Agricultural land values in the Central Valley, and Kern County, have slipped a bit but most analysts aren’t worried about a major drop.
Though water will become a larger question mark in coming years.
For now, analysts are looking at the recent dip in values as more of a “breather” from the meteoric rates at which ag land values shot up between 2010 and 2015.
Does that mean high values are a bubble?
No, said Roland Fumasi, an analyst with Rabobank’s Fresno-based RaboResearch Food & Agribusiness division.
“Because prices are supported by economic reasons,” he said.
Those economic reasons — high demand for Kern’s produce — are still in place, which is why Fumasi and others aren’t predicting a steep drop in land values through the end of 2017.
