Transcript:

Transcript:

Steven Jack Butala:
Jack and Jill here.

Jill K DeWit:
Hello.

Steven Jack Butala:
Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I’m Steven Jack Butala.

Jill K DeWit:
And I’m Jill Dewitt, broadcasting from the Valley of the Sun.

Steven Jack Butala:
Today, Jill and I talk about why sending blind land offers within a price range, backfires.

Jill K DeWit:
I have a lot to say about this.

Steven Jack Butala:
Jill said earlier, or yesterday I should say, that we own a ton of real estate all over the country at any given time, and she’s never received…

Jill K DeWit:
Not one of these.

Steven Jack Butala:
Never received a range offer. What I mean by this is instead of sending an offer for, this is what we teach in Land Academy and very successfully implement, Jill and I together and have for decades. Is, “Hey, we want a buy your property that’s located in this area, that we know you own for $16,832.28.” We don’t send an offer range like, “Well, we think your property’s worth between $14,000 and $22,000 and call us back and we’ll talk about it together.”

Jill K DeWit:
Right.

Steven Jack Butala:
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. Did you know that we have a full blown operational commercial printing company called offer2owners.com? Jill and I set this company up several years ago, specifically, to mail out our blind offer campaigns and then we’ve ultimately started sharing it with our Land Academy members and some non-members only a couple years ago. Last month, I just checked, we mailed out about 700,000 offers that month on our member’s behalf. Give us a call or go to offers2owners.com and see if it’s real.

Jill K DeWit:
Cool.

Jill K DeWit:
I am waiting for it to scroll up. Okay. Erin wrote, “Until recently, I have mostly avoided no access situations and used the title company to confirm access when it is questionable. Interestingly, I had one deal where one title company wouldn’t ensure access, but the other one in town would. I guess the first title company just had a claim or two for a similar situation.” Kind of funny. So one of our moderators, I already have one of their answers. So I’m going to answer this. I’ll read this before we answer. So Kevin, one of our moderators wrote, “I have had a title company insurer with no access, but they had a disclaimer that said they would not govern any issues resulting from not having access. Also, I’m closing on a few right now that have a legal easement, but no rotor path. I purchased these and had a surveyor go out and mark the easement so that my buyers can clearly see that they do have a legal easement.

Jill K DeWit:
I avoid those with no access and even avoid deals or accesses through the neighboring parcel on a friendly verbal arrangement, since it’s that part is not usually transferable. So now I sell all parcels with agents and then I need to have at least legal access for them to be able to show it by law.” So he is taking it to a step further. Oh, one more thing. This is really lengthy. “I purchased a property from a guy who buys tax liens. Somehow he gets the deed. This property had no access, so he’s sued for access. Cost him some money, it took about a year. Then I came long and made a good offer. I sent my surveyor out there to locate and mark the new easement through the neighbor property. That neighbor did not answer any attempt to contact during the suit or the easement.”

Steven Jack Butala:
Sure.

Jill K DeWit:
“The suit for the easement, they may be uncooperative. So I work with an agent in the area who knows the neighbor and he went out there am fair warning that the surveyor will be working on the property next week.” That was very nice. “I would not have done this deal without the connection with the agent to help with the neighbor. Surveyor was reluctant to go charging in there, legal or not.” I understand. This is a touchy subject. That was quite involved that I don’t mean to scare you. I hope that didn’t scare you.

Steven Jack Butala:
So I do mean to scare you.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay, go ahead. You want [crosstalk 00:04:04]

Steven Jack Butala:
No, no, go ahead [crosstalk 00:04:05].

Steven Jack Butala:
I want to hear, because Jill and have a slightly different opinion on this. That’s okay.

Jill K DeWit:
No. So, well, first to the title company, all of the above is true. You can have a title company that says, look, we don’t deal with properties that don’t have access. We don’t even want to go there. That’s their right. They can say, “I don’t want to sell you that.” That’s fine. Legally the title company B can say, “Sure, we’re going to do it with just legal access.”, and title company C can say, “Hey, I don’t care what it is. What do they have, or don’t have, we’re just going to put in here, we have this, we don’t have that and put all that in the schedule B.” These are all correct answers.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s the exact same reason that you get three different car insurance quotes, because it’s the title companies are insurance companies. They see risk in certain things and not as a risk in certain other things.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s all that is.

