How to get past the Fear of Bigger Deals (LA 992)
How to get past the Fear of Bigger Deals (LA 992)
Transcript:
Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here.
Jill DeWit: Hello.
Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land 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 how to get past the fear of bigger deals. You know, right before the show, Jill and I kind of look at each other and say, what are we going to… what’s the point here? And this is what happened with this one.
Jill DeWit: What’s the point here?
Steven Butala: She looked at me, and I looked at her, and I said, want to just save it for the show? And she said yeah.
Jill DeWit: Heck yeah.
Steven Butala: I have a lot to say.
Jill DeWit: Yep.
Steven Butala: So before we get into it, let’s take a question posted by one of our members on the landinvestors.com online community. It’s free.
Jill DeWit: Eric asked, “Hi. What’s a typical amount of time it takes from the time I get a confirmed mailing email from Offers to Owners, to the mail hitting prospects’ mail box? I mailed a Tennessee county on May 7th, and I was thinking it would be delivered by now.” Now, I don’t know what day this was put in, so I can’t actually say that. “My own tracking letter that I stuck in the group hasn’t hit my office yet, either. Thanks, Eric.”
Jill DeWit: So, I think it’s traditionally around two weeks, by the time O2O, because here’s how the process goes. You submit either a completed PDF to Offers To Owners, and if it gets in by… I think it’s 2:00, whatever that day, Pacific time, it gets in the mail that day. You’re either doing that, or you’re submitting them your data and your template, and we do the mail merge for you, input into a PDF, and then you just review it, make sure it checks out, and then, again, if it’s by I think 2:00 that day, I have to double check with Omar and the team, but then it goes in the mail that same day.
Jill DeWit: Now, you know the next steps better than I do from that.
Steven Butala: Here’s the man-way to answer that question.
Jill DeWit: Thanks a lot.
Steven Butala: From the time that it hits the mail-
Jill DeWit: Thanks, babe.
Steven Butala: It takes two to three weeks to hit, to get the offer. That’s why it’s called Offers To Owners. For the owners to actually get the mail, and open it, and make a, and talk about it with their spouse. Two to three weeks. Then you can expect a week of people ranting and raving about the fact that they don’t like your offer, and then you can expect signed offers back. In the bitter end, 30 days.
Steven Butala: You will be buying property 30 days from the time that it goes, and that’s as fast as it’s going to get unless you do, unless you send out First Class mail, or some other mechanism, and then it becomes prohibitively, in my opinion, expensive.
Jill DeWit: Not worth it.
Steven Butala: And I don’t believe… I believe that First Class mail is an illusion.
Jill DeWit: I agree.
Steven Butala: Do you know, I don’t believe that, I don’t believe in First Class mail.
Jill DeWit: I don’t. I totally agree. I got to tell you, even the stupid overnighting things. I’m like, I’m getting to the point where like why am I paying to overnight this? It didn’t get there any faster if I’d had just done the regular thing. This is ridiculous.
Steven Butala: When you think about it, it doesn’t make sense that there’s this separate section for special mail that’s more expensive.
Jill DeWit: Exactly. Yeah. Oh, we’re going to put you aside and wait three days. No they’re not. It’s ridiculous. No. But that is, that’s funny. And you’re right. But once you start the process, it’s only that initial first time you send off that mailer, now you got it going. And you should have a system at this point, so that you don’t have any, there are no lulls, you know, going forward.
Steven Butala: That’s right.
Jill DeWit: If anything you realize, you know what, I can handle more volume. I’m going to send more. Or you go whoa, my gosh, that was too much. I think I’m going to dial it back a little bit.
Steven Butala: Oh yeah, really. In a perfect world, what you should do is you should say, you should have a calendar, and you should arbitrarily pick a number or a date that works for your schedule, where you send out, and on the fifteenth of every month, I send out fifteen hundred letters, or some number like that.
Jill DeWit: Something like that.
Steven Butala: Yeah. And you should, until you get so much deals you can’t handle it, which is kind of like leads into this topic actually.
