Last Friday (September 16, 2011), Rayonier (RYN) announced its intent to acquire 250,000 acres of timberlands in the US South for $330 million.  Expected to close in the fourth quarter of this year, the deal would bring Rayonier’s timberland ownership to 2.7 million acres and increase its US footprint from nine states to ten, in addition to lands in New Zealand.

• Current RYN states (9):  AL, AR, FL, GA, LA, NY, OK, TX, WA
• States of announced 250,000 acre acquisition (4):  AL, LA, MS, OK
• New states for RYN (1): MS

Year-to-day, RYN has led all timber REITs with a return of 16.21%.  As a sector, the FTR Index of publicly-traded timber REITs has outperformed the public REIT sector (see table).

Strong performance from the timber REITs this past week, as well as the S&P 500, put the sector back into the black for 2011.