How much does a hunting lease cost in Missouri?

A 300-acre hunting lease in Missouri typically asks about $4,635 per year, with most comparable properties falling between $2,822 and $7,260. Smaller parcels cost more per acre and larger ones less.

What is the average price per acre for hunting land in Missouri?

About $15.45 per acre per year for a 300-acre property, which is 11% below the national median of $17.32. Per-acre rates fall as properties get larger, so this figure is quoted at a fixed 300 acres to stay comparable between states.

Are these Missouri lease prices what hunters actually pay?

No. Every figure here is an asking price — what landowners list at, not what a lease finally closes for. The model is fit on listing data, so it reflects what a property is likely to be advertised at.

How reliable is the Missouri estimate?

This rate blends listings in this state with the national median. It rests on 24 filtered lease listings from Missouri. Across all states, roughly half of real listings fall inside the range shown, and state and acreage together explain about a quarter of the variation in asking price.

Hunting Lease Prices in Missouri

$4,635

per year · 300 acres · Missouri

Comparable properties list $2,822–$7,260, or about $15.45 per acre.

That is 11% below the national median of $17.32 per acre, ranking Missouri 31 of 48 states by price.

What this rests on

Moderately supported

24 Missouri listings

This rate blends listings in this state with the national median.

By property size

Typical Missouri lease prices

Yearly asking prices for a property with no amenities or premium habitat specified. Adding food plots, a cabin or a trophy species raises the estimate; the calculator below accounts for those.
Property size	Typical asking price	Usual range	Per acre
40 acres	$2,550	$1,632–$3,927	$63.75
100 acres	$3,346	$2,141–$5,153	$33.46
250 acres	$4,391	$2,810–$6,762	$17.56
500 acres	$5,393	$2,853–$8,861	$10.79
1,000 acres	$6,624	$2,897–$11,610	$6.62
2,500 acres	$8,693	$2,956–$16,596	$3.48

The market

Hunting Missouri

Missouri has a large deer harvest, a strong turkey tradition and a conservation department that holds an unusually large amount of public hunting ground for a Midwestern state. Rates land near the national median. Northern Missouri farm country draws the trophy interest; the Ozarks lease considerably cheaper.

Nationally, Missouri has a middling amount of public hunting ground — ranking 27 of 50 states at 5.7% public, and a solid whitetail herd by national standards at 2.0 bucks taken per square mile. Neither figure feeds the estimate above; both are the ground truth a lease is negotiated against.

Whitetail deer
Turkey
Waterfowl

Context, not price drivers — see the methodology note below.
Public hunting land	5.7% of the state 2,525,000 acres · 27 of 50
Bucks harvested	140,735 2.0 per square mile · 2022 season
Leased for	Whitetail deer, Turkey, Waterfowl

Within the state

Where Missouri prices differ

The $15.45 per-acre figure above is a Missouri average. These are the sub-markets it averages over, and they do not trade alike:

Directional, not measured — the estimate is fitted at state level and has no sub-state resolution.
Northern Missouri	Farm and timber-edge country carrying the trophy interest and the highest rates.
Ozarks	Steep forested country with heavy public holdings and thinner deer numbers than the north; among the cheapest leasing in the state.
Bootheel and river bottoms	Row crop with strong deer and waterfowl on the right ground.

Your property

Price your own Missouri land

The table above assumes nothing about your land beyond its size. Add your game species, habitat, forage and amenities for an estimate that reflects the property you actually have.

Calculate a Missouri lease price

Nearby markets

How Missouri compares

States whose hunting lease markets are priced closest to Missouri.
State	Per acre	vs. Missouri
Tennessee	$15.35	lower
Kansas	$15.44	lower
Hawaii	$15.45	about the same
Virginia	$15.48	higher

Missouri hunting guides

Missouri Hunting Lease Prices 2026 | Complete MO Guide to Rates, Counties & Laws

Methodology

How we estimate Missouri lease prices

The estimate comes from a model fit on 979 filtered hunting lease listings across 48 states. A state's rate and the way price scales with acreage are both measured from that data. 24 of those listings were in Missouri, so the Missouri rate is drawn largely from that state's own market.

Three things are worth knowing before you quote these numbers:

These are asking prices. They are what landowners list at, not what a lease closes for.
State and size explain about a quarter of the variation. Roughly half of real listings fall inside the range shown, which is what two features can support — it is the honest width of the answer, not a rough edge waiting to be tuned out.
The land and deer figures above are context, not inputs. They come from Backcountry Chronicles (public hunting acreage) and the National Deer Association's 2024 Deer Report (2022 buck harvest). Neither feeds the estimate, and both correlate only weakly with what states actually charge.
Habitat, game and amenity adjustments are expert judgement, not fit from data — the listing feed does not carry those fields. They are set to be neutral on an average property, so they nudge the estimate rather than drive it.