Is Howard Hughes The GOAT of Land Gainz? Just a fun story if you didn’t know
Howard Hughes Jr purchased 25,000 AC of Las Vegas land for 3$ an AC. YES 3$ an AC!!! He paid a total of $75,000. He was going to relocate his business from Cali but in the end decided not to. From then on he purchased casinos on the strip and unfortunately passed in 1976. 

TO THE GOOD PART

Well that land that Mr. Hughes purchased is roughly today worth $600,000 an AC. Yes most of the land already has homes on it and what not but there is still 5,000 AC yet to be sold. Today the land is called The Summerlin Masterplan which is number 3 in the nation amongst master planned communities. 

All in all the man basically turned $75,000 into 3-10 billion. I know he technically didn’t do it but He was the original investor and his corp is responsible for it today. Biggest gain ever in land? Idk 

If anybody else has some crazy stories they know about where someone turned nothing into a million in real estate Id love to hear it.
[{"id": "io8isii", "text": "Actually, the original investor was multiple owners before him.", "replies": [{"id": "ioagy6o", "text": "The state sold it to him so yes he was the original investor", "replies": [{"id": "ioax0zh", "text": "Fascinating.\n\nI was unaware that the state of Nevada has been around for thousands of years.\n\nNoted.", "replies": [{"id": "iobf6t2", "text": "Mexico -&gt; U.S -&gt; Nevada -&gt; Howard Hughes\nIdk what more you want", "replies": [{"id": "iobuelh", "text": "I don't want anything.  I'm learning new information here.", "replies": [], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "io8p26u", "text": "The Alaska purchase \nThe Louisiana purchase", "replies": [{"id": "io8r2ut", "text": "Louisiana Purchase. What was it again, like $15MM for all of the continental US west of the Mississippi? \n\nI\u2019d offer $20 today and see what the owner says.", "replies": [{"id": "ioaiole", "text": "See if the owner can do seller financing on that $20 as well", "replies": [], "depth": 3}, {"id": "iob0l1x", "text": "Yes and the funny thing is Jefferson really just wanted New Orleans. But Napoleon at the time was stretched thin on multiple fronts and just threw in the rest of the territory to get out of the New World", "replies": [{"id": "iobj05p", "text": "He also didn\u2019t have clear title to all the land. Most of it was still very contested.", "replies": [{"id": "iobki6q", "text": "Well yeah but that\u2019s a whole other topic lol", "replies": [], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "io8pcj2", "text": "I hear Peter Minuit got a pretty good deal for the Dutch West India Company when purchasing Manhattan back in 1626", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "io9537g", "text": "I read an article that he purchased the land in 1952. So the IRR from 1/1/1952 through today is 18.83%. But that doesn\u2019t include any taxes or other expenses that went into the land through the years and doesn\u2019t include any selling costs so I\u2019m sure it\u2019s lower than that. \n\nIt\u2019s not bad for having to do very little work over the years but sit and wait for value to increase. \n\nIt\u2019s better than the S&amp;P during that same time which was 10.75%", "replies": [{"id": "ioahu2l", "text": "lol a 3$ to $600,000 price per Ac is a 200,000x gain over 70 years. I think that is better than alright. 18% compounding interest for 70 years straight is bananas.", "replies": [{"id": "ioaid13", "text": "Yeah the 10.75% would only turn it into $100mm", "replies": [], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "io9dc6k", "text": "Supplemental Howard Hughes commercial RE story (may be partially apocryphal):  When he acquired some mining interests in Nevada, he tried to lease the penthouse suite at the Desert Inn Country Club and Casino in Las Vegas.  He wanted to be closer to his new mining interests for several months, maybe even a couple of years.\n\nThe Desert Inn's manager refused to lease to Hughes because the DI wanted the penthouse suite as an enticement for \"whales\" (very wealthy, big gamblers).  Hughes was only a gambler in the business sense, and not in the casino sense.\n\nHughes still wanted to stay in the DI penthouse, so had one of his corporations just buy the DI outright.  All of a sudden, the DI manager worked for Hughes, who promptly moved into the penthouse.\n\nThen, Hughes was surprised to learn that the DI was actually profitable -- even with the penthouse occupied!  Previous owners had not kept good books (almost like they didn't WANT a good record of the Casino's cash flow, p/l, etc. ...  Money laundering and skimming?  Heaven forbid!).  That's when Hughes went on a spree of buying up Las Vegas casinos.", "replies": [{"id": "io9mgrx", "text": "I don't care if this is true or not. This is awesome. (Not saying I don't believe you).", "replies": [{"id": "ioaf0to", "text": "It might be completely true, or it might not.  It is at least *mostly* true.", "replies": [], "depth": 3}, {"id": "ioaik7o", "text": "Another story for you is that he bought a TV station cause he wanted to be the big name in Vegas and control what was televised and also cause he was a troubled sleeper and always stayed up until the late night. 1 night he is sitting in his penthouse and calls the TV station and tells them he doesn\u2019t like the movie that\u2019s on and wants them to change it to another even though the 1st movie is halfway through. So on live TV they switched over to a different one when they already halfway through one. If you can imagine watching some Movie on HBO today and they switch it halfway through lol He told the person next to him \u201cPenthouse Call\u201d", "replies": [{"id": "ioar3d4", "text": "Love it", "replies": [], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}, {"id": "ioaxblm", "text": "It is true.", "replies": [], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "ioamvg2", "text": "TIL Summerlin is a Howard Hughes community. That's wild. Always thought it was just a naturally affluent neighborhood.", "replies": [{"id": "iobfp6w", "text": "On top of that the howard hughes corp developed DOWNTOWN SUMMERLIN which is literally a masterpiece of a shopping center. Kind of similar to THE BATTERY in atlanta", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "iob7ib5", "text": "the manhattan