How to Buy Hunting Land

If you are like me, and had to hunt on public land all your life and your are ready to buy a hunting tract for yourself, this article will give you some advice on how to buy hunting land. If you are a serious hunter and are sick of crowded public land with very little game and other hunters ruining your hunt or if you are getting older and need a place where you don’t have to take a marathon hike to the top of a mountain to get away from other hunters, you need to own your own land.

There are several factors to take into consideration when purchasing hunting land. The location, size, price, quality, investment value, type of property and wildlife potential are some that come to mind.

Location and Quality – Where to Buy Hunting Land

The most important factor to begin with is location. You have to ask yourself where you want to hunt. Do you need a place close to home so you can hunt on weekends and after work? Can you drive to a far off place to work on food plots and maintain the place? Do you need a tract that can produce trophy quality or just a place to relax and enjoy the outdoors? So many questions come to mind when thinking about buying a place to hunt on.

My advice is to start with how far you want to travel to hunt. If you have the time and the money, buy your hunting tract where there is some great hunting opportunity. When I got to the point in my life when I wanted to get married, I started looking for a mate in Eastern Europe. Yeah, I flew over there and dated women. To find a wife, I went where there were plenty of quality single women. If I would have stayed in rural Pennsylvania, in my 40s, I would certainly still be single. I had spent my prime years in the Rocky Mountains and the Adirondacks, where men are men and so are the women. There was nothing available, kind of like hunting on State Game Lands. I found a great woman foolish enough to marry me.

When I wanted to kill a big deer, I want to Kansas. I killed two of the biggest whitetails of my life there in about 3 hours total hunting time. I hunted my whole life in PA and have never seen a big buck.

If you are a big buck enthusiast, do some research and start looking in places that have them. Eastern Kansas is unbelievable. Southeast Ohio is good as is Kentucky and southern Indiana. Look for places without liberal seasons and good soil. Ohio is great because they have a shotgun only gun season, saving the lives of some bean field bucks. Kansas has a rifle season that is only 9 days long – a week with two weekends. These rules with great genetics, great soil and limited non-resident licenses keep the quality high. Iowa , Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, all good states with great counties within them. Anywhere within the alluvial soil of the Mississippi basin can produce big bucks. One only need to look at the heat map produced by QDMA of B&C and P&Y bucks by county. Then review where CWD and EHD are putting a hurt on populations and eliminate them.

There are places in Pennsylvania where big bucks can be found. In Western PA where the 4 point to a side antler restriction is the law, lots of bucks get to live long enough to grow big.

Size – Does it Really Matter?

In my forestry practice, I have worked on some large tracts of land. Most are owned by hunting clubs and a couple of wealthy dudes. To be honest, most of the ground doesn’t really hold game. I would rather have 50 acres of great habitat in big buck country, especially if the food, cover, sanctuary and huntability are top notch, than 500 acres of poor mountain ground. I did a forest management plan for a club with 1,600 acres years ago. I estimated the entire population of deer to be 75 animals. I would guess that none were wall hanger bucks. Even though there is a lot of posted property adjacent to State Forest land and only 25 members, the maximum deer drive number allowed in PA, I would not be interested in hunting there. The soil is poor, the club is full of members who can’t figure out how to create good cover or manage deer, and won’t take good advice. I would never buy this property if I had unlimited cash.

Then there is a client who has 500 acres of good timber with an orchard, old farm fields and adjacent to other large timber tracts with very low hunting pressure. This land can be managed to produce and hold big deer, and it does. If hunted properly, it could produce a big buck each year for the owner.

My brother owns a property in southern New York. I was cruising it for a guy who wanted to sell it and when I saw the amount of deer sign, I told him he was buying some land. Even though it is only 78 acres, it is all huntable, has two large QDM farms next door and produces venison for us every year. The area doesn’t produce a lot of big deer but they are bigger than PA and I can fill my freezer with does and have a great time hunting it. It’s far enough away that you feel like you’re getting away but not so far I can’t run up there and hunt for the weekend. The problem with the land is that its in the Socialist Republic of New York and the taxes are ridiculous. This is a huge consideration as well. In places like SE Ohio, you can find land that has been purchased by gas speculators. Search for land that is owned by someone in TX or Oklahoma. They bought for the gas and would be willing to sell the land for a reasonable price as the dirt is worthless to them in comparison to the profit possible in natural gas and oil. This brings up the subject of cost.

