Bill
Administrator
Well if it tells you how long it’s been since I did any serious waterfowl hunting it was when Heavy shot came out and I would buy cases of it. The original heavy shot, before Remington bought them out.
Landowners, what % of your net worth does your land equity represent?
- Thread starter Turkish
- Start date
Well if it tells you how long it’s been since I did any serious waterfowl hunting it was when Heavy shot came out and I would buy cases of it. The original heavy shot, before Remington bought them out.
SD51555
5 year old buck +
I'm not against public hunting opportunities. I think there should be more so we don't have to sit 64 people per square mile on public land and then wonder why there are no deer and nobody is having any fun.
What I am against is the ever shrinking private land base in the country. I don't think anyone really understands how quickly it's shrinking between government purchases, easements, foundations, mono-culture forestry, and urban encroachment. It's a double edged sword. As private lands shrink and the fed pours jet fuel into the real estate bubble, the little guy will never ever have a chance to own land. I'd argue we're already there.
I was one of those guys. I had to scrape together everything I had available to get my first piece some ten years ago. I got lucky when I overpaid for my last one, cause it'd doubled in price in only five years, when I overpaid by 25% at the time. I still don't have grid power, running water, AC, or a second room in my one room off-grid shed.
Buying land is the least efficient way to expand access, and frankly has nothing to do with hunter access. If they wanted hunter access, governments could put 10% of acquisition dollars into walk-in areas and triple the amount of public hunting lands available in a year. But that's not the goal. Never was.
Wind Gypsy
5 year old buck +
Wind Gypsy
5 year old buck +
Agree. There's a lot of room for improvement on access to public lands, MN is pretty terrible in this regard for a midwestern state
I don't understand this part. Government land holdings are decreasing. 1990-2018 the Federal land holdings decreased by 31.5 million acres. Many states constitutions mandate that state lands be profitable or sold. A lot of em are getting sold. My father in law just purchased a 40 last year from a govt land sale. 95% of MN State owned lands were given to them by the feds. I'm not aware of the government buying up land in a significant manner but actually to the contrary.
Apologies for the giant thread jack!
SD51555
5 year old buck +
I can't speak for what's going on outside MN, but the big fear from Trumps era was that he'd sell off public land, and he never did. I'm not sure where any public land is being sold. I know the state of MN often has land sales, but those are mostly junk parcels. I watched them for years when I lived in St. Louis county, and they never offered up much other than old DOT sites and non-conforming wedges along state highways.
Follow the bonding money, the lottery money, the sales tax money, Pittman Robertson, and matching grants from the feds for WRP and CREP III. MN has poured billions into land confiscation in the past ten years. CREP III brought in $500 million alone and is set to gobble up 1500 40-acre parcels. Let's also not forget the government is the #1 threat to wildlife habitat. Look no further than the tallgrass prairie management plan, or the glyphosate choppers purifying state timber lands.
Wind Gypsy
5 year old buck +
When you say CREP III is "ready to gobble up 1500 40 acre parcels", do you mean they just get enrolled in CREP and have conservation easements limiting what can be done on them? I wasn't aware of any govt acquisition of those lands only privately owned lands that get enrolled.
Where is the state buying up land? Where is it being confiscated other than tax forfeitures?
Tree Spud
5 year old buck +
SD51555
5 year old buck +
What good is land where the state holds your use rights? It might as well be owned by them. Otherwise, you're just their caretaker. Easements are worse because it enables the state to seize control over twice as much land with the same money as opposed to buying it.
They are buying land everywhere. They're hot on the farm region of southern and western MN. There isn't much forest left as they already have well over 2/3 (and that figure is probably 12 years old) of the wooded lands in northern MN. There are many reports out there. Here's one of them. I've read them all, and nothing is off limits. The forestry reports, every one of them bemoans the human habitation of the forested region. They call us having land out there, parcelization, and in their eyes, it's the number one threat to
Land and land rights sold to the government is confiscated land, cause we're never getting it back, had no right to veto the surrender, and have no say in how it's managed. The deer fight (of which birthed this forum) of the last decade taught us this. People in communist countries would die to have the opportunities we have here. And we just freely trade them away to the government forever for some of their fake currency. I can't imagine what this country would be like if we gave all the land back to the crown 250 years ago in exchange for some hunting access where the queen saw fit.