Jill K DeWit:
Exactly. And then as far as going through the work of getting a surveyor and that kind of a thing, I personally don’t do that. But what I have done personally is done neighbor letters. I just did this recently too. I sent out neighbor letters. We bought a property that had clear physical access. The property was on a road that we thought was a public road, but nevertheless, there’s a road that went to a cemetery. Everybody’s driving up and down this road, technically it’s physical. There was not legal access because 15-20 years ago it didn’t get recorded. Somebody missed the ball, okay, fine. So what I did was I went to all the neighbors and said, “Hey, just want to make sure you’re on board. I’m selling this property.

Jill K DeWit:
Somebody’s going to want to get the access. Are you compliant?” Anyway, I got the yes’s that I need. I didn’t go through and do it. I saw one neighbor letter. I got two emails and a phone call with the three neighbors, everybody’s compliant. They’re like, “I’m just not going to spend any money, but sure I’ll agree to that. Because we’re all using it anyway.” I said, “Thank you very much.” And then I handed that off to my buyer, which by the way, it was through an agent as well.

Steven Jack Butala:
Here’s a whole moral story to property that may or may not have access. The whole topic of access it’s one of the six A’s. Access is one of the six A’s that we test properties from a due diligence standpoint, to see whether or not we want to buy them. And as you can see by this very intentionally lengthy discussion today, it’s not for the weak at heart. It’s complicated. There can be lawsuits involved. There’s all kinds of stuff involved. And I’ll tell you the truth. Here’s a real truth. We send out tons of offers that are lower than retail value for land. And a lot of those offers come back signed with property that does not have access. And so it’s our job to just sift through the ones that really don’t work at all. Maybe put a middle pile in where they might work. And ones where, “Yeah, I’m happy to buy this, it’s so cheap. I don’t care if there’s access or not. I’ll just disclose it when I go sell it.”

Jill K DeWit:
Most states there’s a process that you can go to if everybody’s not on the same page. Either way, there’s a process to gain access. Most states you cannot be withheld access. So I want to make sure everybody knows too that, “That if I buy a property and there’s no legal or physical access, do I have to helicopter there? Or just like land my balloon the right place?” No, you don’t have to do that. Most time you can do it. It’s just going through the motions and for a lot of the properties, I’m not going to do it. I don’t want to do it. So that’s why, like you said, it’s one of the six A’s. So don’t worry too much about it. That was way more than I think you need to know right now.

Steven Jack Butala:
I think it’s just scratching the surface of what you need to know and I would worry about it.

Jill K DeWit:
Let me back up. If you have legal and physical access, you won’t worry.

Steven Jack Butala:
That it!

Jill K DeWit:
That’s what I’m trying to say.

Steven Jack Butala:
A whole point [crosstalk 00:08:00]

Jill K DeWit:
That’s what I mean. If you check the box like we do and you have both and you don’t worry.

Steven Jack Butala:
You got to decide which business you’re in.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
We’re in the business of buying and selling land. And if it’s got flaws like this, chances are Jill and I is going to move on.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
In our land business.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
But I just gave you a real clear example of this person where Kevin, our moderator, bought a piece of property from a guy and that’s his business. His business is to buy tax liens, foreclose on him and then go through a legal motion. He’s probably a lawyer, go through a legal motion to get legal access to the property. Doesn’t probably ever go out there just like us. He just shuffles a lot of paper and creates a bunch of equity for himself.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s his business model.

Steven Jack Butala:
Right.

Jill K DeWit:
Good for him. Not mine. Yeah.

Steven Jack Butala:
Tell you what I would do if I was Kevin and I would befriend this guy.

Jill K DeWit:
Yeah.

Steven Jack Butala:
And I would say, maybe you and I need to be some partners on some stuff. Today’s topic. Finally today’s topic. Why sending blind land offers within a price range, backfires. This is why you’re listening. Jill, you have a lot of notes.

