Key Takeaways

• Mississippi charges $0.00 in state deed transfer tax: Sharkey County landowners pay no state-level transfer tax at closing, making Mississippi one of the most cost-effective states to complete a land sale — recording fees are the primary transactional cost beyond attorney fees
• Vacant land is assessed at 15% of fair market value: Mississippi's 15% assessment ratio for non-owner-occupied property — including bare farmland and bottomland tracts — is 50% higher than the 10% ratio for owner-occupied homes, meaning vacant landholders carry a disproportionate annual tax burden, according to Mississippi State University Extension
• Sharkey County is losing population at a steep rate: Population fell from 4,916 in 2010 to 3,800 in 2020 — a 22.7% decline in one decade — and the county now ranks as the second-least populous in Mississippi, according to U.S. Census data, sharply constraining the local buyer pool for rural land

How Can You Sell Land in Sharkey County Mississippi?

Selling land in Sharkey County, Mississippi means navigating the state's attorney-required closing process, a property tax system that assesses vacant parcels at 15% of fair market value, and a rural real estate market shaped by the Mississippi Delta's deepest geography — a landscape of large-scale row-crop operations, bottomland hardwood sloughs, and the 60,898-acre Delta National Forest, the only bottomland hardwood national forest in the entire National Forest system.

Sharkey County sits in the western Mississippi Delta, with Rolling Fork serving as the county seat. The county is bounded by Washington County to the north, Humphreys County to the northeast, Yazoo County to the east, and Issaquena County to the southwest. The Little Sunflower River and its tributaries drain through the county before joining the larger Yazoo River system. The Delta National Forest occupies a large portion of the county's western interior, managed cooperatively as the Sunflower Wildlife Management Area, and supports significant waterfowl, deer, turkey, and squirrel hunting in seasonally flooded bottomland hardwood stands.

Rolling Fork — the county seat and the Delta National Forest's ranger district office location — was struck by an EF-4 tornado on March 24, 2023, killing 21 people and destroying approximately 300 homes and businesses. Recovery support exceeded $84.9 million by the one-year mark, and rebuilding has continued through 2024 and into 2025, though some residents remained in temporary housing well over a year after the storm. This context matters for landowners: courthouse staff and records offices weathered the recovery period, and any parcel-level records inquiry should confirm current contact information directly with the county.

This guide covers the tax costs of holding vacant land in Sharkey County, the state's attorney-required closing process, how the county compares to its neighbors, and your practical options for selling.

What Are the Tax Costs of Holding Land in Sharkey County?

Mississippi's property tax system is built on a tiered assessment ratio that varies by property type. Owner-occupied residential properties are assessed at 10% of fair market value. All other real property — including vacant land, farmland held by non-resident owners, and bottomland tracts — is assessed at 15% of fair market value, according to Mississippi State University Extension. That 50% differential means vacant land carries a structurally higher tax burden than a neighboring owner-occupied home of equivalent market value.

Sharkey County's median effective property tax rate is approximately 1.16%, according to Ownwell — which exceeds the national median of approximately 1.02% but varies depending on which assessed value benchmark is applied. Given the county's very low median home values (around $46,390, per Ownwell's data), the median annual tax bill is comparatively modest in absolute dollars — approximately $372 per year according to Ownwell, or $479 per year per PropertyTax101 — but the rate itself reflects local millage levied by the county, school district, and any applicable municipal or special district taxing authorities.

How the Tax Bill Compounds for Non-Productive Land

Even at modest absolute dollar amounts, the tax bill on vacant land repeats every year. For land that generates no row-crop lease income, no catfish pond revenue, and no hunting lease income, that annual obligation is pure carrying cost — and it accumulates whether or not the parcel ever appreciates. For absentee owners holding inherited bottomland or non-productive scrub tracts, those payments quietly erode whatever value the land represents.

Mississippi reassesses real property periodically; taxes attach on January 1 each year. Property taxes become due October 1 and must be paid by February 1 to avoid late fees. Delinquent accounts in Mississippi are offered at tax sale on the last Monday in August. Owners who do not redeem within two years of the tax sale risk losing the property. Out-of-state owners — of whom Sharkey County has many, given decades of outmigration — are particularly vulnerable to missing notices mailed to old addresses.