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SD51555
5 year old buck +
Here is one of the many reports where they list citizen ownership of wild lands as the most dangerous problem the wilderness faces.
This is paragraph one in the report. When governments and billionaires tell me they have a big problem with my existence, I believe them, and take them seriously.
This is paragraph one in the report. When governments and billionaires tell me they have a big problem with my existence, I believe them, and take them seriously.
If any of you are in favor of pushing access to public land for hunting, this non-profit has that as one of their biggest lobbying efforts. It is a good organization that I support. If you are looking for a last minute 2021 charitable donation, here you go. https://www.trcp.org/
Wind Gypsy
5 year old buck +
So why did the private land owners sell easements rather than the land? Surely they could have gotten more for the land. Maybe they don't want to see land subdivided and developed.
You don't think big chunks of contiguous land benefit habitat, wildlife, and forest management? Sprawl is a creepin. Everyone wants their 2-5 acres. Now lots of folks don't need to leave the house for work. I'm glad there is something preventing every chunk of land from being split up into little parcels and developed. Obviously there needs to be a balance somewhere unfettered development and breaking up of parcels isn't going to end up pretty for anyone.
Owned, accessed, used, by the private Owners in any way they want other than is restricted by the rights they willingly exchanged for $ is hardly "Confiscated Land".
I'd imagine a lot of people from communist countries would think it's pretty damn cool that anyone can walk around with a gun hunting game in the majority of the forests in northern MN. Hell of a lot cooler than it being split up into tiny little parcels. But say they want to have some private land to themselves - it's not like it's hard to buy land in northern MN and it's still cheaper than the rest of the state.
SD51555
5 year old buck +
Well at least we know where we both stand now. I just hope the people that can't afford land don't come after those of us that made it a priority in our lives. Will those that come after us be grateful there is less and an ever shrinking shot at the American dream of land ownership?
I want the best for my fellow man, and I just don't see how this current system is the way. Their lot is only getting progressively worse under this system. Oodles of free land hundreds and thousands of miles away from population centers doesn't do squat for poor people in the midwest and east of the Mississippi river. They've still got to be rich enough to get to those places.
Wind Gypsy
5 year old buck +
I’ll take my chances that the bolsheviks who apparently might be too poor to take a short drive to a national forest won’t revolt against us for being landowners if it means we don’t chop up all the wild places and develop them. Luckily that is speaking in extremes and there’s a compromise somewhere in there!
This is something we’re clearly both passionate about. I’ll stop thread hijacking and would be happy to message if you want to chat more. I moved back to MN a few years ago and should get more educated about how these things are happening here. The western states get a lot more attention and seem to actually be trending a little differently than MN on these issues.
This is something we’re clearly both passionate about. I’ll stop thread hijacking and would be happy to message if you want to chat more. I moved back to MN a few years ago and should get more educated about how these things are happening here. The western states get a lot more attention and seem to actually be trending a little differently than MN on these issues.
SD51555
5 year old buck +
Agreed.
I'll leave you with this so we can put a bow on it all for the rest of the group. I didn't have access to the report I wanted to show you until I got home. It's important to know the pace at which this is happening. From 2000-2009 over 1,000 forty acre parcels disappeared from the private land ranks, per year. And this was almost exclusively before the sales tax amendment was passed which really threw gas on this fire. That alone increased this rate by 84% per year after 2008.
Chapter 104 - MN Laws
www.revisor.mn.gov
LSOHC
www.lsohc.mn.gov
These dollar amounts were getting that pace of land grab. Now consider there have been two CREP expansions in that time that put an extra $1.295 billion into this machine. Now we're talking upwards of 4,000-5,000 forty acre parcels disappearing per year.
