Ha! Now I have a story here to contribute. My grandfather always wanted to own a farm and an orchard. He was a well to do man so he bought himself some land and sank money into the farm probably 30 years.. by the time I was old enough to recall.. the place had some nice trees, a cow and a pit converted into a swimming hole. Then a highway came through and the government wanted the land.. grandfather refused to sell. So the government compulsorily acquired a part of the farm and left the rest alone. It became pretty shifty farm since there was no privacy and pollution from all the trucks. Finally when grandfather passed on, my dad and uncles let the place run down.. and 15 years later sold it to a developer to make an office Park for probably 50x the money government had offered.