G BULLETIN 874, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



From a number of sources of information it has also been possible 

 to check the accuracy of the increase shown by the table to hare 

 occurred from March 1, 1918, to August, 1919. According to this 

 information it appears that from March, 1918, to March, 1919, the 

 time the increased activity in land sales began to be manifested, there 

 was an increase of not less than SI 5 per acre and possibly as much as 

 $20. 



Table III shows an average increase from the first of March, 1918, 

 to August, 1919, of $65 per acre. This may be compared with the 

 increase of $81 per acre from March, 1918, to March, 1920, according 

 to the statistics of the Bureau of Crop Estimates. The latter figure 

 reflects the full extent of the "boom," showing that there was an 

 increase between August, 1919, and the cessation of unusual activity 

 in sales of farms. 



Assuming that the increase from March, 1918, to the beginning of 

 the "boom" was $15 per acre, there remains an average increase of 

 $50 to be attributed to the advance during the "boom" up to about 

 the middle of August. There was probably a further increase before 

 the cessation of activity in buying and selling land about the middle 

 of September amounting to about $16 an acre. Consequently it 

 appears that an average increase of $66 an acre may be attributed to 

 the farm land "boom" of 1919. 



It will be noted that the increase shown by the data on sales in 

 Table III for the period of the "boom" for March to August inclusive, 

 is only $33 as compared with a probable average increase, as stated 

 above, of approximately $50. Two facts probably account for this. 

 In the first place, the "boom" was really a popular awakening to an 

 increase in values that had been going on steadily in the pre-" boom" 

 period. When the awakening came there was a sudden jump in 

 values manifested in the early months of the year. A second explana- 

 tion is the tendency to sell the best grade of farms first. A supple- 

 mentary investigation was made for the purpose of verifying this 

 conclusion. A typical district was visited and additional sales data 

 were obtained for 194 farms. These farms were classified into "A" 

 grade and "B" grade farms, the first group having an average price 

 of S340 an acre and the second group, $261. It was found that 30 

 per cent of the "A" grade farms were sold between January 1 and 

 April 1, 1919, while only 18 per cent of the "B" grade farms were 

 sold during the same period. 



PROBABLE INCREASE IN VALUE OF LAND IN ENTIRE STATE, 1915 TO 1320. 



On the basis of the figures given in Table II there has been an 

 increase in the average value of Iowa farm land that is little short 

 of astounding. The average value of Iowa farm land increased $121 

 an acre from 1915 to 1920. This represents a total increase of $3,987,- 



