In my opinion, high priced prime farm land in the corn belt and high rental rates for farm ground is being driven by speculation on corn and other comodities and we all know that the high commodity prices of today will only last until the farmers all start to really produce which drives supply up and demand(price) down. It may be next year or it maybe five years from now but with commodity production, supply and demand drive the price and the supply.
Land price has several drivers, the biggest one today seems to be development.If you figure out what you can net per acre in dollars from farming it correctly and then figure out what an acceptable return on investment(ROI) will be for you, you can SCOPE OUT AN APPROXIMATE VALUE.
Say you want a yearly 10% ROI( not really a high value for a business but darned high for an ag investment)and you could make a net $100/acre for the land, machinery, bldgs, livestock, taxes, fertilizer,etc (not the house cuz ya" gotta live somewhere) and management, that meants that the total investment cost per acre for all these inputs spread over the farm has to be $1000/acre($100/0.10). Next you figure the per acre costs for machinery, buildings, inputs, etc, every thing except the land value, and then sum them up and subtract them from a $1000/acre and that will be an ESTIMATE of the value of the land for ag purposes. I used this methodology be cause I ranched on a small scale and had pretty good cost numbers to plug into the model to scope out the "real value" of ag land when we went out to find our ranch. We exceeded the ag land value predicted by this method ($890-$1100/acre by a factors of 1.5-1.8 but we were able to rationalize that by some other intangibles that had value to us and were hard to put a $ value on.)
I will stick my neck out and say no matter how you cut it, unless your cows have golden calves, or you have figured out how to grow 5 carat diamonds by the ton, development value for the land will far exceed the ag value for the ground. There are those that say that this analysis method doesn"t account for this, that , etc and it doesn"t. However, the totally rigorous method would lower the land value for ag purposes even more. I offer it here as a tool to help you get a scoping cost on ag land. You buy in a free market so the real value is what any potential buyer is willng to pay. The final price will almost always be whatever the highest offer is. There are exceptions but they are rare.
We sell tractor parts! We have the parts you need to repair your tractor - the right parts. Our low prices and years of research make us your best choice when you need parts. Shop Online Today. [ About Us ]
Today's Featured Article - 12-Volt Conversions for 4-Cylinder Ford 2000 & 4000 Tractors - by Tommy Duvall. After two summers of having to park my old 1964 model 4000 gas 4 cyl. on a hill just in case the 6 volt system, for whatever reason, would not crank her, I decided to try the 12 volt conversion. After some research of convert or not, I decided to go ahead, the main reason being that this tractor was a working tractor, not a show tractor (yet). I did keep everything I replaced for the day I do want to restore her to showroom condition.
... [Read Article]
Latest Ad:
1964 I-H 140 tractor with cultivators and sidedresser. Starts and runs good. Asking 2650. CALL RON AT 502-319-1952
[More Ads]
All Rights Reserved. Reproduction of any part of this website, including design and content, without written permission is strictly prohibited. Trade Marks and Trade Names contained and used in this Website are those of others, and are used in this Website in a descriptive sense to refer to the products of others. Use of this Web site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy
TRADEMARK DISCLAIMER: Tradenames and Trademarks referred to within Yesterday's Tractor Co. products and within the Yesterday's Tractor Co. websites are the property of their respective trademark holders. None of these trademark holders are affiliated with Yesterday's Tractor Co., our products, or our website nor are we sponsored by them. John Deere and its logos are the registered trademarks of the John Deere Corporation. Agco, Agco Allis, White, Massey Ferguson and their logos are the registered trademarks of AGCO Corporation. Case, Case-IH, Farmall, International Harvester, New Holland and their logos are registered trademarks of CNH Global N.V.