America's farmland is changing hands: here's what it means for you

More than $24 trillion dollars worth of farmland and farming assets will change hands starting this month for the next 20-years. Awareness is your first step to capitalizing from the shift.

I often find the most important issues of all, the ones that impact our day-to-day lives, are the ones left out of national headlines and hot topic discussions at the political level in our country. It’s fitting that I sit down to write this today on Inauguration Day, as well as my birthday, because I believe the incoming farmland revolution is going to change the course of our country forever - and I can’t stop thinking about it.

Starting right now, this very month, $24 trillion dollars (I have heard from farmers and financial investors that it’s much larger than this) worth of farmland, farming assets, and equipment are going to change hands over the next 20-years. This land is changing hands because the average age of the American farmer is over 60. They are being bought out, absorbed by bigger ag empires, paved over for developments, or purchased by foreign entities.

Everyone BUT the average American is making a mad dash for this land - and it’s critically important to sound the alarm so more people are aware this is taking place.

It’s estimated that nearly 50% of the farming workforce in our country is going to retire over the next decade. Even worse, since 1987, the amount of new farmers entering the workforce has decreased by 30%. Millennials, and now Gen Z, don’t want to be farmers… or at least that’s what the older generations say.

I disagree.

I think the millennial generation has a deep-rooted desire to farm and create food autonomy. I think there are roadblocks that have made this seem out of reach for people:

• The way we farm, with one-crop massive expansive farming operations that require incredibly expensive machinery and seems too overwhelming to start

• Farming has been touted as a ‘redneck’ profession meant for the ‘country folk’ that stay out of cities

• State and federal governments have not been friendly to farmers in the form of regulations, laws, and tax hikes

When you combine all three of these issues, you’re left with a major problem: we do not have enough Americans going into the art of farming at the present moment. With trillions of dollars of farmland about to hit the market, we need people, of all ages sure, but especially young people to snatch up this land and continue working the farms.

I’ve thought about this problem so extensively for years that I went ahead and bought 6.74 acres of farmland in 2023 to become my own case study. The experiment is fully underway. This will be my first full year farming and gardening, alone, and I plan to share everything I learn. Still, up until this point, I have learned more than I ever imagined about this problem, and am here to tell you to stop listening to the fear- mongers - you CAN farm.

Around 12,000 years ago, humans began to farm. They traded in hunting and gathering for a more predictable food schedule, irrigating fields and harvesting seeds that they used for the next growing season. To farm and garden is to be human. This idea that only a select few were ‘heavenly ordained’ to take on farming is beyond false. I had zero prior farming and gardening experience, and though I have a long way to go, I was still able to grow things! I own chickens, rabbits, and cats now. I have a farm stand. It hasn’t been rocket science. It’s required hard work, yes, but also a humble mindset admitting to myself I have no damn clue what I am doing - and that’s ok.

We live in a culture today, mainly thanks to social media, where everyone gets online and proclaims themselves an expert from a Tweet they just read. The reality is that there is no such thing as expertise. With the amount of information and innovation released into our world today, it’s impossible to know all of it. The person who’s trying to tell you that you shouldn’t bother farming since you’re 35 and never have before… is incorrect.

Starting now, what we consider farming is going to change in this country. We have an incoming administration with different ideas about farming (I am not saying they are good or bad). They have expressed interest in altering how the USDA and FDA function, and members within the administration have stated they plan to prioritize the ‘small farmer’ and family farming operations this year. It’s nearly impossible for family farms to compete with corporate empires today. Is the help that is promised for these smaller farms really coming? We are going to find out.

It’s the first time in a long-time an incoming administration has expressed interest at this level in changing how we grow our food. I have found in my life when any industry or norm is ‘overturned,’ it’s scary and unpredictable at first - but it also creates the biggest opportunity. That’s why the most millionaires are made during recessions.

We have some big changes on the horizon, and you can bet I will be here monitoring every single one of them, sharing the information as I learn it and apply it. I have barely scratched the surface with the free help available to beginner farmers from the USDA. I am entered into a grant program already (results come out in March) and have begun the process of getting a free high tunnel (green house) for 2026. I am enrolled in my second Cornell Small Farms course (they are only $200/each) that I was told about via the USDA. And I only contacted these people four months ago!

Farmland is one of the best investments a person can make

Farmland is still aplenty in this country. We’re losing acreage by the day - but that doesn’t mean we can’t turn the trajectory around starting right now. There are going to be farmland deals on Zillow, through BizBuySell, on Craiglist, posted in local newspapers, and pinned to bulletins in Tractor Supply. There is going to be farmland that never hits the market. Approaching farmers and either leasing from them, renting acreage, or setting up a trust is desirable in their eyes - people comment on my posts every day that farmers are agreeing to this!

Farmers are aging, they are exhausted, they are indebted to their $200,000 tractor, and they are unable to shoulder 100+ acres as they enter their 70s. Even worse, they have been taken advantage of from a tech perspective. John Deere, considered a classic Americana brand, requires farmers to buy their software to use their tractors today. When the tractors break, the farmers can’t fix them. They have to call John Deere to service the machine via the software. Before the software, farmers were more than capable of making their own machinery fixes. Today, they no longer can without paying the servicing fee - yet another example of corporations destroying this country from the ground up.

We don’t have to accept this anymore. The biggest middle finger you can give these corporations is buying the farmland yourself. And you barely need an acre! It’s possible to turn a profit on LESS than an acre. With little acreage, you won’t need a tractor. Without a tractor, you’ll be able to get started without going into debt. I am doing this as we speak!

It’s time for food autonomy to find its way back to family farms and local communities. We are more than capable of feeding our immediate communities. The only thing standing in our way is land ownership. And there are more pathways to own this farmland than people realize. I personally got a loan from Farm Credit East (I break that down in this article). That is one of the many ways to make this work.

Let 2025 be the year the American people take back their land. It’s already for sale.

I cover all things land loans, the farmland revolution, working with the USDA, Farm Credit, Amish construction and architecture, regenerative farming, and starting a farm as someone who has no idea what I am doing. Follow along!