Opinion on land values for the future

for those of you in rural areas What do you expect the value to
Do in the next say 20 years. Will it be somewhat stagnant like the last 20 or
Go up like from the eighties to the 90-2000's

I think that farm land within 30 minutes drive of a major city will continue to rapidly escalate in price. I think that farm land that is further out will show slow growth, linked to soybean and grain prices. Wooded land, especially if not tillable if cleared, will probably remain more stagnant in price, except in areas where resorts are developed, or if it is within an hour drive of a major city.

Keith

Rural farm land in WI certainly was not stagnant in the last 20 years. The largest and fastest increases in rural ( farm land) came from about 2005 to 2014. Average farm land prices in that time in Wi more than doubled. There has been a leveling off or a slight drop the last 3-5 years. The negative thing about buying farm land currently is that it may fall quite a bit over the next couple years if we don't get our trade issues resolved, but prices will come back and continue to rise, but from an investment point of view buying tillable farm land for 4-8,000 an acre requires a lot of cash or leverage. also one needs a good rate of return from rent or crops to cover the costs.
The one advantage of buying ag land in WI is dairy farmers need land to raise crops and spread manure. The average farm needs about 2-2.5 acres per cow to handle the feed needs and manure application.
With the dairy economy in the toilet for the last 3 years they are more inclined to rent than buy. If you buy an 80 with say 70 tillable for say 400K and you borrow all the money your annual payments will be about 30k per year.
If a dairy farmer pays you $250 per acre for the tillable you will only need about 14 k from other sources to pay the rest of the mortgage and the taxes which are extremely low on ag land.
There may be other investments that will yield as good of a return without the steep entrance fee. Currently land is an investment for those with lots of available cash that don't like securities, gold or silver.
Bryce

Land prices have shot up here in the last 20 years. In my area in particular they have tripled, or more, on some tracts.

Oil and gas money and/or recreational buyers seem to be the driving force.

As of late, however, they seem to have leveled off.

You get out in western KS or eastern CO land prices are still based on potential ag revenues from cattle or crops relating to livestock feed. In populated areas like northeast KS prices keep going up. People buy ground at big numbers not for lumber sales but hunting. Ground is then leased to a cowboy for grazing. Often its because someone just wants to live outside the city. Some real mansions around here out in the middle of nowhere. Its value to produce calves or grow livestock feed is never considered.

Any one care to throw some numbers out there? Virginia land in my neck of the woods is $10,000 + per acre. 20 miles from town. It's been expensive like this for 10-15 years.

there is stuff going that high on the outskirts of the Kansas City Lawrence area. Some even higher on small properties. There are lots in the city bringing 100,000 plus. get out in far west ks 700-1200 an acre. A livable home can be bought out there under 50,000 in those small towns.

https://www.realtor.com/realestatea...ve_Collyer_KS_67631_M89797-51334?view=qv

That listing is pretty cool, Danny. Any house with an acre of land under $100,000 is sold within a week or two here.

Since no more is being made I would not think it is going down much....

We purchased a piece 7 months ago. We were recently contacted and offered 3X what we paid for it.

When the wife and I came back to the farm after college in 1998. We bought a nice house in town. It was pretty small 900 square feet, but it came with almost an entire city block. We payed $7,800 for it as a recall. Nice place!! Sold it in 2002 for $14,000.

In Wisconsin unless some one is kind enough to build a mega Dairy , Hog farm or , chicken operation on your lot line. it would be hard to loose money on build able land in WI.

after all there is only so much Wisconsin and every FIB wants to own a piece of it.

land here in the u p of mi. goes for 700 to 1500 per acer, higher if on water

Amish got rich off mineral rights and land in southern PA and are all relocating to my area driving land prices sky high.money is no option to them and the have realators under contract looking for places for them.

I have bought and sold land through out my life time. I can say I never lost one dime on land. I never buy anything if it has structures on it. I have sold land for 15K an acre and bought junk land for very little and worth a lot today from what is was at one time.

So, in a nut shell land IMO continues to have value which goes up, BUT you my have to own it for a while and find the right person to make that profit. I have had experts say land is a bad investment and advise not to buy, but I have found out differently.

