After railroads, Newhall started focusing on real estate and ranching. He bought 143,000 acres of land between Los Angeles and Monterey counties. The largest piece of land was the 46,460 acres of land in northern Los Angeles County which was called the Rancho San Francisco, later called Newhall Ranch. He sold some of his property to the Southern Pacific Railroad which built a train line through the present-day Newhall Pass. They also built a town and named it after Newhall. The first station North on the new line was named Saugus by Newhall, after his hometown of Saugus, Massachusetts. His children created the Newhall Land and Farming Company that helped build the rest of Santa Clarita.