Beyond the tax bill, vacant land in Sharkey County carries liability exposure, potential maintenance obligations on agricultural drainage infrastructure, and the indirect cost of capital tied up in a non-income-producing asset. Mississippi's ag use-value assessment program can partially offset costs for landowners who actively manage qualifying farmland — see the section below.

For land that has accumulated delinquent taxes, our guide on how to sell land with back taxes explains how to navigate that process.

What Closing Requirements and Zoning Rules Apply in Sharkey County?

Mississippi is an attorney-state for real estate closings. A licensed Mississippi attorney must examine and certify the title before a real estate sale can close, per The Mississippi Bar. This is a legal requirement — not optional — regardless of whether you use a real estate agent, sell directly, or work with a land buyer.

The closing process follows a defined sequence:

1. Title search: The attorney searches land records filed with the Sharkey County Chancery Clerk to identify any liens, easements, judgments, or encumbrances on the property
2. Title certification and insurance: The attorney certifies that title is marketable; title insurance may be issued to protect the buyer from defects not discovered in the search
3. Closing: Both parties (or their authorized representatives) execute the deed, any seller's affidavits, and the settlement statement
4. Recording: After closing, the deed is recorded with the Sharkey County Chancery Clerk

The Sharkey County Chancery Clerk — which maintains the county's land and deed records — is Murindia Williams. The office is located at 120 Locust Street, Rolling Fork, MS (mailing: P.O. Box 218, Rolling Fork, MS 39159), phone 662-873-2755. The Sharkey County Tax Assessor/Collector is Donna Anderson, located at 120 Locust Street, Rolling Fork, MS (mailing: P.O. Box 245, Rolling Fork, MS 39159), phone 662-873-4317.

Mississippi's $0.00 state transfer tax is a meaningful advantage for sellers, holding closing costs comparatively low relative to states that levy a deed or documentary tax.

Zoning and Land Use in Sharkey County

Sharkey County is almost entirely rural, and most land outside Rolling Fork and other small communities operates under minimal county-level zoning regulation. Agricultural and row-crop uses proceed without use permits. The Delta National Forest — all 60,898 acres of it — sits entirely within Sharkey County, and private tracts that border or are adjacent to the national forest carry considerations around deeded access, easements, and adjacent-use restrictions that warrant a thorough review before any sale. Seasonally flooded bottomland tracts within the county may also be subject to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers or Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality wetland regulations; any development or land-disturbing activity on these tracts should be reviewed with counsel.

Mississippi Ag Use-Value and the Reforestation Tax Credit

Mississippi assesses qualifying agricultural land on its use value rather than full market value — a significant break for actively farmed tracts that keeps the assessed base low for land kept in qualifying use. Sharkey County's 112 farms span approximately 177,028 acres of land in farms, with roughly 156,025 acres in cropland, according to the USDA 2022 Census of Agriculture. Soybeans dominate — approximately 107,122 acres were harvested in 2022 — followed by corn (approximately 28,929 acres), with cotton and rice also present in the county's rotational mix. For a farm parcel that qualifies under Mississippi's ag use-value program, the tax base is substantially lower than a comparable parcel assessed at market value.

Mississippi also offers a Reforestation Tax Credit equal to 50% of approved reforestation costs — including site preparation, planting stock, and labor — with a lifetime limit of $75,000 per taxpayer, according to the Mississippi Forestry Commission and the Conservation Finance Center. Landowners must work with a Registered Forester to develop a reforestation plan. Standing bottomland timber in Mississippi is not subject to ad valorem tax until it is harvested, at which point a severance tax applies.

If your land is inherited or title is clouded, our guide on how to sell inherited land covers the steps for Mississippi, including heirs' property and Chancery Court processes. If your parcel is producing row-crop income or has been farmed in recent years, see our guide on how to sell farmland. If your land is primarily valuable for bottomland hunting, see sell hunting land.

How Does Sharkey County Compare to Neighboring Mississippi Counties?

Sharkey County's population collapse is among the steepest in Mississippi — from 4,916 in 2010 to 3,800 in 2020, a 22.7% loss in a single decade, according to U.S. Census data. The county now ranks second-to-last in population out of Mississippi's 82 counties. With a median household income estimated around $40,000 and a poverty rate above 25%, Sharkey is a deep Delta county whose rural land market is driven almost entirely by agricultural operators, hunting club operators, and out-of-region investors — not local residential demand.

