Finding Farmland Calculator

One of the toughest obstacles for new and beginning farmers is figuring out what they can afford and the options available to them. The National Young Farmer's Coalition has a calculator on their website to help you understand financing possibilities, and determine how affordable the property is for you.

Lindsey Lusher Shute is the organization's executive director. She says the calculator allows users to build a financial scenario for buying a piece of farmland.

"They can look at various loan options, they can stack federal loans on top of private loans or guaranteed loans from the farm credit system," she says. "They can even look at what putting a conservation easement on their land might do to the overall price, and to what they're paying for that property over time."

The calculator will allow you to compare two different scenarios every time you log in. And when you're ready to work with a loan officer, you'll have the information you need.

"You can print out a PDF of what you put together," she says. "So, the financing plan that you've modeled in the calculator, you can actually bring that information to a loan agent so it's a great way for a farmer to prepare for that meeting with a farm service agency or with farm credit, or with a local bank, because they have all of the questions already answered that a lender will want to know."

Lusher Shute points out that they do not save any financial information entered into the tool.

Click here for the farmland calculator