It Takes Two Years to Get Traction in Anything (LA 734)
It Takes Two Years to Get Traction in Anything (LA 734)
Transcript:
Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here.
Jill DeWit: Hello.
Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talking. I’m Steven Jack Butala.
Jill DeWit: And, I’m Jill DeWit broadcasting from gorgeous southern California.
Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about, it takes about two years to good traction in anything that’s worth while.
Jill DeWit: It’s true. Sometimes longer, depending what it is.
Steven Butala: That scares a lot of people.
Jill DeWit: Like, some professions and…
Steven Butala: It sounds daunting, it’s 2018 now.
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: What do you mean it takes… So, you mean in 2020 I’m going to start making money or doing well at this? No, that’s not what I mean at all. It just means that, in every project that you’ve already taken on, school’s a good example because everybody can relate to it. There’s a point where it’s like, wow this is hard! I’m not sure I can do this.
Jill DeWit: In the beginning.
Steven Butala: Yeah, and then you do it and a couple times. Okay I got it, I think I got it. Maybe it’s a fluke, maybe it’s a one off, maybe I got lucky. I’m not sure. I’ll try it again and see. But at some point you’re like, you’ve solved about ten problems, you’re doing well. And, you took a look back, for me it’s like looking at the bank balance. It’s like, you know what? Maybe I’ve got this worked out.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: That usually ha[[ens for me like in two years on any big project. But, before we get into it, Let’s take a question posted by one of our members. On TheLandAcademy.com, online community, it’s free.
Jill DeWit: Okay. Matt asks, this is a good one too. So, I’m gonna read the questions and then there’s little parts where people weighed in on it. So, it’s kinda part of the whole thread here, which is awesome. Thank you, producer.
Steven Butala: That’s kind of the point to this whole question, I think. I’ve cleared it over a lot of the other ones. It’s a really good use of LandInvestors.com.
Jill DeWit: That’s true, which is our online community
Matt asks, “Hey guys, I have a deal that I’m about to pull the trigger on. But it’s a step out of my traditional purchase criteria. I bought all small infield lots up until now, about twenty total. This one is $10,000 and 10 acres without physical access. I made a three or four minute video to make it easy for you. If you wouldn’t mind watching that and let me know if you think it’s an issue, or if you think it’s fine. And, if you have any advice in final due diligence that I should be completing before proceeding.” And then, he put a link for the actual video in the thread.
Steven Butala: If you want to watch the video go to LandInvestors.com and just keyword search, something thar is unique in this whole thing. Something like, map. Or, the website that he posted on is called Useloom, U-S-E-L-O-O-M. Just keyword search that, and you’ll be able to find a link to the video and watch that.
Jill DeWit: And see the whole thread.
Steven Butala: Yeah.
Jill DeWit: Yep. I can’t wait to hear what everyone has to say. Here are some of my side questions that I have.
“The sellers say it’s behind a locked gate, so I don’t know if I’ll be able to get a photographer in there before we open escrow. Does that concern anyone? I think it’s fine, but I like photos before it’s closed. Or at least before it’s listed. What other due diligence would you do? I plan to double check on what the deal is with wells are, in the specific area…”
Steven Butala: Okay.
Jill DeWit: “…septic for the area and zoning. The taxes are okay, and I’m closing with title.” So, that’s it.
Steven Butala: Well, good. Because this is a higher priced deal.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). And, then here’s a little bit down in the posting, it says “From Matt, update. I found the easement in legal of the deed. So, it’s there.”
That’s good. So we know there’s access.
Steven Butala: So, there’s legal access to the property. That’s 90% of the battle, maybe 95.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative) . And them, the last line that’s in here is one of our members, Luke, who weighed in on this whole thread. And, he said, “Matt, sounds like you got this one. Sell it to a buyer who likes to use a bulldozer. And, in the ad say, This is closest to the cheapest one to rent. Make it clear. Had a buyer deliver a tiny home on Friday, to find out there’s no physical access to the property. I thought that was a tough phone conversation. Wife was hopping mad, baby was crying. Semi truck driver was like, I can’t drive in there. The fence is locked. Noplace to turn around, big mess.”
Luke had sent me a little note about that, too, by the way, in an email that I got from him. Which, I thought, oh no.
Steven Butala: Wonder how he resolved that?
Jill DeWit: The things that can happen.
Steven Butala: Or licked it. I watched your whole video on Useloom, and I would do the deal. Especially if there’s physical access. And here’s why, because a lot of people with this mid-range, I call it mid-range price property. It’s heavily treed, like out of a movie. This piece of real estate for ten grand. It’s ten acres, so it’s big.