purchase", "replies": [{"id": "iobfwcv", "text": "That is a crazy one!", "replies": [], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "iobcen9", "text": "Not quite at the scale you are speaking of, but my grandfather purchased roughly 5,000 acres of farmland in Central CA in the late 80\u2019s early 90\u2019s for $1,000/ acre and sold about 3,000 acres of it in 2014 for $28,000/ acre to a corporate farming syndicate. The remaining 2,000 acres we kept and have continued to farm it. The proceeds from the sale went into a mini- storage portfolio and some retail property. Right place, right time!!! Needless to say, opportunities like this no longer exist in present day unfortunately\u2026", "replies": [{"id": "iobvfjh", "text": "Interesting\u2026. I was recently talking to a ranch broker in CA who was trying to help his friend find a home for his money. As the story went, he sold a bunch of his land for a lot of money, bought a bunch of self storage units and made a lot more there, and had some rolling off that he was trying to 1031. Must be Jizzy\u2019s grand dad!", "replies": [], "depth": 2}, {"id": "iojx37x", "text": "They exist today.", "replies": [{"id": "iokthwq", "text": "I\u2019m going to kindly, yet strongly disagree with this. It\u2019s just not the reality of it, between the massive influx of people investing in commercial real estate, up- to date internet broadcasting of essentially all commercial properties, and just overall increase in demand for commercial real estate(regardless of it being a \u201cdeal\u201d or not). Sure, some \u201cdeals\u201d in commercial real estate might exist, but if they do come up they are swiped almost immediately and usually you/ nor I are first in line so to speak. Yes, their might be certain sectors of real estate, like \u201cfix &amp; flip\u201d housing that you might be able to get some relatively good deals on, but those require a ton of labor and capital to successfully make money in as opposed to my example of simply buying land and sitting on it for 25-30 years and getting a x2800% ROI.", "replies": [{"id": "iokw6e3", "text": "You aren't living in 2052 (no one else is either).  There's no way to know if this won't happen again, precisely as it happened for Howard Hughes (and has for millions of others throughout history).\n\nKnowing how history works (and has since time began)...I'd say it's as likely as....well.....that the sun will come up tomorrow.", "replies": [{"id": "iokzkjp", "text": "&gt;You aren't living in 2052\n\nNor am I living 1852, when there was a surplus of land with endless opportunities and an 1/8th of our current world population. \n\n&gt;There's no way to know if this won't happen again, precisely as it happened for Howard Hughes (and has for millions of others throughout history).\n\nThe issue I see with this is that we only have so few resources as well as a finite amount of land(a lot of which is already corporately owned) to continue developing at the pace we once were. I\u2019m not opposed to what you are saying by any means and would be thrilled if new commercial real estate opportunities/ such massive returns were to arise, but the likelihood  of this is dwindling. I\u2019m not saying that the commercial real estate sector won\u2019t continue to develop, but the likelihood of private citizens being able to singlehandedly make such returns on investment(like my grandfather) is getting more and more slim to none as time passes. More people, less land, greater income disparity.", "replies": [{"id": "iol23yy", "text": "I remember when people said (after Bill Gates became a billionaire) *\"well, that's not likely to happen again in my lifetime\".*\n\nAnd then along came a guy who started a website scoring women as hot or not (facebook). Following him came a guy who started a book company (Bezos)....Barnes and Noble were not afraid....then after him a fellow who started a car company (\"*he'll fail magnificently*\"): you know who.\n\nThey only make so much land.\n\nInterestingly, all of that land is still here (every square foot of it).\n\nSome of it has lithium in it. Some has water.  Some has a future freeway coming to it.\n\nAnd some may just be where Amazon wants to build a warehouse in 30 years, that some hick currently thinks is a great place to grow tomatoes.\n\nNo one would have ever imagined 7 homes on the same building lot I watched kids play ball on 40 years ago like I see every day in my town (paying more for 1/7th of that dirt....just the dirt.....as the parents of my friends did for the entire home and lot back then).\n\nBob Hope famously bought land 2 miles outside of town because he knew the town would eventually go there, and he could buy 50 times more than in town for the same dollar.\n\nIt's not rocket surgery to buy a casino, and then 20 other casinos and think....*\"Hmmmmm....maybe people will move here someday and want to put up homes....maybe I'll buy a bunch of land for less than I spent on my first casino and see what happens\".*\n\nAnyone else wanting to buy that land could have bought it for $1,000.00 an acre (many people did).  He just happened to have the financial wherewithal to buy multiple thousands of acres.\n\nIt will happen again.  It's happening somewhere right this minute.\n\nIt will happen again in 200, 500 and 10,000 years from now as well.\n\nAnd, it will happen exactly as it's happened millions of times in the past.\n\n(It just won't be at $1,000.00 an acre).", "replies": [], "depth": 6}], "depth": 5}], "depth": 4}], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "iobeqd1", "text": "There is a bigger example than that and the guy is still alive.", "replies": [{"id": "iobg5ln", "text": "don\u2019t hold us in suspense lol", "replies": [{"id": "iobha7g", "text": "Donald Bren", "replies": [], "depth": 3}], "depth": 2}], "depth": 1}, {"id": "ioczras", "text": "Not the GOAT\u2026 look up the Irvine ranch. One guy owns 60% of Orange County, CA. The company he owns spits out a out $1.5B of free cash flow annually.", "replies": [], "depth": 1}, {"id": "iod7wlm", "text": "Look Into Donald bren and the Irvine company. He started out building single family homes than bought the 110,000 acre Irvine ranch. The Irvine company developed the whole city of Irvine.  He is now the wealthiest real estate investor in the us and is worth 17 billion.", "replies": [], "depth": 1}]