Too much...?!

[carbonfibre farmer]

So,

A) Are you going to want some more pea halum?

B) Sounds like a good opportunity Weight it all up the best you can, there'll be some things come bite you in the arse that you didn't see/expect. But for all that, give it a go, what have you got to loose, and look what you could gain. The only opportunities I regret are the ones I didn't take......

 

[Flatlander]

In terms of financial security, everything at the moment is rented - it isn't stacking up for me financially, and I have been working towards seriously changing things recently or, through lack of options, get out for a while, stick to the day job and then start again when something better comes up.
This new option would be all rented still, but more secure in that the landlord is currently farming himself, and wants to get out and rent it to someone younger, at a far more sensible price than what I currently pay. Yes it is more primitive than my current setup, but I can work with that.
The next part of the conversation I think will be about purchase options, I don't see any point paying rent if I'm in it for the long game, I need to building equity in more than just some livestock which could easily drop dead overnight.

If the farm you are in now doesn’t stack up just because of higher rent I doubt changing to another location albeit with a lesser rent will change your situation. I respect the farmers choice to let it go to the younger generation as that’s the way it should be. Another consideration is how long will he live for before the the beneficiaries wish to sell. At which point will you actually be in a position to buy it. I think you need to step back for a moment and look at where you are and where you actually can be before reality bites. Very negative of me but if things aren’t good now having more won’t cure the problem.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

How do you stop your head spinning and get a sensible plan together, when out of the blue you are presented with a massive opportunity (the kind you have only ever dreamed about)?

How have others on here made opportunities, they thought were too big for them, work out?

Advice please because, true to my user name, I'm lost....

Give yourself permission to really look at it and really imagine what your future could be like if you leapt into it.

Being semiretired by my mid 40s sounded like an impossible daydream but it's very possible if you take on the day as an incredible opportunity (which it is, you've never lived today before and never will again) instead of predicting it'll be ordinary, just another day, and set about having that happen.

That's really what it takes, letting go

 

[thorpe]

Give yourself permission to really look at it and really imagine what your future could be like if you leapt into it.

Being semiretired by my mid 40s sounded like an impossible daydream but it's very possible if you take on the day as an incredible opportunity (which it is, you've never lived today before and never will again) instead of predicting it'll be ordinary, just another day, and set about having that happen.

That's really what it takes, letting go

didn't you say your wife worked ? that can make all the differance!

 

[Kiwi Pete]

didn't you say your wife worked ? that can make all the differance!

Yes we both worked very hard for a long time. Made sod all difference really, that's a game of survival.
One day we'll wake up dead and lose the game of surviving, better games to play than that one IMVHO

 

[neilo]

we may have the opportunity to buy 50 odd acres, at around £15,000ac, job to pay the interest at that value.

next generation doesn't think its worth doing, and l agree. Different proposition if we thought product prices were going to rise, but we don't trust the guv, or the processors/retailers, to allow that.

but its not only taking land on, its stocking it, as well, all up front costs, that quickly add up. Now, we already farm that 50 acres, and been expecting to lose it before now, so have taken on another 60 acres, renting at £100 ac, what's the better proposition ?

might be different if interest rates were lower !

If you can pay the interest and, as many would have us believe, land is never going to get cheaper as they’re not making any more , then buying it stacks up, maybe.

If the sh1t hits the fan and land price halves, then not so much…

 

[Thick Farmer]

Fortune favours the brave

 

[Bury the Trash]

 

[som farmer]

If you can pay the interest and, as many would have us believe, land is never going to get cheaper as they’re not making any more , then buying it stacks up, maybe.

