Mega farmers

Maybe some of you on here are mega farmers but I don't think so. My question is how do them guys find all that land to rent? Do they just drive around the country with their checkbook and randomly pull into a farmyard and offer them big bucks for their land? How do they here about all that land for rent? I am not looking for more land to rent but I am curios how that works.

There are some what maybe you would call mega but most do a good job and know how to make money so when someone has ground to rent he wants his money so just go to a big operator who pays his bills and rent to him isnt that what goes on in your area. Same thing if you want to sell go yo those have the money as i want to get paid

They buy anything that comes on the market, driving prices up to where it doesn't make sense for a small operator to stay in farming.

When someone has land to rent, often they'll go to a big operator first, because they know he'll pay cash rent.

I cant comment on all areas but around here, the guys who farm ALOT of rented ground, DO drive around with their checkbook and contact landlords and offer to write bigger checks than anyone else. Sometimes they get chased off and sometimes they get the farm. Once they get known for paying high rent, people will seek them out. I guess its whatever works for ya.
bill

Around here it is kind of like Bill said, folks will come to them with ground. About ten years ago a guy from the next county over came here and paid $50 more than any one else would to rent a really good farm from a guy who was hanging it up. The owner knows every one in the county and bragged about the $200/acre cash rent and every one knocked down the BTO's door wanting it too.

Same way with buy'n farms. Unill a year and a half ago there was a Mennonite guy here who went about 3 years where he bought any and all ground that came up for auction. Only farms he was contending bidder and not winner on were ones with development potential. He cost alot of auctioneers alot of money, got to where there was no need pay an auctioneer when you could just go ask Bill what he will pay for ground because ground around here was worth as much as he would pay for it.

Dave

Here it is alot of over bidding the land worth, and then wrapping it up for years with a confusing contract, and enrolling in as many conservation programs as possible to actually have alot less out of pocket rent. Frustrating for me as a growing farmer. I have went to paying 50% rent the previous fall, and the balance by April 1st. A few people have come to me and asked. What I see alot of is older farmers that do nothing but coplain, put down, and curse some big operators, but then will rent to them whe they retire, or they are giving that "offer". Then all of a sudden that big farmer is their new best friend, the best farmer, yada yada yada. Kinda sickening. I am gonna have to go after some lnd from some of these BIG guys this fall as I need to increase some acreage to increase my enterprise units. This is mostly dry land that they arent paying jack for and have the owners believing they are doing them a favor. I am however locking in most of what I have now with some lengthy contracts and market bonus"s as I am sure I will be making a couple BIG guys mad. You know, it is gonna really hurt there bottem line that I am after 40-80 acre"s of land they whine they are in the red in every year, out of the 3000+ they now farm. They would do it to me in an instint so I am only worryinh about the BIG guys feelings that I am good aquantances with.

I'm not a mega farmer, but here is how I got most what I farm.

When meeting a older farmer or land owner in public I would tell them if they ever decide to rent out their land or change renters to give me a call. Some called as much as 5 years later.

Gary

The BTO get a reputation; It's one that works both ways. Some don't care for them; others look for big bucks and seek them out.

When dad passed away, about 2 weeks later someone called and asked if we were renting out the land, they were interested.

The BTO have banking friends, friends at FSA office, and so on; they hear about land coming up for lease as it happens.

--->Paul

I farm 300 acres. I would say 25 percent of the time here that it is somebody that has done well with farming and looking for more ground. The rest of the time it is somebody who has a gimmick going that can not be replicated by others. Example. Mennonite who just cashed out of Lancaster, PA 50 acres or more at about 250000 dollars per acre or more. Got two of those going here now and they are bidding 30 to 50 dollars per acre more on rent than average on anything that is not below water. One bought the crown jewel farm of the township and has alot of people sore about it. I understand it is an interesting time at the Mennonite meeting house on Sunday with the guys who cashed out for 5000 an acre in the 1970's early 1980's being pretty envious of the newcomers.
Also, you see guys that are highly suspected of having illicit money funding their operations. And lastly there are guys who inherited a lot of money so they have more muscle to flex than they did before.
In the scheme of things I wonder how viable I will be in the future as it is getting near impossible to compete with these guys. Big problem I see with my operation is the soil is just not good enough to make an enterprise such as vegetable possible.
You had to go and get my blood boiling early on a Friday LOL.

You were lucky they waited two weeks.

My father-in-law passed away the evening of New Years Day, 1980. At 8:00 the next morning one of the neighbors drove in the yard and told my mother-in-law if she was going to sell the farm, he'd write her a check right then and there. She ran him off the place.

There was poetic justice. The neighbor and his two sons all filed for bankruptcy several years later.

