Winter is a good time to review farm transition plans.


Finding fairness in farm transition

How are your plans unfolding? Now is the perfect time to check on this

Winter is a great time to take a fresh look at how our plans are unfolding. As a speaker, it’s also a season of meeting and greeting many stressed-out farm families who are seeking solutions to being stuck. BDO’s Jim Synder has a daughter who thinks that families who see fairness defined as “helping everyone […] Read more

Life insurance as the key to farm succession

Farm Management: A solidly developed life insurance policy could be the key to hassle-free planning

Farmers often have something not all non-farmers have: the desire to see their lifelong work continued. Ideally, the next generation will take over, though maybe only one of your kids will stay on the farm. Land values have skyrocketed in the last 30 years and many farmers’ net worths are caught up in land values […] Read more


Discussions must be had so everyone is clear on the plan for transition of labour, management and ownership of the farm.

How do we tell our non-farming children they are not getting a raw deal?

Start by asking what fairness looks like as farm assets are transitioned


Our 33-year-old daughter was lamenting the fact that there is no longer a Sears Christmas Wish book. Decades ago she delighted in flipping pages of the coloured catalogue seeking out requests for her wish list, hoping that the cherished gifts would be under our Christmas tree. I remember the not-so-happy Christmas when some of the […] Read more

Treating non-farming children equally

Treating non-farming children equally

We know the saying: “equal and fair are not the same.” But this is still a succession stickler

Is equalization a succession issue on your farm? Treating farming and non-farming children equally has been a source of conflict for farm families for years. With the rising valuations in farmland and farm machinery and the potential for future increases, many farm families are struggling even more with the topic of how to treat children […] Read more


In their plan to retire from their successful career as farmers, Jurgen and Frieda will include their grandson Herb in their succession plan. Herb has been doing much of the farm work for half a decade. Jurgen and Frieda’s son and daughter have off-farm careers, and don’t wish to farm.

Farm Financial Planner: Succession can skip a generation

This couple will hand the farm over to a grandson, keeping preferred shares for income

In western Manitoba, a couple we’ll call Jurgen, 73, and Frieda, 71, have farmed for the last 52 years. Jurgen inherited the home farm of 320 acres in 1972. The farm grew slowly. Jurgen and Frieda expanded the farming by renting land and buying parcels as they became available. At present, the couple has 2,000 […] Read more

Larry Martin.  Photo: Supplied

8 management practices of successful Canadian farmers

In our CTEAM program and other activities, we get to meet a range of Canadian farmers, and often we have the opportunity to assess their success both financially and personally, in terms of their ability to meet or exceed personal and family goals. Several characteristics of these successful people become obvious rather quickly. Not all […] Read more


Coming to the table to talk about farm transition

Farmers often stop me in the hall of conferences to ask deeper questions that are keeping them awake at night. The most common question is, “Elaine, how do we even get people to the table? My parents are refusing to talk, and my grandparents are even more stubborn!” Farm families are stuck because they give […] Read more



Managing brothers who behave badly on the farm

Managing brothers who behave badly on the farm

“I can’t believe that we have farmed together for over 25 years, and the fights between these two brothers farming just don’t stop!” says the exasperated farm woman who has had enough. This winter may be a good time to reflect on how you want things to be different at your farm. I think Dr. […] Read more

Farm Financial Planner: Switching up a succession plan

When children change their minds, parents revise their farm succession plans

Central Manitoba farmers Lloyd, 59, and his wife Ellie, 58, have been running their grain farm for four decades. With 1,920 acres of land they own personally and 960 acres in their farming corporation and reasonably up to date machinery owned by the corporation, they face the common problem of generational succession. They have two […] Read more