Thanks for the support Alex, I appreciate it. I am probably too old to change much now even if I wanted to. Have a great day.

☝️👆🏼

Starting small is the key. You never can say where that will lead. Be careful to only buy high quality land and you should never fall too far even if the market does go down. Have a great day.

I agree. I have hunted private land once in the last 4 years. The last two years, I've killed nice bucks on a small corner of public land. It's surrounded by private but nobody hunts it during archery. When I say small, I mean there's approximately 350 acres on one side of the road and this piece is on the opposite side and makes up about 30 acres. It is just a perfect piece with a travel corridor, protected doe bedding, and extremely low pressure. The key is it becomes its best during late pre rut and peak rut because of the unpressured doe bedding. When I say nice bucks I have to give you perspective, I'm talking bucks in the 120s and 130s. This is the mountains of PA so they don't get "giant" very often like they do in Ohio or Iowa or Wisconsin or Kansas. But this year I did see one that was well into the 140s. My point is that if you find the right terrain and get things set you don't need a ton of land to kill respectable bucks. And then, you can work your way up to a larger chunk.

Thanks for the input Tim. I appreciate it. Hope you have a great day.

​@@bill-winkeg, cc

Maybe Bill and Ethan can keep it going along with our participation.

We truly appreciate the support! Thanks for watching guys!

Thanks. Much appreciated. Have a great day.

Thanks for the support. I hear you on the upside and downside of land prices if you are an owner. I think if you are planning to leave the land to your family, or have at least five years until you would sell it, then land is probably still OK. It is pretty hard to know what the short-term (next couple of years) prices will be though. They could go down a bit. They really need to, for that matter. Have a great day.

Thanks for watching Mitchell! It won't be easy, but I'm up for the challenge!

Thanks Mitchell. Much appreciated.

That is great news. Congrats and good luck on the dream farm. I appreciate your support.

Thanks Madison. We will keep producing land related episodes in the Dream Farm series and we will come back at various times to address some of the topics brought in the Journey mini-series, so it is not totally ended. I appreciate the support.

It is a great pastime if you own the land and want to make it better. I love the land stuff more than the actual hunting now. Always looking for ways to make the farm better for wildlife and my family to enjoy. I do some on-site consulting work if you aren't too far away, but not much of it. Have a great day.

Ambitious is an understatement! I'm going to take Bill's signature "Dream Big" literally! I would be happy with 1/10th of that amount, but I'm still going to shoot for the moon! Thanks for watching Nate, I appreciate the support!

It is different everywhere. I am sure Ethan's dream farm would be in an area with limited tillable making it much cheaper to own and easier to put together. I know places in the Midwest and plains states where non-tillable "junk" land is still pretty cheap.

Daniel: well said! Priceless life advice. What I truly admire about Bill is his humility, your input resembles Bill’s persona.

Daniel, thanks for watching, that is great advice. There are many things in life that are far more important than land or a whitetail deer. As always, we appreciate the support!

All good advice Daniel. I have talked to a lot of realtors lately and it seems that the consensus is that the market is cooling slowly. I think it pays to be selective and patient. If you don't have to buy now, I don't think I would. In other words, if you are an investor primarily and not a legacy end user, time should be on your side in the short-term (maybe one year, maybe two). No one really knows - who could predict the Covid effect - but it seems that times are getting easier if you are a buyer.

Good point. You never want to say never when it comes to land. It is still, in the end, an investment and that means it can always be sold. Good luck.

Thanks Paul. I appreciate it. Have a great day.

Land prices were a lot cheaper back then. Land prices are much higher now with not much of an increase in wages. Still possible, but much more difficult.

@@williamcox7190That’s exactly right. Back in ‘99 I hunted on an old gentleman’s farm and he offered to sell me 300 acres of timber for $400 an acre. I beat myself up on a daily basis for not buying it.

@Russell Langworthy luckily I bought property just before COVID and the super low interest rates. I paid around $2800 an acre at the time. Now, similar properties are going for $5000 an acre. Not sure how many people can afford $5000 per acre hunting properties with wages being stagnant for so long. 40 acres costs you $200k, which is a pretty steep payment for the vast majority of people.

