• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, November 30, 2011

Another sizeable metropolitan daily newspaper has changed hands this week, with the acquisition of the Omaha World-Herald Company, publisher of The World-Herald, by Berkshire Hathaway Inc., the investment company founded by billionaire investor and Omaha native Warren Buffett.

The purchase price of $200 million included $150 million in cash and the assumption of $50 million in debt by Berkshire Hathaway, according to Buffett, who provided details of the deal in an interview with The World-Herald. The deal also gives Berkshire Hathaway possession of a handful of daily and weekly newspapers located in smaller towns around Nebraska and Iowa.

Separately, Buffett stated: “World-Herald delivers solid profits and is one of the best-run newspapers in America. ... We are also delighted to report that the editorial independence that Nebraskans and Iowans have come to expect from the World-Herald will continue.”

The acquisition comes as something of a surprise in light of Buffett’s previous statements about the inadvisability of investing in newspapers. Berkshire Hathaway owns The Buffalo News, serving Buffalo, NY, and also has a stake in the Washington Post Co. But it has declined to expand its newspaper holdings in recent years, citing the long-term secular downturn resulting from the shift to digital media.

The World-Herald is the 49th-largest newspaper in the country as measured by the daily distribution of the printed newspaper. It also is in the top 10 newspapers in the country in terms of the percentage of households in its market that subscribe, per the newspaper.

This isn’t the only sizeable metro daily to change hands this year. In mid-November The San Diego Union-Tribune was sold by Platinum Equity to MLIM, LLC, a company owned by San Diego real estate developer Doug Manchester, for an undisclosed sum. Platinum Equity had purchased the newspaper from the Copley Press in May 2009.