If the sh1t hits the fan and land price halves, then not so much…

and work your guts out to pay for it ?

l am 68, not for me to decide, that is down to the son and heir. Entirely his choice. But he is looking ahead, we milk a dairy, with all the slurry regs, en route, old parlour and sheds etc, to meet the requirements of RT, s/mkts etc, what was good in 1965, isn't so good today.

we really need a new set up, if we want to continue milking, we have done the upgrades, added sheds onto sheds etc, its coming to the use by date. To build for the future, to stay milking long term, £750,000 needs spending, could be more, add another £750,000 for the land, that's a huge amount of money to find, and pay the interest on.

we could just buy the land, hope for the best, with our old set up, what if EA or even RT, decide we no longer meet 'requirements', in a couple of years time, and we have to stop milking ? Fudged is the word. Need a milk cheque to pay interest etc.

or carry on, as we are, comfortable. Sell the cows, debt free, there are other options, l crippled myself working like a lunatic, really don't want that for son, but, his choice.

we will still have 220 acres, so enough to get on with. Easier less stressful life, sounds good.

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Fortune favours the brave

When you're inside a trap, everything else looks like a trap ??

 

[Hooby Farmer]

I've always found opportunity comes when I can least afford it

 

[Kiwi Pete]

I've always found opportunity comes when I can least afford it

Absolutely. There's always something that stops us.
It doesn't really matter how a fly gets stuck in the flypaper, it's stuck in the flypaper.
It doesn't really matter how we chew our food, we chew the food.

And that's why we don't consider being stopped as "being stopped" but the things we see that we let stop us.

Not enough time is the leading because, I've been studying this. We make time for complaining because we get agreement there.

We don't make time for looking inward because what stops us seems to be "out there" and not "in here"

there is actually someone holding a gun to our head saying something might go wrong if we don't see this heifer have her calf, we've been caught out before.
There's someone holding a gun to our heads saying there's no options in farming that we haven't looked at. And it has us stuck in that.

If our view of ourself is "as assessment" then we're worried what that person with a gun might say about it, if it's selling up or moving on or time or money then we'll make sure of that.

It'll stop us going on that personal development course our mate wants us to do, because that can't change the world, I'd better watch the heifer have her calf. I'd better get the sprayer flushed out and fuelled up.
I'd better make my quality of life at the effect of the weather in New Zealand or some other thing, because that's stopping plenty of TFFers right at the moment. As assessment, we don't measure up.

What good will a change possibly do?
Someone's assessment of who we are, making a difference, is usually not aligned with our thoughts on the matter.
We've been there every single time something didn't go right, so we know the truth about who we are. And we'll be stopped.

One of the key things I have gotten is the ability to notice I have been stopped and think "nothing wrong here, what's available?" and act independently of my experiences, or reality.

I was stopped from selling up by the considerations "what am I letting myself in for, how hard will it be, who will buy it, what will people think" and a whole heap of other noises that go bump.

And now I'm here in the present with no debt at all, a farm to call ours, a life that fills me up and spills out into the world around me.

I did absolutely nothing much differently to before, except for in a few moments where I didn't let myself get stopped. Nothing is wrong

 

[som farmer]

I've always found opportunity comes when I can least afford it

20 or 30 yrs ago, l would have grabbed any opportunity with both hands, indeed l did many times, more than l should perhaps should of done, it was always a cash shortage that prevented exploitation.

any expansion requires cash up front, simple as that, getting the cash, and managing cash flow afterwards, is the killer.

l think its the ability to be able to stand back, and take a hard look at the affordability of those chances, that make, or break them.

my old accountant, once told me, if you really want to do 'something', you will keep re-doing the costings, till they come to the result you want. Always remembered that, its very very true, so now, l half the final figure, and see how that looks !

l got utterly shafted by family, after OM died, nothing l could do about, that was that. Had a sum of money, which l couldn't afford to waste going to court. Used that to start on my own, a relation helped out as well. Bought kit/stock on a market 'high', within 3 years, every thing had crashed, corn, milk and stock, and a bad accident to boot.

by all normal rules of business, l shouldn't have kept farming, but l did, l followed every opportunity l could, grasped with both hands, some paid off handsomely, others didn't. Worked on another old saying, when you are in a hole, stop digging, and get out.