That may have worked a generation ago here but not anymore from what I hear. It's all about money and access. There are people I would like to have constant contact with but I would have to have a good reason to be at their place other than a blue moon. Most people you just can't invite yourself over to chat and let them know you are around. I've heard of farmers keeping an "open line" to a prospective landlord for a couple decades only to have that landlord rent to somebody that has more money and a sexier line of equipment.

The couple I know, are very good farmers. And they grew up here, they know everybody who has 20 acres or more in the county. Very hard to compete with a guy who has several thousand paid for acres, and top notch equipment, plus a very good crew of operators. These guys do almost everything on contract. I have never met a local full time farmer that doesn't have at least one college degree, often 2 - one a MBA. They have the skills, and the money. Pretty tough to beat.

Sometimes it bragging rights for the little one to retire, and go to the coffee shop saying BTO XXXX farms mine.

On yeah, I haven't gotten all the ones I talked to.

But most did talk to me before renting to the big bucks.

Contacts, and doing a good job! If you slack off much in life you don't get much, I just picked up 135 more acres, just through contacts, never met the landlord yet. And a know how to talk to people, jerks don't get much!
Tom

My neighbor has rented our ground since the sixties. I like him because he will loan me a backhoe from time to time. Other considerations like that make a good relationship.

I"d say that it is a whole lot more organized than that. This their biz, and they know all the local players. One guy near me bought the local ag chemical and fertilzer dealer. Now he gets great prices on his inputs, and is making money off his competitors.

They have friends at the local fertilizer dealer, machinery dealer, and grain elevator too. There are one fertilizer dealer and two machinery dealers (red and blue colors) that seem totally disinterested in my business and my neighbors business because in the last few years they "have a horse in the local race" now.
I've never charged (so I am never late with payment) nor teased about business that I never followed through on either.

Recently, a BTO was over soliciting the family of a recently deceased farmer within a couple hours of his passing. The BTO is currently renting the place.

It's a sad thing when a guy who has 100 acres can't get more because the hutterites or the big time potatoe, grain farmers can pay twice what it's worth(and do).I know I will be squezed out because the only land within 10 miles of me exept 160 acres is owned by or rented by hutterites or family farms that will only sell to the highest bidder.I wish the goverment would limit all farms to a max of 2000 acres(leased or owned)then the economy would get alot better alot faster.

people complain they can't find good help.Well they shot themselves in the foot by being gready.
If they think every worker can live on $30,000.a year but they whant to live off of $300,000. a year it's know wonder they can't find workers.

And contrary to what some like to say,BIG equipment is not cheaper than good workers.
The BTO has made it almost imposible for anyone to alow there children to continue farming.I might make a go of it but with 160 acres how many people can I possible suport and why would I teach my children how to work because it is usless.So we tell are children get a colege degree and find a better job.This don't work either because there isn't enough jobs that will sustain a family for all these people in the same boat.
The BTO Want's so much that now instead of 25 families making a living we now have 1 plus 2 highered hands.

It's the same with businesses,I worked for a guy who wanted to make at least $20 an hour on every worker he had.15 workers making $12 an hour and he was making $300.Ain't no man worth that.I tried to feed a family and pay morgage(or rent wich was more)payments on vehicle,hydro,tel.etc.I worked my way from saw opperater to billing in 6 months.Thats when his son wanted in and 6 months latter goodby me.No problem I was bearly breakin eaven workin for him anyway.I ended up on unemployment.They pay 80% of your wages.I made more in that year than I did workin full time.And then the big time opperatores of all kind complain when the gov. taxes them and gives to welfare.If all the BTO's would go half size or less then those who wanted to work would have a chance to ,make a living.

Rent=400
gas =350
tel.=60
vehicle insurance=110
hydro =225
food for 5-6 people=500
total =$1645
wages=$1920 minus deductions
These are the figures I had to work with.No one should have to live in poverty with a full time job.And until the BTO'S realize that it makes more money doing nothing than having a full time job this country will continue to be run more and more by the chinas.

done with my rant

Folks are alot more respectable where you live than I live around. Here folks will show up at the hospital and ask about renting the farm when some one die'n of cancer.

Dave

I do about like Ia Gary as far as talking to landowners.

I have a degree in Ag Economics and another in Agronomy. I took some large--very large--but highly calculated risks early in my career and they paid off. I always do as the numbers say I can do, not what my emotions may want.

I have never had a new vehicle or a new piece of machinery. That's not to say I haven't bought a lot of late-model, low-houred stuff, because I have and still do all the time. I usually buy outright and sell my excess stuff rather than trade.

I do what works for me, not what the neighbors do.

