When it comes to farm management, there are “Hands on” and “Hands off” styles. At Delta Land and Farm Management, we are “Hands on” in every aspect of the management. Every staff member knows all of the tenants as we communicate weekly with most of them. Ninety eight percent of the time, actual face to face meetings for budgets and lease negotiations take place in our office. The Landowner/Tenant relationship is by nature, adversarial. We like for our tenants to know something about the clients we represent but we make it clear, we are representing the client not the tenant.
No one knows the farm better than the tenant. We respect his opinion and relate his or her thoughts to our clients as often as possible. The goals of a farm tenant are to make a profit and have security in knowing he will have a farm to operate. The goals of a landowner are to make a reasonable return on his investment, maintain the environmental integrity of his land and feel safe in knowing he has a highly desired farm. We feel that it is our duty and privilege to relate these goals to both tenant and landowner in an effort to negotiate a mutually agreeable relationship resulting in a lease agreement that all parties can benefit from. It is also our opinion that the same lease is not good for everyone. This is why we offer cash leases, share leases and cash flex leases to our tenants. We try to match the tenant with the lease that best fits the landowners objectives and risk. It has been our experience that high turnover rates of farm tenants while profitable in the short term, are really costly in the long term.
We believe that picking the right tenant is the most important aspect of farm management. This is why we put so much time into getting to know a prospective tenant or making a change if necessary. Additionally, we encourage our managers to spend as much time as possible on the properties communicating with the tenant. We discourage signing a lease and never having any contact other than to collect the rent or make a fast run through the property.
We want to know our tenant like we know our neighbor.
