Transcript:

Steven Jack Butala:
I am Steven Jack Butala.

Jill K DeWit:
And I’m Jill DeWit. And this is the Land Academy Show.

Steven Jack Butala:
Today we are talking about two new Land Academy members who are completely set up for sex. Success. Set up for success.

Jill K DeWit:
Wow.

Steven Jack Butala:
Set up for success according to Jill and I.

Jill K DeWit:
I like the first one.

Steven Jack Butala:
I have a lot to say about that. And our second topic a little bit later in the episode is called Moving Through the 10 Step Process of Successful Land Flipping.

Jill K DeWit:
It’s funny, I was watching somebody’s show the other day, it was a YouTube thing, and I could see where they cut different things and they edited their stuff. We clearly do not cut and edit out bloopers. We go. The only cuts that you hear or see are when our team inserts a video, like when we do the-

Steven Jack Butala:
Something that’s actually helpful-

Jill K DeWit:
Exactly.

Steven Jack Butala:
… is added. Not cut,

Jill K DeWit:
But you know what I’m trying to

Steven Jack Butala:
Say.

Jill K DeWit:
My point is it’s clear that we are not that professional and we don’t do that. We sit down and we go, we don’t even have take one, take two, take three. It’s kind of, turn on the camera. This is it. You better be good.

Steven Jack Butala:
Why, Jill? Why are we not so professional?

Jill K DeWit:
Why are we not so professional?

Steven Jack Butala:
Because we’re here to buy and sell land.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s true.

Steven Jack Butala:
We’re here to get rich. And create wealth for ourselves.

Jill K DeWit:
To have a TV entertainment show-

Steven Jack Butala:
We’re not here to have a fully produced Thursday night sitcom/… I’m seeing more-

Jill K DeWit:
That would fun.

Steven Jack Butala:
… and more and more I’m seeing on YouTube people being rewarded for fully produced, full-blown entertainment. And so if you’re here to be entertained, if you’re here to get wealthy-

Jill K DeWit:
This might not be for you.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s actually what this episode’s about. If you’re here to learn how to buy and sell land, or more importantly buy and sell land on top of an already successful career you have, you don’t care about production value at all.

Jill K DeWit:
Yeah, it’s true.

Steven Jack Butala:
You just care about our banter and-

Jill K DeWit:
Getting the answers.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah, getting the answers.

Jill K DeWit:
I understand.

Steven Jack Butala:
Each week on the show, we answer questions from our Land Academy member Discord forum. We review land acquisitions from our weekly member webinars and we take a deep dive into two land related topics by popular request. If you have or actually want a sneak peek of our Discord forum, go to landacademy.com, it’s free.

Jill K DeWit:
Cool. Or if you just want to get some more information about how to get involved, be sure and send a note to my team via support@landacademy.com.
So here’s the question. Josh wrote, “Hi, I am a new member. My name is Josh. I live in Western United States. I’ve been a realtor for almost 10 years.”

Steven Jack Butala:
Here’s an example, because Jill has to edit her own-

Jill K DeWit:
“I grew up in the timber industry-“

Steven Jack Butala:
Whoever wrote this, it’s me.

Jill K DeWit:
“I grew up in the timber industry and the rural land development world-“

Steven Jack Butala:
Development world.

Jill K DeWit:
“I have bought and sold a few properties. So I’m looking to further advance my career in investing and I’m here to learn. I have three properties for sale currently that I own. I also have a new property in Florida under contract and I’m looking for funding and some help with it. Okay, so which thread should I prose it on? Thank you very much.” Oh, how cool. So that’s just a good little intro and background, ties in, of course you picked a good question to tie into our topic today about someone who’s already hitting the ground running, someone who’s already successful, and they’re here to make it even better. I love it.

Steven Jack Butala:
This person is, well, it’s going to go right into the topic. You know what? Let’s go right into the topic. Today’s first topic is called Two New Land Academy Members who are Set Up for Success. Mine is number one.

Jill K DeWit:
Yours is Josh.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yep. And Jill’s is number two. I’m going to go back to Josh’s question, pick it apart, because I think it’s incredibly important. He’s from the western United States. He’s been a realtor for 10 years. In general, being a successful realtor doesn’t translate completely into being a successful investor, but it doesn’t hurt. They don’t know the terminology. And more importantly, what this person really realizes is that they don’t want to be a realtor for the rest of their lives. They want to actually be an owner and he already sees the benefit of all this stuff. He’s bought and sold a few properties and he’s decided, in his head, he wants to take the next step, professional step to really learning from people who have done 16,000 deals, like Jill and I, and created tens of millions dollars in equity for ourselves over the last 25 years. He’s got three for sale and he is buying another one in Florida

Jill K DeWit:
And getting funding for it, smart.