Jill DeWit: Kinda does. We have members that go nuts. They have like once a week, here it comes man. Every Friday it’s like a couple thousand units.
Steven Butala: I long, long had to stop sending land offers out. Long ago. We still send out, very consistently, I practice what I preach here, about houses, because it’s just so … last house we closed on we made almost 70 thousand bucks. So we’ve got one now that I think we’re going to make, we will clear maybe 200 grand in this. So, and that’s, you know, you have to jam the mail packed on that. You can’t walk away from that.
Jill DeWit: Exactly.
Steven Butala: So Jill, how did we get past the fear of doing bigger deals? This is the meat of the show.
Jill DeWit: To send out the mail. But you don’t have a chance. You know, and I hadn’t even thought about this before the show. But as we’re talking about sending mail, and because of the question, there’s one way to get past the fear. Just flat out research the bigger property types, when I see bigger deals, usually it relates to bigger money. It might be bigger property or a specialized property, but results in the higher dollar amount. That’s usually where people get uncomfortable. Because it doesn’t, you might be really great, five or ten thousand dollars, I have no trouble spending that all day long kinda thing. But when you’re talking you know, 20, 40, 50 thousand dollars, it’s like oh boy, I want to really make sure I’m doing this right.
Jill DeWit: So one way is, go do your research, you know what you’re doing. You’ve already learned how to do it. You know, you’re going to look at this different property type. You know all the different things that are going to go into it. And looking at the numbers, you’re going to go yep, I know this area. It’s worth more. Here’s why. Download that data. Send out the offers at that price and honestly, don’t look back. That’s one way to do it, is just to dive in with both feet. What do you think, Steven? What’s the guy-way?
Steven Butala: Jill’s a big fan of mantras.
Jill DeWit: That’s true.
Steven Butala: If you’re in this business, or you’re thinking about getting in this business, the next time you’re looking at yourself in the mirror, I want you to say this. You know how to buy undervalued real estate.
Jill DeWit: Yep.
Steven Butala: Think about that. That’s amazing. You know how to buy a $250,000 house for 200 grand. If you want to be a billionaire, because of this one concept, you will be.
Jill DeWit: Brings a little tear to my eye, thank you Steven, yes.
Steven Butala: Does it? You’re just teasing.
Steven Butala: You know how to buy undervalued real estate. That’s just truly fantastic and amazing and you’re done. You’re like done, financially. So here’s where the problem starts. Now that we’ve got all, we all know that about ourselves, right? We’ve figured it all out. Or if you’re thinking about getting in the business, you will figure it out, in this group, and with all the stuff that we provide. So that’s a given now. Here’s where everybody gets kind of tripped up in the beginning. I have an accounting background. People, as humans, think in cash flow. And it’ll hold you back. If you can’t get over this, it’s going to hold you back forever. If I have $82 in my checking account, I start making $82 decisions. If I have $82,000 in my checking account, oh, maybe I can buy some bigger property. And if I have access to $18 million, like all of you do in this group, you don’t realize it for some reason, but you do. That’s what Land Tank is, LandTank.com. You have access to 82 million dollars, just by being in this group. Then you start making different decisions.
Jill DeWit: That’s beautiful. And you’re right.
Steven Butala: So that’s how you get past the fear of bigger deals. In accounting there’s accrual basis and cash basis. Cash basis is revenue comes in, expenses go out, as you write the check, cash basis. Accrual, you have to get over this cash mentality, like I don’t have enough money. Everybody who, you know, we’ve all been out with people, or we all have friends who are like, I just don’t have any money. And that’s just, when you say that to yourself 60 times, you’re gonna have no money.
Jill DeWit: That’s true. That’s very true. I believe that totally.
Steven Butala: That’s how you get past the fear of bigger deals. You just gotta stop thinking like that.
Jill DeWit: Yeah. And just start doing it. We talked about that at the first Land event, where we came up with, and a lot of people walked away from that going all right, I got to add a zero. I think that’s one of the two things people walked away from. One was adding a zero and two, they went after the partners, to do some of these bigger deals. And that’s a great way to get over the fear too, if you’re doing it together and you have another pair of eyes looking at it, to make sure you’re not making a mistake. That’s great too. Or helping fund it. Like you just said in Land Tank. That is Land Tank by the way. There you go.
