Latest News From American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers

“If I were picking both from a financial and an emotional perspective, the next place I could put a dollar, I still would favor farmland pretty highly,” Bruce Sherrick says.

The Farmland Security Act of 2023 seeks to further boost transparency in foreign ownership of U.S. farmland.

For those in agriculture, owning farmland has long been viewed as a symbol of status and wealth. Now, even individuals who don’t farm are jumping on board, looking to buy farmland.

House Republicans asked the General Accountability Office to conduct a study on U.S. lands owned by foreign entities. The letter was signed by scores of other House Republicans.

The Ohio State Fair in Columbus debuted more than 2,500 lbs. of butter that features 10 life-size sculptures of kids and animals, including the iconic butter cow, a goat and a pig.

U.S. farm real estate values are seeing a rapid rise in 2021, with the Western Corn Belt seeing values rise at a faster pace than the East, but the storyline could change, according to Jackson Takach of Farmer Mac.

“This is indicative of farmer interest and individual investor interest. We are starting to see prices we last saw between 2012 and 2014,” Dickhut says.

Key forces are converging to send farmland values higher — maybe even to historic levels.

Values and rental rates look stable for 2020

The average farm real estate values for the U.S. is $3,160 per acre in 2019. That’s up $60 from 2018, according to USDA’s 2019 Land Values Summary. 

A larger than typical number of autumn public sales of dairies occurred.

Farm household health insurance expenses have doubled since 2001.

The farmland market continues to be stable in Wisconsin.

One provision of the new tax plan drawing sharp criticism is the elimination of the deduction for personal loss from natural disasters such as wildfires, unless the event is a federally-declared disaster.

The Southeast has the highest pastureland values now in the country with an average value of $3,910 per acre.