Steven Jack Butala:
Josh, you are an absolute perfect example of who we want in our group, Jill and I, and hundreds of people that are already here who have brought a bunch of experience to the table, because not only are you going to sit there and absorb what we have to say and teach and instruct, you’re going to give some back too. We’re going to learn from you, maybe about Oregon, maybe about the timber industry, and maybe about your experience you’re about to have in Florida, whether it’s positive or negative. That’s what makes Land Academy Land Academy. This isn’t third grade, and so if you have, I’ll end on this and Jill’s got an example too I think, if you were just starting your career and you’re wondering, you’ve never heard of Excel before, this is probably not the best place for you.

Jill K DeWit:
Yeah. So I had two things to say, one about Josh, which I love when you say, “I’ve been a realtor for 10 years,” and your comments about it may or may not translate, we have plenty of people in Land Academy that were struggling in the real estate gold jacket to get out of the real estate gold jacket. I’m not kidding, you guys know what I’m talking about. Those of you who’ve been around as long as I have know what I’m talking about, and couldn’t wait to shed that goal blazer and jump into the investment world. So you’re not alone.
You know who you are. There are plenty of people that are like, “You know what? I became a stupid realtor/broker just to get my feet wet. I knew I didn’t want to hang out there. I’m tired of helping other people make money. I should be making my own money. I only did it to get rolling here and I’m done.” And I love that. So you’re in the right place.
And then the other thing is, the whole topic today is, this is who we are and I think sometimes the message gets blurred-

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s what I think.

Jill K DeWit:
… out in the planet. People are like, “Oh, you can make money in real estate? Maybe I’ll go to Land Academy.” Hold on a moment. And I want to say it’s not that it’s not possible. We do have people that have come to us not knowing very much at all and figured it out, but we are really more set up for those of you who are already doing this very successful like, “Oh, I knew there was a better way. I knew that there was something to this direct mail,” or, “I knew there was something to this piece,” or, “I’ve been doing this happily for five years and I need to make some systems. I’ve got as far as I can on my own. I really wanted to hit this home now. I need your guys’ help because I know you guys know how to create systems and build an empire and what do I need to hire? Who do I need to staff? What do I need to stop working on so I can really have-“

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah. Well said.

Jill K DeWit:
… “I’m going to be an investor for life. I’m there?” Or just a better investor for life kind of thing.

Steven Jack Butala:
Look, from a marketing standpoint, this is completely counterintuitive on our part. I’m sure many people are sitting there saying, “What the hell kind of show is this? You don’t want me to join?” No, I don’t want you to join if you don’t understand the basics, the absolute basics about running a company, I don’t know, working with your spouse, or if you have W2 experience and that’s it, there’s other places to go on the internet to learn how to buy and sell land.

Jill K DeWit:
I think what Jack’s trying to say is if you’re sitting here going, “I’m either going to be a land investor or I’m going to learn all about, fill in the blank, this other thing on YouTube. I’m going to learn how to drop ship T-shirts or land. Those are my two things I’ve narrowed it down to on YouTube,” we might not be for you.

Steven Jack Butala:
We have educated, as far as I know, every single place on the internet that you can go learn how to buy and sell land, with a couple of exceptions, they were once Land Academy members themselves. And so they don’t have the transaction experience or the years of real world experience that Jill and I have.

Jill K DeWit:
And our group.

Steven Jack Butala:
And I think they’re probably better set up to teach you whether or not this is for you. We’re not here to teach you whether or not this is for you. If you are a retired engineer, you own your own house, or you and your wife are looking for something to do because all the stuff you’ve done in your life has been relatively successful, this is absolutely the place for you. You will be in great company. Our group is packed full of people just like you.