I should have stated hunting/rec land, not farm land

Most of the land in my neck of the woods is recreational/ hunting land.

i bought 45 acres with a new septic ,has a well and electric. no buildings, 75%wooded ,a bit wet in some areas, great WT-hunting property.
was gonna build but got a house and 28 acres right down the road for 130K.
this was 12 years ago, paid 1850. for vacant land. other land now around the area 3800 pa. and up for same property. rich Pittsburgh-Cleveland folk with cash buying it up.

Hunting land in this area (far north central WI) has done nothing for 10 years. Paper Companies sold a lot of acreage creating a glut and now the CWD has made people very cautious about buying land. Most of the available acreage has sat on the market for several years. I don't see it as a good investment and I own 100+ acres of it. Lake property is an entirely different story.

I bought 20 acres of rugged mountain last year. Went to the bar for lunch after the closing and ended up selling it to the man who owned the bar for 10k more (all cash) than I had just paid for it. Owned it for about 2 hours lol! Like anything, there is value in ANY land if you BUY at the right price. I do have a couple other mountain properties which I got at super low prices when the market crashed a few years ago that I am holding for future value increases. Could have sold one parcel for double what I paid but couldn't bring myself to let go of the best hunting land we have in the family. Buying/selling intrigues me to the point that I think I missed my calling as a realtor. I only wish I would've had the financial means to begin the game about 20 years ago. I have a friend who has made an absolute fortune doing just that. My problem is that it doesn't take me long to become attached to any place in the mountains and it's hard to let go sometimes. I look at it like this: I've already bought those parcels for much less than it's appraised value, bought paid in full from other flips, if nothing else it will be something I can leave to the kids. Land was something I wasn't blessed to have passed on to me.

We have a 10+ acre lot in New Jersey, on a hill with great views, listed with a realtor for $75,000 ($7,500 per acre). 35 miles from the cities (New York metropolitan area) and can't even get a bite on it.

Wish i could see the future, but sadly i can't.

Ag land around me here in southern MN has definitely dropped in value over the past 3-5 years. By the tune of about $2,000-$4,000 an acre. The high water mark was about 4-5 years ago where the average field sold was $8,000-$10,000 with the high end hitting $12,000. Today, land is regularly sold at $5,000-$7000/acre range. There is the odd outlier that will bring a premium, but they are far from the norm. The closer you are to a large metro area, the more these values will go up. My wooded hunting land in Buffalo County Wisconsin sold for nearly $5000/acre 4 years ago, which to me was an obscene price. But someone was willing to buy it and several other properties that connected to it. I expect that land values will increase again in the future, but it won't be anytime too soon. In fact, land values could continue lower over the next few years before making the turn higher. Farming just isn't profitable enough to afford $10,000/acre payments or $300-$400/acre rent. People are struggling to pay $200/acre rent these days. Banks are becoming less and less willing to invest into the ag sector as there isn't any light at the end of the tunnel showing.

Hunting type land here has gone way up, then dropped back down in the last few years. It is still high priced....just not quite as high. Back in the late 80's/early 90's there was a timber company that had large holdings in the county to the west. It had been all planted in Hybrid poplar some years before, and the planting did poorly. This company decided to unload the land. It went for $350 per acre if you bought at least an 80 at once. Within a few years that land was selling for $1500 per acre. Some fellas did very well when they flipped it. The price is well under that today.

Lot of land in north central WI that is listed for 700 to 2000 per acre depending upon how low and wet it is, status of the forest and timber and access. During the late 90s when there were lots of deer in Northern WI those same acres were probably 50 to 100% higher. The disadvantage of recreational land in WI is it is taxed at much higher rates per acre than ag land. An 80 of ag land selling for 320K is not taxed as high as 80 acres of woods selling for 1K. Timber sales are not high, deer are not common and the status of hunting in our state is changing.

Bryce

What's the nearest town?

Any one else have something to share on real estate?

Sussex

I am 73 years old. In my area I have seen housing go up and down (mostly up), but I don't think I have ever seen bare land go down. The 1 acre lot my house sits on is valued at ten times what I paid for it in the late 70's. Lots of other places I have looked at, just keeps going up.

Ttt.