I did, and I do. That's not the case man, I, infact, was a larger nation at the time. The reason I got that was because I didn't have enough money to sell it, because it was negative money, towards negative tech. I believe it gave me this message because I did not have -2000 funds, and I was attempting to "buy" -2000 dollars worth. If I hadn't had enough land to sell, it would have told me I did not have enough land. It instead told me I did not have enough funds.
For the record, I can sell land now without any issues