@@williamcox7190 How many acres did you buy and what area?

It may seem that way but in 1999 guys buying 400$ per acre farms were paying perhaps upwards of 5-10 times more than the previous farmer bought in the 1960s. I will say land is def overpriced for the buyer at the moment for sure so it is a little harder and taking into account inflation ect. But in the end people were making less so it most cases it’s all relative in the end. Just glad we have great Americans like bill to learn from and look up to. Thanks again bill!

Most of the rest of the Dream Farm series will be about projects I will be doing on my farm and other projects that make hunting farms better. Most of those projects will add value to the property in the end, but I can a video specifically on the list of projects and how they impact hunting quality and land value. Have a great day.

I think so. It is just hard to motivate people to do all the work of contributing if they aren't being compensated in some way and it is not a lucrative business where there is a lot of extra money floating around. I do need a couple more contributors for sure, but I want to be fair to everyone while growing slowly and carefully. It needs to work well for everyone involved or it is only a short-term deal. Good question.

I think that works if all the satellite farms are in good neighborhoods. I am sure Mark's are. I get what he is doing and it does make sense, but I still would rather have all my land in one block. I may not be quite as bent on shooting giants every year as Mark (he certainly does shoot them). I think my goals are the overall landownership experience and that feels best to me when all my land is in one place. I have more room to roam, more ridges to look over and all my management effort is in one place. No need to move the equipment around when all the effort is one farm. There are tradeoffs for sure so it comes down to goals in the end. Have a great day.

Flipping that buck to doe ratio took a ton of work by a lot of people: myself, my friends that hunted my farm and my neighbors. We all got on board with the program and shot tons of does and very few bucks. Over about three to four years, that led to a buck to doe ratio what was heavily skewed toward bucks (more bucks than does). I learned a lot about deer behavior through it all and the result was some pretty fabulous hunting. That all ended in 2012, unfortunately, when we got hit hard with EHD that wiped out a lot of my bucks. I shot some big deer after that, but the farm was never quite as good again as it was in 2011, the year before the EHD.

Pat, my dream farm is always a hunting farm in a very rural area where the prices are reasonable and not affected by development. I would hate to try to buy much land near a city. That would not be for me. Good luck.

Ethan has been hitting the lottery hard these past few weeks. JK. He is a hard worker and good smart young man. I would definitely bet on him having something pretty nice in a few years. Thanks for the support. Have a great day.

Alex, I answered this for another guy farther up the comments. He asked me to compare my approach to Mark Drury's (which is to own more tracts instead of one big one). Here is my reply: "I think that works if all the satellite farms are in good neighborhoods. I am sure Mark's are. I get what he is doing and it does make sense, but I still would rather have all my land in one block. I may not be quite as bent on shooting giants every year as Mark (he certainly does shoot them). I think my goals are the overall landownership experience and that feels best to me when all my land is in one place. I have more room to roam, more ridges to look over and all my management effort is in one place. No need to move the equipment around when all the effort is one farm. There are tradeoffs for sure so it comes down to goals in the end. Have a great day."

@@bill-winke appreciate the (re)reply Bill, I should have done a better job looking at the comments. Have a good weekend!

Good points you made. Things were different back when he was doing this. Land was slowly appreciating in value and was also very cheap. You used to be able to buy land and almost pay for it with timber value. Then fix it up some for hunting and access and turn around and make your money back and more when you sold it. I would imagine you could have made some pretty good money doing so as the price of timber was about the same or even higher at times than it is now days.

