How Much Is an Acre Worth in Loudoun County?

The short answer

Loudoun County's vacant-land median sold price ran about $525,000 to $542,000 in 2024 and 2025, across 44 to 77 land sales a year. Equestrian and estate farms typically sell for $1.5 million to $8 million, with outliers reaching $19 million. For contrast, Virginia's statewide average agricultural land value is about $5,434 per acre — a fraction of what most Loudoun land commands, reflecting the county's proximity to Washington, D.C., its horse-country reputation, and its data-center economy.

That range moves noticeably from year to year in part because Loudoun sees relatively few land sales — as few as 44 in a slow year — so a handful of unusually large or small transactions can shift the median more than in a county with a deeper pool of sales.

What moves value in Loudoun

Western Loudoun is horse and hunt country — rolling pasture, historic villages, and some of the highest-profile equestrian real estate in Virginia, centered around Middleburg, Purcellville, and the surrounding countryside. That character supports strong prices for both bare land and improved estate farms, independent of anything happening with data centers.

Data-center pressure is the other half of the Loudoun story, and it's larger here than anywhere else in the region. Data centers now make up roughly 26% of the county's real estate tax base, and the county's February 2026 assessment put the average value of data-center-zoned land at $3.76 million per acre, up $1.4 million per acre year over year. That pricing applies to a specific, infrastructure-heavy slice of the county — not to ordinary farmland in western Loudoun, which trades on its own terms.

Land-use taxation matters too. Loudoun's 2026 assessment showed rural land appreciating roughly 5.9% to 8.6% for the year — a solid, ordinary gain, and a useful reminder that most of the county's farmland is still part of a conventional market, not the data-center one. The gap between a $525,000 median vacant-land sale and a $3.76 million-per-acre data-center parcel is the clearest illustration in the region of how differently these two markets price the same kind of ground.

Loudoun has had a Purchase of Development Rights program in its ordinance since 1999, but it has gone unfunded since 2004. Unlike Fauquier's active PDR program, it isn't currently a practical option for Loudoun landowners weighing whether to permanently retire development rights in exchange for a payment.

What a per-acre figure leaves out in Loudoun

Loudoun has the widest gap between its two land markets of any county covered here, so a single average per acre is close to meaningless without saying which market a parcel sits in.

Ordinary rural land rose between 5.9 and 8.6 per cent in the county's 2026 assessment. Data-center-zoned land averaged $3.76 million an acre in the same February 2026 assessment, up $1.4 million an acre year over year, and data centers now make up about twenty-six per cent of the county's real-estate tax base.

Use value is a third number again. For Tax Year 2026 the state's advisory council put Loudoun's average agricultural use value at $430 an acre on soil classes I through VII, which is what enrolled land is assessed against rather than what it would sell for.

Where a parcel sits also matters more here than the acreage does. The ground around Middleburg, Purcellville and Leesburg carries three different price bands inside one county line.

Land vs. improved farm

An improved equestrian or estate property — barns, fencing, riding rings, a well-maintained residence — commands a substantial premium over bare acreage in Loudoun, which is part of why the county's farm sales range so widely, from $1.5 million up to $19 million at the top end. Bare land without those improvements still sells well by national standards, but the gap between raw acreage and a turnkey farm is wider here than in the county's neighbors.

The data-center caveat for Loudoun

Loudoun is now pumping the brakes on new data-center growth after two decades of rapid expansion. The Board of Supervisors voted 6-1 to have staff draft a pause option on new applications, with a report due September 15, 2026, though the County Attorney has told the board a true moratorium is likely not legal under Virginia's Dillon Rule. That means the pace of new data-center land deals may slow even as existing infrastructure keeps values in already-zoned areas high — a 97-acre Leesburg parcel sold for roughly $6.3 million per acre, the regional record, and a developer offered about $4.4 million per acre for a roughly 130-acre neighborhood assemblage in Ashburn in March 2026.

None of this changes the outlook for ordinary Loudoun farmland, which remains a separate, steadier market. For the full regional price ladder, see our data center land value page; for what an approach from a developer actually looks like, see what a data center offer really means.

How to get a real number

Loudoun's range is wide enough that a county-wide median tells you very little about any one parcel. Location within the county, acreage, improvements, and any data-center relevance all matter, and two farms only a few miles apart can land on very different ends of that wide range once all of those specifics are actually weighed together. For a broader county-by-county comparison, see our land value page; for more on the local market, see our Loudoun County page.

Sources

• USDA 2022 Census of Agriculture: Loudoun County profile (PDF)
• Loudoun County Commissioner of the Revenue: real estate assessments