News

Supply and demand stabilizing farmland values

The senior vice president of real estate operations at Farmers National Company (FNC) says he’s optimistic high demand will continue to offset pressures on the land market.

Paul Shadegg tells Brownfield, “Industry wide, we are looking at about 25% decrease in available land for sale.”  He says, “The other side of that equation is that we have these motivated buyers in the market that typically are farm operators about 70% of the time.”

He says it’s brought stability to land values.

“In spite of the lower commodity markets, interest rate issues and anticipated net farm income, those land values stayed strong pretty much across all the regions that we cover.”  He says, “In particular, the areas of Iowa, Illinois, Indiana still show pretty good strength.”

Shadegg says it’s been an active market, as the company handled more sales in 2024 than its 10-year average, and he says 2025 is already off to a busy start.

“We’re running at a higher-than-normal volume, probably about 5% above where we were a year ago.”  He says, “So that again, that kind of plays into our optimism we’re starting to see some more listings become available.  We know we have motivated buyers in the market.”

He anticipates operating farmers will continue to be the primary land buyers in the new year.

AUDIO: Paul Shadegg – Farmers National Company