Los Angeles Rams’ Stan Kroenke is on the sidelines during the game against the Philadelphia Eagles at SoFi Stadium on Oct. 8, 2023 in Inglewood, Calif.
Rick Tapia | Getty Images Sports | Getty Images
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Owned by Stanley Kroenke the most valuable sports empire in the worldincluding the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams. Now, according to newly released data, the sports magnate is America’s largest private landowner Land report.
At 2.7 million acres, Kroenke’s holdings are larger than Yellowstone National Park, or the equivalent of about 2 million football fields.
Kroenke bought nearly 1 million acres of ranchland in New Mexico from the family behind industrial conglomerate Teledyne in December, according to The Land Report. The Singleton Ranches deal is the largest land acquisition in the U.S. in more than a decade, according to the trade publication. The late Teledyne founder Henry Singleton started his eponymous ranch in the 1980s, and it has grown into one of the largest cattle and horse operations in the country.
The purchase moves Kroenke from fourth to first in The Land Report’s annual ranking of the nation’s 100 largest private landowners, ahead of the Emmerson lumber family and billionaire media moguls John Malone and Ted Turner.
Most of the top 100 landlords aren’t bold-faced names like Kroenke. The second-ranked Emmerson family owns about 2.44 million acres through their forest products company, Sierra Pacific Industries. The Singleton family, who sold ranches in New Mexico to Kroenke, still ranked 98th with 171,000 acres.
However, Investing in US farmland became popular among the very wealthy as a hedge against inflation and stock market volatility. From 2019 to 2024, agricultural land values increased at an average annual rate of 5.8%, or 2% after inflation, US Department of Agriculture.
Billionaire entrepreneurs from Bill Gates to Philip Anschutz are buying up more land for agriculture, livestock and forestry. Gates ranks 44th overall on The Land Report’s list with 275,000 acres, but is still the largest private owner of U.S. farmland. Belongs to investment group Cascade Investment. Gates field they grow soybeans, corn, cotton, rice, and even potatoes McDonald’s french fries.
Online brokerage billionaire Thomas Peterffy and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos made cuts of 647,000 acres and 462,000 acres, respectively.
Kroenke was able to grow his holdings relatively quickly by buying large ranches that had been in families for decades or even generations. He purchased Wagoner Ranch, one of the largest ranches in north Texas, for $725 million in 2016, ending 160 years of family ownership. While these unique ranches are scarce, more and more are coming on the market the heirs decide to sell instead of doing the family business.