My first thought would be that when you start out, it is all you can afford. 1.25 Mil is not enough to get a descent farm going if your maintenance costs are high. Add to that you have to repay $250,000.00 of your starting funds and in Seasons; 'interest' payments in Seasons are also quite heavy. So if you dont want to get sidled with interest payments in seasons, you pay back $250,000.00 immediately upon starting a new game and you only have 1 mil to buy everything with.
Then you have to plan for the inevitable ever growing property maintenance costs, let a lone equipment maintenance and leasing costs, fertiliser/seed/lime costs, etc... and it leaves very little after your initial purchases.
Remember, you only get one harvest per year per field. Essentially, you get one day out of 12 (with seasons set to 3 days) with which to make money.