Buying timber....which way do you prefer?

[readonly]

When cutting a tract of timber, would you prefer to buy the boundary through sealed bid, or pay the landowner according to a predetermined ratio for load? What are the factors that affect one choice over the other, such as market conditions, quality of logs, etc?

 

[Oldtimer]

I prefer to buy it by the cord (Or ton) and the thousand, leaving room in the contract for increasing the harvest numbers
(I always estimate low to be certain I can meet the goals I set for $$ for the owner)
and for stopping until market conditions come back around should they go flat. Pay weekly, supplying the mill slips with payment for same. It's the only way to cover your butt.

Buying the whole tract via sealed bid might be OK, but you better be danged sure of what you will be getting for volume and grade...if every other tree has rot or bugs and you didn't account for that....could be bad times.

 

[D&B Mack]

I prefer to buy it by the cord (Or ton) and the thousand, leaving room in the contract for increasing the harvest numbers
(I always estimate low to be certain I can meet the goals I set for $$ for the owner)
and for stopping until market conditions come back around should they go flat. Pay weekly, supplying the mill slips with payment for same. It's the only way to cover your butt.

Buying the whole tract via sealed bid might be OK, but you better be danged sure of what you will be getting for volume and grade...if every other tree has rot or bugs and you didn't account for that....could be bad times.

+1, also, given the current timber market for building products; bidding for tracts around here has become pretty tight. The return on the wood is not near what it was 3/4 years ago. Both of this combined make bidding pretty risky now. I now prefer giving the owner a percentage of the wood taken.