Land Acquisition Professionals
Overview
Introduction
Land acquisition professionals assist in efforts by nonprofit land trusts to preserve land and water from development, subdivision, overly heavy recreational or agricultural use, or other human disruption by handling the land transaction—buying the land outright, acquiring development rights to it, obtaining easements, getting landowners to donate the land, or similar actions.
Quick Facts
Median Salary
Employment Prospects
Minimum Education Level
Experience
Skills
Personality Traits
Earnings
Full-time land acquisition analysts earned average annual salaries of $73,763 in 2024, according to PayScale.com. The lowest paid 10 percent earned $56,000 or less, while the highest paid 10 percent earned $96,000 or more. ZipRecruiter.com reports that land acquisition managers earned average annual salaries of $109,005 in December 2024. Earnings ranged from $34,500 to $154,500 or more.
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Work Environment
This job can take a land acquisition specialist literally "out in the field," checking out land or water parcels the land trust is considering acquiring; it also can bring them to the negotiating table, where they will be sitting down with landowners hashing out a deal. Land trusts exist all over the country. Work with a large national organization might involve travel to help out the smaller l...
Outlook
The outlook for private land trust work currently is brighter than that for federal land and water conservation jobs. Land trusts are going strong right now, and the entire land and water conservation segment, of which land trust and preserve management is a part, is growing at a steady rate annually. Land Trust Alliance reports that state, local, and national land trusts had conserved 61 milli...