The Illinois Society of Professional Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers announced during the 2014 Farm Progress Show held this week in Boone, IA that prices being paid for farmland across Illinois have seen a “softening” from 2.0 percent to 4.1 percent. This was discovered during the organization’s Midyear Land Values Snapshot Survey.
The decline was found for the first half of 2014 but survey respondents believe the trend in prices paid will stay the same or decline modestly over the next year according to Dale Aupperle, with Heartland Ag Group, LTD and the chair of the report.
More specifically, for the first half of 2014, land values decreased:
- 2 percent for excellent quality farmland (over 190 bushels per acre);
- 3.7 percent for good quality farmland (between 170-190 bushels per acre);
- 4.2 percent for average quality farmland (between 150-170 bushels per acre); and
- 6 percent for fair quality farmland (averages below 150 bushels per acre).
“Participants were evenly divided on expectations for volume in the second half of 2014: 33 percent expect more land being offered for sale in the second half of than last year while 38 percent expect the same amount of land and 29 percent expect less,” said Gary Schnitkey, Ph.D. with the University of Illinois College of ACES, who conducted the study. “Local farmers are still the primary buyers.”
To learn more about farmland prices in Illinois, listen to the Illinois Society of Professional Farm Managers press conference:Land Values Showing Softness in Illinois Presser
View the Farm Progress 2014 Flicker photo album.
Coverage of the 2014 Farm Progress Show is sponsored by
