Warren Buffett charged his son Howard rent on the family's first farm
When Howard Graham Buffett began farming in Tekamah, Nebraska, in 1977, his father Warren bought the land for $760,000 and then charged him rent. Nearly five decades later, on September 18, 2026, Howard succeeded Warren as chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, after many years on its board.
Born on December 16, 1954, the middle child of Warren Buffett, he was named after his grandfather Howard Buffett and after Benjamin Graham, his father's favourite professor. He grew up in Omaha with his sister Susan and brother Peter. Today he lives in Decatur, Illinois, overseeing a 1,500-acre family farm and foundation research farms that include 9,200 acres in South Africa, and he champions no-till conservation agriculture.
His business career ran through agriculture and food: he was an executive and director at Archer Daniels Midland in the early 1990s, then a director at ConAgra Foods and chairman of Lindsay Corporation. From 1993 to 2004 he also sat on the board of Coca-Cola Enterprises, the largest Coca-Cola bottler. He has been a Berkshire director since 1992 and a Coca-Cola director since December 2010, and in 2011 Warren said publicly he wanted Howard to become non-executive chairman.
A Republican, he spent 1989 to 1992 as one of the elected commissioners for Nebraska's Douglas County, and in September 2017 was sworn in as sheriff of Macon County, Illinois, to complete a departing sheriff's term after years as a volunteer there. His foundation has given millions to police agencies around central Illinois.
As head of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation he has visited more than 130 countries, funding agriculture, water, conservation and humanitarian work, especially in Africa and Central America. In 2014 it gave $23.7 million toward fighting rhino poaching in South Africa, and it pledged $200 million to help farmers in Tibú, Colombia, replace coca with crops such as cacao. He has also published eight books, including the bestseller Forty Chances, written with his son Howard Warren Buffett.
Source: Howard Graham Buffett