The question people are going to ask, in the area where you’re selling it, when they look at it against other properties that they buy is, Wow! What the hell’s wrong with this property that it’s so cheap. And, now you have an answer. The answer is, do you want the good news or the bad news first?
Here’s the good news. It has physical access, and here it is. It’s platted and all thing, but, I don’t feel like hiring a bulldozer guy to put in there and do the whole thing. But, maybe you’re that guy. So, yeah. My loss is your gain. I’m happy to sell it to you for, I’m happy to sell you a $200,000 piece of property for 20 grand, if you can figure out access.
Jill DeWit: Well, Luke even went a step further. It depends on what you want to do, and how much you want to put your sale into a wholesaler, or the end user. But, it’s kind of funny that he even put in here, I made three phone calls. Here’s the cheapest bulldozer in the area. So, you even know what you’re getting into.
Steven Butala: Yeah.
Jill DeWit: So, that’s not crazy. I’ve talked to people, they wanna know… It used to be, before we had all the GPS coordinates that we have now, thanks to ParcelFact.com. But, they would often ask questions about where the boundaries are. Now, I can give them the GPS, so they can walk it themselves. But, they would ask about having it staked out. I would tell them, here’s what you can expect, here’s who to call, and how much it runs. I just knew it. Like, 800 bucks, and this is the guy at the county. And, you can get it done. Give them a week or two and they’ll go stake it out, kind of a thing.
But, having that information sometimes, ahead of times, then that helps them and they know what they’re getting into. And, I’ll tell them too, they’re like, “Will you do it?”. And, my standard answer is , like this one I might even say. “Well would you do it for me?” “Sure, but now it’s not, the price just changed.”
Steven Butala: Sure.
Jill DeWit: That’s the point. I’m passing the savings on to you, here. Wink, wink. You either get it, or you don’t. Most of the time, they’re gonna go, “Oh, I get it.”
Steven Butala: So, I’m recording Land Academy 2.0 right now. And I break up something. We spend a vast amount of time, on this Land Academy show, talking about really inexpensive rural they can land. But it turns out there’s a lot of other types of property that we buy and sell. In fact, the fact is Jill and I don’t spend much time buying and selling rural, vacant land anymore at all.
We buy properties like the one that Matt’s addressing here. That are mid-range properties, maybe they have a little flaw. This is a perfect flaw for us. I would do this sale. We go the extra mile, because we find out it’s worth 200,000 bucks. It’s probably worth half a million, actually, just looking at his video. So, it’s something that we would do. We would write for $10,000, and we would solve all the problems theoretically. Then we would send somebody out there, even potentially with bolt cutters. Or jump over the fence, and get somebody back there with [inaudible 00:07:41] and really get some good pictures.
There’s a lot of money here. At least $100.000 of profit, in less than 30 days. So, it’s worth spending a little time and money on deals like this. I cover this in Land Academy 2.0. I would call this a mid-range deal. And, he’s already got experience with infield lots, which is my personal, absolute favorite type of deal I do. We cover that in the… We talk a lot about getting your feet wet with rural, vacant land. But, I’m really glad that he asked this question, and I hope he bought it by now.
Jill DeWit: I just thought of a side business, like we need another one. Can you imagine? Why hasn’t somebody done this? Can you imagine, you know like there’s a one stop shopping for notaries?
Steven Butala: You’re so the right girl for me.
Jill DeWit: Thank you, There’s multiple web sites out there, you can usually get a notary in 30 seconds. It’s all collected in one space, and all that good stuff. Why isn’t there a one stop shopping for drones. Someone should contract, or at least
Steven Butala: There is.
Jill DeWit: Is there one place I can go for one
Steven Butala: Yeah, it’s called Drone IO.
Jill DeWit: And they get drones all over the country for a flat rate?
Steven Butala: There’s drone owners and drone pilots. It’s not a flat rate. It’s not all like Uber, but it is, it’s like lottery. You have to negotiate a rate with the person that’s in that location.
Jill DeWit: But it’s nationwide?
Steven Butala: Yeah.
Jill DeWit: Perfect. Then that solve my thing. Well there should be more then so they have some competition.
Steven Butala: It is a good idea though.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: I mean if you really think about that concept, there’s so many things that could happen.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Steven Butala: Where you need a local representation. Oh wait! Boots on the ground. We already did.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: We’re not supposed to talk about houses on this show. But, we’ve conquered it.
Jill DeWit: Thank you.
Steven Butala: Today’s topic, it takes two years to get traction in anything worth while. This is the meat of the show. Steve, what the hell does that mean? It takes two years? I though you said you can just buy a piece of property and sell it for more.
