A sprawling property with enormous development opportunity has traded hands in Darien, Connecticut.

The approximately 52-acre Ziegler Farm, once owned by the baking powder baron William Ziegler, has sold for $57.5 million, making it the state’s third highest sale of the year, according to a release from the listing brokerage. 

While getting Connecticut’s bronze medal for priciest transaction of 2023, the final price was a far cry from the $85 million it originally listed for back in the summer of 2022. 

The buyer is unknown, and the sellers are Ziegler’s descendants, according to the Wall Street Journal, which first reported news of the deal.

Ziegler — who enjoyed yachting and doing polar research in the Arctic when he wasn’t being a baking powder mogul — bought up a great deal of acreage in the area around the turn of the 20th century, ahead of his 1905 death. 

The freshly offloaded waterfront estate is located adjacent to Connecticut’s Great Island, once Ziegler’s summer place, and today is one of the largest remaining undeveloped pieces of land in the area, according to the release. 

(Great Island also happened to sell earlier this year, to the town of Darien, for $85 million.) 

The only building on the Ziegler Farm is an old cow barn, but there’s great potential: The farm comes with approved plans to build up to 14 homes. 

There are also two paved private roads, water, electric and sewer lines already in place. 

Its stretch along Long Neck Point Road “features picturesque waterfront living and is near the stunning 8+ acre Pear Tree Point Town Beach,” boasts the listing, which was held by Leslie McElwreath and Joseph Barbieri of Sotheby’s International Realty – Greenwich Brokerage. “Rarest of opportunities to buy undeveloped land in desirable Darien renowned for excellent schools, beautiful parks and a vibrant downtown with fine dining and shopping all 40 +/- miles to NYC.”