Jill K DeWit:
Well, I was going to back up and just make it real clear. So what we do is send out by the thousands and Land Academy does, very personalized strategic offers to owners of the property that already pass our tests of an area that we want to hit. We know the size, we know the zoning, we know exactly what we’re going for kind of thing. So it’s not vague at all, down to the price. The name is specific and perfect. The property description is specific and perfect. It’s got the APN. It’s got the legal description. It’s got the size on there. So when you’re getting a letter from us, it’s Jill DeWit. Hi, this is who I am. I know you own 4.9 acres in XYZ county, Colorado. This is the legal whatever it is, and I want to buy it for $16,124.42 cents.

Jill K DeWit:
Here’s how the terms are going to go. Here’s how long my offer’s valid if you’re interested. Here’s where to reach me. And here’s all my conditions too, by the way, this is assuming that it passes my test. One of them might be access by the way, and back taxes and things like that. So it’s a very specific non-generic letter. And we have been doing this. Steven’s been doing this for over two decades. You’re pushing, are you at three? Not yet. I can’t remember if you’re…

Steven Jack Butala:
25.

Jill K DeWit:
…The math.

Steven Jack Butala:
25.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay. How many decades?

Steven Jack Butala:
Like really? Almost 30, 28.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay. so you’re pushing it. That’s what I thought. So pushing three decades that you’ve been doing this for all property types and we’ve tested all kinds of stuff and this is what works. It’s interesting because people come along all the time and they’re doing just generic postcards. They do, I’ve gotten sticky notes on our front door and now we’re talking about today, this blind offer price range. And I think this is hilarious because it sounds to me like they’re sending out the letter, it’s maybe personalized. I hope it’s personalized to the person and hope what it’s personalized to the property. And it sounds like it’s a version of because I haven’t got one of these, but I know people are doing them, “I want to buy your property from anywhere from 15 to $25,000. Please reach out to me if you’re interested and here’s my contact.”

Jill K DeWit:
Well, I’m pretty sure if I’m Mr. Seller, I didn’t see the 15, I saw the 25,000. So I’m not sure what the point is here. That’s where I’m at. Please, I’d love to do a show with you, if you tested this and it somehow works and you’ve got a theory here, let’s talk. I want to talk. Because I don’t get it.

Steven Jack Butala:
We’re in the business of buying real estate from people where a price is not their first. It’s not their whole point to doing the transaction. Their transaction is to liquidate a piece of property or sell a piece of property. They full know. Maybe they know, maybe they don’t know that it’s under value from a retail standpoint. It’s not the retail price for the property. If it is there first, the person that’s going to call you back. And a letter offer range number is a person who cares about price. The person who’s going to care, who’s calling you back with just an offer. The way that we do it is a person that just wants to get the deal done.

Jill K DeWit:
Yep.

Steven Jack Butala:
They don’t want the property anymore. For the same reason that most people have a garage sale, they don’t want the stuff anymore. And they’re not there to make tons and tons of money or maximize the exact retail value of an old broom. They’re there to just get some stuff out of the garage. Maybe they’re moving, who knows whatever life reason that they have. It’s the exact same thing with how we buy land and a price range in an offer opens yourself up to a discussion. And long discussions about buying and selling real estate, never lead anywhere.

Jill K DeWit:
And justifying the price. Can you imagine like give me one, you don’t even go to a car dealership. There’s a sticker price.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah.

Jill K DeWit:
There’s a starting point.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yep.

Jill K DeWit:
Or something.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s right Jill. It’s not a range.

Jill K DeWit:
Its either that’s the price.

Steven Jack Butala:
There’s not a range on a car sticker.

Jill K DeWit:
Exactly, so I don’t understand. Kind of like going to the grocery store. I don’t know. Might be $2 a gallon might be $8 a gallon, I don’t know Let’s see. What the heck.

Steven Jack Butala:
I was just in a restaurant looking at a menu and it says burgers between $16 and $38. And you read…

Jill K DeWit:
Where was that?

Steven Jack Butala:
Down at the bar we go to all time. I said, “What do you do? Do you put two pounds of lobster on the ladder, and it’s $38? I don’t know, I don’t get it so.

Jill K DeWit:
Was is it a typo? It had to a typo.

Steven Jack Butala:
No.

Jill K DeWit:
Oh, what does that mean?

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s the whole thing. Depends on what you put on it. We might charge extra.

