Looking for agricultural land for sale in France? This page brings together the vacant farmland offered by private landowners, farmers reducing their acreage, rural estate agencies and notaries: arable land, meadows and pasture, abandoned ground to bring back into production, and holdings sold as one block or split into lots. Each listing states the area, the municipality, the planning classification, whether a tenant is in place and, where known, the access, the boundary survey, the drainage or the irrigation. It complements all the farms for sale in France on ma-propriete.fr.
Beyond the listings, you will find the benchmarks buyers usually lack when buying farmland in France: land prices region by region, the areas where supply is densest, how sales run by SAFER, the rural land agency, actually work, and the steps of a private sale between individuals. Our white paper « Créer une exploitation agricole » (in French) serves as a guide to building a realistic project.
For a bare plot, the price of land and pasture is the central benchmark: there is no building, no herd and no machinery to carry the value, and almost everything rests on the price per hectare paid locally. Two sources help you place an offer. Our own statistics, computed from the sales recorded by the French tax administration (DVF), show the prices actually paid; the SAFER benchmark of land values gives the reference for vacant and tenanted land and pasture, and the vacant figure is the one that applies to a plot sold free of any lease.
Across France, 14,328 sales of agricultural land were recorded in 2025, at a median price of €5,307/ha (average €6,059/ha; 80% of transactions between €2,500 and €10,537/ha). The SAFER benchmark of land values puts vacant land and pasture at €6,460/ha (+0.9% year on year) and tenanted land at €5,350/ha (+2.5%), an average discount of around 17% where a tenant farmer is in place.
| Region | Sales 2025 (DVF) | DVF median price (€/ha) | SAFER vacant land (€/ha) | 1-year change | SAFER tenanted land (€/ha) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brittany | 1,297 | 5,500 | 6,540 | +0.3% | 5,180 |
| Pays de la Loire | 1,873 | 3,267 | 4,100 | +1.5% | 3,350 |
| Normandy | 1,442 | 8,305 | 9,610 | +2.9% | 8,410 |
| Hauts-de-France | 1,365 | 7,976 | 10,890 | -0.5% | 7,650 |
| Grand Est | 1,233 | 5,611 | 6,510 | -4.4% | 6,120 |
| Île-de-France | 214 | 7,465 | 8,190 | +5.7% | 7,000 |
| Centre-Val de Loire | 1,195 | 5,480 | 6,260 | -6.1% | 5,700 |
| Bourgogne-Franche-Comté | 1,303 | 2,773 | 2,740 | -6.2% | 2,750 |
| Nouvelle-Aquitaine | 2,103 | 4,538 | 5,770 | +5.5% | 3,900 |
| Occitanie | 995 | 7,015 | 7,260 | -0.3% | n/a |
| Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes | 1,230 | 3,887 | 5,100 | +4.9% | 4,140 |
| Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur* | 59 | 13,518 | 12,260 | +2.8% | n/a |
| Corsica* | 19 | 5,012 | — | — | n/a |
The table shows wide gaps from one region to another: the arable regions of northern and central France sit well above the livestock regions and the mountain areas, where pasture remains the most affordable. For a single plot, however, value depends less on the regional average than on the local context: neighbouring farms looking to expand, soil potential and access matter as much as the number of hectares. From one region to the next, the benchmark varies fourfold, from €2,740/ha in Bourgogne-Franche-Comté to €10,890/ha in Hauts-de-France. See the full analysis, department by department, on our agricultural land price observatory, estimate your plots with the land value tool, and work out notary fees and borrowing capacity with our financial calculators. * Fewer than 100 recorded sales: indicative value. n/a: no tenanted-land benchmark published for this region.
A plot is judged first on its soil potential: soil type and depth, water-holding capacity, slope, aspect and cropping history. Deep drained loam does not trade like a wet valley-bottom meadow or scrubland that needs clearing. Shape comes next: a single block reachable by wide machinery from a usable track is worth more than a scatter of small, landlocked parcels. Access decides much of the rest: a plot served only by a way across a neighbour's ground requires a written right of way, to be checked in the deed before any offer.
