acres of land in Houston County for $28.7 million from Oaky Woods Properties LLC. The Middle Georgia acreage is part of 16,000 acres in Oaky Woods west of the Ocmulgee River already under lease by the state.

At $2,865+ per acre, the acquisition cost is almost double the property’s price in 2004, which is when the State of Georgia declined the opportunity to acquire it previously.

Energen Moves Into the Permian Basin

Birmingham-based Energen Corp. (EGN) announced the purchase of more than 40,000 acres in West Texas from SandRidge Energy (SD) in Loving, Reeves, Ward, and Winkler counties. Energen says it has identified 62 potential drilling sites in the 3rd Bone Spring play. At a vertical depth of 10,500 to 11,500 feet, the typical Bone Spring well has estimated ultimate recovery of 400,000 to 500,000 barrels of oil equivalent. The company will pay $110 million plus standard closing adjustments. Energen is budgeting $7.5 million per well for drilling and completion costs.

IP to Sell 163,000 Acres for $200 Million

International Paper (IP) will sell 163,000 acres in the Southeast for a minimum of $200 million to an affiliate of Rock Creek Capital, a Jacksonville-based asset management firm that invests in unique, resource-rich land. According to wire reports, IP will receive a minimum $160 million when the deal closes later this quarter. It will receive the balance, plus interest, within three years. The company will also receive 20% of the net profit generated from the land after the Rock Creek affiliate achieves “certain financial returns.”

$500 Million Everglades Deal Postponed Again

Florida Gov. Charlie Christ is getting a lesson that real estate brokers know all too well: big deals take time.

It’s been almost two years since Christ announced the $1.75 billion purchase of 187,000 acres in the Florida Everglades from United States Sugar. Since then the economy has tanked and the purchase price has been lowered twice: to $1.34 billion and now $536 million. In each instance, the number of acres has also fallen: first, to 180,000, and, in the most recent iteration, to 72,500. Faced with a March 30 deadline, the governing board of the South Florida Water Management District voted 9-0 to extend the closing for another six months.

An added element to the high-profile transaction was an in-depth front-page story in The New York Times last week that questioned many deal points, including the cost per acre, which The Times suggested is much too high, the tracts themselves, which The Times suggested include some of the least valuable belonging to U.S. Sugar, and the purpose of buying six separate tracts without reaching out to Florida Crystals, United States Sugar’s chief competitor and the owner of key blocks of adjacent land.

But the principle focus of the article was how Gov. Christ’s plan to save the Everglades will instead rescue United States Sugar. Since its publication, supporters and detractors have descended upon the media with their own interpretations of the deal.

Read more from a gubernatorial candidate who opposes the purchase HERE.

Read more about environmentalists who support the purchase HERE.

Heath Shuler: Eye on the Prize

Growing up in the 1970s, Heath Shuler saw quail hunting disappear from the mountains of his native North Carolina. “It occurred to me early on that if I wanted to hunt quail, I might have to buy property with good habitat,” he says.

Nowadays, that’s no small feat, especially in the Southeast where bobwhite populations have been declining for the past half-century due to changing land use. But Heath Shuler has never been a man of modest goals.

BY HENRY CHAPPELL
PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMBER HUMPHRIES & GRETA REYNOLDS
PUBLISHED SUMMER 2009

After a record-setting career as quarterback at the University of Tennessee, a second-place finish in 1993 Heisman Trophy voting, and several years in the NFL, he founded Heath Shuler Realty and grew it into one of the largest independent real estate firms in the South. Naturally, he kept an eye out for the best hunting and fishing properties.

“I’ve always wanted to invest in and be involved with property with excellent wildlife habitat,” he says. “That’s very important to me.”

But it was his career as a football star that led him to his dream property. Several years ago, at the annual Quail Unlimited Celebrity Quail Hunt, Rocky Evans, the organization’s longtime president, told him about a prime quail plantation in South Georgia. In 2003, with the money from the sale of a Knoxville property, he bought a stake in Wynfield Plantation (www.wynfieldplantation.com) in the storied quail country near Albany.

