Buying Hunting Land

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Must be nice to step out off your back porch and start hunting.
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Indeed it is. One great advantage is that you can hunt critters that you would never pay big bucks to hunt -- like squirrels. I can whistle up the horses, feed them, then make a circuit through the woods and come back with a mess of squirrels in time to turn the horses out.
 
I own 40 acres but I see all my deer in the three acre food plot. It draws the deer in for miles. I could reconize 14 bucks last year. Think smarter, not bigger.
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Exactly, scout and think in terms of where the deer go. I bought 10 acres, strategically located on a big ranch's fence line and down the road from another big ranch, bought this in '88. First season, not even a feeder out on it, killed three buck off it, two of 'em mine and one a friend's and all shot in the first two weeks of season, and there's more deer down there than ever, now. Texas allows feeders, do feeder watching is the only way on a little chunk of land like this. It cost me $11800 at the time, would perhaps sell for $60K now. Pretty good for investment. I'm a poor boy, could never afford anything much more than that. It's still wild down there, takes 4x4 or dirt bike to get in when it's wet. I sold my 4x4, but I've got dirt bikes. It's only about 3/8 mile walk from the road if nothing else. There's a great spot for a pond in the back of it if I ever drum up the money to hire a dozer.

I know a guy that bought a long, skinny 3 acres down on the fence line to Aransas Nat'l Wildlife refuge and killed deer every year down there. Just all in where it's located. Lots of 20-40 acre places I know about produce good hunting.

If it ever grows up in development around my place, I'll sell it in a heartbeat and look for something else somewhere less developed. Once you get a chunk of land paid for, that's always an option. I'd like to have trees and squirrels, but I have deer out the wazz down there and hogs come in at night, especially when it's wet down there. I can't complain. It's a great poor boy's playground. I go down there and ride the dirt bikes out of season, hunt dove off it. Not too great dove hunting. I could suck in more game, especially could get ducks in there, with a pond. I don't think it'd take a grand to do a pond down there.
 
Thought I'd add to the above post. Hunting one spot every year, every season is a drag. You get to know every leaf on every tree and every blade of grass and feeder watching ain't all that fun after a while. So, over the years, there's been many a year I didn't even go down there. It's sort of my back up when I can't go anywhere else. It's only 30 minutes from my house in town. I was in a hunting club, kinda neat deal, for about 10 years and spent most of my time hunting in the club. Dropped out of that and went down to my place for a few seasons to fill the freezer. Then, I got into a bird lease for a while. That was quite affordable and I spent most of my time dove hunting early and goose hunting later on. Then, I dropped out of that lease so now I'm going to set my feeder up this season.

If the land is to be your only place to hunt, helps to have a section or two. :banghead: :D That way, the scenery can change. But, I scrimped to afford 10 acres...:banghead:
 
I'd say the land I paid $8,000 for in '69 is now worth at least $350,000 to $400,000.
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If you'd have invested that in an IRA, you'd have over $400k cash value.

Should be able to write off truck, fuel, 4 wheeler, and other items as farm expenses.....can't do it you don't own land.
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Yes, you CAN write off anything you want - of course the auditor may have something different to say about that WHEN audited.

Legally, you can write off your expenses vs. your income on the land. So if you are growing corn, yeah, the expenses related to the business of growing corn can be written off. Writing it all off? Good luck.
 
Schedule C, halvey: "Developer". Heck, a couple of lonesome old cows makes you a rancher...

While that IRA is accumulating to $400K, you can't use it. You can enjoy the use of the land during those years. You can make money from farming/ranching, which puts you way ahead of any IRA in total money derived from the property.

And, hey, what's happiness worth? Isn't that part of where "Priceless!" enters the equation?

:), Art
 
Good luck on that "ranching" aspect. You have to show the auditor income vs. depreciation. But like I said, you can deduct anything you want.

You can enjoy IRA's. Up until 1986, you could put collectibles in them including guns. I know many a person who has some nice Parkers and pre-64's in their IRA's.

And, hey, what's happiness worth? Isn't that part of here "Priceless!" enters the equation?
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Bragging about buying land at $50/acre in 1969?

Back to the subject: there's a lot of hunting land deals I've seen lately. Lots of land out there for a decent price, yet no one seems to be buying. I know of an 80 acre parcel for under $1500/acre - steep, but not bad considering - that has been up for well over a year.
 
How much hunting land you need depends to a large extent on your neighbors. IF you have neighbors surrounding you who do not hunt their land you don;t need very much. Just a small place to set up a feeder or plant a foot plot and THEY WILL COME.

If you are planning on "managing" your herd the amount you need is somewhat dependent on the environment, ie, water, cover and feed. Keeping in mind that the only way to keep um on your place is with a fence. You can minimize their travels by providing adequate food and water but when the rut kicks in they are gonna go where the girls are.