Improvements then count. Sound underground drainage secures winter crops, while a borehole or a connection to an irrigation network opens the rotation to spring crops. A boundary survey removes the doubt over limits and over the true area, which often differs from the cadastral figure. Woodland or hedgerows can add sporting value on top of the farming value, without changing the planning status: land zoned for agriculture stays outside any building rights.
A significant share of the farmland for sale in France is not negotiated privately but passes through SAFER, the regional rural land agency. Once it has acquired a property, by agreement, by substituting itself for a buyer or through pre-emption, the agency puts it back on the market by a call for candidates: the sale is published and posted at the town hall, each candidate files an application describing the project and its financing, and a technical committee reviews the files before re-allocation. The highest bidder does not automatically win: the decision follows public priorities, setting up new farmers and consolidating fragile holdings.
These sales run on their own timetable, longer than an ordinary transaction, and the price is set at local market value rather than by auction. A candidate who is not a farmer may apply, but the file is judged against those priorities. Plots are often released in several parts, which is why one sale can end with several neighbouring buyers.
The first is the letting situation. Land advertised as vacant must genuinely be so: a rural lease, even a verbal one, continues with the new owner, and the sitting tenant holds a pre-emption right ranking ahead of SAFER's. An informal arrangement with no written contract can also be reclassified as a lease. Check next that the deed notified to SAFER has cleared the pre-emption rights, and whether the purchase falls under the structures control, which requires an operating authorisation above certain thresholds.
Practical checks follow: rights of way for access, water or utilities, public rural paths, ownership of boundary fences, shooting rights often vested in a communal hunting association, and classification in a nitrate-vulnerable or wetland zone. The planning document deserves careful reading: changes of use go through long procedures that are rarely granted.
The transaction takes very different forms depending on where the land comes from. Between private parties, the sale covers precisely identified cadastral parcels, the notary notifies the plan to SAFER, and completion follows once the pre-emption period has run; that route is described in our article selling farmland without going through SAFER. Where the agency decides to step in, the purchase changes nature and follows the call-for-candidates procedure; what pre-emption means for the seller and for the displaced buyer is set out in what happens if SAFER pre-empts.
For an owner, selling is not the only option: letting to a neighbouring farmer under a rural lease, signing a long-term lease ahead of a family handover, or putting the ground to work in another way can be preferable to an immediate sale, as explained in how to make the most of a farmland plot. Buyers who are not farmers often have amenity use in mind, which the planning rules tightly control. Purchase, sale, exchange, transfer into a company or inheritance: each route carries its own tax consequences and its own timetable.
It varies widely with the region, the soil and the layout of the parcels. The table above gives the order of magnitude of the price per hectare, drawn from recorded sales and from the official benchmark. Against it you then apply the adjustments specific to the plot: access, boundary survey, drainage or irrigation, fragmentation, a tenant in place, sporting value.
Yes. There is no nationality restriction and no rule reserving farmland ownership to farmers. The limits concern use and competition to buy: SAFER may pre-empt in order to set up or strengthen a farmer, and farming the land yourself means passing the structures control. The usual answer is to buy the land and let it under a rural lease, as our article buying farmland without being a farmer explains.
Start by identifying the natural buyers: the sitting tenant, who holds a pre-emption right, then neighbouring farmers looking to expand, then the open market of private buyers and investors. Set the price from the local price per hectare and the features of the plot rather than by feel. The sale must go through a notary, who notifies it to SAFER; the agency then has a set period in which to pre-empt or stand aside, which lengthens the timetable.
As a rule, no. Agricultural zoning in the local planning document reserves construction for buildings needed by a farm business, under conditions, and for public facilities. A leisure cabin or a dwelling is not allowed. Before any project, ask the town hall for a planning certificate: it is the only document that states the rules applying to that plot.
Valuation starts from the local land price, then weights it for soil potential, access, drainage or irrigation, the way the parcels sit together, and any lease in place, which carries a discount. Comparable sales recorded in the same and neighbouring municipalities give the soundest basis. An outside opinion on each item makes the negotiation safer.
The agricultural land for sale in France listed on ma-propriete.fr comes from private landowners, farmers, rural estate agencies and notaries' offices. Filter by region, department, area or price, and set up an e-mail alert to be told as soon as new land comes on the market near you. Selling parcels of your own? Post your listing to reach the farmers, neighbours and investors who use France's specialist rural property portal.
