Page Four
How .Young People Acquire Farms I
By FRANK D. HANSING
(Reprinted From the USDA Agricultural Situation)
i ———
If you were a young farmer want
ing to attain ownership of a family
farm, what would you do?
If your family could help you with
the initial capital, what sort of a
plan would you work out, and how
much of the purchase price would be
required? Would you have to wait
until your parents died and use your
inheritance ? Would you work on the
home farm to save the needed capital.
Or, would your family be able to fur
nish the money for the initial down
payment ?
If your family could not help you,
what would you do ? Would you work
at nonfarm employment and save un
t'"l you could make a down payment on
on a family-sized farm? Could you
borrow the entire amount outside
your family? Or, would you try to
work your way up the ladder, first as
farmhand, next as tenant, and finally
a? owner ?
Every year thousands 'of our farm
youths are confronted with these ques
tions. Maybe you’re one of them.
You must decide what to do and how
to do it.
Your problems are getting more
complicated. The amount of capital
needed has gone up pretty fast. Land
and buildings, machinery and equip
ment, livestock and supplies . . . all,
are much higher priced than they
were a few years ago. The way we
do things on the farm, in this modem
age of machines and new techniques,
has increased the capital required for
farming. In many areas, livestock
production is of increasing import
ance, and this makes large invest
ments necessary . . . not only for ani
mals but for feed, pasture, and equip
ment.
You young men who are interested
in farm ownership are thus confront
ed with the problem of how to acquire
this large amount of capital.
A study in Virginia sheds some
light on how some young men have
solved this problem, and finally at
tained farm home ownership. It shows
how a typical young couple can ac
quire enough capital to buy an owner
ship interest in a farm of average
value—as high as $30,000. It shows
that some young farm owners depend
on family help in acquiring farm own
ership. And it shows that some can
get started in ownership without fam
ily assistance.
The study was made cooperatively
fcy the Virginia Agricultural Experi
ment Station and the Bureau of Agri
cultural Economics. It was centered
in Culpepper and Orange Counties,
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where beef cattle and dairying are
the main enterprises. Forty-nine
farm owners were included in the pi
lot study. All of them bought their
1 farms between 1930 and 1951. For
' purposes of analysis the farms were
’ sorted into two major groups: Those
| starting without family help, and
[ those starting with family help.
Without Family Help
! Twenty-one of these farmers got
the capital with which to buy their
first land without family help. They
1 got their capital in 3 ways: Some
of them saved enough to get started
' while working at a nonfarm job. Some
borrowed what they needed from non
relatives. A few in the group climbed
1 the so-called agricultural ladder.
' More than half of these young
! farmers accumulated capital with
| which to get started as farm owners
| by working at nonfarm employment.
Practically all of these purchases were
made in a time of growing prosperity
1 . . . during and following World War
11. That is to say, these farmers
' worked during a period favorable to
1 rapid accumulation of capital. Farm
ing was not a new venture to this
I group, however, since many of them
J had had farming experience before
* they bought their land.
These farmers who had no family
’ help began farming with an average
1 of 243 acres per farm and an average
! farm investment of $16,744. The av
-1 erage cash investment, or down pay
| ment made by these farmers was rela
' tively low at $6,720, or about 40 per
' cent of the total farm investment.
Thus, the average indebtedness per
farm was about 60 per cent.. Total
investment was divided as follows:
Land and buildings, $12,030; machin
. ery and equipment, $1,031; and live
stock, $3,683. Sixteen of the twenty
one farms have remained the same
1 size since purchase. Some farms,
however, were bought so recently that
1 their operators haven’t had enough
! time to accumulate capital to buy ad
ditional land. Furthermore, many of
the recent purchases were large
enough to make unnecessary the prac
j tice of adding tract after tract to get
an economic unit. Only 3 of these
young farmers added more land to
their original purchase. And 2 of
the 21 had changed farms completely
since they first became farm owners.
With Family Help
Twenty-eight farmers, among -those
surveyed, had some kind of family
help to get started into ownership.
And they got their help in one of I
three ways: Inheritance, family fi-J
nancing, and working on the home
farm.