I NEVER go see a family in grief--I know it costs me some opportunity, but I have to live with myself, too.

I send my helpers to the neighbors when they are in a bind, and some of them remember that when the need a tenant.

I raise LOTS of livestock in a mainly cash-grain area. Manure is my main fertilizer.

I do all of the chores myself on Sundays and holidays. I sometimes lay awake at night worrying about the markets, or how to fill a key position when someone leaves abruptly. Sometimes I feel I spend more time managing people more than I actually work at raising crops and livestock. Margins are thin--I need a gross of 2 million to make it all work. I have paid income taxes every year I have farmed except one.

The headaches I have are self-inflicted since I grew my operation to the size it is out of my own free will, but it has been a tremendous amount of work. When you are "at the lake", or just watching tv at night, I am most likely looking at my numbers trying to become more efficient and hopefully more profitable.

I skip that new car, new pickup, nice vacation, etc, and use the money as a down payment on something with a positive ROI.

I have not, or will not ever, inherit anything but a good work ethic.

Try it sometime, it is not as easy as you might think.

Iowa corn and hogs

around here the sod farms are the big farmers, they pay more rent then anyone else so they get the land, most landlords dont care about the soil loss.

Around here it's 4 or 5 BTO, Amish and the few remaining small timers like me. The BTO tend to take out the hedge rows, tile, grade and generally make things workable. They pay big bucks for the privilege. The Amish tend to buy "junk" farms, old worn out, wet and rocky pieces that haven't been worked since the late 60's if not before. They generally improve the lands and in truth the only new barns going up anymore are Amish. Some folks hate 'em, some put them up on a pedestal. They're just people, no more, no less.

The small timers are often part timers and "hobby" farms going bigger. It's not easy competing with the BTO and the city slickers for prices on equipment or feed, much less land. Any decent tractor seems to go for 15-25% higher than they should and the only ones who can swing it are the BTO and city boys buying their 17 acre "estate".

I don't know what to make of it anymore.

Well, ya do live in Kentucky....

So if I have a fulltime job at McDonalds, I should be able to raise a family on that? How much do you want to pay for your Big Mac?

Sounds like you don't believe in free markets.

One of my neighbors rented her farm to one of the BTO three years ago. Between myself, my grand father and an Uncle we had farmed that farm for over forty years. Always mowed the ditches and kept the fences and gates in working order. Her "friends" at the beauty parlor told her we where taking advantage of her by not paying cash rent, we had been doing a fifty/fifty share crop.
She came to us last week to see if we would be interested in taking it back. Told her if it was put back in the shape we left it yes. If as it is now, then no. What or why would we do that??? Well there is not a single gate or gate post left on the farm. The BTO had his combine dauled up so it is twenty feet wide without the header. All of the gates where 18". So he just would take the back tire of the combine and just back over the gate and post. So every single gate post is broke off at the ground and the gates have been drove over. Also we noticed that the last two years he just applied nitrogen to the corn ground, nothing else. The soybean ground got nothing the three years he farmed it. I sent some soil test out. The fertility we built up and maintained is gone. So we are going to offer her cash rent that is in line with what it is worth now. She will have to pay to have the gates and fences fixed. We usually pasture cattle on the stalks after harvest.
What did this teach us??? All of our ground is now under multi years contracts. If we apply lime or anything else that has a multi years use benefit the the contract has a buy out provision.
We do pay ALL cash rents on April 1st. We only have about three share crop farms left. Which is a shame as they get a higher return if you look at the long term picture. But cash rent is king now. Have several land owners feeling us out for more ground as it seems that those "BIG" cash rents some how never got all paid.

Not familiar with the term BTO. What does that mean?

Big Time Operator, as far as I know.

What's your definitiojn of a BTO? 2000 acres? 10000 acres?

The BTOs around me come into a farm promising the world to get a contract, then they spend all their time trying to break the terms. All the "big" guys around me are mining the rental properties, just like JDseller's story. They put only just enough nutrients to feed the crop because they know they won't be farming it in 10 years, so why should they care? We're pretty steep around here and these operators will put in a whole hillside into soybeans where the owner had farmed on 10 or 15 strips. They wouldn't even think of a hay strip. Waterways are sprayed through the first year and tilled up the second year because "there's no grass there anyway" If we get some driving rain storms and the topsoil ends up in the crick, who cares? Ain't their property.

I know several older guys with ground that consider themselves lucky if they get paid for rent. A couple have told me they wished they'd have just put the ground in CRP, guaranteed check and the ground doesn't get raped.

The BTOs like the rumors made about them, they like the fact that the bank, the machinery dealer, the seed and chemical seller, and the grain elevator operator all kiss their but for thier business. That is, until the BTO decides to not pay a bill or file bankruptcy.

