Agridge

Essex farm lets survey · 2026

How do your barn rents compare?

Nobody publishes rents for farm buildings, so every farm sets them by word of mouth. Our survey, opening soon, gives you a report on how you compare with farms with similar lets in your area, by building type, size and more. No farm is ever named, and no farm's details are ever shared.

Tell me when the survey opensSee what the survey asksSee a sample report

A figure only appears once five farms are behind it.

A real barn, from the Environment Agency's laser survey, lit by the sun over Essex right now. Click to play it, or drag across it.

One barn can earn more than 480 acres.

Defra Farm Business Survey 2024/25

One 5,000 sq ft barn, let at £9 a square foot
£45,000 a year
One acre of let farmland, the average rent in England
£93 a year
Acres of land it takes to earn what one barn earns
484

Farm buildings can be the most profitable part of your farm, and they're the only part with no market report.

1 acre of let farmlandThe barn, to scale

Land: farm business tenancies, £230 a hectare. The barn rent is an example. Both figures are revenue, not profit.

At least 50 million sq ft of farm buildings. Not one published rent.

Essex, from the air

A map of Essex with 16,274 gold marks, one for every building standing in an Essex farmyard, sized by its floor area.ChelmsfordColchesterSouthendHarlowBraintreeSaffron WaldenBasildonClacton
Buildings in Essex farmyards
16,274
Farmyards
2,223
Over 10,000 sq ft each
755
Published rents
—

Every building standing in an Essex farmyard that OpenStreetMap has mapped, measured from Microsoft's building outlines. OpenStreetMap misses some farmyards, so the true total is higher. Each mark is drawn larger than life, sized by floor area.

Every other part of farming has a market report.

Where each price is published

  • The farmland

    Defra's Farm Business Survey publishes what farmland rents for, and what farms earn, every year.

    Published

  • The farmhouse

    The Land Registry records what houses sell for, and the property portals show the prices.

    Published

  • The buildings

    No index, no register, no record of what they actually let for. Every farm guesses. That's the gap we're filling.

    —

Take a five-minute survey. Get a market report.

How it works

  1. 01

    Provide your rates

    One page, about five minutes. You don't name a building or a tenant. You tell us what you charge for a kind and size of building: say, a 5,000 sq ft modern shed at £6.50 a square foot. Use whichever units you charge in.

    £ per sq ft£ a month£ a year
  2. 02

    We pool it with farms like yours

    You're grouped with farms a similar distance from cities and motorway junctions, and compared building type by building type. Your farm is never named, and its details are never shared.

  3. 03

    Receive your market report, every six months

    What farms near you charge for each kind of building, where your rents sit, and, from your second report on, which way they're moving. If your rents are unusual for your area, the report says so, and by how much they lift or lower its figures.

Your rents stay yours.

Five rules, built in

A rent is private business. These rules are built into how every figure is made.

  • No building is named

    You never tell us which building or which tenant. You tell us what you charge for a kind and size of building, like a 5,000 sq ft modern shed at £6.50 a square foot.

  • Five farms or no figure

    A number only appears when at least five farms are behind it. Until then, your report tells you we're still gathering.

  • No one farm can be the figure

    No single farm can make up more than half of the buildings behind any number, so a big estate can't set the figure alone.

  • Never named

    We never show or share one farm's rents. Land agents and valuers get figures for whole areas, to help them value farms and plan new lets, never a single farm's.

  • Yours to take back

    Ask us and we'll delete your answers and your contact details. Read the privacy notice.

Where you sit, building by building.

What you get back

What farms like yours charge for modern sheds, traditional barns, Dutch barns and yards, next to what you charge. Whether you stay near the market, or choose to stay below it for a good tenant, is up to you.

See the full sample reportHow to read it

Essex farm lets
Today: no farms have answered yet

Near you, farms charge — a sq ft for an insulated modern shed. Nobody has ever published this figure.

Modern shed, insulated—
Modern shed, not insulated—
Traditional barn—

These fill in once five farms near you have answered. The first figures come out in spring 2027.

The survey is the start.

The Agridge app

Agridge builds a 3D model of your yard from open laser-survey data, with every barn measured, every square foot counted, and a rent beside each building.

  • Every barn measured

    Footprint, height and roof, read from laser survey data.

  • A rent for each building

    What it could let for, next to what it lets for now.

  • Plan what's next

    See where a new shed, an extension or a hardstanding yard would earn its keep.

  • Your lettings ledger

    Tenants, rents and payments in one place.

Read the guide to the app

Built on a working Essex farm.

Agridge started on our own family farm, where we let buildings, sheds and yards to local businesses. We wanted to know what the market paid. There was nowhere to look, so we're building it.

What we never knew was whether we were charging too much or too little.

Five minutes of yours. Your area's figures in return.

The survey opens soon, starting in Essex. Email us and we'll tell you when.

Tell me when the survey opens