3rd-generation Eastern WA ranch sells for $18M. What’s next for the massive property
A Connell-area ranch held by the same family for three generations has sold to a group of friends in one of the larger real estate sales in Franklin County history.
Their plan is to turn it into a hunting and fishing retreat.
Spokane-area investors paid $18 million for the 13,000-acre property called T Lake Ranch.
The land deal consists of rangeland, a feedlot, its namesake lake and farming circles. The sale closed Nov. 26.
Bryon Clarke and Paul Valentine of Hayden Outdoors Real Estate brokered the agreement. Clarke said it is one of the larger property transactions in county history, particularly for ranches.
It’s an impressive price, but not a record.
“That’s a big sale,” agreed John Rosenau, Franklin County’s assessor. Most recently, the county recorded the $82 million Farmland Reserve sale in June and the $57 million Oakdell Farms sale a year ago.
This buyer is T Lake Cattle Co., a newly formed limited liability company Clarke described as friends who will maintain leasing operations while using the property as a hunting and fishing retreat.
The transaction includes 629 acres of water rights, which will remain with the land, Clarke said.
Michael Schmidt, a fourth-generation rancher as well as commercial broker specializing in ag properties with John L. Scott, wasn’t surprised T Lake sold to sportsmen rather than ranchers. Ranching is challenging and often unprofitable.
He wasn’t involved with the sale, but toured the property with clients and is familiar with the property.
“It’s exactly who we knew would buy it,” he said.
3-generation ag family
The sellers were a brother and sister duo, the third generation of the Camp family to own T Lake.
The family’s history with the ranch dates to 1963, when Louise and Herb Camp brought their deep roots in Washington agriculture to the Connell area.
Herb was born in LaCrosse, Wash., where his great grandfather homesteaded in 1885, according to a 1992 obituary in the Tri-City Herald.
The couple farmed and ranched in LaCrosse for nearly three decades before making the move to Connell. Their son, Larry, and daughter-in-law, Maryette, joined them there a few years later.
The third generation, siblings David and Laurie, owned T Lake as Camp and Camp LLC, property records show.
Clarke said the Camp siblings didn’t live on the property.
Leasing it for rangeland, a cattle feedlot and guided hunting and fishing tours. sustained it and paid the taxes. They wanted to retire and pass it into new hands, according to Clarke.
Hayden Outdoors, a national real estate firm in Colorado with a focus on agricultural properties, was tasked with selling the family property.
Any number of ranches are listed for sale in Washington, but none approaches the scale of T Lake’s 13,000 acres.
Clarke and Valentine marketed it as a unique agricultural, ranching and hunting opportunity. That included dramatic drone video that formed the basis to promote it on its “Life on the Land” program, which is broadcast on The Cowboy Channel and RFD-TV.
It took 204 days to sell.
Complicated property
Clarke said 204 days was a fairly swift sale for such a complex, diverse property.
T Lake Ranch is a collection of irrigated crop land, irrigated pasture, vast swaths of rangeland and a 100-acre feedlot with capacity for 2,500 head of beef cattle.
It is dotted with residential structures, barns, a livestock shed, commodity buildings and other structures, including irrigation pivots.
The ranch has run up to 6,500 head at times.
State corporation records indicate T-Lake Cattle Co. LLC is led by Jason Bryan. A related company, T-Lake Cattle Group LLC, is led by Charles Adams.
T-Lake Cattle Co. and T-Lake Cattle Group are based in Spokane Valley.
The ranch is on Aubert Road, between Scooteney Reservoir and Mesa in north Franklin County.
Camp family history
Maryette and Larry Camp moved to Connell to join Larry’s parents, Louise and Herb Camp, at the ranch in 1967.
The couple took it over in 1996, though a devastating blow would strike just three years later.
Larry Camp and his sister-in-law died in a 1999 wreck on Interstate 84 that spared their spouses.
Son David remembered him as a man whose “handshake was golden” in a news account of the fatal wreck. Maryette Camp died in 2021 and the ranch passed to their children.
Her obituary showed the depth of the family’s commitment to ranching and farming.
“Maryette loved riding in the semi-truck with Larry as they hauled cattle around the Pacific Northwest,” it said. “She enjoyed working the cattle as she was a farm woman through and through.”
This story was originally published December 13, 2024 at 5:00 AM.