100+ acre lake

[farmguy]

I am looking at a 3000 acre kind of show place ranch with a 100+ acre lake. Has anyone developed any ratios between ranches with "prime water feature" and ranches without? Don't expect tracts to be comparable on a head to head basis, but there may be some correlation in ratios.

 

[Sid Holderly]

Pond/Lake in FArm/Ranch

Land/crops produce income & ponds or lakes don't within a large tract, unless you have something unusual.

 

[farmguy]

Income is not the motivation.

 

[CANative]

A million or two.

Scarcity is the factor. How many 100 acre private lakes are there? If someone can afford a 3,000 acre ranch then they need a 100 acre lake for when their rich friends fly in for the weekend.

 

[farmguy]

CANative - you got it. I have done a good many lake tracts, but normally it is a few hundred acres with a 15 to 30 acre lake, couple in the 50 to 60 acre range, but this is bigger by a good measure and well located. Location is such the big house is built right on the water with a five stall boat house. I have tried to come up with units of comparison for lake tracts. Surface acre, ratio surface acre to total acre, some kind of cost analysis, etc; can never get any kind of reliable correlation. It typically comes down to how "pretty" it is and I pair up a very desirable tract to an average tract. I am just kind of fishing here for other folks thoughts.

 

[CANative]

The sky is the limit on something like this. I don't think 100 acre private lakes are all that rare but they tend to stay in families for generations so there are no sales to use to compare.

And besides, do rich Texas ranchers give a flip whether it's $1 million or $5 million extra? They want the biggest lake to impress their friends.

 

[stangtime]

With the drought in Texas how much water is really in that 100 acre lake?

Dan

 

[farmguy]

I was expecting it to be very low but he purchases water out of adjoining river and then comes out of lake to a pivot on a hay field. He has kept it full. This is an extreme year and he has pumped water to lake. The lake has been there since before mid 60's as it shows up on 1966 vintage topo maps. It has a large enough water shed it typically stays pretty constant level.

 

[CANative]

100 lake...

http://www.unitedcountry.com/RecreationalProperty/Texas/Comanche County Texas-42165-11710.htm

Lots of stuff to look at. Large ranches. Saw one along the Red River giving me fond images of John Wayne, Montgomery Clift and Walter Brennan.

http://www.unitedcountry.com/RecreationalProperty/Texas/results.htm

If I had to guess, it looks like the lake adds at least a million dollars or more to the list price (204 acres priced about the same as 500 to over 1,000 acres)

 

[Financially Feasible]

It typically comes down to how "pretty" it is

As funny of an idea as that is, it may be pretty spot on. Buyers of this kind of property type throw out all sorts of conventional wisdom when they do deals for high-end or unique property. Take for instance the following article...

http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/billionaires-home-buying-binge.html

In your particular scenario, I might not focus so much on the black and white numbers... I might start hunting down buyers/sellers of this type of property and ask them what motivates them when doing a deal such as this. You're likely to find much better information there than in looking at any hard data. Sorry, I don't have Larry Ellison in my address book... :icon_mrgreen: