WA farmer John Nicoletti continues to buy up WA farms, adding two more premium properties near Newdegate

WA farming stalwart John Nicoletti has added two Newdegate properties worth about $35 million to his portfolio. The new properties mean Mr Nicoletti has become firmly entrenched as one of WA’s biggest private owners of WA farms, amassing at least 70,000ha across the Wheatbelt. Although the transaction is not yet finalised, Mr Nicoletti is also in the process of buying the 12,284ha EDL Farms, a cropping and sheep property, at Lake Magenta, south-east of Newdegate, owned by an overseas investor. The asking price for EDL, listed by Ray White’s Hugh Ness, was $17m-$18m. Earlier this year Mr Nicoletti bought Coonawarrie at Mt Sheridan, a 11,500ha mixed cropping and sheep farm from Ian and Lesla Chamberlain, for $17m. The owners were initially asking $20m for the property, listed by Simon Cheetham of Elders Real Estate. Mr Nicoletti had access to EDL, which continues to be managed by Wes Hall, to plant a crop this year. Once WA’s biggest Wheatbelt farmer, Mr Nicoletti sold his 200,000ha aggregation of eastern Wheatbelt farms in 2019 to the Saudi Agricultural and Livestock Investment Company for about $65m, at the time declaring he was retiring from farming. However, he is building his way back to the top of the ranks of big WA landholders. Under Apache Investments Australia, Mr Nicoletti bought five new properties in 2019 totalling more than 26,000ha and collectively worth $30m. These stretch from Borden to Gingin and to his old stamping ground in the central and eastern Wheatbelt. He has also taken on a 20,000ha lease at Warrenup, near Esperance, outside Apache Investments. Mr Nicoletti could not be contacted but had previously told The West Australian he intended to retire from farming, but “could not help himself”.