You absolutely can. You can do it in the first week. People join our group, and in the first month they make ten grand, on one deal. But, to get some real traction, to put the hours in, to really understand… Anybody can pick up a soccer ball and dribble it down the field and kick into the goal, right? But, to become a soccer player, you gotta put some saddle time in. That’s not the sport reference you’re referring to all the time. That’s not football.
Jill DeWit: Not today.
Steven Butala: To really sit down and have a good conversation with yourself, like I said earlier, it takes a couple years. And here’s the thing, that scares some people. Two years from now, it’s gonna be two years from now anyway. If you’re 24, you’re gonna be 26? So what, you’re gonna be 26 anyway.
She’s raising her hand like we’re in a classroom.
Jill DeWit: I’m not going to interrupt you.
Steven Butala: I’m glad.
Jill DeWit: Why does this scare anyone? The minute you start a new job, you’re not going to be a pro. If you’re lucky, you really have a good handle on it in six months. But, it really takes you a long time…
Steven Butala: It takes two years.
Jill DeWit: …to get to know a job. So why is this any different? You know, that’s an interesting, this to me is the topic. Why do people come into this sometimes, with unrealistic expectations?
Steven Butala: I don’t know, that’s a really…
Jill DeWit: That’s to me the meat of the show.
Steven Butala: That is the meat of the show, you’re right. I don’t know Jill, I can’t answer that.
Jill DeWit: You come in thinking you’re gonna perfect. No. You’re never gonna make a mistake. No. It’s not gonna be hard. No. You’re not gonna have to work at it. No. It’s gonna come easy and overnight just because I have the program. No. It comes back to my Eddie VanHalen’s guitar kind of thing, too. You can take lessons from a pro, doesn’t mean you’re gonna be a pro. You gotta put the time in, and the energy. There’s a couple things, and it’s gotta be a good fit.
It’s gotta be a good fit, and you know what? We haven’t talked about this in a while, but if it’s not a good fit for you, but you are hell bent on doing it, you can. Your energy ,and your aggressiveness, and your commitment can overcome that stuff.
Steven Butala: You can overcome anything.
Jill DeWit: Correct.
Steven Butala: Anything, almost without exception. There’s a few crazy things like …
Jill DeWit: Except for the physical things that you can’t overcome, because you’re 6’5″ and you can’t do..
Steven Butala: Or brain surgery or something.
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: So, there’s a few exceptions, but, the will to do it, and solve the little problems as you go, and not taking all the stuff personally. That’s the real trick here.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: So, two years is nothing. I mean, are you kidding me? You got a job, congratulations. Spend two years on the weekend, developing a side business that costs very little start up capital, and little to no risk, in my opinion. That’s nothing.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). It really is. When you think about where you were two years ago. Heck, it’s been over two years since Land Academy. That’s easy.
Steven Butala: This whole thing happened to me on accident.
Jill DeWit: Yeah. You ran into me on accident.
Steven Butala: I mean, when I started buying and selling land, it was intentional in the beginning. And then, I did a relatively large deal and sold off all the assets for four times what I paid. Then I realized, wow. There’s really something here.
Jill DeWit: I tried to make a joke there, and you went right over it.
Steven Butala: What was it? I missed it.
Jill DeWit: I know.
Steven Butala: I didn’t hear you, I’m sorry.
Jill DeWit: It’s okay.
Steven Butala: What was the joke?
Jill DeWit: You happened to me by accident. It took me, I took two years. I had to put two years into it. I had to put ten years into it. Just kidding.
Steven Butala: How did you and I meat? Oh, yeah. Somebody introduced us. That was an accident.
Jill DeWit: It was an accident.
Steven Butala: That was full blown accidental.
Jill DeWit: Yes, it was.
Steven Butala: I was not looking for any type of relationship.
Jill DeWit: Neither was I.
Steven Butala: Wow.
Jill DeWit: Yeah, I wasn’t even sure I wanted one. I was like, I don’t really wanna do this.
Steven Butala: Like ever, ever.
Jill DeWit: Yeah, that’s true.
Steven Butala: Wow. But, anyway..
Jill DeWit: Yes.
Steven Butala: So, two years is nothing. There’s some people that it takes 20 minutes, there’s some people it might take five years. But, if you’re making two, three, four hundred thousand bucks flipping property. And, you have a good confident sense about it, and you’re an expert in your little area, it’s well worth it.
Jill DeWit: It is.
Steven Butala: I guess that’s what you have to ask yourself, is it worth it or not?
Jill DeWit: Am I committed to it? Is it worth it? Yes. Am I committed to it too?
Steven Butala: Is it worth it? There’s no question it’s worth it.
Jill DeWit: Well, what do you have to give up?
Steven Butala: Yeah, which is very little. Maybe just the weekend stuff.
