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Walton Global sells 1,215 acres in Grayson County; land entitled for over 7,000 homes

A major real estate investment and land asset management company has closed the sale of 1,215 acres of land in Grayson County that could eventually accommodate more than 7,000 homes and ancillary uses.

Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Walton Global, which has $3.4 billion under management, sold the property, called Kimberlin Heights, for an undisclosed amount.

David Peter, executive vice president of Walton Global, called the sale “an exciting next step for the property.”

The original entitlements on the property, which date back to before Walton bought the land in 2010, allow for as many as 6,800 single-family homes, 1,450 apartments, plus retail, office, schools and industrial use, Peter said in an interview with the Dallas Business Journal. The acreage is agricultural land now, he said.

“The Dallas North Tollway is supposed to go either through or adjacent to it so it’d be accessible to the tollway when that gets up there,” Peter said. “That road is intended to continue up through and past this property.”

The Dallas-Fort Worth market is sizzling, and Walton Global plans to continue to buy and sell aggressively in the market, Peter said.

As a result of the land sale, a distribution of about $36 million will be made to Walton investors for the property.

The land is within the Grayson County Double Platinum Ranch Water Control and Improvement District No. 1.

Walton Global, a path-of-growth land buyer and seller, originally acquired almost 34,000 acres in Texas, including more than 21,000 acres in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.

According to the company’s estimates, Walton Global’s existing portfolio could translate into over 100,000 new homes throughout Texas once the land has been provided to homebuilders. The firm plans to acquire about 2,500 more acres in Texas this year, which the company estimates could ultimately accommodate 10,000 new homes.

Of the acreage Walton Global currently owns or manages in North Texas, several large parcels are in Grayson and Ellis Counties.

“We continue to buy more properties in and around the Dallas market and we continue to sell properties in and around the Dallas-Fort Worth market,” Peter told the Business Journal. “Grayson County, in particular, has seen a lot of attention as a result of the big Texas Instruments plant that’s going in up in Sherman, but the toll road as well and just natural growth and migration in Dallas-Fort Worth market (make it attractive).

“Really all of Texas has been a very robust economic development environment. There are lots of jobs and lots of people moving there. So I think it continues to bode well for us as a new investor and as a seller.”

Outside of North Texas, Walton Global originally owned about 11,400 acres in Austin and about 1,400 acres in Houston.