Cheapest Land for Sale in America

There has been cheap land for sale in America since the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620. The big variable, of course, is that the word “cheap” meant different prices at different stages in America’s history. The constant factor, however, was that what seemed like a cheap land price in one period in time ALWAYS became substantially higher at a future point in time.

Let’s take a short walk down memory lane regarding some land sales transactions and prices.

• In 1626 Peter Minuit purchased Manhattan Island from the Indians for $24. There are 23 square miles in Manhattan or a little less than 15,000 acres. Thus the price amounted to approximately 2/10th of one cent per acre.

• In 1803, President Thomas Jefferson paid Napoleon Bonaparte $15 million for more than 500 million acres of land constituting the Louisiana Purchase. The price was approximately three cents per acre.

• In 1853, The United States acquired from Mexico almost 19 million acres in southern Arizona, known as the Gadsden Purchase. The price was $10 million, or a little over 50 cents per acre.

• During the last half of the 19th Century, the railroads were promoting and marketing millions acres of land in the Western states for $1.25 to $2.50 per acre.

• In the first half of the 20th Century, ranchers, settler, and speculators purchased millions of acres in the Western states for prices ranging from $5 to $25 per acre.

• In the second half of the 20th Century, some of the same land acquired for $5 to $25 per acre was resold for $25 to $250 per acre.

• Today, in the first few years of the 21st Century, it is becoming more and more difficult to find tracts of unimproved acreage anywhere in the United States for much less than $500 per acre.

To view some cheap land for sale in America, please click here.