Real estate investors profited by selling to Gwinnett County (Ga.) district

From The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: The Gwinnett County (Ga.) school district spent nearly $9 million more for three properties than the price developers and investors had paid for those parcels just a few months earlier. In a fourth transaction, the district paid $12.5 million for land about a year after investors bought it for $6.5 million. In at least two of the purchases, the real estate groups got the land under contract after — or around the same time — the school district expressed interest in the property, documents and interviews show. The four deals, which occurred between 2005 and 2007, cost the district a total of nearly $42.6 million. Had the school district acquired the property for the same prices the real estate investors paid for it, taxpayers would have saved $14.55 million.