Leasing Land

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cherokeeruby

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Curious if anyone can tell me what to expect to receive if I lease some of my land. Have 160 acres of sandy loam in North Texas area. Pasture is mixed grass some bermuda. Fences are good, cross-fenced, ponds, barn.
 
In my immediate area (not far from you), we typically pay $20 per acre for improved grasses, good fences, and year-round water. If I have to make improvements such as repair a little fence, rebuild a gate, fertilize, etc., the price goes down or I negotiate the expenses directly off the annual lease payment.

As a side note, I get most of my leases for free. Most retired people or small land owners (less than 100 acres), just like someone keeping it up for them.
 
What is the best way to go about getting that initial lease? The realtors around the Austin area have most of everything tied up, and won't allow a grazing lease. Someone else for me to hate I guess.
 
In this area the best way to get a lease is improve the leases that you have been lucky enough to get. Generally the land owner will tell others how much better the land is, and that you've improved the place.
Finding the first lease is a lot of knocking on doors and leg work.

dun
 
That first lease is very difficult, and so can be everyone that follows. In my area, Dallas keeps creeping towards us and people and selling to developers faster than you can imagine. That makes land hard to get and way over priced to buy. Word of mouth is the only way I have ever found GOOD lease land.
 
lazyhill":398d7gs9 said:
I just looked at some poor land this morning for a lease and the person wanted $30 an acre. I hope that this is not a sign of things to come!!!!!

Unfortnately, it may be. :x Seems like all the city people I know that have land in the country want to lease it for big bucks. A lot of them could care less about the land, they just want the money!

Seems like if one land owner gets a high price lease, then everbody else around the area starts raising their prices too.
 
Land is like anything else. People have a feeling of what something is worth and that's the deal. Unfortunetly too many people see someone getting 17-20 for really good pasture and they can't see that theirs is really not all that good (after all, it's got grass) and figure that they should get top dollar. Herd blindness doesn't just refer to animals. The sad part is that someone may end up paying that kind of money and it will screw up the values/prices for everyone else. We had a bunch of fools come up here from Baja Oklahoma and were paying 2500- 3500 per acre for land that is typically selling for around 750-1000. Now land prices have started to go nuts.

dun


lazyhill":35u7wiao said:
I just looked at some poor land this morning for a lease and the person wanted $30 an acre. I hope that this is not a sign of things to come!!!!!
 
dun":i4n90k2t said:
We had a bunch of fools come up here from Baja Oklahoma and were paying 2500- 3500 per acre for land that is typically selling for around 750-1000. Now land prices have started to go nuts.

dun


lazyhill":i4n90k2t said:
I just looked at some poor land this morning for a lease and the person wanted $30 an acre. I hope that this is not a sign of things to come!!!!!

Same here. I'm about 25 miles NW Waco, Tx and they are asking from $7,000 - $10,000 acre for some of the land right across the road from the ranch I live on. I thought they'd never get it, but they have sold a few lots (5 - 10 acres), next to the Brazos river and ruined some good coastal hay fields.
 
Are these supposed to be little ranchettes? If so could a person rent or lease the land for hay until they start building.
 
At the risk of making everyone mad, I'm going to put my two cents worth in!

I'm a rancher AND a Realtor. All I sell is farm and ranch property.

Finding "new" leases in this area ( I'm also in central Texas) is very hard.. primarily because tenants rarely give up leases, and if they do, it's only because they are forced to when the land owners decide to sell.

Leasing was probably a viable option 10 - 15 years ago, but in my opinion, it's getting to be a thing of the past. Sometimes when I sell a ranch property the new owner wants to lease the land for a couple of years.. until they are ready to move or take over the responsibilities of the land themselves, but most tenants want something long term.

I've seen tenants pay from $3 an acre (that's a story in itself) to $22 for good pasture land. As said in a previous post, you'd better be a good tenant and work with the owner as much as possible. Sometimes doing some improvements to the property is worth more than the $$ issue.
 
In my area of North Tx, the money one receives from leasing land is chicken feed compared to the taxes they save by keeping the land zoned agricultural. The property tax on a hundred acres would be well over 20-30K if they ever lost the exemption. I have a neighbor who cuts fields for hay for some folks around here, he fertilizes and cuts field, , pays nothing to the owners, they reap tax savings. Win - Win situation for both of them. As stated, these are mostly just city folks who are waiting to build their dream house in a few yrs.
 

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