Effect and Mitigation of Sea Level Rise on US Agricultural Land Values

Saltwater intrusion and flooding from sea level rise (SWISLR) causes substantial damage to coastal agriculture. Using real estate sale records, measures of coastal flooding, and measures of relative mean sea levels, I estimate SWISLR’s effect on agricultural land sales over 1985 to 2023 from Texas to New Jersey using a spatial differencein- differences Ricardian approach accounting for expectations of future exposure. This study is the first and most spatially comprehensive fair market value investigation of SWISLR’s effects on agriculture, at least in the US. Total damages for the approximately 70.5 million acres within the study area amount to nearly $4 billion [$0.5 billion, $7 billion, 95% CI]. This damage is concentrated—the approximate 8.9 million acres of agricultural land within 5 miles of the coast suffered about $1000 per-acre in damage—and doesn’t include complete land loss. Landowners anticipate and capitalize future worsening exposure into their land values, and the majority of this updating occurs because of hurricane rain exposure. Though, despite forecasting future SWISLR exposure, landowners are evidently not mitigating damages. This is possibly because no effective options exist. These results suggest agricultural sea level rise impacts are substantially underway and insufficiently addressed.