In this group, more of them got
. their start through inheritance than
any other way. The inheritance us
ually was some interest in farm real
estate —only two cases involved cash
inheritance. Inheritance of land rang
ed from a one-sixth interest in 365
acres. The years of initial land ac
quisition of these owners were about,
equally divided between the 1930’s and
the 1940’5. Thus, the relatively low
average farm investment of $11,547
was influenced by the fact that sev
eral of the operators made their ini
tial purchases during the 1930’s when
land values were still comparatively
low. The average initial investment
made by these operators was $7,272,
or 62 per cent of the total farm in
vestment, leaving an average indebt
edness of less than 40 per cent. This
is in contrast to those operators with
out family help, whose average in
debtedness was about 63 per cent.
Here again land and buildings made
up most of the farm investment, with
an average of $8,576. Machinery and
equipment averaged sl,lll and live
stock $1,860 per farm. Unlike the
without-family-help group, those with
family help showed considerable in
terest in buying additional land and
in building up their farms to econom
ic-sized units. Only 6of the 28 farms
ir. this group were as big when’
bought as they are today. The other
22 are farms that have since been en
larged . . . either by purchase, by in
heritance, or both. Three of the op
erators were sons who did not own a
full interest in their respective farms.
In these cases the fathers were very
old and in poor health, and the sons
made all of the managerial decisions
even though they owned only a par
tial interest in the farm real estate.
As a young man, the chances are
that you would use one or more of
these six methods in getting started
in farm ownership. The hardest thing
is to get money for the down pay
ment. The best solution to this prob
lem ha* to be determined, of course,
by individual circumstances.
The process of getting started on
a small tract and adding to it, piece
by piece, is now practiced much less
in Virginia than formerly. Also, con
trary to popular opinion, few farm
ers in this area during recent years
have climbed the so-called agricul
tural ladder from farm laborer to
tenant, to mortgaged owner, to full
owner. Work at nonfarm employ
ment was more prevalent than we had
exected. Thus, high industrial activi
ty has evidently added a new process
by which young men can attain owner
ship of farm homes.
If the opportunity for rapid accum
ulation of capital by working in in
dustry should decrease very much,
farm youth without help from the
family will find it hard to get started
in farm home ownership. Unless
farm ownership is to become virtual -
lv a closed shop —with farm* banded
THE CHOWAN HERALD. EDENTON. N. C,. THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 10, 1953.
down from father to son, from gen- s
eration to generation— the road must c
be kept open for young men without ].
family help to break into the owner- ,
ship column. In the absence of luc
rative off-farm employment, it may
be necessary for many farmers to get
loans to finance a large proportion of
the farms they buy.
Lonnie Van Horn Dies
After Lingering Illness
Lonnie Van Horn, 46, died at his
home on East Church Street Friday
morning at 4:15 o’clock following a
long illness. A native of Bertie Coun
ty, he lived in Edenton most of his
life, working as a painter.
Surviving are his wife, Mrs. Mattie
Ruth Van Horn; his mother, Mrs.
Pearl Van Horn; two sons, Earl and
Carl, at home; one daughter, Mrs.
Dorothy Mae Dickerson of Richmond,
Indiana; three sisters, Mrs. Oscar
Bunch, Mrs. Elizabeth Holmes of
Edenton and Mrs. Bessie Pike of Win
fall, and two grandchildren.
Funeral services were conducted at
the First Christian Church, of which
he was a member Saturday afternoon
at 4 o’clock. The pastor, the Rev. E.
C. Alexander, officiated and burial
was in Beaver Hill Cemetery.
Not Long Enough
Peewitt —When that elevator fell
with you I suppose all your sins
flashed before your eyes.
Poette—Well, not all of them. We
only dropped five stories.
Edenton Police Make
51 Arrests In August
Chief of Police George I. Dafl re
ported to Town Council Tuesday night
that Edenton police made 51 arrests
during August, of which number 47
were found guilty as charged. Mis
cellaneous traffic violations led the
list with 17 arrests, followed by 11
for being drunk.
Os those arrested 27 were white
males, no white females, 22 colored
males and two colored females.
Fines amounted to $675 and costs
$382.35 or a total of $1,057.35, of
which $130.50 was turned back to the
town in way of officers’ fees.
During the month the police an-
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I EDENTON, NORTH CAROLINA , {
swered 84 calls, investigated four ac-|
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