Jill Friday – Why My Heart Felt Land Business Model Has Worked for Decades (LA 1548)
Jill Friday – Why My Heart Felt Land Business Model Has Worked for Decades (LA 1548)
Transcript:
Steven J Butala:
Steve and Jill here.
Jill DeWit:
Howdy.
Steven J 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 sweet, sizzling, Scottsdale, Arizona. I got to ask you something. Why did you pause there for a second, like, “What show am I doing?”
Steven J Butala:
That’s why.
Jill DeWit:
Have you not done enough?
Steven J Butala:
That’s exactly why.
Jill DeWit:
“Welcome to the, what show is this today?” The same one you’ve done for 1,547 times before this.
Steven J Butala:
I’ve been writing the Showing Up for Life show, and we did a House Academy show for a long time.
Jill DeWit:
That’s no excuse.
Steven J Butala:
And it’s Friday. And it’s your show. In fact, it’s called Jill Friday: Why My Heartfelt Land Business Model Has Worked for Decades. Before we get into it, let’s take a question posted by one of our members on landinvestors.com online community. It’s free. Please have patience with me, unlike Jill, about reading lines. If you’re already a Land Academy member, join us on Discord.
Jill DeWit:
And as you saw, you are witness to, he just skipped right over my comments. It’s Friday. He’s done. That’s what that is. Okay, Sam Amalita wrote, “Love the honesty. We had a similar call. Was the daughter.” So this is obviously down in the conversation.
Steven J Butala:
Yep. But it’s really worth.
Jill DeWit:
“It was the daughter of the owner. She said, ‘You’re absolutely sure you want to buy this?’ ‘It used to be farmland and the land my father grew up on. The state took most of it and flooded it to expand the lake. Now we don’t even know where the parcel is, but it’s only what was leftover after the flooding. We tried to get there by foot and we couldn’t. We had to cross other people’s land, and we could never find it. We’re guessing you have to go by boat.’ I asked her why in the world her dad is paying on that, and she said, well, she’s been asking him that for 15 years.”
Steven J Butala:
They went on to buy the property. This person Sam Amalita, I believe, it was down a string, said they got it for such a good price from these people who inherited it, that they bought it.
Jill DeWit:
Definitely almost gave it away.
Steven J Butala:
So my point is not trying to get cheap property, because we all know how to do that. They’re having a back and forth conversation, an honest conversation about the property. They clearly, as a seller, doesn’t want the stuff anymore, or doesn’t see the value in it. I will tell you, we have bought boat access only property and made a killing on it. People love that stuff.
Jill DeWit:
It was unique. You had to find the right buyer, but it worked. I want to say this, about asking that for 15 years. This is something I come across often. People don’t know you can stop paying the taxes. There’s a lot of people out there that think all unwanted land is in a back tax situation. No, it’s not. There’s a ton of unwanted land in a back tax situation like this one. People didn’t know they could not pay the taxes. They think the IRS is going to come after them and garnish their wages or do something like that, which they don’t.
Steven J Butala:
Let me make a comment on that. Jill is exactly right. When you stop paying your mortgage, you’re in a lot of trouble.
Jill DeWit:
Correct.
Steven J Butala:
It’s going to really affect your credit score, depending on what state you’re in, they’re going to come after you, and all kinds of stuff is going to happen. The IRS may or may not get involved. Typically, not now, they don’t. And because you unknowingly signed a personal guarantee in a document that’s tied to that real estate, usually it’s a primary residence, or an office building, or all kinds of stuff, with freely owned real estate, the taxing authority, and this is true for houses or any other type of real estate, if there’s no lender, the taxes stay with the property just the way a license plate stays with a car in California, but it doesn’t in Arizona. And so, if you stop paying the taxes, they’re not going to come knocking on the door. They’re going to send you a couple of letters, and they’re actually pretty nice letters, that say, “Hey, I think you might’ve forgotten to pay the taxes.” And then a year later, “Hey, I really think that you probably forgot to pay the taxes on this, but we don’t want to take it back.”
