Agricultural land market in Slovakia in years 2001-2008

The article presents the results from the monitoring analyses of the buying/selling prices of agricultural land in accordance with the deposited contracts in the Real Estate Cadastre in years 2001-2008. Agricultural land sales, land areas and market prices are observed and evaluated under the size structure of the sold estates and their anticipated further utilization in the counties Dunajská Streda, Topoľčany, Rimavská Sobota, Liptovský Mikuláš, Michalovce and Svidník and for all observed counties as a whole. By data analyzing and evaluating of the agricultural land purchases/sales, there was taken into consideration the fact that the average price of the sold estates is to a large extent influenced by their size, location and the purpose of further utilisation. The estates of small area characterized as agricultural land are selling for the highest prices, but they already figure in the development studies and the land-use plans of the villages or they are regarded as building estates in the future. Therefore, the sold estates were divided into two categories in accordance with the expected further land utilization. As the estates for further agricultural utilization, there were considered the estates with the area above 1 hectare of agricultural land. In the case of smaller estates, it is assumed that they will be of building, recreational, sporting or other utilization after the landowner change.