I have always valued a well-built farm road. Given the slope and the wear and tear on the paths leading to our fields, many of our farm roads were rutted and rocky. Most had switchbacks to keep the rain from gaining too much speed racing down 25-35° slopes.
Therefore, given my past experience with farm roads, when I visited a client who was building a sleek new road leading to his fields, I was impressed.
“Wow! I wish you’d talk my Dad into rebuilding our farm roads!” I exclaimed. “The roads going to our corn fields need work.”
“Oh, that’s not going to the fields,” he replied. “That’s my escape route.” He went on to explain the plan of the route, past their dry cow lot and on to the state highway on the back side of the dairy.
An escape route? “My Dad is 83. He sits in the window up at his house and watches me farm all day long. Every time I haul a cull cow to market, he throws a fit.”
“We’re going to go broke!” he quoted his father.
“By going towards the dry lot, he thinks they are just dried off. I have open cows given 30 pounds of milk and he wants to keep them, because in his day, they were still profitable. Or so he thought, I have my doubts.”
I listened to a 60-year-old man, nearly brought to tears because of the lengths he had to go to escape his father’s overwatch. I could tell he hated to deceive his father, but what he hated even worse was not being trusted, even after decades of successful service on the family farm.
It was at that moment I was introduced to the 60-year-old teenager… a grown man who was still a boy in his father’s eyes.
Estate planning and farm transition are hot draws any time there is a farm meeting on those topics. Often panelists will talk about their experiences, and many discuss rifts in the family, especially between on-farm and off-farm siblings.
The thing that bothers me is that we tend to skip an important step in the discussion. What is or isn’t happening regarding farm transition before Mom and Dad pass?
I don’t know of a single farmer who works their whole life to build a family farm with the end goal of having that farm destroy the family.
Can you imagine a father holding a newborn grandchild and saying, “Little one, we are going to work so hard to build something that will ruin your life.” As cruel as that may sound, if that isn’t the goal, why does it happen so much?
Which brings us to an immutable truth. Estate issues happen more due to the inaction of the deceased than the actions of the heirs.
Farmers love to plan. They plan which corn varieties they are going to plant; they plan on which tractor they will trade or trade for next.
They plan on the weed control they will need next spring; they even plan on what the weather may or may not affect when they plant or how they market their crops.
Isn’t it strange, the one thing in life that is a certainty, our own demise, is the one thing that farmers almost universally refuse to plan for?
So here is my challenge to the farm owner now. You had the courage to farm; now have the courage to not farm… or at least not call the shots on the farm.
Part of the problem is estate planning takes time, a close second is that estate planning can cause hurt feelings. Those two issues do not overtake the fact that estate planning is the right thing to do and the time to begin is today.
As the late Coach Lou Holtz sad, “There never a wrong time to do the right thing and there’s never a right time to do the wrong thing.”
Where do I begin?
A great start is to ask yourself what would be the ideal outcome for your farm when you die. Do you want to preserve the family farm after you pass? What’s the financial realities of the farm and how many families can it realistically support?
All these questions need to asked and answered in the presence of everyone who is affected by the decisions that are made. If you feel that the conversation will become heated, bring in a third party to facilitate family discussions. People tend to be more reserved when a stranger is at the table.
The first agreement has to be that everyone will sit and listen with understanding that the property in question is yours to do with as you see fit. If anyone refuses to meet, that should tell you a lot about how well they are going to get along after you pass. For the good of the estate, move forward.
On-farm heirs are not powerless in the negotiations. When I graduated 40+ years ago, several of us were returning to the home farm. Even then, advice was offered that an internship elsewhere might not be a bad investment in ourselves and the home farm.
Few of us took that advice for one reason… loyalty. We felt a responsibility to return to the home farm and help our parents continue the farm. There is certainly nothing wrong with helping those who helped you immeasurably.
Still, death is a certainty so if the child had to return in order for the farm to stay physically and financially viable, who will rescue the child when the parents pass?
My Dad was a very talented person (as I am sure many of your dads were too). I had a tractor dealer ask me once what I would do if something happened to him. It was a reasonable question. I shared many of the same talents that my Dad had, but we were not equals.
I thought for a second and answered, “I’ll do the best I can do, but I will always do what is best for my wife and child because a man who saves the farm but loses his family has some messed up priorities.”
With that sentiment in mind, after all the discussions have taken place and the decisions on the estate planning have been made, the on-farm heir needs to look very hard at the situation and leave open the option to say “no.” Not because you don’t love your family, but because you do love them.
I loved growing up on the farm, but I didn’t love my parents because we farmed. I would have loved them no matter what they did.
I love my wife. I love her enough to provide for her to the best of my ability, not because she wants too much but because she deserves my best efforts whether that is on the farm or in the office.
One final thing. If you decide to leave your farm to a child, trust them to manage it. If you have doubts about their abilities, don’t leave it to them.
But if you trust them, recognize that they have their own talents and will make decisions based on what they think is best. And no matter what, they need to grow into the role.
Where do people keep their most prized artwork? Ours is preserved in our safe now, but thirty years ago, it was on our refrigerator. That is where our daughter’s drawing of our family, a tree, her dog, or any number of things ended up. The refrigerator was a place of honor. It didn’t recognize greatness; it was a place of growth towards greatness.
Let’s end the 60-year-old teenager by letting go long before then.
