Written by HLRBO Staff|
Last updated
Across 739 day-priced hunting leases active on HLRBO as of October 2, the median asks $200 a day, which displays at $228 once HLRBO's 14 percent is included, and the middle half of the market runs from about $114 to $342. For most of the country, a day on private ground costs roughly what a nonresident deer tag does. That is the first time anyone has put a number on the short-term lease market, and the number is smaller than the market's reputation.
In September we published the annual lease market, where the median displays at $3,420 a year. This is the other end of the shelf: the day, the week, the season, and the per-hunter package, priced from the same dataset with the same rules. Active, approved private listings; obvious data-entry errors excluded; medians, not averages; displayed rates meaning the landowner's ask plus 14 percent, exactly as a hunter sees them. Asking prices, not closed transactions.
The day rate by region
Day leases are a Southern and Midwestern product first. The South carries 323 of the 739 day-priced listings, with a median ask of $200 ($228 displayed) on a median tract of 150 acres. The Midwest has 196, also a $200 median ($228 displayed), on much smaller ground: a median tract of 53 acres, which is the day-lease sweet spot of a woodlot a single party can cover in a sit. The Northeast is the cheapest day in the country at a $150 median ($171 displayed) across 114 listings. The West is the dearest, $300 asked and $342 displayed, on 400-acre median tracts, which is to say the West sells a different day: more ground, more species, and in many cases an elk or antelope tag behind it.
The spread inside each region is as telling as the median. Nationally the lower quarter of day rates sits at or below $114 displayed. A hunter who assumes private access starts at hundreds of dollars a day has not looked at the bottom half of the board.
The week, the season, the hunter
The other short-term products stack neatly on top. Weekly leases, 163 of them, ask a median of $1,800, about $2,052 displayed, with a middle half from roughly $900 to $3,990 displayed. Seasonal leases, 194 listings, ask a median $1,000, about $1,140 displayed, and the upper quarter runs past $3,600 displayed for prime deer ground. Per-person pricing, 70 listings and mostly waterfowl and dove country, asks a median of $2,000 per hunter, about $2,280 displayed, which generally buys a multi-day package and belongs in the same comparison as an outfitted hunt.
Line the medians up and the market has an internal logic: a day at $228, a week at about $2,050 (roughly nine days' worth), a season at $1,140, a year at $3,420. The season is the bargain in that column, which says most landowners price a season to move and a year to hold.
What it means for each side
For hunters, the day lease is the answer to the most common complaint about private access, which is that it costs a year's commitment. It does not. For the price of a nonresident tag and a tank of gas, a hunter with one Saturday is on private ground, and a group booking three rut days is spending less than a single outfitted day in most of the country. We walk through which lease type fits which season in a companion piece.
For landowners, the data says the short-term market is real and priced to fill. A property that leases its season for $1,140 displayed and its October weekends by the day is earning twice from the same ground, and the Midwest's 53-acre median tells you small properties are not shut out of this market; they are its core.
One more honest line
Asking is not getting, and short-term asks have a wider spread than annual ones because the product varies more: a day of dove shooting and a day in an Illinois timber stand are both "per day." Treat the medians as the market's center of gravity, not a price list. We will revisit the short-term board after the firearms seasons, when the day leases that actually booked tell the rest of the story.
More than 700 day-priced leases and roughly 1,700 annual listings are live on HLRBO now. Find a lease. Landowners who want to fill weekends without leasing the year can list by the day.