A Missouri company accused a Magnolia timber appraiser and forestry management services company of making errors when handling about 4,200 acres of timberland.
How much did Gross & Janes Co. of Kirkwood, Missouri, lose as result of working with Jeff Neill Timberland Management Inc.?
More than $2 million, according to the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in El Dorado.
The case started in late 2011, when Gross & Janes wanted to buy 4,200 acres of timberland to make railroad ties.
The timberland management company was hired to do the forestry appraisal to determine if G&J should buy the land in Arkansas and Louisiana from the Smith-Turner Land Co. of Springhill, Louisiana. The lawsuit didn’t say exactly where the property was located.
Jeff Neill Timberland Management’s report said that the value of the timber was between $5.8 million and $6.4 million, according to the lawsuit.
G&J said it relied on the appraisal when it made the purchase in January 2012 but didn’t list the purchase price. G&J’s attorney, Brian Ratcliff of El Dorado, didn’t return a call.
Sometime after the purchase, G&J “learned the actual value of the standing timber on the parcels was significantly less than represented by” the timberland management firm, according to the lawsuit.
Before learning that, however, G&J had hired the defendant as forestry manager for the property, and G&J said the company didn’t do that properly either.
“The actual value of the timber cut on the property since the sale and while under the management of [Jeff Neill Timberland Management] significantly exceeds the amounts paid to” G&J, the lawsuit said.
Jeff Neill Timberland Management hadn’t filed a response to the lawsuit as of Thursday.
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