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First of all find a long term leasee Ima makes some great points. If brother is wanting to sell out, work out a purchase agreement to buy out his share of the land at appraised ag value.
Also what if your location? In some places it is almost impossible to earn a living on 250 acres of land. I applaud you for not wanting to develop the land or sell to a corporation.
I'm with the bro on this one, sell it and be done with it as it ceased being a relevant ancestral home when the house and barns ceased to exist, now its just a field..
I'd have to disagree with jambo101. That because I still own a portion of the family farm that was originally 100 acres, 7 acres was stolen (long story there), of the 93 acres about 80 acres still remain in the family. Even though I live hundreds of miles away, it still has family meaning - it's been through four generations of our family, only stopped being a working farm with my father's generation, and only stopped being where family members lived in the past generation. Thought about selling my portion at one time, but just can't do it - and if I did, the other family members would get first dibs.
But some folks have more attachment to the land than others, even within the same family. To some, it's just money; to others, it's as much a part of the family history as their parents and grandparents are.
OP, I, too, applaud you for wanting to keep it in farmland. One of these days at the rate we're going the farmland is all going to be paved over in subdivisions that are empty because everyone who would have lived in them has starved to death because there's no land left to grow food. Short, short, short-sighted culture, we are, it sometimes seems.
As for whether or not a young farm family could make a living off of it, depends on a few things, like what exactly they decide to grow (some CSA's around here, for example, make a tidy living on a small portion of that much land, and some farm five acres in herbs sold to restaurants and at farmers' markets and do well). Also on whether that's the only piece of land they lease - note that your current tenant leases multiple pieces of land. Do you know who the tenant is, by the way? They might already be a young farm family - might want to look into that if you don't know.
once agin, before spending time thinking about what you want to do with the farm, think about what your brother can do. If he file for partition sale or forces property sale, the court will divide the land and divy it up regardless of what you want or which piece you would want. Or they can simple order the whole land sold and the money goes equally to all three. If that happens, you have no land to worry about. Most estate land issues in my neck of the woods end up as a buy out or full sale. If you cant buy out your brothers share of value, thet order the full sale and split proceeds. someone else now owns the property.
^^^^ THIS!
I was in the situation a few years ago where a sibling with whom I co-owned acreage was going to force a sale if I didn't pay "her" price. The only way to avoid a forced sale was to do just that even though she chose the high side of the appraised value.
Simply put OP, you and your sister will have to find a solution that is palatable to your brother or he indeed can force the sale. Be nice and not confrontational; but, time is of the essence and you cannot afford to dither any longer.
Why can't they equally divide the land into thirds--thus elimitating the buy-out? Personally, I would check with the estate's lawyer on the availability of this option first.
i like the idea of dividing it equally between the 3 of you (assuming subdivisions are allowed), if your brother wants to then sell his section you can either buy him out, or if cant afford, not, but at least youd still, between you and your sister have MOST of the land left even if some of it is sold.
if it were mine, id be out there right now trying to figure out where my house was going :P
You could also convince your brother that right now isn't a good time to sell with the economy as it is. This doesn't erase the problem, but would buy you more time.
Last year my brother and sister and I inherited the family farm - 240 acres of corn and soybeans. It's been rented to tenants since the 1960s. There is no house or barn on the land anymore - just farm land. None of us live in the state where the farm is located.
If we sold it at current market value it would be worth about 2.5 million.
none of us is wealthy and none of us really has any farming knowledge.
Thanks!
For some one who isnt wealthy, it seems you are depriving yourselves of a substantial financial windfall just to maintain the luxury of hanging on to a field that may have had some relevance a long time ago..
On the thought of "you cant go home again" i'd sell off the field and buy a more meaningful field for your kids/family maybe something a little closer to home, maybe something useful like a summer cottage.
I think some of those posting for division do not understand the effect of a loss of total acreage has on the remainder nor perhaps are they considering the cost on all the co-owners for a survey to delineate the three individual pieces.
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