But the biggest thing keeping these guys in business is SUBSIDIES SUBSIDIES SUBSIDIES. They don't care what they do to the ground as long as they get corn and beans off it. They also use the Donald nnalert form of business, if they can get away with not paying a bill, they will. If their business starts losing too much money, they file bankruptcy. Next year, they're back in business with even newer equipment.

I sprayed for all these guys while working at an agronomy business for the last 8 years and no longer want any part of it. There were a very few doing a good job, but most followed the mode of business I described in my rant.

I'm trying a different route. I'm gonna buy my F-I-L's farm this next month. Everything's written up, my wife and I are just waiting for the lower interest in September. It's 360 acres with 200 tillable and has an 8000 bird Organic laying hen operation on it.

I believe in free eterprise I just get so sick of people complaining that the goverment is paying someone to stay alive (because there's no jobs)and they get so money hungry go autiomatic to get rid of more workers,complain like shut when they have to pay tax so someone else can sit on welfare or unemployment.In case you never noticed population has increased dramaticly and the amont of jobs available per person is way down.Like I said before 1 person is making enough for 25 all in the name of progress and as you like to call it (free enterprise).If you want to make that much then pay the tax shut your mouth and don't complain about the jobless people.It's afully hard to get people to want to work when they can't even aford a nice vehicle on the wages BTO'S want to pay them..At one time there was a shortage in available employees now there is a shotage of jobs avalible,unless your an elegal imagrant that works under the table.So if the goverment doesn't take a little from the rich and give to the poor alot of us would just plain starve to death.I've been on both sides of the fence.I have had to realy on charity just to feed my family(it wasn't because I didn't want to work)and it don't fell good either.I had an accident and couldn't find work I could do at the time,had no insurance because as a Mcdonalds workers wage I couldn't aford it.ALL farm labourers in this area at the time(20 some years ago) couldn't get more than $6.50 an hour(less than what minimum wage was)as farmers were exempt from that law.My one boss said there were enough Mennonites and mexican mennonits around that they didn't have to pay more(as they lived 4 familys per house hold and all the kids had to work to give to the parents they could survive on less income).I now work for myself farm on 160 acres and do a little trucking,I scrape buy but without family allowance I would throw in the towel.There just ain't enough work to go around anymore.10 years ago you could work for any of the 50-100 farmers around here.Now there's only 25-50 farms left and they have less workers.So you tell me where are the other 50-100 workers sopose to go, to make a living.Where ever you go it's the same thing all across the country.I know once I have it payed for and buy 160 acres more I won't get the family allowence and will make it just fine with out it.

Oh, there is a reason why mostly kids work at McDonalds.Easy to make money when some one else pays your bills. And a big mack ain't worth anything as I don't eat out.food at home out of the garden and farmers burger(eaven if it's there oldest cow they sell me REAL cheap)tastes much better.

I don't call it Free Enterprise, that's what it is, I didn't design or name it. I calle dit that because that's what it is.

If the population is rising, doesn't that mean there are more jobs needed to take care of more people? More people to feed them, like farmers and fast food workers? Making clothes for them? Making cars for them? Building houses for them? Or are all those people living in a cave?

You act as though no one has free will. You mentioned how 20 years ago all the farm help in your area could only make $6.50/hr.. Well, if I had been there I would've worked two jobs and saved enough to move to where there was more work. Sounds like you chose to stay where there was little opportunity, but that was your choice, you made it.

Bottom line, life isn't fair, and it's not the government's job to make it fair. If you believe that it is, or that the they could, then you are a fool.

My grandfather had 160 acres, couldn't make enough to support the family. So what did he do? He went to town and got a job, and continued farming too. Never took a penny of government aid. Some people have pride.

Now, the world is an ever-changing place, and if you just plain flat-out refuse to change with it, you get what you deserve. Moan and bellyache all you want, it won't help any. Should've gotten more education and made yourself more valuable to those who would need your services. But no, you wanted to stay stuck in the past.

You sound just like tlak. "Give me mine, give me mine". Or, "take it from them, take it from them". Disgusting.

Be a man. Quit blaming everyone else and pull yourself up. Or go on living like you are and die bitter and unhappy, doesn't matter to me one way or the other, I'm moving on. You can stay where you are.

And just so you know, I don't necessarily like where the world has gone either. I don't think it's right that two people need to work to continue the lifestyle our parents enjoyed with just one working. I don't like big mega farms. I don't like how materialistic society has become. But just because I don't like it doesn't mean the world is going to change for me. Or you. And complaining sure won't help either.