How long do farms take to sell?
No public report gives a time to sell for farms in Carroll, Grayson, Wythe, Pulaski, Montgomery or Floyd counties or the City of Galax. The calendar a seller can actually read starts with the termination date in the signed listing agreement, then the MLS entry deadline, then the steps a farm adds before settlement: a lease, a crop, equipment, and a land use enrollment a buyer may want to keep.
The first date on a farm sale's calendar is the one the listing agreement ends on
Before any buyer walks the fields, a farm seller puts one date in writing: the day the listing ends. Virginia requires it. Under Va. Code 54.1-2137 C 1, a brokerage agreement must be in writing and must have a definite termination date, and an agreement that does not specify one terminates 90 days after its date.
That 90-day figure is a fallback for an agreement missing a date, not a standard length for farm listings. The term of a listing agreement is whatever the seller and the brokerage write into it.
The same section says how the relationship ends. Under Va. Code 54.1-2137 A, it continues until completion of performance under the agreement or, if earlier, any expiration date the parties agreed on, a mutually agreed termination, a default by a party under the agreement, or a termination under 54.1-2139 G. Counting forward from the signature, then, the seller already knows the outer edge of the first listing period before a single buyer has called.
In the SWVAR MLS, the definition of Active carries a deadline counted in business days
The next deadline is short and it belongs to the MLS. Under its definition of Active, the SWVAR MLS quick reference says a listing must be Active within two business days of the seller's ratification of the listing agreement, or one business day of public marketing, whichever comes first. That line sits among other status definitions, so which status a new farm listing is entered in first is a question for the listing agent, and a farm listed in a different MLS follows that MLS's rules. The quick reference file posted online carries a 2024 date, so its current rules are SWVAR's to confirm.
Active there means the property is actively being shown to buyers and is available for showings. From that point the farm is on the market in the sense the MLS uses, and how the MLS keeps its day count from there is covered in what days-on-market means on a listing. If the agreement's end date passes without a sale and without a renewal, the SWVAR status for that is Expired: the contract for the listing has expired and has not been renewed.
The steps only a farm adds between the listing and the settlement table
A house sale and a farm sale share the same statutes about listing agreements. What a farm adds is a set of questions the contract has to answer, and each takes its own time.
The lease
If someone rents the pasture or cropland, the lease has to be read against the sale, and a specific lease's terms are an attorney's reading.
The crop
Hay standing in a field, or cut and stored, raises the question of who owns it at closing, and how a contract handles that is an attorney's reading.
The equipment and livestock
Which items convey with the real estate is one more term to agree in writing before settlement.
The land use enrollment
If the farm is taxed on its use value, a buyer may want to keep it that way, and the seller will want to know what the change of owner does.
What happens to a lease at a sale is covered in what happens to a farm lease when you sell.
The last of those four has a statute behind it. Va. Code 58.1-3237 keeps a sale alone from bringing roll-back taxes when the new owner goes on using the land as classified and does not rezone it to a more intensive use, unless a local subsection G ordinance provides otherwise, while a change to a nonqualifying use does bring rollback taxes. How that works on a sale of enrolled farm ground, and where land use taxation questions go, is covered in selling a farm that is in the land use program; the figures belong to the commissioner of the revenue.
Why the one farmland sales study reaching these counties has no clock in it
A seller who wants a number of months will not find one that is honest. The public sources that reach these localities were checked for this answer, and none publishes a time to sell for land or farms in these counties.
The closest thing is Virginia Cooperative Extension's report Agricultural Land Sales in Virginia, 2023, published March 25, 2025. It analyzes market-based, arms-length agricultural land transactions at the county, district and statewide levels, looking at how many sales took place and at what prices. It does not measure how long any of those properties were on the market.
The other public sources that reach these counties count home sales, not farms. Where each one is, what it does and does not cover, and the cautions the farmland study attaches to its own figures are set out in where to find real market data for Southwest Virginia. Whether the time of year changes anything is a separate question, taken up in the season to sell land here.
From a signed contract to settlement, the calendar belongs to the contract
Once a buyer signs, the dates that matter move from the listing agreement into the purchase contract: any study period the buyer negotiated, the date set for settlement, and whatever the contract says about the lease, the crop and the equipment.
How long the closing itself runs on rural ground, and what tends to set its pace, is covered in how long closing takes on land. The brokerage relationship that began with the first signature runs until performance under the listing agreement is complete, or until one of the earlier endings the statute lists.
Seen whole, a farm sale's calendar is a sequence of dates the parties write down, not a figure anyone publishes. What happens to equipment, crops and livestock, and whether to sell the farm whole or split it, are taken up on selling your farm.
Laying out the calendar for selling a farm?
Tell Lowell the acreage, whether any of it is leased or in land use, and what you expect to convey. He will lay out the steps between listing and settlement with you, without guessing at a number of months. No cost, no obligation.
Got it. Thank you.
We'll be in touch shortly with an honest read.
Questions this raises
What happens if the listing period ends before the farm sells?
The brokerage relationship ends on the expiration date the parties agreed to, unless it was renewed or amended. In the SWVAR MLS the status for that is Expired, meaning the listing contract expired and was not renewed. Whether to list again, and with whom, is a new decision for the seller.
Does the 90-day rule mean a farm listing only lasts 90 days?
No. Va. Code 54.1-2137 C 1 requires every brokerage agreement to have a definite termination date. The 90 days applies only when an agreement fails to specify one, in which case it terminates 90 days after its date. A listing agreement that states its own termination date runs to that date, subject to the earlier endings the statute lists.
Why not use the statewide home sales reports to estimate a farm's time on the market?
Those reports describe home sales, and Virginia Cooperative Extension's farmland study, which does cover agricultural land, measures how many sales took place and at what prices but not how long anything took to sell. Carrying a statewide home figure over to a farm in these counties would apply a number to property it was never drawn from. The listing agreement and the contract dates are the calendar a seller can rely on.
Where this page's facts come from
Every rule, office and figure above traces to one of these. Rules change; check the office before you act on one.
- Va. Code 54.1-2137, commencement and termination of brokerage relationships Virginia General Assembly
- Va. Code 58.1-3237, roll-back taxes Virginia General Assembly
- Agricultural Land Sales in Virginia, 2023 (AAEC-324) Virginia Cooperative Extension
- MLS quick reference handout (status definitions and relisting rule) Southwest Virginia Association of REALTORS