Factor	Sharkey County	Humphreys County	Yazoo County	Issaquena County
Population (2020 census)	~3,800	~7,785	~26,743	~1,338
Population trend	Steep decline (−22.7% 2010–2020)	Declining	Declining	Steep decline
Effective tax rate	~1.16%	~0.78%–1.82% (varying sources)	~1.74%	~0.35%
County seat	Rolling Fork	Belzoni	Yazoo City	Mayersville
Land character	Delta row-crop, Delta National Forest bottomland	Delta row-crop, catfish aquaculture ponds	Delta/hill-country transition, row-crop	Mississippi River levee corridor, bottomland
Key economic driver	Row-crop agriculture, hunting/recreation	Row-crop agriculture, catfish industry	Row-crop agriculture, timber transition	Agriculture, very limited commercial base

All four of Sharkey's neighbors share the Delta's fundamental land-market reality: thin, declining local buyer pools, agricultural operators who already own or lease the productive farmland they want, and out-of-region buyers as the primary source of demand for parcels that hit the open market. Issaquena County — the least populous county in Mississippi, with only 1,338 people in the 2020 census — is the most extreme example of this dynamic. Humphreys County to the northeast, centered on Belzoni (the self-described "Farm-Raised Catfish Capital of the World"), shares Sharkey's row-crop and aquaculture profile. Yazoo County to the east is larger, with a small city (Yazoo City) and a transitional economy between Delta farmland and the eastern hill country, but is also in broad population decline.

Economy and Agriculture in Sharkey County

Sharkey County's economy is rooted in large-scale row-crop agriculture. The 2022 USDA Census of Agriculture reports 112 farms in the county covering approximately 177,028 acres of land in farms — an average farm size of about 1,581 acres, reflecting the highly consolidated, capital-intensive agricultural operations typical of the Mississippi Delta. Total market value of agricultural products sold reached approximately $126.9 million in 2022. Soybeans are the dominant crop, followed by corn; cotton and rice also rotate through the county's alluvial clay soils — including the heavy Sharkey clay series — that characterize the Delta's interior.

Alongside its row-crop identity, Sharkey County is defined by the Delta National Forest. Established in 1961 and covering 60,898 acres entirely within Sharkey County, the forest is the only bottomland hardwood national forest in the entire National Forest system — one of only six national forests contained entirely within a single county. Managed cooperatively as the Sunflower Wildlife Management Area, the forest supports waterfowl hunting in seasonally flooded sloughs, deer, turkey, and squirrel hunting in mature bottomland stands dominated by overcup oak, willow oak, Nuttall oak, ash, sugarberry, sweetgum, and cypress. The Little Sunflower River and its drainage network run through the county, connecting private bottomland tracts with the national forest's water management system.

For absentee landowners, this dual identity — big farm and big woods — creates two distinct market segments. Large cultivated tracts appeal to agricultural operators; bottomland parcels adjacent to or near the Delta National Forest appeal to hunting clubs and recreational buyers. Neither market is deep.

For a statewide overview of the selling process, closing requirements, and other counties we buy in, see our guide on how to sell land in Mississippi. For county-level land analysis across the state, explore our blog. For help understanding what your land is worth before you list or accept an offer, see how much is my land worth.

What Are Your Options for Selling Land in Sharkey County?

Sharkey County landowners carrying vacant parcels face some of the most challenging market conditions of any Mississippi county: land assessed at 15% of market value, an effective tax rate around 1.16%, a county that has lost nearly a quarter of its population in a decade, and a local buyer pool that is almost entirely agricultural or recreational in nature. For absentee owners — those who inherited bottomland, moved to Memphis, Jackson, or out of state, or simply stopped actively farming a leased parcel — the question is often not whether to sell but how to do it without an indefinite wait. Row-crop farmland under active lease may attract interest from neighboring operators, but non-cultivated bottomland, cut-over tracts, or small non-farm parcels can sit for a long time in a market this thin.

Before listing or accepting any offer, verify your property records through the Sharkey County Chancery Clerk — Murindia Williams, 662-873-2755, 120 Locust Street (P.O. Box 218), Rolling Fork, MS 39159. Confirm tax status through the Sharkey County Tax Assessor/Collector — Donna Anderson, 662-873-4317, 120 Locust Street (P.O. Box 245), Rolling Fork, MS 39159. If the parcel is leased cropland, confirm the current lease terms and whether any remaining lease period would transfer to a buyer. If there are title questions from inheritance or old deeds, the attorney handling your closing will flag these during the title search.

