For those that have sold a farm- Why? Regrets? Lessons Learned?
- Thread starter gjs4
- Start date
Tree Spud
5 year old buck +
Had a 300 acre parcel with great deer hunting and good bucks. It had a WRP easement on most and that became a problem. The NRCS tried to force removal of all deer stands & blinds by Dec 31st, permit to have a lock on a gate, restricted to no food plots, held up food plot permit for over a year because of an endangered spotted newt 2 miles away, can't mow trails, etc. etc. No regrets whatsoever.
Howboutthemdawgs
5 year old buck +
And you described why I will never enroll any of my farms into government or other programs. I have 60 acres I’m most likely pulling out of crop and putting into the equivalent of crp. Would pay me close to $10,000 a year if I enrolled it. Not a prayer. Not having some agency tell me what I can and cannot do on my land.
Sold a 250 because the living arrangements weren’t adequate for a family and didn’t have access to convenient power. Good property but I was sick of living like I was still at one of our old school hunting camps. I would spend a hour every time I came shop vacuuming lady bugs.
Wow. Thats surprising. I don’t hear anything like that here. In my part of the country WRP land is universally deer and duck hunted, managed, and manipulated heavily for that purpose. Hundreds of thousands of acres, I’d guess. It has been the fastest appreciating recreational real estate in the last 20 years in this region, selling for less than $1k/ac after enrollment. I think some enrollees are even performing timber thinning operations today.
To stay on topic, I will sell all or part of my 85 as soon as something better comes along. I’m shopping every day and have been for awhile. I bought it thinking it’d be a lifetime place and started trying to add to it within 12 months. After about 3 years, I realized my long term goals were to have more land than I’d likely be able to accumulate in that spot.
Last edited:
swat1018
5 year old buck +
I've bought and sold a lot of land in the last 25 years. Started buying farm ground in the Midwest when I could save enough for a decent down payment. Then I would finance what the cash rent would cover. Bought several farms that way. Stumbled into several that were large and way below market value. I kept flipping stuff and doing 1031 exchanges into hunting ground. I eventually sold all of the farm ground, and moved west to NEMO and bought a couple good size hunting farms that I plan to hold. It's my life insurance for my wife, when I go she won't want or need the trouble, and she can live a long time on the proceeds.
bwoods11
5 year old buck +
I’ve bought and sold a number of farms as investment & hunting. I usually look at investment first, basically 50/50 farms and/or I try to buy it with hunting in combination, or improve it .
I’m getting to the point of being happy with what I have. But I still look for deals.
I’m getting to the point of being happy with what I have. But I still look for deals.
Oleo
A good 3 year old buck
I’m interested in buying and selling land. Do you guys have any tips for finding good deals? Are you waiting for good deals on land that get listed, going to land auctions, or contacting land owners on unlisted land?
What is a 50/50 farm?
Where i am getting lost is buying hunting land with a revenue income stream. I wouldn't mind paying on the investment and gaining equity, but the current one appears to be a great investment venture but lacking with deer.
I have not sold any land and dont plan on it. That said, in putting my acreage together, I have purchased land six times and one time the purchased acred was listed for sale. The other five times, I approached to owner. In one of those cases, it took eleven years before he sold. Only one time was it a one time call with a yes.
Great topic and close to home for me in terms of recency. I sold 2 tracts in 2023 and when the year started I hadn't planned to sell either. Land values to a dramatic increase in my area, and I tested the market because these properties were purchased as hunting land, but also investment land.
I sold one tract early this year that I had in a partnership with a friend. I have none of the partnership horror stories, only positive. We sold it after 5 years because it had a note on it, and in our specific area we we were able to to sell it for substantially more than we paid. and as good as the experience was in the partnership- it was always going to have to sell eventually as letting it go to heirs would have been complicated. That said we didn't expect to sell it after only 5 years. It was a combination of return on investment, life keeping us away from it and the note getting ready to adjust. Obviously we had to pay the note then split the proceeds. I had done a lot of improvement work on this land and sold it as a turn key hunting tract, which is not how we purchased it.
