Hazelton, KS

Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City issued its First Quarter 2011 Survey of Tenth District Agricultural Credit Conditions Report and all values in Kansas are reported as being up. Surprisingly ranchland or pastureland had a fairly large increase this time as compared to previous reports where it stayed relatively flat.

Summary as follows for the year through March period.

Non-irrigated cropland values up approx. 24%, Irrigated cropland values up about 18% and Pasture values up approx. 11%.

Table 1 from the Survey of Tenth District Agricultural Credit Conditions

First Quarter 2011 report by Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City

Farm income increases continue to be a contributing factor in land values and farmers expand their operations and have cash to use to purchase more land. An interesting point was that farm loan demand remained weak because of the strong liquidity of farmers allowing them to use cash rather than debt for operating expenses.

Some Kansas Banker Comments from the survey included the following...from South Central and SW Kansas.

Operating lines of credit are smaller due to excellent income last year.

We have had a lot of oil and gas leases in the last three months, paying a higher rate per acre.

The Survey of Agricultural Credit Conditions is a survey of 256 banks in Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Wyoming, New Mexico and Missouri. This is a survey of bankers which is an important point to remember on the numbers in this survey. These are only numbers that bankers are providing and this does not include an entire market picture. Cash sales, small even owner financed land sales or leaseback transactions are not included and usually prices in those transactions will be less than in purchases where a bank loan is needed. Even with farmland all prices remain local and these numbers are not necessarily reflective of most of the markets in Kansas. Some auctions can cause inflated prices and drive up the numbers substantially with just one or two sales and distort the numbers and the true market value picture. For help in finding values for your farmland call Kansas Land Brokers at 800-557-9151.