Land Business Marketing and Sales (LA 738)
Land Business Marketing and Sales (LA 738)
Transcript:
Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here.
Jill DeWit: Hi.
Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show entertaining show and investment talk. I’m Steven Jack Butala.
Jill DeWit: And I’m Jill DeWit Broadcasting from sunny southern California.
Steven Butala: Today jill and I talk about your land business, marketing and sales effort. What the heck good is it if you can buy cheap property if you can’t sell it? People ask me this all the time, to which I laugh.
Jill DeWit: It’s kind of funny, this is important and I’m glad we’re talking about it and I’m going to share why we don’t get hung up on it.
Steven Butala: Yeah, and what your mindset needs to be. The theme of this week is, so you’ve completed 10 deals now what? And you should probably, since you’ve completed these 10 deals know all the answers to most of this anyway. Marketing, selling property is so easy. Even in a really bad market.
Jill DeWit: I know.
Steven Butala: As long as you buy cheap.
Jill DeWit: It’s so funny. I mean, what I’m going to share in this show is just three little things that to us are little, everybody should know. And everything I get a call from somebody that’s hung up on this, they have a property, maybe they said, “gosh, I’d love to do this. I understand where you guys are coming from. Man I don’t know how this works because i have a property and I’ve had it for six months and it’s not selling.” Well one of my three things I’m going to mention here, once I say these three things they go, “Oh, okay, got it. Now I know.” There’s three things and they’re doing them wrong and they’re like, “Oh, duh.” I’m, “Yep, thanks. We can help.”
Steven Butala: How many times have you answered this question and while they’re asking it the property sells. Like right during the conversation, “Oh wait, forget it, then. It just sold.”
Jill DeWit: That’s with our members. That’s a whole different thing, because I know they’re doing it right. They just get hung up … you know what’s funny? Our members are doing it right because they know how to do it. What they get hung up on, “It’s been five minutes and they didn’t check out.” Well come on, give it more than five minutes. And they go, “Okay, an hour and five minutes, now it’s gone. Thanks.” Not that fast, but you get.
Steven Butala: Before we get into Jill’s suggestions lets take a question posted by one of our members, atlanta.com online community. It’s free.
Jill DeWit: Okay, Rob asks, “I’m a real estate broker, full time, who invests in land on the side.”
Steven Butala: Good Rob. You are in the minority.
Jill DeWit: You should be the majority. “I would be curious to hear any strategies real estate agents are using to cultivate listings from your investment mailings.”
Steven Butala: Great question.
Jill DeWit: “As I’m sure you know I come across a lot of property that is not a good fit on the investment side, because of the numbers, however, many of these properties would make nice listings. Any thoughts on turning that corner?”
Steven Butala: Yes, you just answered your own question. You should never let this mail go to waste. So if there’s properties that just don’t fit your acquisition criteria from specifically from a price standpoint, I think you should practice in the mirror that conversation.
“I’m sorry seller, that just doesn’t’ work for me and my investment group. However, there’;s a guy down the road that I sell a lot of property to just like this and I know this is in his price range and in his area, so what do say we just we do a listing?” Works for houses. Works great for houses. For land, listed expensive land on the MLS always sells, always. It just takes a lot longer. So if you get your head around that plus the other thing, you have a huge advantage here because your actually learning how to buy and sell land or you’ve learned theoretically how to do it right. So at some point your goal is prob is to not be an agent any longer, because it just doesn’t make any sense, just to buy and sell your own property. So you’re in a good unique position over the rest of us who aren’t brokers. I would really start to creatively think how to maximize the mail. Go ahead Jill.
Jill DeWit: I want to complement Rob for being this person. This is phenomenal, because most brokers and most full-time agents, they don’t get it. They can’t see the transition to being the investor themselves, for some reason. And I think it’s a pure mental block. And I know because I talked, there’s so many guys, not you rob obviously, there are so many brokers that I know that shove me deals all day long and I’m like, “This is a five thousand property worth 30 why are you just not buying this,” and they’re, “Ah, it’s not my thing.” And they can’t mentally go there. I’m, “Do you not have five thousand dollars?” “No, I have it, it just not my thing.”
Steven Butala: Just never understood why.
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: You would go through all the education process and the licensing process and go through all of that just to do half of what you could potentially do or less. I mean I you ask a real estate agent what they want to do in 10 years, they look at you with this blank stare, because they’re just not thinking about it. Rob wants to own all his own property. So I don’t understand that and never will actually. Sounds like you’ve got it figured out though.
Today’s topic, land business, your land business, marketing and sales. This is the meat of the show. Jill I know you have so much to say.
Jill DeWit: Yep.
Steven Butala: And I think what that really means is I get to take a break.
Jill DeWit: Nope, no you don’t.
Steven Butala: Go ahead.
Jill DeWit: Okay, but and I can’t wait for Atlanta [inaudible 00:05:15] 2.0, because we have a lot that we’re going to share. I know in marketing and sales that we have gathered just over the last couple years, because a lot of stuffs changed and gotten better and easier and more awesome, so this is going to be good. So here’s the deal, marketing and sales really comes down to three things.
