BLOG Today I am publishing a report documenting and analysing the rural land market in large scale landholdings from 2020 - 2022. Short thread with some headlines. 1/8 andywightman.scot/2024/02/large-…
Report analyses all sales > 500ha plus those below this threshold where buyer owns land above the threshold. This is relevant to the proposed duties placed on large landholdings by forthcoming land reform bill. Data is derived from research behind . 2/8whoownsscotland.org.uk
During 2020 - 2000, there were 79 such sales totalling 103,924 ha of land of which 11 were of parcels >3000 ha. The majority of land acquired during this period was by buyers who already owned land - a trend towards greater concentration of landownership. 3/8 
Almost without exception, the new buyers are financial companies with a focus on forests, carbon and “nature” finance. Table 5 shows top spenders (where revealed) Among them are the following: - 4/8
Gresham House, now (provisionally), the 5th largest private landowner in Scotland (or 3rd if you exclude RSPB & NTS). It now owns 53,783 ha or 132,989 ha. Gresham (through a series of Scottish Limited Partnerships spent at least £135 million acquiring ten new properties. 5/8
Profound UK Holdings Ltd. acquired two large holdings - the Auch and Invermearan Estates. The company is controlled by Ming Tai Tau, Chair of Chinese Estates Holdings in Hong Kong. 6/8
Auchencairn LLP acquired four properties totalling 2301 ha bringing its total landholding across Scotland to 10,612 ha. Auchencairn is controlled by John Hart, founder and managing partner of Inflexion Private Equity. 7/8
Read the report for full details of these and others. I hope the report provides some useful intelligence on the likely impact of the measures contained in the forthcoming land reform bill. 8/8
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