One of only 24 Orvis Endorsed Wingshooting lodges, Wynfield was named the plantation Wingshooting Lodge of the Year in 2005. October through March, Wynfield welcomes quail hunters, their families, and hunting dogs to some of the South’s best quail hunting, sporting clays, dining, and accommodations.

Now imagine the scene: A classy brace of English setters, high on both ends, locked up tight on a covey of bobwhites amid the pines and knee-high sedge. A pair of hunters approach, one with a Labrador retriever at heel. They position themselves for clear shots, and the dog handler sends his Lab in for the flush. The birds whir out the grass, boring away toward the nearest escape cover, trying to put trees between themselves and the hunters. All the while, the setters remain steady. The guns thump four times; four birds fall.

Having stopped at the flush, the Lab marks two of the downed birds. On command, she fetches them both, sitting to deliver. With the “dead bird!” command, the setters snort up the other two birds and bring them to hand before being cast in search of another covey.

A passage from a Nash Buckingham story? Actually, similar scenes play out nearly every fall and winter day at Wynfield Plantation. Heath is serious about his dogs and shooting.

“I started out as a kid hunting squirrels on those steep ridges around home,” he says. “As soon as I got big enough, I graduated to what I consider to be the most challenging game bird in the world – the ruffed grouse. A dog that can handle grouse can handle anything.”

Later, when he wasn’t playing football or closing real estate deals, Heath worked his Labs at the highest levels of amateur field trail competition and field testing. Several of his dogs achieved Master Hunter level in the American Kennel Club testing program.

In 2006, Heath’s schedule went from full to packed when he defeated an eight-term incumbent Republican to win a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. He was reelected by a landslide in 2008. He’s a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, a caucus of moderate and conservative House Democrats. His district covers most of his home region in the mountains of Western North Carolina. As Chairman of the House Subcommittee on Rural Development, Entrepreneurship, and Trade, he sponsored and shepherded into law the Small Energy Efficient Business Act, which stimulates growth in alternative energy markets by increasing investment in small producers. True to his conservationist sensibilities, he sponsored legislation aimed at developing biomass and carbon trading markets for private forest owners, and he continues to work closely with the Environmental Protection Agency on the assessment and cleanup of a large, contaminated former electronics manufacturing site that threatens water supplies in his home district. He takes stewardship and roots very seriously.

In 2007, realizing that he simply didn’t have time to be involved in the plantation’s day-to-day business, Heath hired his longtime friend Mike Osteen, a veteran professional dog trainer, as general manager and head trainer.

At Wynfield Plantation, Mike and two other trainers work a kennel of English pointers, English Setters, German shorthaired pointers, English cocker spaniels, springer spaniels, Brittanies, and Labrador retrievers. The staff also takes on a limited number of outside dogs for training. Most years, the Wynfield kennel produces several litters of puppies out of championship bloodlines. A few of these pups are chosen to replenish the kennel. The rest are offered for sale. Mike considers, Labs, English setters, and English cockers kennel specialties. Wynfield is a member of the Orvis-Endorsed Breeding and Training program.

Wynfield shooting dogs learn their trade in some of the best quail habitat in the Deep South – nearly 1,900 acres of open longleaf pine uplands and classic Southern bottomland with Spanish moss-draped live oaks. The staff controls encroaching brush and stimulates growth of forbs and legumes through prescribed burning, which mimics the natural, cleansing fires that maintained the open, grassy longleaf ecosystem prior to settlement.

Heath and his guests do most of their hunting on foot, so Wynfield pointing dogs are bred and trained to hunt at medium range: 100 to 200 yards. However, Mike Osteen says that the dogs range as wide or as close as they need to. Mature dogs are steady to wing and shot, and spaniels and retrievers generally stay at heel until sent to flush or retrieve, although they’ll quarter within shotgun range when the situation calls for it.

“I love it when we have multiple birds down so that we can let the Labs and cockers practice blind retrieves,” Heath says. They’ll pick up the ones they mark, and then we’ll handle them to the others.

