14 MASS. EXPERIMENT STATION BULLETIN 405 



The distribution of the dollar amount of outstanding mortgage per farm (shown 

 in Table 14) may not be representative of the State, as indicated by the great 

 variation in average size of outstanding mortgage per farm reported from differ- 

 ent sources (Table 15). 



Table 15. — Average Size of Mortgage Indebtedness for Massachusetts, as 

 Reported by Different Sources. 



Source Repoi tihg Average Date Average Amount 



Size of Mortgage for of Mortgage per 



Outstanding Report Mortgaged Farm 



Census of Agriculture (1) 4/1/40 $2,470 



Bureau of Agricultural Economics (2) 1/1/35 2,727 



Survey 257 Owner-Operated Farms (this study) 3/1/41 3,696 



Survey 333 Owner-Operated Farms (3) 1934 4,853 



Farm Credit Administration Mortgages 



F. C. A. Federal Land Bank (4) 1/1/41 $2,205 



Land Bank Commissioner (5) 1/1/41 1,656 



Survey 257 Farms (this study) 



Federal Land Bank 3/1/41 3,400 



Land Bank Commissioner 3/1/41 2,091 



Survey 333 Farms 



Federal Land Bank (3) 1934 4,575 



(1) 16th Census of United States, 1940. According to the Census, the total amount of mort- 

 gages reported for Massachusetts, April 1, 1940, was $37,359,000. 



(2) Agricultural Statistics, 1941, p. 593. The total amount of mortgages reported for Massa- 

 chusetts, January 1, 1940, was $54,497,000. 



(3) Donley, J. E. Thesis, "Study of Rural Credit in Certain Areas in Massachusetts," 1935. 



(4) Agricultural Statistics, 1941, p. 598. 



(5) Ibid., p. 604. 



The average size of mortgage indicated by surveys runs consistently higher 

 than the average size reported by those agencies which report for the entire State. 

 The average size of mortgage found in this study was about 50 percent higher than 

 that reported by other agencies. This may be the difTerence between full-time 

 commercial farms, which the surveys cover, and all farms, including part-time 

 farms, which State-wide reports cover. 



There were 3,093 Federal Land Bank loans reported by the Farm Credit 

 Administration in Massachusetts, and 2,276 Land Bank Commissioner loans. 

 The total outstanding on these two types of mortgages was $10,588,468. Assum- 

 ing that most of this debt was outstanding on 3,093 farms with Federal Land Bank 

 loans the average mortgage indebtedness of these farms would be $3,423. This 

 figure compares closely with $3,696, which was the average mortgage indebtedness 

 found by this study for all farms. However, if figured the same way (i. e., adding 

 Federal Land Bank and Land Bank Commissioner loans together and dividing 

 by Federal Land Bank borrowers), the average mortgage for the farms in this 



study was $4,504. . , , 



A frequency distribution of the mortgages on the survey farms when they were 

 purchased shows a distribution which is approximately the same as for the pres- 

 ent outstanding mortgage (Table 16). 



Except for the last ten-year period, over half the mortgages were for no more 

 thin $3 000. There was slight indication that the size of mortgage was increasing. 

 Thus not only were over 50 percent of the mortgages outstanding on farms no 

 more than $3,000, but also over 50 percent of the original mortgages were no 

 more than $3,000. The average size of mortgage was between $3,000 and $4,000. 