Steven Butala: And we will release later this year House Tank.
Jill DeWit: And once you get past it, once you do one or two, you’re like, I got this. Because think of it, you forget, by the way, before you bought your first property, you were probably afraid of doing that. You know, you got past that. Now you have ten. Now you’ve done twenty deals. You know how this goes. So doing bigger deals is not nuts. And it’s less work.
Steven Butala: You know, I started out in commercial real estate, buying and selling healthcare facilities, nursing homes, and assisted living buildings, and occasionally a hospital. Sometimes post-acute hospitals and all that. So I didn’t have, I had no money then. But my job was, and I took responsibility for, locating properties that were undervalued. That’s how I learned how to do all this stuff. Did I buy them myselves? Eventually. But not in the first 40 or 50 deals. None of those deals would have gotten done if they weren’t good deals. None of them. There aren’t people walking around saying, I really need to spend this money. Well maybe there are in Palo Alto, where people just need to spend money for some reason, because they have a publicly-traded company, they have to make announcements, which by the way, is a great place to be if you need to, if you have that kind of mentality. But, if you can buy undervalued real estate, like all of us can, you can do the biggest deal imaginable.
Jill DeWit: Yep. That should be on our business cards by the way. I was really thinking about that. I’m like, that’s a good way to introduce yourself at a dinner party. Like hi, what do you do? I buy undervalued real estate. I know how to do that.
Steven Butala: Boy, that conversation’s not going to end there though.
Jill DeWit: Right, I know. That’s the problem.
Steven Butala: What the hell do you mean? You buy undervalued real estate.
Jill DeWit: Just that. Anyway, will you pass the chips?
Steven Butala: Jill can do that because she’s dripping with diamonds.
Jill DeWit: I could do that. Pass the chips please.
Steven Butala: Draped in diamonds constantly. You are.
Jill DeWit: I know. Keeping my hands down.
Steven Butala: Somebody recently said to me that real estate is like man jewelry.
Jill DeWit: I like that. That’s really good. Yeah, you’re right. That’s cool.
Steven Butala: You know, it’s like, I want 80 acres in Montana. That’s like a man. And a woman’s version of that is, I just got a one and a half carat diamond. It’s the same kind of thing. You can hang your hat on it.
Jill DeWit: I was thinking about this topic. You and I don’t … here’s what I think. You and I traditionally appear fearless in anything that we do, and I think that we, you especially, there’s so much research and knowledge and checking that goes into something before we do it, that people don’t realize. So if you have a fear of doing bigger deals then spend some time on them. Why don’t you look at some case studies. Look at some other members and the deals that they’re doing. You know what’s going on. So if you put some more research into it, not too much research by the way, because we don’t want you getting hung up there, but I mean, what do you think, Steven?
Steven Butala: I think this. If you buy an undervalued piece of real estate, I’m going to give you like four examples. Someone’s going to want it. And so now your job is to find that person. So here’s one example.
Steven Butala: A farmer just passed away on the west side of Phoenix, and he and his family own, they don’t farm it, they just lease it out to a big farm. The guy passes away, and all of his children or his wife or whomever, they’re like oh, I don’t want to deal with this real estate anymore. I never wanted to when he was alive. And you magically have a database of about twenty-two or thirty people that are the acquisition people for home developers, like Shea Homes or Toll Brothers. They magically had a database, CRM, and with their texts, you had their cell numbers in there. Someone’s going to buy that property, period. And so, you have to dream like that. It starts with a dream, or an example, or a what if kind of thing.
Steven Butala: If you buy a long-term care facility in Minnesota that someone’s just done with or they’re tired of it, or it’s part of their exit strategy or they’re retiring, and it’s worth 80% of actually what, if you fill it up to 100% occupancy, right now it’s at 80%, it’s worth X and you buy it for 80% of that. Someone’s going to want it. It’s just all about finding that person who’s going to want it. And it’s easy. You know who wants property like that? People who own other properties just like it.