always judged success, as getting more things right, than wrong.

biggest gamble, start milking again, when huge numbers were stopping, 2007, apparently, l was one of the first three farmers, in the UK, to start milking again, for several years, post F&M, and collapse of quota value.

still not 100% sure it was the right move .................................................

age has taught me to be more careful, and less 'gung ho', son is careful with his costings, and more risk adverse, than l was, not a bad thing.

but, chances are only that, chances. Some will prosper, some won't, but not to many come along. Those that come to you, you really need to grasp at them, do the figures, and think of the future, and, at the same time, be ready to walk away, if those figures don't add up, remember, divide by 2.

 

[Flatlander]

20 or 30 yrs ago, l would have grabbed any opportunity with both hands, indeed l did many times, more than l should perhaps should of done, it was always a cash shortage that prevented exploitation.

any expansion requires cash up front, simple as that, getting the cash, and managing cash flow afterwards, is the killer.

l think its the ability to be able to stand back, and take a hard look at the affordability of those chances, that make, or break them.

my old accountant, once told me, if you really want to do 'something', you will keep re-doing the costings, till they come to the result you want. Always remembered that, its very very true, so now, l half the final figure, and see how that looks !

l got utterly shafted by family, after OM died, nothing l could do about, that was that. Had a sum of money, which l couldn't afford to waste going to court. Used that to start on my own, a relation helped out as well. Bought kit/stock on a market 'high', within 3 years, every thing had crashed, corn, milk and stock, and a bad accident to boot.

by all normal rules of business, l shouldn't have kept farming, but l did, l followed every opportunity l could, grasped with both hands, some paid off handsomely, others didn't. Worked on another old saying, when you are in a hole, stop digging, and get out.

always judged success, as getting more things right, than wrong.

biggest gamble, start milking again, when huge numbers were stopping, 2007, apparently, l was one of the first three farmers, in the UK, to start milking again, for several years, post F&M, and collapse of quota value.

still not 100% sure it was the right move .................................................

age has taught me to be more careful, and less 'gung ho', son is careful with his costings, and more risk adverse, than l was, not a bad thing.

but, chances are only that, chances. Some will prosper, some won't, but not to many come along. Those that come to you, you really need to grasp at them, do the figures, and think of the future, and, at the same time, be ready to walk away, if those figures don't add up, remember, divide by 2.

Failure is a better teacher than success and if it costs you money you’ll learn a lot quicker.

 

[som farmer]

Failure is a better teacher than success and if it costs you money you’ll learn a lot quicker.

back in those days, didn't have the money to lose.

cash flow was the killer, exactly the same as it is today.

but you certainly learn things the hard way !

 

[Kiwi Pete]

Yep, I learnt that I liked having money to spend and got after it.
Nothing wrong with being at the effect of money except for the impact of it on nearly every facet of your life.

Or you can just have a transformed relationship with the stuff, like all the people we don't like....

 

[Aspiring Peasants]

Failure is a better teacher than success and if it costs you money you’ll learn a lot quicker.

Any one who never had failure,, never achieved anything either

 

[unlacedgecko]

Fortune favours the brave

God hates a coward.

Who's up for buying some of these very cheap livestock in Australia?

Big payback as Qld producer put 38,000 bought cattle on agistment - Beef Central

In one of the largest cattle deals seen in recent years without a property transaction involved, 38,000 head of cattle have been bought by a southern Queensland cattleman and agisted on almost 60 paddocks across Queensland and NSW – before being sold into the booming feeder market. The sale is...

www.beefcentral.com

 

[spin cycle]

don't know what type of farm . grass or arable?

if mainly latter then i'dve thought sfi could be a good tool.....you can go big initially to reflect capital/stock you have... .then reduce as you grow...or not...so flexible

 

[crashbox]

I've lived by the mantra "bite off more than you can chew, then chew like fück".

There's been some massive losses. And some big wins.

Love it