Jill K DeWit:
Ahhh. That’s hilarious.

Steven Jack Butala:
Takes all the…

Jill K DeWit:
Well, oh, that’s okay. That’s the second thing I’ve never seen. Cause I’ve never seen that, but yeah, no matter where you go, there’s not a range. Your airline tickets, your cars, come on. There’s a number. I’m going to recap for my listeners. Just kidding.

Steven Jack Butala:
Oh my gosh. You’re right. You have listeners. And I have listeners.

Jill K DeWit:
Exactly.

Steven Jack Butala:
I have six listeners and you have 16,000.

Jill K DeWit:
You describe things differently so I’m having going to recap for my people what the point is here. You’re just trying to evoke an action and smoke out who wants to sell and get rid of it.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s it.

Jill K DeWit:
They’re not here to talk about it. A range is going to make a lot of conversations and do you really have time for that by the way?

Steven Jack Butala:
No.

Jill K DeWit:
You’re running your own land business. You’re a one-man show, most likely, we were in the beginning. And if I’m going to be talking to everybody all day, every day about deals, how am I going to get anything done? I need offers going out, people seeing them, signing them, sending them back. And then I pick the ones I want done.

Steven Jack Butala:
Here’s the math on it. Send out 5,000 offers chances are, if you do everything right, price it right and all the stuff that the education that we have. You might buy two or three properties. Let’s say between one and five, our way. And you’ll probably get 15 phone calls and maybe twenty five phone calls.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
And then you’ll get some signed offers back and you might not want to buy the properties. There’s a lot of stuff that goes on and then it’s over.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
And then you move on to the next mailer, usually the next month. And you just keep that machine going.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Steven Jack Butala:
And buying and selling land. If you send an offer range out, or God forbid a postcard that says, “Hey, I’m really interested in buying your property, give me a call.” What you’re going to get if you send 5,000 of those out, is probably 200-300, maybe more phone calls back or some type of email correspondence saying, “Yeah, give me a call. Let’s talk about it. Actually turns out I do want to sell that property.” Jill and I own hundreds and hundreds of properties.

Jill K DeWit:
I’m going to sell everything.

Steven Jack Butala:
Every single property I want to sell.

Jill K DeWit:
I’m going to sell my house I’m sitting in, but there’s a make me move number. And I don’t think that’s in your range, but if you give me a range, I’m going to call you and talk about it.

Steven Jack Butala:
People that choose to send range offers out, probably because they’ve had other education about how to buy and sell real estate, are doing that because they’re not yet convinced or completely secure with the fact that you only want about 10 or 15 calls back and you only want to buy one or two or three properties in a mailer.

Jill K DeWit:
Right?

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s it.

Jill K DeWit:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). Thank you. Happy to join us today, five days a week, you can find us here on the Land Academy Show or…

Steven Jack Butala:
Tomorrow the episode on the House Academy Show is called Recovering HGTV House Flippers, Make great Land Academy Land Flippers. You are not alone in your real estate ambition.

Jill K DeWit:
We have several of them, but before we get into that, real quick I’m going to say one thing. Today, depending on the time that you’re listening to this, you may still have a chance to watch us Live or if not, catch the replay. So today, this is March 15th, 2022, Tuesday at four o’clock Pacific time, which is eight o’clock Eastern time. Jack and I are Live on Facebook and YouTube under the Land Academy umbrella, go find us. We’re talking all about career path, but we’re going to talk all about Land Academy too. We are always happy to answer your questions. Do you want to add anything to that?

Steven Jack Butala:
No, great work.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay. Thank you for tuning in and Jack and I are very aware that not everyone has a hundred grand lying around to buy land. Well, we may fund your deals and land. We do everybody’s deals, but primarily land academy members deals every single week and it’s called LandFunding.com. So in addition to us, our members have combined their own money and there’s about, at this point 40 million available to fund other Land Academy Members’ transactions, and they do it every week. So go to LandAcademy.com or LandIvestors.com or LandFunding.com, and you’ll find out a lot more information on that.

Both Speakers:
We are Jack and Jill.

Steven Jack Butala:
Information,

Jill K DeWit:
And inspiration,

Steven Jack Butala:
To buy undervalued property.