Same here - one of my best friends is a long time real estate agent and he has helped me find 5 or 6 properties over the years that I later sold for better returns than I could ever get in the market. I just retired and think I am done on buy more land. We found 25 acres to live on near Georgetown 4 years ago and built a house and barn and it has a beautiful 2 acre pond on it. It has already more than doubled in value.

As everyone knows, real estate goes up and down so I have always tried to make sure that I had the ability to hold onto a property in case there was a downturn.

I stopped thinking about buying land to hunt when I realized I would be spending more time trying to maintain it and less time traveling with the wife. Any increase in value would end up with the kids and the wife and I are both ones to leave little for the kids. They all make a lot more than we did at their age and can follow their own saving plans for retirement. With a lease, I drive up, get out and hunt, and then go back home. As someone once said, spend less on stuff and more on experiences.

Maintain what? I just show up and hunt and get my dividend equivalent check from the mailbox

Dang, what am i thinking? The profitable "disposal" of my properties will be my "daughters' "problem" to deal with.

Proverbs 13:22

its not going to cost you 6-8% a year of the value to maintain it.



I can give you countless examples of land that was bought and then resold for 20-50% higher in a year or two's time

My first ranch went 2.5x in value in 7 years and had an average yearly payout of $32 acre which essentially was a 7% yearly dividend based off purchase price.

I’ll probably sell mine in a year or 2. Had it about 40 years and I’m getting old. Actually I have already gotten old; 81 yoa. Arthritis is kicking my butt and I’m having to depend on grandsons and son-in-law to do a bunch of things that I’ve done all my life. That really sux after a lifetime of stomping my own snakes.

It wasn’t supposed to happen to me.

ROI on rural, hunting acreage is a lot like other investments, will ultimately depend on prevailing market and level of leasehold improvements invested or not onto property. Mine have been minimal in nature and I know for nearly a fact that I could turn a 2-3x profit over what I paid 15 years ago for it based of surrounding sales comp pricing. Being 2 hours from metromess helps tremendously with ultimate ROI.

I align with most he said above. Leasing a place I work very hard and long cause I WANT to but Im not sure doing work on my own place cause I HAVE to would be the same thing. Im older and blessed to not have to do much of anything I dont want to.
Neighbors wouldn’t concern me the way he explained except I wouldn’t want them shooting what they often shoot. To not worry about the neighbors hunting I would need way more country than I could afford(crux of my feelings). I want at least a few thousand acres to hunt and I have to lease to do that. I also don’t want to hunt the same two or three stands every time.
Owning land as an investment is a great idea and for some a few hundred acres is enough to hunt. Owning investment land is fine for me but I don’t want to hunt a small place and I dont want the hassle of ownership.
In a nutshell, I want to lease a lot of country as opposed to owning a small place cause it’s more enjoyable and can be managed easier for Trophy deer.
Another topic where everyone is going to have a different opinion cause everyone is different. That’s understandable as well as fine.

Do you look at land as part of your retirement fund or just hunting?

Me??? I don’t look at buying land for hunting at all.
Buying land for investment/retirement fund is great if you can hold for long enough or just enjoy flipping em. For me, I don’t see owning land in my future.
For someone that is ok with hunting smaller acreage and needs a place to invest for future then buying land to hunt would be an obvious choice. I don’t fit either category.

Freerange, I agree with you. After hunting big acreage leases the idea of hunting 200-400 acres with friends and guests is not that appealing. Especially after you have gotten thoroughly familiar with said property.

Even if you paid cash for 200-300 acres and kept it for 15 years, when you sell it you would need to subtract taxes and improvements you have paid to see actual ROI. If you financed it and paid 8 % interest on the mortgage it would be even less ROI. Like DQ said, it would depend on prevailing market.

This thread could have just asked who all here are city folks / weekend hunters and want to do that until they die.

The ROI is pretty attractive if you do the right timing/forecasting/get lucky, etc. I paid $43,560 for my 133 acres a heckuva long, long, time ago. Realtor’s are now telling me I could list it for $10,000 per acre and come off a little. I don’t live there. Yeah, I’d rather be lucky than smart. The migration to Texas has all real estate sky rocketing.

Other than going to Africa one time, I’ve seldom hunted anywhere else since I bought it. That recent 4 year drought hit my wildlife pretty hard. I only saw 5 or 6 deer this year, no turkeys and only one mess of pigs. Stock tanks got so low, I lost 90% of the fish. I’ll restock if and/or when we get some big rains.

Until I bought it, I hunted a lot of different parts of the West and Southwest and fished a lot of tournaments. Now, rural land everyday expenses and taxes have me hunting and fishing at home. I have some young men filling feeders, cutting brush, building stands, etc. They have been hunting there since they were pre teens. Thats good when the old guy gets arthritis and really is handicapped.

When I do sell, I’ll have a heckuva tax bill. But, I guess that’s not a bad problem to have. I’ll have some left or my wife will.