Jill DeWit: It’s true.
Steven Butala: It’s the same with rural vacant land, and it’s certainly the same with houses. So it’s all just a matter of, no matter how big the deal is, finding the person that wants to buy it. And the person that’s going to want to buy it, is somebody who already owns property just like it.
Jill DeWit: Yep.
Steven Butala: Successfully, not-
Jill DeWit: So you’re just saying, reach out, once you reach out and get to know those people, and know that they exist, that helps you get over the fear. Because that’s really it. I mean, and that’s true. You don’t want to buy something going now what do I do with it. I saw the value, I hope somebody else does.
Steven Butala: What you never want to do is say, there’s only $82 in my checking account.
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: So I only can buy a property that’s $82.
Jill DeWit: Yes.
Steven Butala: You laughed, Jill.
Jill DeWit: I know.
Steven Butala: But that’s what people do.
Jill DeWit: I know.
Steven Butala: Not $82, is a bad example. Let’s say $5000. I have $5000 in the bank, I’m only going to buy a $2500 property. Because then you have the other 2500, because I have bills coming up next month. And I really believe that’s what happens.
Jill DeWit: I agree.
Steven Butala: What you should be saying is this. You should beat your chest, send out some mail wherever you think it’s logical, and start reselling the property to other people who have like kind properties in that market, A, or B, if you want to close on it, which we advocate-
Jill DeWit: Right.
Steven Butala: Call us. That’s what deal funding is. There’s way more people in this group that have hoards of money, that want to invest with you, then you really think.
Jill DeWit: Because they know how you found the property, they know it’s a good deal.
Steven Butala: They know it’s a good deal.
Jill DeWit: They know. That’s the reason why.
Steven Butala: And that’s powerful.
Jill DeWit: That’s part of the reason why Land Tank is a closed group. It’s just for us, and it’s just for our members.
Steven Butala: We’re not scouring the MLS, wondering if that’s a good deal.
Jill DeWit: Nope.
Steven Butala: So that’s how you get past the fear of bigger deals. In fact, there are some people now, because we’ve been talking about this topic on our Wednesday, our Thursday calls I mean. We have a webinar for our group that’s closed. And we’ve been preaching this like, just stop it. There’s nothing but, you have a captive audience. Look, if you buy 80 acres in Montana, for 50% of what it’s worth, or in our case, 20-30%, people are going to come out of the … and you talk about it in our group. They’re going to come out of the woodwork.
Jill DeWit: Yep.
Steven Butala: So once you do a couple of deals like that, it’s over.
Jill DeWit: Exactly.
Steven Butala: I’ve never had an issue with that.
Jill DeWit: Nope.
Steven Butala: Have you?
Jill DeWit: Nope.
Steven Butala: I sold a portfolio of post-acute hospitals in Ohio in early 90’s to somebody that owned guess what? They owned a bunch of post-acute hospitals in Ohio. They just wanted more.
Jill DeWit: Right. Part of the reason-
Steven Butala: I made almost a million dollars.
Jill DeWit: Well you, (A) you know what it’s worth. And then (B), the way we buy it, I don’t worry about it too, because we’re paying cash for it. So if it doesn’t sell, if it doesn’t sell fast by the way, it’s because of something I did. I did not post it for sale. I did not … usually that’s it. I’m not letting people know it’s available.
Steven Butala: In a sentence, that’s why I chose you to be my mate.
Jill DeWit: Thank you.
Steven Butala: Because you take responsibility for yourself. You take your responsibility for your own happiness. You don’t get up in the morning and look over the other side of the bed and say, that guy’s not making me happy. And believe me, I’ve been in beds like that.
Jill DeWit: Got it. Nope, nope, that doesn’t go on at all. And vice versa, thank you.
Steven Butala: I know.
Jill DeWit: Thank you very much. All right.
Steven Butala: Oh, she just kicked me under the table. Well you’ve done it again. You’ve spent another 15 minutes or 20 minutes I guess listening to the Land Academy show. Join us next time for the Episode called Finance Friday with Steven, Jill and Justin.