Sellers have several paths. Listing with a Mississippi land-specialist agent exposes your property to a wider pool of agricultural, recreational, and investment buyers. Platforms like Land.com and LandWatch serve buyers specifically looking for rural Mississippi Delta land — though small non-farm parcels and non-cultivated bottomland tracts can be slow to move. If you own land out of state and are managing a sale remotely, see our guide on selling land as an out-of-state owner for a practical rundown of how to handle the closing remotely. For landowners who want a written number quickly — without the uncertainty of extended market exposure — Jerez Land provides a parcel-specific, firm written cash offer for your land. As a direct buyer, we absorb the carrying costs, marketing time, and resale risk that come with holding rural Delta acreage. There are no agent commissions, no transfer tax (Mississippi charges none), and the attorney manages the closing as required by state law.

If you are weighing whether to involve an agent at all, our guide on whether you need a realtor to sell land walks through the trade-offs for rural parcels in thin markets like Sharkey County.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I sell vacant land in Sharkey County Mississippi?

Contact the Sharkey County Chancery Clerk (Murindia Williams, 662-873-2755) to verify your deed and legal description, and check your tax status through the Sharkey County Tax Assessor/Collector (Donna Anderson, 662-873-4317) at 120 Locust Street, Rolling Fork. Mississippi requires a licensed attorney to handle the title examination, deed preparation, and closing. From there, you can list with a local land-specialist real estate agent, market through online land platforms, or request a direct cash offer from a land buyer like Jerez Land.

What is the property tax rate in Sharkey County Mississippi?

Sharkey County has a median effective property tax rate of approximately 1.16%, according to Ownwell — somewhat above the national median. Vacant land is assessed at 15% of fair market value, compared to 10% for owner-occupied homes, under Mississippi's tiered assessment system per Mississippi State University Extension. Qualifying agricultural land may be assessed on use value rather than full market value, which significantly reduces the tax base for actively farmed tracts.

Does Mississippi charge a transfer tax on land sales?

No. Mississippi has a $0.00 state deed transfer tax. Sellers do not owe a state-level transfer tax on land sales, regardless of sale price. This makes Mississippi one of the lowest-closing-cost states for land transactions. A licensed Mississippi attorney still handles the title work and recording, which carries its own fees.

Is an attorney required for land sales in Sharkey County?

Yes. Mississippi requires a licensed attorney to examine and certify the title for real estate transactions. The attorney prepares the deed and oversees the closing. After closing, the deed is recorded with the Sharkey County Chancery Clerk — Murindia Williams, at 120 Locust Street (P.O. Box 218), Rolling Fork, MS 39159, phone 662-873-2755.

What makes Delta National Forest significant for Sharkey County land?

Delta National Forest is a 60,898-acre federal forest located entirely within Sharkey County — one of only six national forests contained entirely within a single county in the United States. It is the only bottomland hardwood forest in the entire National Forest system, established in 1961 and managed cooperatively as the Sunflower Wildlife Management Area. The forest provides waterfowl, deer, turkey, and squirrel hunting on seasonally flooded bottomland hardwood stands. Private parcels adjacent to or near the national forest boundary may carry access, easement, and wetland considerations that require careful title and survey review before sale.

Is Sharkey County Mississippi population growing or declining?

Sharkey County has experienced steep population decline: from 4,916 in 2010 to 3,800 in 2020 — a 22.7% loss — according to U.S. Census data, making it the second-least populous county in Mississippi. Estimates for the mid-2020s range from approximately 3,097 to 3,872 depending on the data source and methodology. The decline reflects deep outmigration across the Mississippi Delta, accelerated by the devastating EF-4 tornado that struck Rolling Fork in March 2023. This shrinking population creates a very thin local buyer pool for rural land, and most demand for Sharkey County parcels comes from out-of-region agricultural operators, hunting clubs, and land investors.

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Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal, financial, or professional advice. Laws and regulations vary by jurisdiction and change over time. Always consult with qualified professionals before making land purchase decisions. Jerez Land is not responsible for actions taken based on this information.