About Us
The Papaian Ranch almost didn’t happen. When we embarked upon our search for the most beautiful property in rural Texas country, our search started and ended in the quaint, small town of Bellville. Population 4,206 as of 2020. To put this into perspective for where we were coming from, my husband was CEO of a nationally-recognized company. At any given day and time, his company had more than double the population of Bellville in his building. So instantly, Bellville was perfect for us!
But the story of how this ranch was built, made us walk away from it. Only to find out, we couldn’t. Today, we are proud to say we are the first residents of our ranch. But we weren't the ones that built it. The story is, in 2014, the previous owner was diagnosed with cancer. He was originally from Texas but moved to California for work and stayed in California for over 30 years. Upon his cancer diagnosis, he fought the disease and ended up beating it. This changed his perspective on work and life. Thus, he retired from his work, moved back to Texas, and among all the land he owned, chose the most beautiful piece and built his dream retirement home on it. He was going to sit on his back porch, watch the sunsets, and sip whiskey next to his wife. Sadly, upon 90% completion of this ranch, his cancer returned. Once again, he fought hard. But this time, it was a battle his body could not endure. He passed away in 2016. His widow couldn’t handle the pain of living out their dream without him by her side and so, this dream retirement ranch was put on the market.
In summer 2017, our schedule only allowed us one day to tour ranches. This ranch was the first home we saw in a long list of ten. It was also the last home we saw that day. We fell in love with it the first instant we saw it. But the sad story of the previous owner hit way too close for me. I couldn’t shake the feeling of familiarity in my husband’s cancer diagnosis and his parallel background with the previous owner. So we passed on it and continued touring other ranches, crossing each one off our list. As beautiful as these other ranches were, a nagging, numbing, inexplicable urge kept tugging at our hearts. We couldn’t get that first ranch out of our minds.
After finishing all the houses on our list, we followed that "tug" in our hearts and went back to see that first ranch one more time. It was the last ranch we saw that day. Because upon walking on the ranch again, the sun was hanging low in its setting and we were met with a glowing, purplish-red haze stretched across the big, vast sky. The colors of red, purple, orange and hints of blue seemed as if they were swimming across the horizon in front of us. As we ran our eyes from west to east, across the entire expanse of the property, we knew. This was it.
Today, The Papaian Ranch sits on over 300 acres of luscious farmland. It showcases 4 ponds of varying sizes and beautiful trees, woods and pastures picturesquely spread across the acreage. Since our purchase in 2017, we have planted over 500 trees, added a small petting zoo of a variety of farm animals, built a chapel, added a rose garden of over 500 rose bushes, planted an orchard of fruit trees, erected two enormous red barns, and planted over hundreds of flowers. The ranch produces fresh eggs daily and fresh meat from pasture-raised and grass-fed cows and chicken. The Papaian Ranch also boasts two large pecan orchards that produce countless of pecans every year. Last year, we recently installed a gorgeous greenhouse launching Papaian Farm for our new one-acre farm-to-table vegetable garden.
Set on the perfect backdrop for private events and destination weddings, we call this home our slice of paradise. Today, we are honored to share our paradise with you.
Sincerely,
Hien Papaian