Some of the farmland listed for sale by the Assemi family is owned by third parties who had not given the family authorization to sell, data obtained by The Sun finds.
Data acquired by The Sun finds that some of the third parties – who are invested in Assemi operations – did not know that the Assemi family planned to sell Maricopa Orchards and Touchstone Pistachio Company.
The backstory: The Assemi family is shopping around 52,000 acres, putting its farming operations up for sale, as first reported by The Sun.
- The total value of Maricopa, Touchstone and all of the land is estimated around $2 billion.
- Around 28,000 acres are currently planted with almond and pistachio trees, as well as 10,000 acres that are optioned for solar panels.
The big picture: The Assemi family’s farming operations have some outside investors that own parts of larger farms.
- One such example is in west Fresno County, the site of a 3,000-acre Assemi farm that has more than 600 acres of pistachio and almond orchards owned by outside investors.
- Sources with knowledge told The Sun that outside investors were unaware that their property was being incorporated as part of the Project Green pitch by the Assemi family.