Jill DeWit:
Here’s last year and this year in one sum.
Steven J Butala:
“Well, we’re starting down the path to taking it back.” Fast forward five years, certified mail, “Hey, I’m really sorry about this, but we’re going to take the property back because we just need to get it back on the tax rolls. Hope you understand.” A lot of it’s really worded like that. If you get a letter from the bank when you’re 30 days late on a mortgage, it’s like, “We might come and find you with a hasher.” And so, it’s really important to understand real estate taxes are tied with the property. They don’t care about you. You’re just the owner of record, that’s why they’re sending it to you.
Jill DeWit:
And when you sell the property, taxes stay with the property. So if you buy that property, and the guy owes $500, and you bought it, now you owe $500. It’s not the guy.
Steven J Butala:
Yep. Today’s topic is today, it’s Jill Friday: Why My Heartfelt Land Business Model Has Worked for Decades. This is the meat of the show.
Jill DeWit:
I have three points to make, and then I will open it up to questions from you.
Steven J Butala:
Are you talking to me?
Jill DeWit:
Yeah. All right. So one is how we roll with our members, how we roll with our buyers, and everyone, all inclusive. So, how our heartfelt business landmark has worked for decades, so what’s the point about the members. And how we roll is this. It’s important to help. We help, other people help, former members, more experienced members help, people who just know areas better help. The point of this is, the more you help and the more you give, the more you’re going to get back. I’ve been testing this for a long time, and I promise you, it works.
Jill DeWit:
Every Thursday call, here’s an example, every time we’re doing a Would You Do This Deal on our Thursday afternoon Land Academy member calls, somebody invariably pipes in and says, “Oh my gosh. I just sold something in that area and killed it. Don’t forget to ask about X.” Or someone will say, “Oh, that’s a rough area. I used to live there. Watch out for Y.” What great information. And it was just nice of them to share that, to save the next guy, because probably somebody did that for them, or somebody will do that for them. That’s just all that goes around. And that’s who we are, and that’s our community now.
Jill DeWit:
Now, how does this translate to my buyers? I sincerely want my buyers to make money on their property and lovingly enjoy their purchase of property, however they wish. And if you walk around like that, you know that, “I could have held out for retail, but you know what? I sold it. I moved on. I know what I wanted to make out of it, and I did just great,” your buyer getting exactly what they want at a great price, you still did awesome, but they’re doing great too, it’s only going to move forward. And it’s just going to be… You’re going to have happy customers for life. They might come back to you and say, “What else do you have? Oh my gosh. It’s exactly what you told me it was.” It’s the greatest thing.
Jill DeWit:
And then my last thing is, this came from you.
Steven J Butala:
Uh-oh.
Jill DeWit:
I know. But this has been our company motto, and sometimes it hurts. I hope you take this as your company motto, which is this. It’s important to do the right thing, even if it costs money. Yeah. There’s things that come up, like shucks. Like I had a title company, literally had a title company, forget some taxes and their due diligence, and they’re closing, and then it came back on the sell side. I’m like, “How’d you guys miss this? It’s $800.” Oops, sorry. And then you go down the path of fighting with them. I still haven’t won that battle. I’m like, “Who cares?” But I’m paying $800. I can afford it. I’m making enough money on the deal. It’s the right thing for me to do. I do it. I move on. There’s a lot of things like that that happen in our world.
Steven J Butala:
We have… And I’m just realizing it now, because we’ve had Land Academy for what? Six years? Seven years? Six years. And we’ve been buying and selling land for decades. I’ve been doing it for almost 30 years. But I didn’t realize it until recently that I’ve gone out of my way to make sure that the customer and our employees get what they need. I don’t care if you’re a Land Academy member as a customer, a buyer of land, or a seller of land, or if you work for us, 1099 or W2. I want to go out of my way to make sure you’re getting what you need. I said getting what you need for a reason. I didn’t say you’re extremely happy and give me all kinds of feedback.
