By admin 
It’s official, the 700-acre California ranch formerly owned late “Jeopardy!” host Alex Trebek has been sold at auction for $16.9 million — for about half of its original asking price.
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The Windfall Farms property located in the hills between Paso Robles and Creston in San Luis Obispo County was on the market for 39 days and was formerly listed for $33 million through Sotheby’s International Realty.
After receiving a $15 million opening bid, the ranch sold on Friday during a live auction at the RM Sotheby’s stage at Monterey Car Week, Concierge Auctions’ inaugural live real estate auction during the Pebble Beach event, which ran from Aug. 5 to Aug. 15.
“Windfall Farms is the type of extraordinary, highly specialized property that demonstrates the value of a competitive auction process,” Concierge Auctions VP of business development Carolyn Wright said in a news release on Monday. “Our global platform generated meaningful competition among qualified buyers and delivered a definitive result on an accelerated timeline.”
Concierge Auctions told The Tribune via email that it could not yet confirm who had purchased the property, however.
The winery estate located at 4710 Flying Paster Lane was owned by Trebek for nine years and is known for its sustainable local agriculture and celebration of equestrian, ranch and agrarian lifestyles.
Initially developed as the only Kentucky-style thoroughbred farm in California, it is currently operated as a horse training and boarding facility with an extensive farming operation, SLOCal’s website said.
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The property also hosts special events like private parties, corporate outings and weddings.
Beside its celebrity provenance, the release said the 724-acre-property also features a singular private estate — a 10,000-square-foot home with eight bedrooms and 12 bathrooms — and has the potential for a separate destination winery or resort, a legacy vineyard operation or a curated residential community anchored by 76 already approved buildable lots.
The estate also has a working enterprise consisting of 387 acres of premium dry red varietals that are sold under contract to name-brand regional wineries.
But winery operations aren’t the only turnkey feature.
The estate has a Kentucky-style 6.5-furlong racetrack with room for a professional polo field, as well as expansive paddocks, four barns to support the full lifecycle of thoroughbred breeding and training, a training barn adjacent to the racetrack, a foaling barn, a stallion breeding barn and a yearling barn.
Sotheby Internation Realty’s Chris Atkinson said that the company’s partnership with Concierge Auctions gives the estate the attention it deserves.
“Windfall Farms is a property that truly defies category. Its operational vineyard business, equestrian heritage and the sheer scale of what is possible here creates an opportunity that simply cannot be replicated on the Central Coast,” he said in the release.
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