Bill Gates Owns 275,000 Acres of U.S. Farmland —He Explains Why He's Buying So Much...But It's Not the 'Grand Scheme' You Think

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Bill Gates has vowed to give away 99% of his wealth and eventually fall off the billionaire lists. Even so, his fortune keeps sprouting in unexpected places — namely, America's farmland.

According to the 2025 Land Report, Gates ranks 43rd among America's largest private landowners with 275,000 acres. Roughly 248,000 of those acres are active farmland, while other holdings include projects like TerraPower's nuclear facility in Wyoming. It's not the typical billionaire portfolio of yachts or sports teams, but acres of crops stretching across multiple states.

The curiosity surrounding his farmland empire boiled over in 2023 during a Reddit "Ask Me Anything." One user asked him directly: "Why are you buying up so much farmland, do you think this is a problem with billionaire wealth and how much you can disproportionately acquire?"

Gates' reply was blunt: "I own less than 1/4000 of the farmland in the US. I have invested in these farms to make them more productive and create more jobs. There isn't some grand scheme involved—in fact all these decisions are made by a professional investment team."

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By his math, that's about one acre out of every 4,000 in the country — a sliver of America's nearly 900 million acres of farmland, but still a footprint big enough to make headlines. Gates has consistently framed the purchases as professional investments, not personal empire-building.

Why farmland? According to Popular Mechanics, Gates began investing in farmland through Cascade Investment in 2013 because of its steady increase in value and low volatility. And the math backs that up: Mother Jones reported that between 1940 and 2015, the average price of U.S. farmland increased sixfold — a trend expected to continue. It's a sector known less for flash than for stability.

What's actually happening on those acres is conventional, not exotic. Some reports show his farms produce staple crops like corn, soybeans, and potatoes. The land is typically leased to farmers and managed by professionals through Cascade, which Gates credits with making the decisions about acquisitions. His defense has been consistent: investment returns paired with productivity gains and jobs.

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Gates' farmland stake has become a lightning rod because land is so tangible — and so hard to come by for ordinary buyers. At a time when younger generations are priced out of starter homes, the idea of a billionaire owning hundreds of thousands of acres hits a nerve.

That's why the farmland debate dovetails with real estate more broadly. Gates is able to amass tens of thousands of acres across multiple counties via a professional investment structure. Everyday investors, on the other hand, are turning to platforms like Arrived, backed by Jeff Bezos, which lets users buy fractional shares of rental homes starting at $100. The goal is the same: capture the stability and long-term returns of real estate. The scale couldn't be more different.

When Gates told Reddit, "There isn't some grand scheme involved," he meant to quiet the conspiracies. But with 275,000 acres listed under his name, his holdings remain impossible to ignore. Call it a hedge against volatility, call it a symbol of billionaire clout — either way, Gates has managed to turn cornfields and potato plots into one of the most closely watched investments in America.

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This article Bill Gates Owns 275,000 Acres of U.S. Farmland —He Explains Why He's Buying So Much…But It's Not the 'Grand Scheme' You Think originally appeared on Benzinga.com

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