Steven J Butala:
What I said was you’re getting what you need, meaning you’re getting the information and the tools that you need to buy and sell land if you’re a Land Academy member, you’re getting a rational price and honesty as a seller of real estate from Jill and I, and that’s closing on time and the promises that we’re making, we keep, or if we can’t keep them for some reason, we’re real up front about it, and lines of communication are over, and then doubly so on the sell side. My motto has always been, try to make sure the person who’s going to buy this property from you is going to make more money than you do. You’ll have a customer for life. And those things, I didn’t quantify it like that, that’s just who we are.
Jill DeWit:
Because you know what happens if you don’t? Can you imagine all the negative feedback? Are people going to sell from you? Are people going to buy from you if all they find is all kinds of overpriced, and you didn’t promise it, and then they call you, maybe they have a question you’re dark on them, whatever it is. Don’t do that. It’s going to ruin your business.
Steven J Butala:
There’s a section or a certain type of person that’s relatively prevalent, who believes, for some reason, and I don’t know where they got this, that you have to do something illegal to make a lot of money. You have to swindle somebody, or have some angle, or not provide a bunch of information, or just really not file your taxes, or just some version of that to get ahead or to make money.
Jill DeWit:
It’s not true.
Steven J Butala:
It’s not true.
Jill DeWit:
It’s not true. Not at all.
Steven J Butala:
And that’s too bad for them. I don’t know where they got that. I don’t know if they were born with it or grew up in an environment like that, but we just want to make sure everybody’s happy. The flip side of that is that you all know that you can’t make everybody happy. We all know that.
Jill DeWit:
That’s okay. Yeah. There’s going to be people you just can’t please no matter what. I’m not giving it to you for free and $500 because you’re mad. That’s not going to happen.
Steven J Butala:
Same with the Land Academy. 99% of the Land Academy members we have are amazing, but there’s always one or two that, and you know who you are, are not amazing, and you will never get enough from us.
Jill DeWit:
This is not Steve Rant. This is Jill Friday.
Steven J Butala:
Oh, sorry. Oh, I’ll stop right there.
Jill DeWit:
Yes. You got a little confused there. That’s Thursday. If you want to do a Thursday stuff, you could turn it into that.
Steven J Butala:
Sorry.
Jill DeWit:
Okay. So, my last point is this. I’ll close it on this. Because if you roll like we do, you’re going to have nothing but positive, awesome, helpful people, it’s going to make me cry, in your community like we do. And I’m so appreciative of Land Academy and everything we do. I know. I said it’s making me cry. So do the right thing. Happy you could join us today. Five days a week, you can find us here on the Land Academy Show.
Steven J Butala:
Join us next week for another interesting episode. You are not alone in your real estate ambition. Wow, Jill.
Jill DeWit:
Does it to me every time. I think about our community and how many… We have some… Everybody gets it. They get it. They’re here, you’re here. We’ve attracted the right people, and I’m so proud and happy for that.
Steven J Butala:
This really is a two way relationship with our Land Academy members, and that’s what I love the most. It’s not just, we created some videos. It’s a true community. We have an amazing retention rate. I lined up our retention rate just to… I bring everything back to numbers, and our retention rate is amazing compared to other types of groups.
Jill DeWit:
Thank you. And thank you for tuning in. We hope you find our content valuable, and we really appreciate your support. If you haven’t already, please zip on over to our YouTube channel, hit the subscribe button, and please comment on the shows that you love, like this one.
Steven J Butala:
We’re Steve and Jill.
Jill DeWit:
We’re Steve and Jill.
Steven J Butala:
Information-
Jill DeWit:
And inspiration-
Steven J Butala:
To buy undervalued property.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
If you enjoyed the podcast, please review it in Apple Podcasts . Reviews are incredibly important for rankings on Apple Podcasts. 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 Apple Podcasts.