Connor, if you are good enough at investing, I agree, but I still think that if I had to, I could beat the stock market pretty handily even in a bull market in stocks. I was never good enough with the stock market to feel comfortable. One year I lost a ton of money when the market tanked and I was deep into some tech stocks a friend of my wife's family (a successful broker) had recommended - the companies basically went away. I didn't even know what they made. I vowed then that I would never buy stocks again. I understand land so I just stick with that. I do think the rate of return when re-selling land quickly is way higher than anything I could get in the stock market because I am making money with the bank's money when buying land. In simple terms, just forgetting about interest payments for now, if you put 20% down (that's what my bank accepted) on a property that is a good value (for any number of reasons) and then sell it the next year for 20% more than you bought it for, you have effectively doubled your money in one year. Again, remember you are making money on the bank's money. It is very similar to buying stocks on margin, but way, way, way less risky (in my opinion). The longer you own a property that you buy at a good price to resell, the closer the rate of return approaches the long-term average of roughly 7%. At least that has been the historical average. Times are strange now, but the rate of return will soon enough come back to that trend line. Realizing the upside in value and moving it quickly is the key to really getting a high return. That is why you have to buy right and move them quickly. It is not for everyone, and it is harder to do now than in the 2000s, but that is how I put mine together and how I would do it again if I had to start with nothing. Good luck.

@Bill Winke thanks Bill I appreciate the informative comment. Leveraging the banks money for higher returns makes a lot of sense. Your approach reminds me of the approach many guys have used to have success with real estate.

Thanks Brian. Much appreciated.

That is a bit misleading because they are huge geographically. I am certain that if you look at trophies per square mile a number of other countries will jump ahead.

Home..., I think you do what you have to do to buy land in your preferred area, but if given a choice there are tradeoffs to both approaches. I answered this for another guy farther up the comments. He asked me to compare my approach to Mark Drury's (which is to own more tracts instead of one big one). Here is my reply: "I think that works if all the satellite farms are in good neighborhoods. I am sure Mark's are. I get what he is doing and it does make sense, but I still would rather have all my land in one block. I may not be quite as bent on shooting giants every year as Mark (he certainly does shoot them). I think my goals are the overall landownership experience and that feels best to me when all my land is in one place. I have more room to roam, more ridges to look over and all my management effort is in one place. No need to move the equipment around when all the effort is one farm. There are tradeoffs for sure so it comes down to goals in the end. Have a great day."

I answered this earlier for someone else. Here is the answer I gave them: I never felt really good about working with anyone except River City Hardwoods in Muscatine. But that was many years ago. I am not sure how they are operating now. It would be a starting point, but likely you will need to work with a consulting forester to get a good program set up for your timber. They can handle the sale for you and make sure it is fair and competitive. Good luck.

I’m short yes it can be. A lot Depends on the neighbors. As someone mentioned, be ready to sell anytime bad neighbors show up. Own 40 acres that join large parcels. Not small individual homesites where everyone likes to shoot deer.

But keep in mind that while I shot those bucks from my favorite stand, they were protected on the rest on my land and somewhat protected on my neighbors. So in order for that small area to be productive, it had to be attached to a very big sanctuary. If everyone around you has their own dream 40, you won't grow many mature bucks unless all those people are on the same page as relates to letting younger bucks walk. Very hard to do that, but it can be done with a lot of patience and a lifetime of encouraging your neighbors. Think about the numbers, biologists say that the typical distribution of decent antlered mature bucks is roughly 1 per 200 acres in good areas. In some areas (great areas) it will be higher and in some areas (most areas) it will be lower. But in the end, lets assume that the biologist's number holds. That means that with 40 acres you have to be content (on average) to shoot one of those kind of bucks every five years, and so do your neighbors. Is that realistic? I don't see it happening. Unless you are attached to a sanctuary of some kind, or lower your standards considerably, 40 acres is not going to consistently produce mature bucks. Not to say it can't still be a dream farm for plenty of other reasons, but don't expect to shoot many big antlered bucks unless the overall area has plenty of sanctuary. Good luck.

@@bill-winke Thank you for your outlook and your point of view. If you could ever do a segment or a series on making smaller parcels better that would be awesome and I sure it would connect with a lot of people. A lot of us just own smaller parcels and you could explain to people to work together maybe.🇺🇲

@@independentredneck2555 I think that is a great idea. We will get on that right away.