The second tract was the hard one. My wife and I purchased it 10 years ago and it was paid for. This one was my most valuable asset and like the other farm, I had done a ton of habitat improvement to make it desirable as a turn key hunting tract I had a good documented history of deer and turkey to show. I had 3 large landowners around it, all wanting to add to theirs and mine was a key piece for all 3. I'd held out for 6 years driving the price up and got to 3X what I paid- cash buyer, private sale- this fall. That's well above market for my area, even in this boom. From a financial standpoint- with a wife and teen to young kids at home- i felt like I had to take it as an investment. That's serious return. I used that money to pay off my mortgage which I felt was the best thing for my family. So to the original question- that's my why for this sale. I will say this one still keeps me up at night even though I believe it was the right thing. I miss it.
In both cases, the loss of hunting ground has been a major negative for me and my kids and prospects for repurchase are not great for at least 5 years given that I used the proceeds otherwise. However I feel like I made the best move for my family.
Thankfully, my home sits on 50 acres, half wooded, and half that I have now taken out of crop production to do habitat work on. while its not quite enough for 3 hunting kids and myself- it's better than nothing and its ours.
I do hope to purchase land in the future- but that probably will be =/- 5 years at current values
Cap gains taxes are horrible.... that is all.
I sold one tract early this year that I had in a partnership with a friend. I have none of the partnership horror stories, only positive. We sold it after 5 years because it had a note on it, and in our specific area we we were able to to sell it for substantially more than we paid. and as good as the experience was in the partnership- it was always going to have to sell eventually as letting it go to heirs would have been complicated. That said we didn't expect to sell it after only 5 years. It was a combination of return on investment, life keeping us away from it and the note getting ready to adjust. Obviously we had to pay the note then split the proceeds. I had done a lot of improvement work on this land and sold it as a turn key hunting tract, which is not how we purchased it.
The second tract was the hard one. My wife and I purchased it 10 years ago and it was paid for. This one was my most valuable asset and like the other farm, I had done a ton of habitat improvement to make it desirable as a turn key hunting tract I had a good documented history of deer and turkey to show. I had 3 large landowners around it, all wanting to add to theirs and mine was a key piece for all 3. I'd held out for 6 years driving the price up and got to 3X what I paid- cash buyer, private sale- this fall. That's well above market for my area, even in this boom. From a financial standpoint- with a wife and teen to young kids at home- i felt like I had to take it as an investment. That's serious return. I used that money to pay off my mortgage which I felt was the best thing for my family. So to the original question- that's my why for this sale. I will say this one still keeps me up at night even though I believe it was the right thing. I miss it.
In both cases, the loss of hunting ground has been a major negative for me and my kids and prospects for repurchase are not great for at least 5 years given that I used the proceeds otherwise. However I feel like I made the best move for my family.
Thankfully, my home sits on 50 acres, half wooded, and half that I have now taken out of crop production to do habitat work on. while its not quite enough for 3 hunting kids and myself- it's better than nothing and its ours.
I do hope to purchase land in the future- but that probably will be =/- 5 years at current values
Cap gains taxes are horrible.... that is all.
Any recommendations on how to be tactful but direct in those exchanges that last over the course of years?
To the OP: see if your neighbors want to buy it.
I dont start out hard sell at all. Usually see them at the post office, dump, broke down along the road, helping put cows up, etc. I just mention that I would sure like to buy that 40 of theirs that joins mine down in the bottoms. One neighbor I talked to for several years. He worked his land until was 87 and died. I had spoken to his son one time. His son said he appreciated me helping his dad. He said his dad mentioned a couple time I might be interested in buying some land down in the bottoms. I said sure would be. And he said he would be interested in selling it to me to help distribute the estate with his brother and sister. Never know.
Bill
Administrator
That how I've done it. Just mention "I sure would like to buy that if you ever want to sell" it eventually worked...
Thanks. Makes plenty of sense. None of my neighbors are local and neither am I.
That would make it much more difficult
I’d certainly like to think my success would be greater if they could see what a great guy I am.
swat1018
5 year old buck +
50% Cover 50% tillable, my preference, as well.
swat1018
5 year old buck +
I'm not sure there are any good deals right now, the price / acre has reached my pain threshold. My plan was to buy any land that I could get to pay for itself and trade my way into good investment acreage that was excellent hunting too. I finally got there, and plan on holding for now. I'm 55 years old and just retired. I am not going to have the income to make big purchases without dipping into retirement savings, don't plan on financing anything. It's not the same ballgame as it was when I started 30 years ago. You can't get a good enough ROI to let cash rent pay for your farm.