So I would suggest that you consider each prospect based on the location and surroundings and if anyone tries to convince you of a "certain" acreage they are full of bull.
 
How things change over the years. While buying land in England was out of the question there was always plenty of shooting to be had. going back 30/40 years i had more pigeon, rabbit ,hare shooting than i could cope with. Started deer hunting in the late 60s. To most farmers deer were vermin. I would get a phone call to come and shoot these bloody deer. No death was bad enough for them as far as the farmers were concerned. As the years went by German, Dutch and English hunters pushed the price of deer stalking beyond the price of many hunters. Even here in Sweden where hunting land is much cheaper, Bought a small farm here with 85 acres of forest for what i sold my house in England for. Renting hunting ground here is getting more and more expensive as well. I have put my land in with my neighbours just for the moose hunting. Ten land owner in the moose hunting team only three of us hunt and my neighbour has champion moose hunting dogs, Great fun.
Another neighbour has good hare hunting dogs and I've just bought a dog for hunting roedeer. So buy land they don't make it any more
 
investment land

You lock in your profits when you buy. You just have to find that underpriced place. I wanted out of ten acres I bought in 1994 for $4500. I got $6000 in 1998. New owner put in a little cabin, cleared and improved old apple trees and sold for $125,000 in a few years.

Wish I had kept that place. My selling cheao without doing a little work on it was his gain.
 
we look for tax forfeit land. it is land that has been offered for auction and not claimed, often it can be bought with out competition by merely paying off the due taxes....

320 acres for $21,700 fees included just last year, 2.5 hours from a major metropolitan area.

We are in the act of buying another 800 acres for 34K right now, all tax forfeit, county owned land. property taxes by state law can not grow by more than 5% for ten years.

If you see any land listed in the "recreational land" ad books is priced for city people who don't know any better, Look for people have equipment auctions, research the county for people behind on their taxes, ask around at rural stations and gun shops for anyone who is getting old and looking to move on, ask the cty or records of all lands sold in the past year to get a better idea of what stuff is really going for.

On our 320 acres, we will be renting the land out to a neighbor (well actually about 140 acres) for ag uses. we are giving him a sweetheart lease so he will also do a little work on some food plots. That also means we can keep the land on the Ag tax roles which really really reduces the taxes on it. we are putting another 100 acres into the CRP programs.

figuring this, the land will cost us nothing to buy or own for several years.

The larger parcel will be resold to ourselves after breaking it into some building lots and some preserve lots, we will be leasing some land to a nature conservation group who are going to use it to add a strip continium between two wildlife management areas and some old growth areas. Doing so, will still allow us to hunt, fish etc, but will not allow us to clear cut or build on certain strips of land on our property. This has no effect on our desired usage of the land. By breaking it up now and yet keeping as one large block, we give ourselves options in the future to break it up if we want with out worrying about future laws overriding our plans...

There is a lot of land out there, it is not all going to 5 to 10 k an acre. you just have to look at the situation.
 
It varies by state, but a good place to start is the Tax Collector's office. They can tell you what land is delinquent and tell you what the taxes are.

In Arkansas, you can buy the land by paying the delinquent taxes for three years in a row, but the original owner can come in at any time during those three years and settle up.

In most states, the newspaper of record will publish a list of delinquent properties as well -- but I'd act before the list comes out, so you know what you want.
 
We found about 1/2 of the property we looked at thru the tax assessors office, maybe 25% but looking around for farm auctions and the rest by word of mouth.
The latest one we are buying is from a family who are going to loose it for back taxes, we are paying about 20K on back taxes on the bulk land, and we are going to pay about 12 K on back taxes on the sellers homestead. we are not going to get that land, but in doing so we prevent gramma from getting tossed off her homestead. This one has not gone to the sheriffs auction yet, and as there is no mortgage, there will be no bank showing up to buy the land for pennies on the dollar. We are also going to be paying gramma's property taxes as a lien in estate, meaning for as long as she lives in the house. (she's over 85 so 15 years max) as part of the deal we keep her in the house she lived in, we get the land with clear title and the dead beat kids have nothing to worry about. Her property tax is under 250 bucks a year so we can deal with it.

The smaller parcel was bought from the tax office on a uncontested auction, not sure how it works but the land was offered for sale at an auction in the past and no one bid, now it sits on the land roles and the county wants to get rid of it. So when we show up, they post it 30 days before that they are selling the land and if someone has claim or interest in the land that they have to notify the county. If no one notifies the county, then they just have us and the sheriff and the tax assessor do the closing in the office. We have a cashiers check, they hand you a clean uncontestable title. The sheriff signs that no one showed with claim or interest and you walk out. The one thing we have found is that these places are usually not primo spots as they sit. Often they are heavily overgrown with weed species and will take some work to make into good hunting places or places fun to be around.