You read right. English cocker spaniels running blind retrieves: taking lines, sitting at the whistle, and responding to hand signals. Sure, you’d expect that from a decent Lab, but a cocker spaniel? Clearly we’re not talking about the typical neurotic, bug-eyed, coiffed American cocker or even the average working English cocker. This is high-end spaniel work.

But Wynfield welcomes all comers. “By all means, bring your own dogs,” Mike says. “Sure, we’ll provide guides and dogs, but real dog people want to hunt with their own dogs. If your dog has a few problems out in the field, we’ll make suggestions for fixing them, or, if you prefer, we’ll fix them for you. We customize the experience so that everyone feels comfortable.”

That same attitude extends to gunning as well. Wynfield gunsmiths and gun fitters custom build shotguns to individual specification or modify guests’ guns for better fit. Rental guns are also available for guests who chose not to bring a gun.

Heath’s wife, Nikol, though not a hunter, enjoys shooting sporting clays on the Wynfield course. He and his eight year-old son, Navy, hunt with Mike Osteen and his sons, eleven-year-old Grant and nine-year-old John. This past quail season, Navy shot his first quail on the rise. “He’d been watching the older boys and was waiting for his chance,” Heath says. His first bird, on the wing, over a good dog, is a huge deal. Now he’s hooked. He’s a hunter for life.”

Ultimately, Heath’s relationship with his land is about creating memories. “Nowadays, my kids get all excited about staying in ‘their cabin,’ or sleeping in ‘their bunk.’ My four year-old daughter, Island, fishes in the lake and gets to ride on the four wheeler.”

“For Heath, the dog training and hunting really serve as an escape from the pressures of Washington and the demands of his business, and gives him a chance to spend time with his family,” Mike says. “I’ve known Heath for a long time, and he’s more mesmerized by this place than by anything else he’s experienced.

Considering Heath Shuler’s experiences so far, that’s saying something.

Duke Energy Makes Major Investment in GreenTrees

Duke Energy has become the lead investor in GreenTrees, a privately managed forest restoration program created and managed by C2I for landowners in the Lower Mississippi Alluvial Valley: Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

This enormous valley once held 24.7 million acres of forest and emergent wetlands. Today more than 18 million acres – or 80 percent – has been cleared, resulting in the loss of critical natural habitat.

The program is expected to generate high-quality, verifiable carbon offsets that Duke believes will help reduce the overall cost of compliance with federal climate change legislation. Duke’s initial investment will result in the planting of more than 1 million trees on approximately 1,700 acres in Arkansas.

GreenTrees is designed to create, enhance, and sustain conservation and wildlife benefits from afforestation. GreenTrees provides landowners the most economic and environmental value for each acre of trees planted. The program utilizes a specific inter-planting of 302 cottonwoods plus 302 mixed hardwoods per acre. The specific design of 302/302 delivers more conservation value, more carbon, and better sustainable hardwood revenues than a previous design of 302 cottonwood and 151 hardwoods.

In exchange for the landowners’ long-term lease to prevent reversibility, GreenTrees offers a variety of short and long-term income opportunities. Landowners can simultaneously enroll the same qualified acres into GreenTrees, CRP, and other conservation practices, thus receiving multiple financial incentives and incomes together.

GreenTrees was founded by Izaak Walton League of America board member Carey Crane and Texaco Chevron Conservation Award recipient Chandler Van Voorhis. Both men have received great inspiration from Crane’s mother, Maggie Bryant. Bryant is a past-two term Chairperson of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and retired from her board position in 2001. She has been awarded the prestigious Chevron Conservation Award as well as the Governor’s Award for Conservation in Mississippi, and she continues to be active in conservation measures around the world.

Landowners are enthusiastic about GreenTrees. Arkansas landowner Brandon Stafford is a recent enrollee. Stafford found himself with 210 acres of un-irrigated farmland that he had to do something with. He enrolled it in CRP and GreenTrees. After the initial planting and subsequent sprayings Brandon says, “It’s amazing what the trees are doing.” The CRP and GreenTrees programs work in concert for him. Currently over 2,500 acres from 20 landowners are enrolled in the program.

To learn more about GreenTrees, visit their website: www.green-trees.com.

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