Paulson Said to Buy 875 Acres of Land in Las Vegas Area

Paulson & Co., the hedge fund run by billionaire John Paulson, purchased more than 875 acres of land in a resort community in the Las Vegas area, a bet on a housing recovery in the region as the supply of homes shrinks.

The $17 million purchase at Lake Las Vegas in Henderson, Nevada, was made through the Paulson Real Estate Recovery Fund, which seeks to build houses on raw land and resell the properties to homebuilders, said a person with knowledge of the deal.

The fund bought the majority of what remains undeveloped at the 3,600-acre (1,456-hectare) site, said the person, who asked not to be named because the details were private. The deal was among the largest land purchases in the area in at least three years, according to Greg Gross, director of the Nevada region for Metrostudy, a Houston-based firm that tracks new construction. The Las Vegas area has fewer than 13,000 vacant lots for homebuilding, a small portion of which are for sale, he said. Inventories of available properties also have declined in the past year as foreclosures in Nevada slid.

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