50 years in Shropshire... and counting
I celebrate 50 years with Barbers as a rural surveyor this month. And in my time there have been dramatic changes in land prices.
In the early 1970s I was agreeing sales at £800 an acre, which included the farmhouse as no buyer placed any value in the house.
In the 1980s bare land hit £2,000 an acre, excluding the property, and I even recall a 40-acre block selling for £4,000, much to the bemusement of the locals.
The early 1990s saw land prices take a hit and prices dropped to approximately £1,100 an acre, but this didn’t last long and they gradually rose throughout the next decade to approximately £3,000.
The last decade has seen the most dramatic hike in prices with prices in 2021 averaging at £10,000 an acre minimum with better quality land averaging £12,000 and smaller parcels attracting prices in excess of £20,000.
What a dramatic change in a mere 50 years!
Bob Oakes, Barbers Rural Consultancy LLP
