By Dar Danielson (Radio Iowa)

The Iowa State University farmland survey shows the upward run of land prices stalled out this year. ISU extension economist Rabail Chandio revealed the 2024 survey results today..

“This year we have ended a streak of five consecutive years of increases in land values in Iowa with a decline of three-point-one percent,” she says. “This brings us to $11,467  an acre.” That is a drop of 369 dollars an acre from last year’s record high. “The nominal value of farmland fell from our record high from last year, but it is still higher than the nominal value in 2020-2022. And if we adjust for inflation, our inflation-adjusted average value for 2024 is only 2.5% lower than the 2013 peak, which was the previous peak before the pandemic highs that we just saw,” Chandio says.

Chandio says the south-central land district was the only one to see an increase in land values, while the west-central district saw the largest decline in prices. “Seventy-five of the 99 counties reported decreases in their nominal values, and 88 counties reported a decrease in inflation-adjusted values. Despite that, 20 counties still report their highest nominal values since 1950,” she says.

Chandio says this year appears to be a correction after land values had gone up 29% in 2021 and 17% in 2022 coming out of the pandemic. “That naturally leads to somewhat of a resetting or balancing in the market, and sort of the similar trend we saw for after the previous peak in 2013,” she says.

Chandio says the drop in farm income was the top issue for lower land values. “The most commonly cited negative factor by our respondents this year was lowering commodity prices, 34 percent of the responses mentioned this,” she says. High interest rates were a close second to the commodity prices in responses about the impact on land values.