Cost of Buying Hunting Land

One can find great hunting land where there are good soils here in Pennsylvania, but with a hefty price tag. Its pretty hard to justify thousands Lper acre when its just a hunting piece. However, what if you could divide off some road frontage housing lots, lease acreage to a farmer, sell timber? These are all things to consider when evaluating a property. I spoke to a seller this morning who has a 300 acre tract with multiple road frontage and is on the PA/NY border. This tract could be divided easily and a timber sale could bring in some money to recover some of the cost of the purchase. I have purchased land in the past for investors where we were able to recover most of the original purchase price and have a large tract of land for free in the end. This is hard to do in today’s real estate and timber market, but it is still something to consider.

Land Value

Tillable acreage is very valuable and goes up with the price of agricultural commodities. Corn subsidies have supported a high price for corn. Here in PA, most of the corn goes to feed dairy cows the price of acreage up. It’s best to look for land that is marginal farmland. There are many marginal but in the midwest where high yields are common, farmers can make a lot of money on it, which drives farms that can’t produce a profit and get abandoned. A case in point is a property I am currently working on. The owners purchased this abandoned farm and sold the house off. The ground is very stony and steep, hard to grow crops but plenty good enough to plant food plots without the expense of clearing forest. Early farmers scraped a living out of poor land for a couple hundred years all over the hills and we can see the evidence of generations worth of picking rocks out of fields. These old fields can be put back into deer feed. There are ways of de-stoning fields but that/s another article. This property is adjacent to State Game Lands and other large private lands. So, there will be a constant supply of deer. It is important to look at where the deer will come from to get to your place when you set it up for hunting.

Hunting land should be a good investment. It should have timber, tillable land that can grow commodity crops, subdivision potential, minerals including gas and oil potential. I often go to properties that are poor mountain land stripped of any timber value, minerals separated (the norm for Pa coal and gas country) and no potential of development. People pay way too much for this junk, in my opinion. Be smart about what your are buying. Once you have a great hunting property, that is a commodity also, don’t forget. Being able to kill big deer on a piece of land is very valuable.

Another tip. If you can figure out where there are growing communities of Amish families this is a great place to buy. Amish multiply and they need farmland that is close by and will pay premium prices for it. So, its a good investment.

A big consideration is tax. Another reason to buy in OH and not in NY. New York is a tax and spend liberal state. Taxes are so bad that farmers have to tear down barns so they won’t have to pay the tax on the structure. Find a place with low taxes. You can reduce tax burdon by donating the subdivision potential to a conservancy or using state preservation incentives like Clean and Green in PA an 480-A in NY. Be careful with these and make sure you understand what you are getting into.

Huntability – Food – Water – Cover

Does the property have good access for hunting that will not disturb deer? Does it have multiple points of entry so you can approach stands from downwind? Can you get to areas where you can create food plots and work on timber improvements – a good road and trail network? These are very important considerations. Make sure there is a place to put in food, there should be a source of water and there has to be a place where deer can find good undisturbed cover. A tract that doesn’t have these traits should not be considered.

Also, take a look at the surrounding landscape. When looking at a property, consider the neighborhood. Is it hunted hard, are there QDM principals being practiced in a serious way? Talk to the neighbors, ask for deer kill pictures, trail cam pictures so you know what the potential is and what kind of neighbors you are in for. The neighborhood is as important in hunting property as it is in buying a house.

Here is a pdf of What I Consider to be a Good Hunting Property

Using a Consultant to Buy Hunting Land

In my consulting practice and as a Realtor in PA, I consult with people who are buying land and help them to find suitable property. In your region, look for a Realtor who is a Land Specialist. These guys are different from the average real estate agent. You can also talk to a Consulting Forester and keep in touch with these guys. If you find one who is a hunting enthusiast, he may come in contact with landowners looking to sell.

As you can see there are many things to consider when buying a tract of hunting land. If you are reading this you are a serious Buyer who is interested in educating himself on the subject, so feel free to get in touch with me. Phone calls can get you free advice. And, if you want to buy in central PA, let me know and you can retain me as your Buyer Agent.  

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