This property is over 5 hours north of the Bay Area. Harvest/processing/sale was probably completed... about 20 hours ago, when this listing went live. The photos reveal pre-harvest bounty: some listings only hint at what's afoot, while this one positively celebrates its full flourish of plantings & even an individual "glam-shot" of sticky-ass bud (specifically, Photo #15).
This listing is also interesting to me, because I think it may reveal something about the cultivation process. Look first at Photo #3: it shows a covered structure along side the framework of a neighboring covered structure. Now look at Photo #16: I believe it shows the same effective photograph angle, but later in the season. Note that the covered structure in Photo #3 is removed in Photo #16. Lastly, check out Photo #12 & #20, which shows juveniles in a covered structure.
I think this shows the cultivation process: start juveniles in a covered structure as seen in Photo #12. Once they grow large enough, you string cross-netting as seeing Photo #20 as preparation against wind, and as support for limbs weighed down by buds. Then, when the plants are large enough for the natural elements, you remove the cover and afford them the natural season, as seen first in Photo #3... but you stagger plantings so you have a rolling harvest... which may be why only one of those two structures is uncovered. (We do this with tomato planting in our garden: put in a series of juveniles over the course of a month, rather than all at once, so that the resulting harvest does not all come at once, but instead, we enjoy an extended period of picked fresh tomatoes, as they mature in sequence.) Lastly, Photo #16 shows that the earlier-uncovered crop is larger than the later-uncovered crop behind it. I'd guess staggering the planting this way would allow a smaller crew to manage harvest & processing.
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Bridgeville/44-Acres-Showers-Pass-RD-95526/home/183023303
Happy Thanksgiving!
Little known anecdote about the Pilgrims: they were all stoners of the first order. Thought they were sailing to Ireland on a hemp run... ended up instead in North America.
Last night's listing was on a road called "Covelo" - it is the second pot farm I've found on that road. The two properties are separated by about 9 minutes' drive. It makes sense to me that you'd see some tight grouping of farms: before legalization, I suspect/may-have-heard-told there were "communities" of growers who knew one another, trusted one another, looked out for one another, and really didn't welcome outsiders. Additionally, once you master a strain in an ecosystem, there are advantages to expanding that strain's planting nearby. Lastly, I imagine that post-legalization, a bunch of these communities secured licenses and shifted into a less paranoid situation.
Somewhere north of here in the town of "Bridgeville" (of which I've never heard), there is a place called "Larabee Valley." I imagine this place was - and may still be - such a community. Up there, you can get 51 gorgeous California acres, a beautiful cabin/home that was built in 2012, outbuildings, timber, meadows, and... of course, a "Cannabis license/permit" for $699K, which is the September 2022 "relisting" asking after a May 2022 "relisting."
This listing is interesting, because Photos #3-7 show the characteristic "rounds," however, in apparent full bloom. I count 50 (5 X 10) in an orderly stand-apart situation, and then maybe another 50 rounds tucked in around the greenhouse. There is also, then, the greenhouse - I'd guess that's where young clones are encouraged before transplanting to the rounds... but I don't really know. Perhaps, instead, it's a separate production line relying on a strain better adapted to greenhouses?
Those photos really bring home how very large pot plants become when in a happy locale & properly attended: the marriage between strain & ecosystem, overseen by an attentive farmer.
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Unknown/51-Larabee-Valley-Rd-95526/home/179239890
And then, from the listing, there is this: "Can be sold with neighboring property. They go very well together."
"very well together"? Like strain & ecosystem?
And so we find nearby on Larabee Valley Road, a second place, with a similar "May 2022/September 2022" history, asking $599K for 147 gorgeous Californian acres. And it, too, is a pot farm: "15,000 sq. ft. Cannabis license/permit. There is a 140,000 gallons of water storage, cold framed greenhouses, 20x40 processing building."
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Unknown/147-Larabee-Valley-Rd-95526/home/179241523
Would love to see the books on these places. I have no handle on what one nets from, say, the first property and its ~100 rounds & greenhouse. The second property seems of a far-larger commercial scale: what has it historically generated as yield & net income?
What are the underlying economics of these sort of pot farms? I mean, superficially on the first listing, 100 rounds = 100 lbs = $50K gross if you assume $500/lb. But it would be better to know non-superficial real numbers.
It's on my list of research tasks.
No, man.
He’s sailing waves. He’s living his best life, right now. He’s laughing & smiling. He’s happy for himself & he’s happy for all of us. He’s grateful, because it’s Thanksgiving.
This, I believe.
Alrighty, then!
W(ile E. Coyot)e may actually be getting somewhere on price.
This whole California pot-farm thing has been intriguing to discover.
I was driving around town with my youngest - he's in junior high, figuring it all out.