Jill DeWit: That’s going to be fun, because we haven’t done that in a while with him. And we answer your questions posted on one of our online communities. Check out LandInvestors.com or on HouseAcademy.com. They are free.
Steven Butala: You are not alone in your real estate ambition. Where did that go sideways for you, that I deserved a little kick like that?
Jill DeWit: No. I just feel like we’re beating a dead horse at this point.
Steven Butala: Oh, okay.
Jill DeWit: That’s all. That’s it. No, I wanted to tell you something funny by the way. When I wrote down this topic, The Fear of Bigger Deals, I listened to your show today on my car, and this woman, for people with the fear of dating, check it out.
Steven Butala: Fear of dating?
Jill DeWit: Check this out. This is her business model. I think it’s kind of cool. You reach out to her, she has a couple of different services. One where she’ll analyze your dating profile. Two, she’ll have a mock date with you and find out what’s wrong with you.
Steven Butala: Oh my God. There’s a show there.
Jill DeWit: Isn’t this great? And then three, she’ll take a-
Steven Butala: She got to film that stuff.
Jill DeWit: She does that. Well she has a whole business here, and I forgot her name. I’ll have to go look it up. Anyway, and then she will take it to this, if you want the Grand Package if you will, she will help you, make sure you’re on the right dating websites. She’ll even go in and like ghost write, and ghost text for you, to help you get that date, get over whatever hurdle and get your foot in the door, if you will, and stuff. It’s so-
Steven Butala: So whatever relationship gets developed is all built on lies.
Jill DeWit: Well this is a question that the person said. Well wait a minute. If you’re doing it, she’s like no, I really get to know the person and I want to make sure that I’m giving out, I’m helping them properly convey hopefully how wonderful and how awesome they are. They just can’t vocalize it or get it out there. I don’t know. But she said, she had a couple things like, one of the things too, she’s like well, I’m looking at their profile, everybody needs a better picture. That’s number one. I don’t care who you are. Go get a professional photograph.
Steven Butala: I disagree with all this. I want to talk about this for a minute.
Jill DeWit: And she said really? All right. It was just so funny.
Steven Butala: Everybody has experienced seeing, I’m sure we’re perfect examples of this. Like seeing somebody on the internet and their picture’s plastered all over it, and then you meet them and it’s like, that guy doesn’t look like that at all.
Jill DeWit: Well I didn’t say don’t get a, make it a good, okay how about this?
Steven Butala: So no, you just don’t get professional pictures.
Jill DeWit: It shouldn’t be a stupid selfie on your phone where it’s washed out and blurry and it’s hiding something.
Steven Butala: The last thing I want to do is go out with a girl that’s been, some professional woman’s been texting me for three weeks, and now I go out with this person, and it’s like what are you, you know, there’s nothing there. I want the person that was texting me.
Jill DeWit: Maybe, maybe though you need to meet them. Maybe there’s wonderful people out there you’re not even getting that opportunity yet, because you already discounted them. Give them a chance.
Steven Butala: I say, let nature take it’s course.
Jill DeWit: Give them a chance. I gave you a chance. I’m just kidding.
Steven Butala: Give peace a chance.
Jill DeWit: Give them a chance. She’s naming all these websites, these dating websites. I don’t think I ever heard of them. I’m like okay. That was really funny. None of them were Match.
Steven Butala: Years and years and years and years ago, if you want to have a successful date, just shut the hell up. That’s it. As a man, that’s all you have to do is let her talk about herself.
Jill DeWit: That’s never changed.
Steven Butala: You look super pretty today. How’s your day going? And then you can sit back and order a couple scotches, and have a beautiful life. And that’s like some of the best advice I’ve ever gotten.
Jill DeWit: We’re going to end on that. Wherever you’re watching, or wherever you’re listening, please subscribe and rate us there.
Jill DeWit: We are Steve and Jill.
Steven Butala: We are Steve and Jill. Information-
Jill DeWit: And inspiration-
Steven Butala: To buy undervalued property-
Jill DeWit: Or a limp date.
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.
