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SC Wisconsin | I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, I purchased a farm last fall, which will essentially double my acres. This is the first large-ish land purchase ive ever made, so seeing all those zeros staring at you can be a bit intimidating. I made it come close to cash flowing at prices nearing half of what we are now, so I plan to contract a percentage of the crop and put a big chunk of change away if we do have a good crop with good prices so ill have most or all of next years payment set aside a year in advance. The timing has worked out very well which is the hardest thing to predict.
On the other hand, dad loves to preach about the 80's and how they barely scraped by, but there were dozens of farms in our neighborhood who went whole hog buying land and machinery when the times were good and everyone said they were here to stay. 2 years later most of those farms were for sale on the courthouse steps. I was a mere twinkle in dads eye in the 80's so I didn't get to see it first hand, but it sounds terrifying to hear him tell it..
I feel confident in my own abilities to weather a storm, between my town job and all the other irons in the fire I can survive. I do a lot of traveling around the area for my town job, and there's a lot of guys spending money like its going out of style. I hope they are spending money thats already in the bank (CFAP payments and sold/delivered grain etc) and not financing to the hilt. I know we don't have the high interest like the 80's which is what got a lot of guys, but I just don't want to see a lot of guys go belly up like the past. Lord knows we are losing too many as it is. All thats going to amount from another event like that is consolidation of ownership and more land in the hands of investors the like of bill gates etc.
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