14,500 acres of land in the Mid-Columbia was just sold to a Louisiana investor for a whopping $171 million dollars! That is locally one of the largest land purchases in recent history.

The land is in the 100 Circles area of the Horse Heaven Hills, near the Benton-Yakima county border. It was previously owned by John Hancock Life Insurance Co.

The land purchase is an example of skyrocketing prices for the valuable and reliable resources in our area for agriculture.

Investors in Agriculture like this region because of the "private land with confirmed water rights, a vast food processing network and infrastructure to move products to international markets by road, river and rail", according to reports.

The sale of the land that was completed at the end of August lead to $2.1 million in excise taxes for the state and $427,000 for local government.

The new owners are going to keep using the land to produce potatoes in rotation with sweet corn and wheat.

Normally land fetching such a large price tag only happens in large cities like downtown Seattle or Portland, according to reports.

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