We bought one a few years ago and found when spring came nearly 1/4 of it was over run with poison Ivy, I have never sprayed so much roundup in my life, then burning it off too but having to stay up wind the whole time as the smoke is nasty. we got that place ok, but decided the poison Ivy issue (it keeps coming back) was enough to make us choose somewhere else. we sold that as soon as the five years was up. (some counties will not let you sell ag land off tax forfiet roles for a period of time to prevent land developers from chopping everything up). some counties are not putting plat maps online. If you search up your county you may find something you like that way, some have acronyms for the Tax forfeit land, but you can figure that out pretty easy. If you find land you want and then ask around after the sale, you might be able to do as we do and then rent out some land for Ag uses and qualify for land use taxes, that really helps.

The best land for us is off the beaten track, usually a half hour or more off the freeway, any closer and people are more hungry for it. both of our current parcels have year round roads, and are about a mile or so off paved roads, this really makes it more desirable for us and less so for developers.
 
My wife and I bought 28 acres in NE Missouri in 1993 for $17K, probably worth 5 times that now. We've killed 44 deer in 11 seasons on it including 3 bucks on the very first opening weekend in 1994. I'll repeat what others have said, it's not how much you own but what you own. Mine is located about a half mile from a large Corp of Engineers reservoir where there's public hunting. It's the perfect mix of cover, fields, food and water.
 
My wife and I bought 163 acres in Arkansas when I came back from my second tour in Viet Nam -- for $8,000. And that was big money in those days. We built on it in 1999, and bought an adjoining 22 acres. It has everything -- deer, squirrels, rabbits, turkey and even black bear.

Smartest thing I ever did.:D
 
I've got to get some hunting property bought soon, but unfortunately, in Alabama, it seems like everyone else has the same idea. I'd be happy if I could find a piece for around $1,000 an acre, but I've seen several pieces of pine covered hunting land (read: old paper company land) for $8,000 an acre, when it used to be 1/10th of that just a few years ago.
 
I was kinda wondering about that myself. I could buy a decent sized plot of land for $250 an acre.... build a little cabin out there and have a vacation place for hunting trips.
 
Taxes

This is a very important point when buying larger parcels. A lot of the ground for sale will make the buyer sign a continuance on the current tax classification because the assessor can go back up to 10yrs, depending on the juristiction to transfer tax class.

In Washington there are 3 main types of classifications that keep the man off an individuals back.

There is straight Ag, which is the hard work farming, there is Forest Land where you watch trees grow, and there is open space where you watch the wind blow.

Ag, has the best rates because they tax you on the crop you sell every year.

Forestry is next, I have 114 acres that is in forestry and I pay about $4.75 a month in taxes. They give you a break because when you harvest the trees or remove the classification they hit you hard.

Open Space is last because there is nothing to tas currently or in the future.

It isn't necessarily hard to get into a classification but it is extremely difficult to get out unless you have the money. If I were to put a perminent structure on the land I would have to carve out a minimum of 1 acre and remove it from the forest class and pay a single family home rate.

Good luck.
 
Our property owner's association has a website. http://www.terlinguaranch.com Browse it, for a bit of a feel. Click on the "Property Owner's Website" and then on "For Sale by Owner"

The Solitario country has the least numbers of people wandering through. Call the access "graded jeep trails". Not many deer, but dove, quail, javelina, coyotes, the occasional cougar, and a few Mouflon sheep wander through. Hardly any of us who own land back there worry about property lines; it's a "Code of the West" deal. Don't hunt through somebody's camp; don't throw trash. I think land is up, somewhat; it's moving at around $200 to $250 an acre. $142/year maintenance fee for the road grading.

Land with water and electricity goes for $1,000/ac and up. GhostTown area, $10K or so. The electric company (a co-op) charges $9/foot to extend a line.

Even with grading, 4WD is a Good Thing. Avoids wheelspin and driving a rock through a tread.

Look before signing. Some of the Ranch ain't worth nuthin'. One benefit is that any owner can drive around and sightsee on the 1,100 miles of roads around the 220,000 acres.


My house is in the dead center of this picture, if the URL comes up "righteous":

http://www.google.com/maps?q=terlin...4,-103.590131&spn=0.006672,0.012802&t=k&hl=en

Terlingua Creek just on the west; a neighbor some 300 yards to the east. You can see my road-building efforts. :) On a full-moon night I fairly regularly drive home without the headlights on. Boss-lady wife-mate does not approve even one iota. :D

Art
 
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