Last updated: September 30, 2026. The court monitor's docket shows no new orders or filings since the Aug 19 Arizona sale approval, so the next hard date is the Oct 15 binding bid deadline. This page gets updated as the story develops, so bookmark it.
The biggest farmland story in Canada right now isn't a policy file or a trade spat. It's one Saskatchewan farm putting 274,000 acres on the market at the same time. Here's the whole saga in one place: what happened, what's for sale, what's sold, and the dates that matter next.
📖 The story in 30 seconds
Swift Current-based Monette Farms grew from a family operation into one of North America's largest private farms, with roughly 274,000 acres owned, plus a couple hundred thousand more leased, across Saskatchewan, Manitoba, B.C., Alberta, Montana, Arizona and Colorado.
Then the bill came due. On April 15, 2026, a syndicated loan originally worth $950 million matured, and the company couldn't cover it. Monette filed for creditor protection under the CCAA (Canada's version of Chapter 11), kept farming on $90 million of court-approved emergency financing, and in June a judge signed off on a plan to list essentially all of the land for sale.
Brokers started marketing the properties on June 29. Bids run through the fall, with the whole process wrapping by the end of November.
🔢 The key numbers
The number | What it is |
|---|---|
274,000 acres | Owned land listed for sale |
~$1.04 billion | Appraised value of the land package |
~117,000 acres | The Saskatchewan portion alone |
~$950 million | Original syndicate loan (2018), led by Scotiabank |
~$1 billion | Total liabilities at filing |
$88.2M of $90M | DIP financing drawn as of July 31 to get the crop in the ground |
208 | Prospective buyers who've received marketing teasers and signed NDAs so far |
$1.9 million | What SCIC says Monette owes on a crop-insurance overpayment, unresolved as of Aug 25 |
What's for sale, jurisdiction by jurisdiction:
Jurisdiction | Acres | Lead broker |
|---|---|---|
Saskatchewan | ~117,000–129,000 | Hammond Realty, with Sutton-Harrison Realty and Royal LePage Martin-Liberty |
Montana | 54,482 | Premier Land Company |
Manitoba | ~49,000 | Hammond Realty |
British Columbia | ~45,000 | LandQuest Realty Corp. |
Colorado | 4,079 | Clark & Associates Land Brokers |
Arizona | 3,157 | Southwest Land Associates |
Sask range reflects reporting variance across sources; treat 117K–129K as the working range rather than a single hard figure. The two U.S.-restriction-free provinces (Sask, Man) cap non-resident buyers at 40 acres each, while the ~61,700 acres in Montana, Colorado and Arizona have no such cap.
The cash clock is the real deadline now. As of July 31, Monette had drawn $88.2M of the $90M DIP facility, leaving $12.3M cash on hand. The monitor's forecast has that falling to just $5M by Nov 13, the exact day creditor protection expires. The land doesn't just need to sell. It needs to sell inside a window now measured in weeks, not months.
🗓️ Timeline so far
Dec 2018: Monette signs a $950M senior credit facility with a lender syndicate (Scotiabank, BMO, RBC, CIBC, TD, CWB, Conexus, EDC), fueling years of aggressive expansion.
April 15, 2026: The loan matures with ~$830M outstanding. Monette can't pay and becomes insolvent.
Late April 2026: CCAA filing. Creditor protection granted; FTI Consulting appointed monitor.
May 2026: Court approves $90M in DIP financing so the farm can seed. Cattle are sold to clear an ~$11.8M Farm Credit Canada loan. An early $28.9M land sale closes.
May 1, 2026: 19 Saskatchewan parcels near Hafford, plus buildings, grain storage and equipment, are approved for sale to G and K Walter Farms and Harvesting Ltd. through an expedited sale-approval and vesting-order track that runs alongside the main SISP. The deal closes May 13.
June 12, 2026: Justice R.W. Armstrong approves the Sale and Investment Solicitation Process (SISP) and extends creditor protection to Nov 13.
June 29, 2026: Brokers begin listing all 274,000 acres. Sask and Manitoba land (~177,000 acres, ~$725M) is flagged as "restricted" because provincial rules cap foreign ownership at 40 acres.
Week of July 6, 2026: B.C. properties hit the market, though a broker (LandQuest Realty) wasn't picked until late July. LandQuest is marketing 11 ranch packages totalling ~45,000 acres, land Monette had tried and failed to sell before.
July 31, 2026: B.C. goes fully live, the last jurisdiction to do so, roughly ten weeks before bids close. Monette has drawn $88.2M of its $90M DIP facility to get through the growing season, with $12.3M cash on hand. FTI's update says marketing teasers and NDAs have gone out to 208 potential buyers since SISP launched.