Number one, have a system and don’t think about each property. Don’t sit and spend time and feel, because you may know I don’t like talking about that too, each property and where best you think it’s going to be sold. You should never be saying to yourself, “Wow, I just sold one just like this on Craigslist so I’m only going to post it on Craigslist, I’m not going to post it on these other places.-
Steven Butala: That’s what happens.
Jill DeWit: “I know it’s going to sell there best, because of the other one. That’s not what you should be doing.
Steven Butala: May I comment?
Jill DeWit: Okay. It’s your show.
Steven Butala: Heres’ what happens to me, it actually really is isn’t it?
Jill DeWit: I know. I can’t say no.
Steven Butala: What happens to me, I’m mentally am done and whole transaction is completed when I make the decision to buy it. And I don’t mean close on it, I don’t mean the deed and all that stuff. When I make a decision to buy it I am 100% confident how much we’re going to price it right there and the whole thing. I don’;t look into it anymore. I don’t look into access or what potential can happen, and I do not try to maximize the value of that property. I just put it back in the machine and let everybody do what they’re suppose to do. And it gets sold, because I don’t give a shit. I just read a whole article about not caring.
Jill DeWit: I’m proud of you for not caring. That’s nice.
Steven Butala: Go ahead, Jill, and that’s really why you’re saying, “Just get the system in place and do the same thing.”
Jill DeWit: Exactly. Don’t pick Craigslist over Landpin, don’t think whatever. You should have a list of 10 places that you post every property and you do that consistently. So that’s the marketing piece of this. Now the sale piece of this.
Number two, if you did this correctly, sales are easy. Huh. Well that’s a thought, and-
Steven Butala: The suspense is killing me.
Jill DeWit: … just to give you a little tip here, the lower priced properties are going to go faster, rule of thumb. And the higher priced properties are going to go a little bit slower, but they do sell. You know what? if you’re not sur about this or this sounds absolutely bonkers, ask our community. They will tell you and their plenty in our community-
Steven Butala: They might buy it from you.
Jill DeWit: … that are right now they are saying, “I got tired of doing 20 deals a month to yield 20 thousand dollars. I decided to do, three deals a year that yield 50 thousand dollars. That’s what I do now. That’s my game and that’s what I’m doing.” It’s not crazy. So that’s the thing and we haven’t talked about it a little bit when I mean when you do I correctly like Steven was just saying, you bought it right, you priced it right. You know how it’s priced. You know what it’s worth. You have that confidence now, because you’ve done 10 deals you know what you said in your offers and the calls are going to come back.
You almost don’t have to look at them because you know you did it really well, when they come back at you, “I know I’m going to buy these. I already know this area, I know this stuff. It’s a no-brainer. I’m just going to buy them. I know how it’s going to play out. I know roughly how long they’re going to take to sell. I know this and I don’t think about it.” Do you want to add on that?
Steven Butala: No I mean you are nailing it. You are absolutely nailing it but there’s a theme in what you’re saying and how your saying it.
Jill DeWit: Oh what is that? Jill’s theme?
Steven Butala: It is. It’s literally, “Don’t over think it.” If you’re gong to look at the property really quickly, it’s hard to do. Look you did 10 deals already, right? That’s the theme of this week. So you’ve done 10 deals, now what? I’m sure there’s trials and tribulations in those first 10 deals, but you’ve worked that out.
Jill DeWit: Right, this really all ties in and I’m going to tell you number three here in just a second. This really ties in to the three things that i talk to people all the time that when they’re finding Land Academy they’re sitting on a property that they just can’t sell so they’re scratching their head going, “How are you guys successful? How does this work?” I ask them flat out, “Well, where are you marketing and where it is posted?” “Well, I have it on Craigslist,” and I’ll say, “where else,” and they say, “Well, I have it on Craigslist.” I go, ‘Okay, wait a minute, have you considered doing these other nine places?” And they go, “Oh,” and then the next thing I ask them is, “What’s it priced at?”
“Well, I got to get this out [inaudible 00:09:51].” And I’m, “All right, you paid too much.” And they go, “Yeah,” so these are the two things I just covered so marketing system, buying it right and then the final thing, for marketing and sales, if you want to be a pro and make this super easy on yourself and get this stuff happening sooner and faster so you don’t even know what’s gong on, is make it easy on yourself and make it easy on your buyers, and here’s the points.
Make it easy on yourself by having good thorough posting with everything you know about the property. If you get a bunch of questions about the taxes, “Huh, maybe I should go back in and add more information about the taxes.” You don’t want 20 people calling you asking you the same question. You want only the two people that are calling you to say, “Hey, I had one [inaudible 00:10:37],” or, “is it available? I’ve got to move some money over.” That kind of a thing. Those are the questions that you want. And make it easy on them by having your buyers make it easy so they can check out on line and they know the process of how it’s gong to go so they don’t have to ask you. They know that when I click this button and I put my credit card, the next thing that’s going to happen is I’m going to get an email or however you have it set up for the deed information, they know who’s going to record, they know how it’s going to happen, all that good stuff. It’s just so easy.
