Are tractors and equipment a good investment right now?

[CloverKnollFarms]

Okay guys, then when should I be advertising the brush hog I want to sell?

2020...

 

[rScotty]

I have a mile long gravel driveway and 80 acres of trees to manage/maintain. I have never purchased anything with the idea of future profit on a sale. I buy what I need and use it.

I don't buy tools based on whether they are an investment. I buy them based on whether the tool is useful. Sometimes that leads to fixing a broken one.

 

[WinterDeere]

2020...

Haha... it's sold! That was a weird one. After listing it several times on CList, and having it sit months with no replies, I suddenly had three interested buyers inside of a week or two. The first one got it, and a pretty darn good price.

 

[marhar]

What Is an Investment?​

An investment is an asset or item acquired with the goal of generating income or appreciation. Appreciation refers to an increase in the value of an asset over time. When an individual purchases a good as an investment, the intent is not to consume the good but rather to use it in the future to create wealth.


An investment always concerns the outlay of some resource today—time, effort, money, or an asset—in hopes of a greater payoff in the future than what was originally put in. For example, an investor may purchase a monetary asset now with the idea that the asset will provide income in the future or will later be sold at a higher price for a profit.

KEY TAKEAWAYS​

• An investment involves putting capital to use today in order to increase its value over time.
• An investment requires putting capital to work, in the form of time, money, effort, etc., in hopes of a greater payoff in the future than what was originally put in.
• An investment can refer to any medium or mechanism used for generating future income, including bonds, stocks, real estate property, or alternative investments.
• Investments usually do not come with guarantees of appreciation; it is possible to end up with less money than with what you started.
• Investments can be diversified to reduce risk, though this may reduce the amount of earning potential.

I recommend investing in the STOCK MARKET through a no-load mutual fund. A tax deferred IRA will increase your long term return.

Are tractors and equipment a good investment right now ?​

(This is speculation, not investment.)​

Explained very well.

 

[Williy]

I read someplace that inflation is 3% but its actually around
24% I belive this is closer to the truth as when Trump was in office gas was $1.68 now $2.54 canned chicken was $9.95 now $19.95 Ice cream $5.69 now Blue Bell $8.65
fuel has come down its election year. Also we have been
hearing that SS will be getting a $1400 stimulus check and
this has been going on for over a year or more or is it longer??

willy

 

[WinterDeere]

I read someplace that inflation is 3% but its actually around 24%

The price of housing doesn't follow the price of eggs, or the cost of hiring employees. So, there are multiple price indexes used when calculating inflation, and depending on one's agenda, they tend to cite the one that favors the point they're trying to make. We know the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 7% last year, and is down around 3% this year, but perhaps housing or auto's are jumping at the 24% rate you name above.

I did a lot of work in 2022, trying to determine the rate I should charge for engineering work, which included paying for various salary and consulting rate data to determine what the industry would bear. It was a lot of work, that I don't want to have to repeat on a regular basis. So, when deciding how my rate should change year-to-year, I use a weighted average of four indexes, to automatically calculate my "raise".

I believe these four indexes are most representative of my daily pain, although with two teens in the house, maybe I should throw a collegiate cost index in the mix:

	2022	2023	2024
CPI	NA	7.10%	3.10%
PCEPI	112.829	119.011	121.222
PCEPI%	NA	5.48%	1.86%
PPI	NA	7.20%	1.30%
ECI	NA	5%	4.30%

So, you can see CPI (Consumer Price Index) is indeed running around 3% YTD, but the ECI (Employment Cost Index) is running a bit higher than that. It's good that ECI is greater than CPI, but I assume that ECI includes more than just salaries (i.e. taxes, insurance, etc.), so ECI > CPI is not necessarily an indicator that salaries are climbing faster than consumer pricing.

Links to the indexes below:

CPI Home

www.bls.gov

Personal Consumption Expenditures: Chain-type Price Index

Graph and download economic data for Personal Consumption Expenditures: Chain-type Price Index (PCEPI) from Jan 1959 to May 2025 about chained, headline figure, PCE, consumption expenditures, consumption, personal, inflation, price index, indexes, price, and USA.

fred.stlouisfed.org

Producer Price Index Home

www.bls.gov

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/eci.pdf

 

[rScotty]

The price of housing doesn't follow the price of eggs, or the cost of hiring employees. So, there are multiple price indexes used when calculating inflation, and depending on one's agenda, they tend to cite the one that favors the point they're trying to make. We know the Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 7% last year, and is down around 3% this year, but perhaps housing or auto's are jumping at the 24% rate you name above.

I did a lot of work in 2022, trying to determine the rate I should charge for engineering work, which included paying for various salary and consulting rate data to determine what the industry would bear. It was a lot of work, that I don't want to have to repeat on a regular basis. So, when deciding how my rate should change year-to-year, I use a weighted average of four indexes, to automatically calculate my "raise".

I believe these four indexes are most representative of my daily pain, although with two teens in the house, maybe I should throw a collegiate cost index in the mix:

	2022	2023	2024
CPI	NA	7.10%	3.10%
PCEPI	112.829	119.011	121.222
PCEPI%	NA	5.48%	1.86%
PPI	NA	7.20%	1.30%
ECI	NA	5%	4.30%

So, you can see CPI (Consumer Price Index) is indeed running around 3% YTD, but the ECI (Employment Cost Index) is running a bit higher than that. It's good that ECI is greater than CPI, but I assume that ECI includes more than just salaries (i.e. taxes, insurance, etc.), so ECI > CPI is not necessarily an indicator that salaries are climbing faster than consumer pricing.

Links to the indexes below:

CPI Home

www.bls.gov

Personal Consumption Expenditures: Chain-type Price Index

Graph and download economic data for Personal Consumption Expenditures: Chain-type Price Index (PCEPI) from Jan 1959 to May 2025 about chained, headline figure, PCE, consumption expenditures, consumption, personal, inflation, price index, indexes, price, and USA.

fred.stlouisfed.org

Producer Price Index Home

www.bls.gov

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/eci.pdf

Very nice work, Winter Deere. I did something similar when calculating raises for a town's water employees last year. The actual numbers came out very close to a multi-year average CPI... around 4%.
Using that, I was able to get them closer to a 5% raise. Reviewable in 2 years.
rScotty

 

[ultrarunner]

I read someplace that inflation is 3% but its actually around
24% I belive this is closer to the truth as when Trump was in office gas was $1.68 now $2.54 canned chicken was $9.95 now $19.95 Ice cream $5.69 now Blue Bell $8.65
fuel has come down its election year. Also we have been
hearing that SS will be getting a $1400 stimulus check and
this has been going on for over a year or more or is it longer??

willy

Gas dropped to under $2 and now over $5

Gas, Electric and Water big spike and garbage too..

Had some improvement projects and building materials really went up from concrete, lumber, roofing, etc.

 

[jyoutz]

Gas dropped to under $2 and now over $5

Gas, Electric and Water big spike and garbage too..

Had some improvement projects and building materials really went up from concrete, lumber, roofing, etc.

$5 gas???? It’s around $2.50-2.75 everywhere I have bought regular gas recently. And this is in AZ, NM, CO, and TX.

 

[ultrarunner]

S

$5 gas???? It’s around $2.50-2.75 everywhere I have bought regular gas recently. And this is in AZ, NM, CO, and TX.

SF Bay Area this week...