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CO, NE | As others have said, beginning farmers don't start out with the newer or new equipment, they start with old equipment that they fix up or fix as needed.
I think farmers fall into two categories. The first is one who farms less land, has older equipment, and does most of the wrenching himself (or has kids to help). The repair bills are much less this way, but much more time taken up by repairs. Of course, you have to be a good mechanic to do this and be able to anticipate what you should repair on your equipment in the off-season. I think this group is also more likely to work a W-2 job or have some other business going as well.
The second is one is the one who doesn't have time to do their own wrenching due to the amount of land that they farm. So they have to pay the dealer or someone else to do it. That gets expensive very quickly and factor in the cost of spare machinery because they can't afford the downtime for a breakdown. A cycle of buying and trading newer equipment makes more sense then. Farming the large amount of land brings in the income to pay for it. They also put a lot more hours on equipment each year, so a 30 year old tractor might be run into the ground in a few years of their operation. Some I know also do custom farming to help pay the equipment bills.
My dad was definitely the first type. When he was younger we farmed a lot of ground with a pair of 4020's and a 105 combine. It was also the '80's, so new equipment wasn't in the cards. We mainly raised wheat to feed our hog operation anyway.
Now my dad is gone and my brother and I are running the farm on the weekends. We have a MF3545 for a field tractor and a 4020 utility tractor (not sure I would try to put that one in the field anymore). We had a breakdown on the 3545 last year that caused us a lot of headache due to the amount of time the repair took (splitting the tractor). After that, I'm seriously considering a new-to-us field tractor and using the 3545 as a backup/spraying tractor. The cost is hard to stomach, but I look at the probable lost revenue this year and it doesn't look so bad. | |
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How do you afford expensive tractors / machinery?