Steven Butala: If you’ve done 10 deals, that’s the theme this week, and you want to do more, it is imperative that you accept credit cards on your website and that all the marketing you do is social media and everywhere else, like Jill is talking about, points back to the fact that all the information about this property is on your website. Drive all the traffic back there, so that they can check out if they want to buy it.
Jill DeWit: Exactly.
Steven Butala: And that’s the same for houses, believe it or not, now too. It’s 21st century, there’s such a demand for houses to flip right now. That’s how we post it. We make them put a non-refundable deposit down and check out with their credit card online, for a few thousand dollars to secure the deal. And if it goes south, it’s over.
Jill DeWit: Right, that some of it out. I know it’s funny you say that because-
Steven Butala: It gives us some call to action and some sense of urgency.
Jill DeWit: Like a little side note. I just had someone say that the other day. It was on Facebook, they posted a, “Gosh darn it, this is just not cool.” And I agree with this because we’ve had this too. You put a house for sale and brokers come along and tie up the asset and say, ‘Oh, we’re in,” and they’ll sign the agreement when they really have no intention of buying it.
Steven Butala: Yeah, that;’s kind of a rookie mistake.
Jill DeWit: They sign and then you pull it off the market and then three days later they back out and you’re like, “Hey, come on. That’s not cool.” It is not cool, but that’s our way of stopping that. So I hope if your in that situation please use our way. Get them to secure, put some money where there mouth is and you keep that money, they’re going to think a little more about the process before they do that.
Steven Butala: You know it’s on topic today to talk about developing an A list of buyers. The truth is we sell a ton of property just by sending an email out. We call it the Platinum buyers list. Every week and people just… and we drive them back to our website and they click on it and check it out.
Jill DeWit: Well, sometimes I don’t even got them on the website yet, that’s what happens too.
Steven Butala: Some of the most successful house deals that we do and we could do them every week are because we have a buyer in our back pocket. We have a very short list of very wealthy buyers in our back pocket, they just buy a hose. After two or three house deals like that, they don’t ask us anymore. We just send them the deal and they look at it, just the way we buy land, they do like, they probably go Azilla, Trulia, and Bang, bang, bang, “yes I’ll buy it.” Is it 10 thousand dollars more for them? Maybe, but they are so used to, they don’t want to turn the faucet off with us, that’s how hard it is to find houses right now, enough to flip for them.
Jill DeWit: I don’t think it is more money. It’s definitely saving money.-
Steven Butala: It’s saving money over the MLS but here’s what I notice happens, and it happens in commercial real estate all the time. You send somebody a deal, and it’s not their perfect deal, and they say, “you know what? I am going to buy this from you. It’s not really what I want, because I don’t you to turn the faucet off. And I want you to send me the next best deal you have,” and stuff like that happens all the time. I’m starting to see that more and more because we;’re getting the same buyers for certain assets in certain areas. So that’s another way to just build in marketing.
I’m an adverse, I don’t like marketing. And I don’t like sales. and I love acquisitions. So if I can get out of selling and marketing that’s good.
Jill DeWit: Well you are.
Steven Butala: I know. One of the ways I did that was to get involved with Jill.
Jill DeWit: Get me, exactly. So wait a minute are you telling me all this time we’re together just so I can take this off your plate?
Steven Butala: Wouldn’t that be funny?
Jill DeWit: Oh my gosh.
Steven Butala: No it wouldn’t. Well you’ve done it again, you spent another 15 minutes with us listening to the Land Academy Show. Join us tomorrow for another interesting episode, where we discuss your land business sources of accessory data and bulk mail. They are two tools you can not live without, especially if you’ve been limping along figuring it out on your own, you’ve got to find a consistent source of data and bulk mail.
Jill DeWit: Yep, and we answer your questions posted on our free online community found off of landacamdemy.com or you can go straight there, it’s landinvestors.com.
Steven Butala: You are not alone in your real estate ambition. Where do you think they should go? Land academy.com or landinvestors.com?
Jill DeWit: I should go straight their to landinvestors.com.
Steven Butala: I’m gong to change it in the script.
Jill DeWit: I was like that.
Steven Butala: Because every single time-
Jill DeWit: Yeah, have you noticed?
Steven Butala: Your in academy land investors go there its good.
Jill DeWit: I know it would be great. Can we just call it what it is? Please, call a spade a spade.
Steven Butala: Sounds good.
Jill DeWit: And I still want to discuss with you why we’re together now I’m seeing an ulterior motive, but we’ll save that for off the air.
Steven Butala: And yeah, and you don’t have any ulterior motives?
Jill DeWit: Sure [inaudible 00:16:01] by subscribing to iTunes over ever listing and while your at it please rate us there. We are Steve and Jill for now.
Steven Butala: Steve and jill for now, information is-
Jill DeWit: For information
Steven Butala: To buy undervalued property.
If you enjoyed the podcast, please review it in iTunes . Reviews are incredibly important for rankings on iTunes. My staff and I read each and every one.
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to email me directly at steven@BuWit.com.
The BuWit Family of Companies include:
I would like to think it’s entertaining and informative and in the end profitable.
And finally, don’t forget to subscribe to the show on iTunes.