@@bill-winke Awesome! I truly think this is going to be a huge hit and help a lot of guys like me that do shoot mature bucks on smaller parcels. Truly looking forward to it. 🇺🇲

With 1,000 acres, believe it or not, you still need help from your neighbors to produce older age class bucks. I would love to see something like that in Michigan. I have hunted that state and think it would be really cool to see some good co-ops spring up where landowners formed into a group with the goal of producing mature bucks. Once you get past the firs couple of years, there would be great hunting for everyone. Good luck.

I will do a few more on these topics in the future. Have a great day and thanks for the support.

Who says you have to have a house before you can buy land? Lots of people do it that way. Many of them eventually build on their land.

Ethan, start your truck and head south!

It is about 2 1/2 hours.

Mike, it did factor in slightly. Once I finally got away from Midwest Whitetail completely I didn't have to have the farm to create content for the show that definitely freed us up to sell it if we so chose. That is not why we sold, for sure, but had I still be involved in creating content for the show, I probably would have felt that I needed to keep it. The plan all along was to replace it with land near my parents. That just took a lot longer than expected. Have a great day.

@@bill-winke Thanks Bill. I enjoyed all the content that was produced by the team at Midwest Whitetail. You must be proud of the spinoffs from there (THP)etc. Through them that I found your sites but did follow you on Monster Bucks videos (I believe). Thanks again and I'll keep following and spreading the word. Mike

@@wduncan4231 Thanks Mike. Much appreciated.

I agree. It does suck right now. Not sure where it goes from here. Likely will stay high but not increase anywhere near as fast as it has the last few years. But it still leaves you behind (and me). The key is to own some kind of land that you can buy at a good price (you will have to be selective on what you buy to be sure it is a good value). Then you can fix it up, maybe even build on it one day, or just fix and sell and move on to something bigger or better. That is the formula that has worked for me. You have to find a good value at each turn or you will get bogged down. So, before you start, be sure to study an area very hard for a few months to understand price, trends and value before you even start to think about buying. Also, it is best to start buying in an area that is not already highly sought after. For example, $200k (most borrowed) could buy you 50 acres in an area where land is at $4k per acre or 20 acres where it is $10k per acre. If you buy a good value, you can add 25% to $4k per acre land much easier than you can to $10k per acre land. At least in my experience. Again, you have to start somewhere. As you state, at least right now, you can't keep up with land prices my just savings alone. Good luck.

I am not touching those kind of comments with a ten food pole. Ethan will be a good catch for some young woman.

Jim, depends on the area. In most areas, an available 1,000 doesn't exist, but it can be assembled over a lifetime starting as young as Ethan. If he wants to get to the dream in a shorter time, then you are absolutely right, he needs to think smaller and focus on a great neighborhood. But a big part of the fun in anything worthwhile is the quest (the journey) and not the destination. Same as deer hunting. Once they are dead, they are way less interesting! Have a great day.

Haha no kidding! Thanks for watching David!

The rich farm girl is the key! Good advice!

Thanks for watching Steven! I appreciate the support. Your 5 dollars will go straight to my "Dream Farm Fund!"

Don't send that kid any money. He will just blow it on cigarettes and beer. Have a great day Steven.

Haha, thanks for watching Fergystuff, we appreciate the support!

@@ethan_stubbs best of luck, no better feeling than owning your very own dirt!

Highly overused but couldnt be more true.

Yea these realtors love this market because there making more money with these high dollar sales on land. They also really seem to push the idea of buying and selling to make money and build up to your dream farm. Makes them alot more money with that concept

@@Jay-hu1pc well the prices are starting to come down and interest rates are up causing a pullback. So, I hope they saved up some dough from the high dollar run.

It is true though and I see that very fact as the one thing that makes me more comfortable with land as my core investment than anything else that I could otherwise be in. Good word.

Where you see that

It's been under contract for a few weeks I believe.

yup split it into two parcels

7000/ac is not too bad for great deer hunting ground, especially with some tillable and crp income

Yes, I saw that. A bit heart-breaking, but I understand the reason the guy sold it, which I won't offer to the public. Have a great day.