You arent allowing any land producing income into the argument, land isnt income less unless you choose it to be. I have a piece of land that returns 17% of purchase price yearly. Its mail box money, I do nothing. Tenant is on 5 year lease, same tenant for past 12 years.

what land improvement expenses are you talking about? Land improvement is voluntary, Rental property not so much…..

land for me is an income producing extension of my investment portfillo… But i guess you could just invest in land REITs and not get to hunt it ever

I've leased all of my life, but my dream has always been to own my own little piece of hunting property for my family & friends. I have recently began making changes in my life that will help me get there. Sold my big azz house on 5 acres, paid truck & RV off early, and now I'm living in my RV for a spell. Goal is to SAVE money, something I couldn't do living where I was. I'm 46 yrs old now and a PawPaw to two grandsons and have no retirement plan. I've made a lot of money in my life but have nothing to show for it now. Before I die I will have a piece of ground for my family to have fun on. Obviously a big ranch is out of the question, but 200-300 acres in my old stomping grounds of S Texas is what I'm looking for, or will be looking for....a place big enough to develop for damn good dove hunting, pigs, a few deer, and some rabbit hunting. Would like to buy thick undeveloped ground, and slowly build her up. Build a medium sized efficient barndo & shop with some guest quarters on it. Keep it simple and live out the rest of my days there.

Of course, when you love to fish and purchase boats that adds to the delay of things....

What all this “maintenance” y’all mention? As a landowner, I can’t think of anything that would be considered maintenance that I’m doing that I wouldn’t be doing if I was leasing.

As an owner, this is what I’ve been wondering. Maintenance and improvements are not the same. Ag, timber, wildlife, etc exemption, taxes are just over a dollar an acre per year. I don’t know what else there is that is required maintenance that even comes close to disrupting 7-10 pct rise in value per year. And that 7-10pct on a property within 2 hours of any population of people can easily be in the 25 pct range

My electric is about $45/month, insurance $238/month.

Feed is about $300/month.

Two of those things I’d have regardless of if I owned or leased.

I’ve spent some money in cedar clearing but it only made the value of the land go up further and enhanced the aesthetic appeal.


Maintaining a rural place is not all that expensive unless you have special circumstances. But you can have that with a lease. I know guys who have big south Texas leases were 4 of them will drop a combined $100k in feed plus biologist costs.

there are enough soil and pasture conservation programs you can either wipe all or part of the costs away also

Interesting read here. The two biggest words that separate leasing from owning are…..write offs. The next two are…Ag Exemption. All maintenance and taxes are a write off. So are most anything you do to maintain and improve your place. We own income producing properties that consist of pasture, wheat fields, and cattle. Wheat brings deer and pigs, as the cattle gain. Wheat dies, sunflowers grow, Hello dove! A regular paradise. The absolute best decision our family made was to invest in land. Yes, we lease some too, but owning is by far a financial benefit. Work? Yes, but I enjoy every minute of it. Bobo speaks of programs that can benefit your property and you financially, he’s right, they can and do. Wildlife Exemptions? Bird Sanctuary? CRP? Timber? All kinds of programs for each part of the state. And, I haven’t even mentioned ROI from land value perspective. We all believe that will only continue to increase because it always has. “They ain’t making any more of it”

Dave, enjoy those grandkids and son-in-law. You are teaching them lessons they can’t learn anywhere else. 81 not to old. Keep going and make them load up and clean what you kill. My Dad killed his last deer at 90. You can too.

3K, those guys have been there since they were small children. When my grandson was in the 3rd grade his teacher called me and asked if I would come and speak to the kids about the rural world. I spoke about the balance of nature like the symbiotic relationship between coyotes and rabbits, deer, drought effects on nature and wildlife, livestock, etc. I’m still doing it but to a couple more classes of town kids.

One of my grandsons friends was in the 3rd grade audience. Grandson said that he had a friend that also wanted to hunt. I said ok and that young man is still there along with his fiancé. Couldn’t run him off by chunking rocks. He recently proposed to her there and that’s where they want to honeymoon. Of course, I said OK.

Grandson lost his virginity there to the girl that is now his wife.

After moving to this amazing state in 1998 and having a number of leases that were less then rewarding my wife asked why don't we buy a place, I must say she shocked me but she's a great friend and partner and I felt empowered with her support so we commenced the search in 2009, I lived on Padre Island but had a daughter and family in CO and one in KS. both with hunting grandsons and son-in-laws.

Picked a mid point for us to gather which was in the Dickens county area, After a number of disappointments found 160 acres in a family trust with no improvements, with folks eager to sell. Long story short we settled on 500,00 an acre,

Best decision of my life, Retired now 10 years and this p[ace has kept me young and mentally focused, Finished a Morgan shed into a comfortable cabin, fenced 3 miles of perimeter and cross fence. had a well drilled and installed pump and piping created food plots and improved cover,

The labor is a labor of love and yep my kids will reap the financial benefit as it's at least quadrupled in value. and the quality of the deer has improved accordingly.

I want my grandsons to share everything they're comfortable with with me...but I'm not sure what I'd respond to this. I'll come up with a plan, just in case.