Bargains for Big-Time Shoppers

A 17,000-acre town in northern Michigan (price: $5.9 million). One 420-acre town in northern Michigan (price: $5.9 million). One 420-acre island in the west Caribbean ($2.9 million). The 600-acre Ponderosa ranch in Incline Village, Nev., where part of the 1960s television series Bonanza was filmed ($10 million). An oil refinery in Alberta, Canada, Bob Hope's 10,000 acres of California land and several Learjets. Those were just a few of the big-buck items available last week at the Sales Trade and Purchase International, a two-day event in Reno, described by Orga nizer Brian Lovig as a "swap meet for the elite."

For a $5,000 registration fee, top-shelf shoppers were greeted at the airport by young women in tuxedos and whisked by limousine to the MGM Grand Hotel, where they were lectured by Economist Arthur Laffer and entertained by Bob Hope as they mingled with other high rollers. Inside the hotel's Capitol Room, even those who were not striking deals said that they had got their money's worth. "I'm always interested in finding out what's happening in the marketplace, and it's not always easy to find out what's happening," explained G. Allan Kingston, regional manager for the Dallas-based Tecon Realty Corp. "I'd rather meet in an atmosphere where it's congenial and you know the people are legitimate." Lovig, 32, is an enterprising Canadian speculator who says that he "hollered for money" as an auctioneer before he began devoting all his time four years ago to a Canadian holding company that invests in apartment buildings, shopping centers and real estate. Lovig got the idea for the event from the experience of running his own business, in which he found himself doing more traveling, but making fewer transactions. By organizing a meeting of businessmen with similar interests and fortunes, he hoped to attract as many as 500 participants. Though only 55 attended the swap, Lovig declared himself "unhappily happy" about the event. Said he: "I'm unhappy there's not a larger crowd, but I'm happy because when was the last time so many people like this gathered in one office?" Lovig, who might repeat the event next year, had another reason to be satisfied. In the first 20 minutes of the swapping, he traded his Learjet for a casino in Las Vegas.

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