Aug 10, 2026: A new affidavit surfaces a wrinkle: Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corp says Monette owes $1.9M from a 2023-24 overpayment and wants it back by Aug 15 to keep 2026 crop coverage in place. The same affidavit shows the Aguila property was marketed by directly contacting 17 prospective buyers, drawing 41 listing-platform hits and 37 broker-website views, and just one offer.
Aug 19, 2026: First sale approved. A King's Bench justice in Calgary signs off on Byner Cattle Co. (Nevada) buying ~3,100 acres at Aguila, Arizona, plus a cold storage facility and seed plant. Price is under seal by a separate order; Darrel Monette's affidavit argued disclosure "could impact any future sale process." An omnibus Chapter 15 hearing follows Aug 25, but no order recognizing the sale has posted to the U.S. docket.
Sept 1, 2026: The restriction barring the monitor from designating winning bids lifts. Bids submitted on or before today aim for court approval by Oct 31; bids arriving after today and before Oct 15 aim for approval by the Nov 30 process-termination date. Since creditor protection itself expires Nov 13, anything landing late in that second window needs its own extension just to close.
⏭️ The dates to watch
✅ Sept 1: Done. The monitor can now designate winning bids on offers already submitted.
Oct 15: Binding bid deadline.
Oct 31: Target for court approval of bids submitted on or before Sept 1.
Nov 13: Creditor protection expires. Also the day the monitor's cash forecast has Monette down to $5M on hand.
Nov 30: Process-termination date; target approval for bids submitted between Sept 1 and Oct 15.
💰 What's sold so far
Land near Regina: $41.18M
17,000 acres at Havre, Montana: $47.5M (USD)
Stewart Valley, Sask.: 12,932 acres for $54M, about 158% over its 2025 appraisal 👀
Hafford, Sask.: 19 parcels (2,553 acres), plus buildings, grain storage and equipment, for $29M to G and K Walter Farms and Harvesting Ltd. Approved May 1 through an expedited track, closed May 13.
Waldeck, Sask.: 485 acres for $1.78M
Aguila, Arizona: ~3,100 acres plus a cold storage facility and seed plant, to Byner Cattle Co. of Nevada, the only offer the property drew. Price is under seal by court order; Monette argued disclosure could hurt future sales. Court-approved Aug 19, though the transfer still needs a nod from the U.S. bankruptcy side under Chapter 15, and no order had posted as of Sept 1.
That Stewart Valley premium is the number to remember: the company's own counsel has said don't expect fire-sale prices, since this is a court-supervised sale, not a bankruptcy auction.
🏔️ B.C. is the cautionary tale here
The ~45,000 B.C. acres aren't just slow movers, they're on their third attempt at a sale. A first try at a Jan 9 deadline drew no buyers. A second attempt through a Ritchie Bros. tender-by-auction closed March 3, also with no sale, with title concerns blamed at the time. The ground is now relisted as 11 packages with LandQuest Realty. If a Prairie-scale seller with 274,000 acres to move still can't clear B.C. ranch land twice, that's worth remembering next time someone tells you Prairie farmland only ever goes up.
🚨 The open question: is the 2026 crop even insured?
The newest wrinkle doesn't involve land at all. An Aug 10 affidavit revealed Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corp says an audit of the 2023-24 crop year turned up a $1.9M overpayment to Monette, and SCIC wants it back by Aug 15 to keep this year's coverage valid.
Monette, FTI, and the farm's lender are pushing back, arguing the $1.9M is a pre-filing debt that SCIC can't use as leverage to yank coverage mid-CCAA. As of Aug 25, no court filing has resolved it either way. Premiums are typically settled after harvest, so the whole dispute could turn out to be moot if this year's yields clear the payout threshold. Worth watching, not yet an emergency.
🚜 What it means for your farm gate
Land values. 117,000 Saskatchewan acres hitting the market at once is unprecedented. If it sells strong (see: Stewart Valley), it validates current land prices. If parcels sit, it's the first real stress test of the Prairie land market in years.
The buyer pool is you. Foreign-ownership rules cap non-resident buyers at 40 acres in Sask and Manitoba, so the realistic buyers for most of this land are neighbouring farms, Canadian investors, and Canadian funds.
A once-in-a-generation expansion window. If there's ever been a moment to talk to your lender about the quarter next door, hundreds of parcels arriving on the market at once is it.
Watch how crop insurance treats insolvency. The SCIC dispute is worth following even if you've never touched a Monette acre. How an insurer handles a producer under creditor protection could set a precedent for how any of us get treated if things go sideways.
🌾 Our coverage so far
👉 Monette Farms' 274,000-Acre Land Sale Goes Live (June 30)
👉 A Megafarm Fire Sale Lands on Saskatchewan (June 22)
👉 More farmland stories: the Farmland archive
🔗 Primary sources
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