Farm land value over time

[Foggy47]

Interesting that MN, IL, and IN are that much lower! I wonder if the scales used by each state are apples to apples or at least close? Maybe there are other attributes like drainage, topography, and farmability built in?

Northern MN and Southern MN would be light years apart. Not sure if these things are factored in?

 

[Hoytvectrix]

Interesting that MN, IL, and IN are that much lower! I wonder if the scales used by each state are apples to apples or at least close? Maybe there are other attributes like drainage, topography, and farmability built in?

They did not factor for any of those other attributes like drainage or irrigation. Technically they are built into the averages for an entire state (i.e. Nebraska having lots of irrigation), but aren't very helpful within a state because they lack that information right now.

The guest on the podcast mentioned that MN is unique because of the diverse growing regions. He mentioned northern MN has a technically high productivity index, but a low rating for some crops like corn that need a longer growing season. I am sure that as they build this report out, it will get more details and conditions you can filter by.

 

[Hoytvectrix]

Something not really mentioned is that prices for tillable acres are notoriously difficult to track. This report attempted to compare across states and set some values according to soil conditions.

 

[FarmerDan]

On the most recent episode of the Land Podcast, one of the data scientists from Acre.com was on to present a land value report they had created for the Heartland (mostly Midwestern states). They present data for price per acre, per tillable acre, and per productivity index. You can download the report for free from their website, but you need to give them your email. This report mostly includes data relevant to tillable acres, but they do track recreation land on their website. Some of the more interesting things from the report is the presentation of price per productivity index trends across states and time.

As this type of data becomes more and more accessible, I would imagine finding good deals is going to be more and more difficult.

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There's a lot to decipher on that one chart. And there's a lot of manipulation of data presented for a general geographic area. I'm not saying it's bad. It's just hard to apply to specific conditions and situations. And states are a bad way to characterize agriculture. Land doesn't change at the state line but it does within a state.

I often wonder if, unconsciously when we talk about land values related to recreation and/or agriculture, we remember the most extreme numbers (like $35k an acre) and not the typical?

Averages are handy ways to summarize data but to calculate the average means (probably) there are numbers on either side.