Jill DeWit: I don’t know, maybe its not a good fit for you. You know what, though? Let me run this by you, ’cause I don’t think this is crazy and I know we have these numbers. I am positive that there are members in out group, that started down this process, that were probably afraid of spread sheets. But they knew what the end goal was, and they stuck to it. And, maybe it took ’em six months to get comfortable with data and spread sheets, so flippin’ what. Here they are now, a year later, and they’re doing it.
Steven Butala: Every single week, Jill and I get an email where somebody says, “Hey, you don’t know me, and I joined your group 3 years ago. We made 4.2 million dollars buying and selling real estate. We stopped doing land a long time ago. We buy apartments now, for a lot of reasons. But, hey just wanna thank you. Thanks.” And, then, we’ll never hear from them again. They use our data every month, they use our bulk mail company.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative) And they’re off doing their thing.
Steven Butala: They didn’t even ask themselves how long this is gonna to take. And, there’s no questions about traction or two years.
Jill DeWit: That’s true.
Steven Butala: Oh, yeah. Sending a lot of offers to people makes sense.
Jill DeWit: It will take time.
Steven Butala: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Jill DeWit: Some amount of time. There you go. The beauty of this is, it’s so nice. Even though it takes years to get the traction and really get comfortable, and all that good stuff. As a rule, if you will, you can quickly see some results that motivate you. I.E. flip something this month, make some money. I don’t know about you, but that motivates me.
Steven Butala: Motivates me too.
Jill DeWit: There you go.
Steven Butala: I mean dramatically motivates me. There’s a bunch of stuff that really, actually motivates me. Here’s one thing that motivates me, that we never talk about. I think two questions ago, a couple days ago, somebody bought a piece of property and realized there was some back taxes on it. So, it doubled the acquisition cost. Is he gonna die, is this a catastrophic, bankruptcy situation? No.
Jill DeWit: No.
Steven Butala: Let’s say you buy a house. I’m not supposed to talk about houses, but whatever. Let’s say you’re a House Academy member, you buy a house, you spend too much money on it. Jill and I have done this. Many times, actually. You sit down, and you dig deeper, and you figure out what’s it gonna take to make thing worth some more money so you can get out of it what you think.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: That’s just what you do. Let’s say you buy a dry cleaner, a company that’s a dry cleaner, and you find out that you’re allergic to the plastic that the stuff’s wrapped in. Or, it’s a bad location, or the seller lied to you. Or any number or things that can really happen. That’s a catastrophic loss.
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: You quit your job because of it, you pull all the time in.
Jill DeWit: It’s true.
Steven Butala: But, if you buy one or two bad properties, it’s not the end of the world.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative)
Steven Butala: You don’t have to quit your job to do this.
Jill DeWit: That’s true.
Steven Butala: There’s just so many things about why two years to get traction , really is a good decision.
Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Very true.
Steven Butala: Join us tomorrow for another interesting episode, where we discuss, this should actually come naturally to you, not forced.
Jill DeWit: And, we can help with that. And, we answer your questions posted on our free online community, which you can find off our website, LandAcademy.com.
Steven Butala: You’re not alone in your real estate ambition.
Jill DeWit: It’s true that people, sometimes forget that it takes time. I see people getting impatient with themselves. I see people comparing themselves to others, and it’s not accurate. Everybody’s different.
Steven Butala: Yeah.
Jill DeWit: Even though you think you’re behind that guy, you’re ahead of six other people.
Steven Butala: Yeah.
Jill DeWit: So, knock it off.
Steven Butala: Our retention rate, I just calculated it off. Our group retention rate, for people who sign up and don’t actually follow through with it, is less than three percent now.
Jill DeWit: Wait a minute, you mean the people that fall off. The retention rate is 90 something.
Steven Butala: Our retention rate is 97.5%.
Jill DeWit: There you go.
Steven Butala: I’m telling you, it takes me a lot to stop, and really kind of smell the roses figuratively and say, wow that’s amazing. That is truly..
Jill DeWit: Isn’t it. For a lot of businesses, 50% of repeat customers is good. I mean, come on.
Steven Butala: Since we started, our retention rate has not dropped lower than…
Jill DeWit: Retention rate is high.
Steven Butala: Is higher than 97%.
Jill DeWit: Right. It’s always been really, really high. Thank you. And, I think a lot of it, I attribute it to, like this show, and everything that we’re doing. We want to provide a bunch of education and everything up front, for free, so you know what you’re getting into. You know exactly what to expect. You know what’s involved. And, you’re not gonna pull the trigger unless you know this is for you.
Steven Butala: Right.
Jill DeWit: And, that kind of ties into the next show.
Steven Butala: It sure does.
Jill DeWit: It does.
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