On one route to his school, we routinely pass a dispensary, which isn't that unique in this state & region. There's always a security guard in front when it's open.
A couple months back, my son asks, "Why is there always a security guard there - is it a bank?" Fair question.
So, I explain that it's a marijuana dispensary, and that there is a legal tension between permissive state law & restrictive federal law. And one way this manifests is that the marijuana economy is largely conducted in cash... because of federal regulations regarding knowingly financing illegal activity. So, while the rest of the stuff one typically buys uses some digital payment - credit card, debit card, Apple Pay, pay pal, whatever - retail pot is bought & sold for cash, because digital credit providers can't afford to anger federal regulators by involving themselves in the transactions... and so, a pot dispensary has unique security needs because of the large cash that accumulates.
I assume California pot farming is also largely cash-transacted. If you've enjoyed a successful harvest, you will have a bunch of cash. You can imagine that one conservative & rational way to deploy harvest-cash would be to pay down the note on the farm.
Price history on this listing indicates it transacted for $299K in April 2008.
Then it listed in February 2022... just before spring.
Then it... probably saw a harvest stuck in the rounds.
Then it relisted in October 2022... right after harvest.
When initial asking was $415K.
Cut to $350K a month later in mid-November... and then to $275K the same day.
Someone wants out, and asking now is ~8% below April 2008 price.
This is the price discovery I've been waiting for.
Photo #6 shows the telltale "rounds" - I eyeball about 160 of them?
No claim of licensing in the listing... who knows?
Betchya the place is owned free & clear by seller.
Because cash.
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Willits/40643-Covelo-Rd-95490/home/120199677
Let's say... you're a stoner pot farmer in California.
And you wanted a nice piece of property to pursue your gentleman yeoman activity.
And, maybe a little farmhouse to go with it.
But not any typical farmhouse... because you are a stoner pot farmer from California!
You need "a crib" befitting your crop.
So, you think, "Maybe an 'A Frame'?"
But that's too... chic-Tahoe.
"Maybe all glass & steel!"
But that's too... cold industrial Bauhaus for the countryside.
"A yurt! Gotta have a yurt, amirite?"
No, you are stoned: yurts are not ideal as a primary structure. They're more apt quarters for drum circles and dogs.
"Wow, man... this is a really hard quiz. Is it a tee-pee? Oh, I know - a 'grass' hut! Oh man, that's funny...."
No... the answer the judges were looking for was, "geodesic dome."
It's every stoner pot farmer's dream to live in a dome... because Buckminster Fuller is the patron saint of California stoners. ("His name is just so... groovy!")
And luckily, today's farm possesses a dome-home and for only 7-figures!
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Guerneville/2425-Pool-Ridge-Rd-95446/home/2425149
This has got to be the tidiest farm to-date. Look how much loving care went into spacing the rounds, and how conveniently they are located to the stony dome. Check out the interior photos of the dome structure.
"But... there aren't any?"
Curious, right? $1.35m and the listing agent hasn't provided a single shot of the inside. But we have plenty of drone-secured views at 500' elevation.
My quick eyeball suggests there are 700-800 planting rounds gathered in tightly around the house. Assuming about a pound per plant yield, and, say, $750/lb, your annual harvest would generate ~$500K in revenue, if all goes well.
Listing indicates the place transacted for $815K back in October 2014, after sitting on the market for a year after first being listed for $1.1m in October 2013.
Here's a weird - but also instructive - pot farm listing.
First the instructive part,:
"Interim County Permit and State Provisional License in hand. 2 Story 30'x50' building and 20'x20' building. 16,557 sq ft of outdoor cultivation, 4,992 of mixed-light cultivation, onsite nursery and processing, permitted septic."
https://www.redfin.com/CA/Blue-Lake/2499-Titlow-Hill-Rd-95525/home/115743183
That's a lot of vague words, amirite? But if you sum 16,557 + 4,992, you get 21,549.
Why do we care? It turns out that "22,000" is presently a magical pot-farm licensing threshold value:
https://cannabis.ca.gov/applicants/license-types/
Now, the weird. Look at the price history. The day after it listed for $1.15m on February 16, 2021, it sold for asking.
Wut?
That seems very... fortuitous... as if someone "listed" it with a buyer in mind at a pre-established price.
Then, only seven months later on September 21, 2022, the property listed again , but this time for... $599,000.
So, then-buyer/now-seller decides to "eat" $551,000 on a transaction?
But that was before the October 18, 2022 price cut to $475,000.
I'm wondering whether someone settled a debt with someone else by overpaying for 90 acres of California pot farming? It just seems weird. And now, they are selling at a loss, because it offsets gains elsewhere?
I'm a suspicious man.
Sometimes, I even get "the 'noids".....