Knehrke
5 year old buck +
I certainly can't speak to other areas, and the data you present appears compelling, but in Western New York the issue of parcelization is a significant barrier to effective land management.
Grandpa Joe leaves 50 acres of his estate to each of his five children. Two of them sell their parcels for further subdivision. And the guy next door who's trying to keep invasive species to a minimum is now surrounded by untended land full of multiflora, honeysuckle, autumn olive, garlic mustard, and swallowwort. Not to speak of the dozen guys who now hunt 5 acre parcels on the border, or just trespass because they know that there's no oversight. Implementing a unified management plan with your neighbors is a joke.
I say all of this knowing full well that I am part of the problem, since all of my parcels are less than 50 acres.
The other issue is that the flow never changes direction. Land is divided, but never condensed. Once a 5000 acre farm is lost, it's lost forever. So, speaking for my area, where land ownership is likely a very different experience than many other places, though I'd expect the suburban midwest to be similar, I've got to agree that division of parcels is a big problem.
Grandpa Joe leaves 50 acres of his estate to each of his five children. Two of them sell their parcels for further subdivision. And the guy next door who's trying to keep invasive species to a minimum is now surrounded by untended land full of multiflora, honeysuckle, autumn olive, garlic mustard, and swallowwort. Not to speak of the dozen guys who now hunt 5 acre parcels on the border, or just trespass because they know that there's no oversight. Implementing a unified management plan with your neighbors is a joke.
I say all of this knowing full well that I am part of the problem, since all of my parcels are less than 50 acres.
The other issue is that the flow never changes direction. Land is divided, but never condensed. Once a 5000 acre farm is lost, it's lost forever. So, speaking for my area, where land ownership is likely a very different experience than many other places, though I'd expect the suburban midwest to be similar, I've got to agree that division of parcels is a big problem.
Tree Spud
5 year old buck +
Not really, they will take marginal ag ground out of production when it only produces say 150 bushels/acre. On WRP easements, one of the farmers I know has has contracted for permanent easements on 600-700 acres at $1000/acre and then sold the land at recreational land prices. Pretty sweet deal at taxpayers expense.
SD51555
5 year old buck +
What do you think should be done about it?
chummer
5 year old buck +
Same boat as you. I presently see no way to stay in NY after retirement. I plan on keeping the camp and land and sell everything else. I am hoping my kids end up in the Carolinas or a point south so I can live 6 months and 1 day near them and the rest at camp. This state does such a magnificent job of driving away college grads and retirees, pretty hard to accomplish both at the same time.
Triple C
5 year old buck +
chummer - Come on down south. Plenty of land available and in many parts...southern hospitality still exists. My farm is in a very rural county about 1.5 hrs east of Atlanta. I was there on Thursday and still amazed at the Trump signs and American flags flying. In fact...more Trump signs now than during the election. Taxes relatively low...cost of living not bad...low crime and generally decent folk.
As to the OP's original question - my farm represents a small portion total net worth. That may go up in the coming years assuming adjoining property comes up for sale. I'm 65, still enjoy working but retirement looms. Ain't counting on the pine trees growing on my farm to provide any kind of retirement income but plenty to keep up with my habitat/tractor/implements/tree stands, etc., addiction.
Mortenson
5 year old buck +
That's not necessarily true at all. Over on other threads just now people are complaining how it's only a rich man's game and parcels are getting bigger and tied together. If a 5000 acre farm gets broken down, don't you assume a guy with 4500 might be the one picking up another 500, thus making a new 5000 ac farm? Our own farm is an example, although on a much smaller scale. Our hunting farm was under 200 acres, and then a few years ago a good neighbor graciously sold us part of her property that adjoins us. She got smaller and we got bigger. Also the tax man decided to bend us over and now we pay over $200/ac in taxes on the new acquisition. So what's the best option to make that easier to stomach? Enroll in a govt forest program. Again, as is being talked about on another thread, just another form of confiscation where govt gets its mitts on your property.
