Arnett CPA / Arnett Crop Insurance

05/27/2026

Here's something a lot of farmers are sleeping on right now: USDA is adding 30 million new base acres for the first time since 2018. If you haven't gotten a letter from FSA about your base acre allocation yet, watch your mailbox — they started going out in mid-May. You have 90 days to confirm, select eligible acreage, or opt out, and no action could mean leaving money on the table.

But here's the bigger thing — CY25 had a one-time "Higher-Of" rule that let you collect the higher of ARC or PLC regardless of what you elected. That's gone after this year. CY26 is a real decision again, and the election window opens in September.

Before that window hits, it's worth sitting down and stress-testing your farm: are you more exposed to price risk or revenue risk? The answer might be different for your corn acres than your bean acres. If you want to walk through what ARC vs. PLC actually looks like for your operation, I'm happy to help. Drop a comment or send me a message.

05/20/2026

You just finished planting — and that means the clock is already ticking on your acreage reporting deadline. July 15th is the date every grain farmer needs to have circled on their calendar. Your acreage report is what officially tells your crop insurance company what you planted, where, and how many acres — and if that number is wrong (or late), it can reduce or completely eliminate your indemnity payment if something goes wrong this summer. Don't let a paperwork mistake undo the coverage you signed up for. If you want help making sure your records are clean and your report is accurate, reach out before July rolls around.

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05/12/2026

As grain farmers finish committing spring inputs across the Corn Belt, breakeven price analysis is the single most actionable managerial accounting tool a producer can have — and a surprising number of operations have never formally calculated it. The formula is simple: total cost per acre (variable costs plus properly allocated fixed costs) divided by expected yield. A corn operation running $640/acre all-in at 175 bu/ac carries a $3.66/bu breakeven. That one number should be driving forward marketing decisions, crop insurance coverage level selection, and FSA program enrollment — not gut instinct. Tax accounting won't give you this. It only tells you what happened last year. Managerial accounting tells you what has to happen this year to stay profitable. If you work with grain farmers or ag lenders and want to build this kind of financial clarity into an operation, I'm happy to have that conversation.

05/05/2026

Most grain farmers can tell you what corn is trading for. Very few can tell you their exact breakeven price — and that gap is where financial risk lives. Breakeven price is a straightforward managerial accounting concept: total cost per acre ÷ expected yield. But the work is in the cost separation. Variable costs (seed, fertilizer, chemicals, drying fuel) behave differently than fixed costs (land rent, depreciation, loan payments), and blending them together without understanding which is which gives you a number that looks clean but misleads your decisions. At $680/acre all-in with a 185 bu/acre APH, your corn breakeven is $3.67. At $4.40 new-crop, that's a 20% margin — enough to forward contract with confidence, or to evaluate whether crop insurance coverage levels are properly calibrated to protect below that threshold. This is the analysis that tax accounting never produces, because tax accounting is backward-looking by design. If your operation is making planting decisions without a breakeven model, that's the first thing I'd help you build. Happy to connect.

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