Jill K DeWit:
Yeah. Hey, I’m going to give you my other part of this thing. So we each talked about two members who just recently joined who are perfect fits. And so you shared one, which is Josh. Well, I have one which is like, it’s kind of funny because his name is Jack who brought another Jack. I’m like, “Are you kidding me? Your name is Jack?” “Yep.” “And your partner, your business partner’s Jack?” “Yep.” I’m like, “Okay, this is going to get so confusing,” but this is very, very true. So I talked to one of the Jacks a couple weeks ago and he’s a perfect fit. He was referred to us from another member and when he dropped them, I’m like, “All right, who are you talking about?” And he dropped the member’s name. I’m like, “I know who that is,” who happens to be in Colorado. And so this is a thing, and this is a common story with us. They obviously travel in some of the same real estate circles in this town in Colorado. And Jack-

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s good.

Jill K DeWit:
… was finally hitting up this other active Land Academy member who has another business partner, these two guys that are happily doing it, and he’s like, “I’ve been talking to this guy. He finally dropped with me where he’s got his knowledge from.” I was trying to learn from the guy, the guy didn’t have time to really give me a lot of information, but the guy, it’s almost in passing, just said, “Call Land Academy,” kind of thing. And so this Jack said, “Fine, I’m calling Land Academy,” and now he’s here. So that’s a perfect fit and I love that.

Steven Jack Butala:
Perfect example.

Jill K DeWit:
It’s word of mouth. What it is is word of mouth, and that’s the best thing. And I watched it in Discord today too. I don’t know if you noticed that, but there was somebody in Discord said, “Hey, somebody, I have a friend that wants to learn more-“

Steven Jack Butala:
Oh, I did see that.

Jill K DeWit:
… “Can we hook them up?” I’m like, “Yeah, we’ll hook up your friend. So send them our way, definitely.” But people, if you’re already in the real estate circle, like Jack’s saying, whether you’re already doing deals or you’re in this stuff to learn it, you’re probably a good fit. This person that I’m talking about is not new. Two things that also struck me as great. So number one, he’s already in it and was referred to by a member.

Steven Jack Butala:
Huge.

Jill K DeWit:
That makes me feel great.

Steven Jack Butala:
Huge. Yep.

Jill K DeWit:
Sweet. So that person already vetted him. Thank you very much for vetting this person. I think that’s what happens sometimes too. I don’t think word gets out so much, because I think our members don’t necessarily want to share it with everybody because they want to keep our community. We want to protect what we’ve built. That’s a lot of this.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s great, Jill.

Jill K DeWit:
Number two, this person is not new to doing land deals. He’s already got plenty of things that he’s done. He wants to perfect it, get better at it and grow his business. And then the third thing is too, I thought was really great, because I mentioned Jack and Jack, already have a business partner. God, that’s great. Well, if you come into this and you’re that far along, you already have a business partner, you’re already splitting up responsibilities, you already know who’s good at what, what they’re good at and what you’re good at, so when you come into Land Academy and you sit and see the 10 steps that you’re going to talk about here in a few minutes, you can easily go, “Well, that’s mine, that’s yours, that’s mine, that’s yours.”

Steven Jack Butala:
I actually already did that for them.

Jill K DeWit:
How great is that?

Steven Jack Butala:
And it’s going to takes a huge weight off. We’ll get to that in a second.

Jill K DeWit:
Totally. So that’s like, we talk about red flags, we don’t talk about green flags. That’s green flag number three. So woo-hoo. Open arms. If this is you and your business partner or something like this is singing to you, you might be a good fit. And reach out to us. Reach out to my team. We’ll talk to you.
You know what? Here’s the thing, I’ll end on this for me. When you talk to myself or my team, because you’re inquiring about Land Academy and my little team is me and one of the person, I’ll tell you right now, why? Because we’re not here to set appointments and get people to come into Land Academy and make this Land Academy 5,000.

Steven Jack Butala:
Thank you. Well said.

Jill K DeWit:
Myself and my one other person who will talk to you about joining Land Academy are here to weed out not good fits.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s it.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s really what this is.

Steven Jack Butala:
They’re not there to sell.

Jill K DeWit:
I mean it. I’m here to protect what we’ve made, not to sell it and make it massive.

Steven Jack Butala:
If you already know that you can make a ton of money buying and selling land or real estate, maybe you haven’t done it, but you know that that’s the case. So you’re sold on the model. You have less inquiries and more, if most of your questions about this business are, how exactly do I do this because I already know it works? I’ve already bought into it, and by the way, I’ve already done this thing over here that was really successful. We have people, geez, in our group, that have built a restaurant chain and sold it or just come from all kinds of places, people that are in STEM-types of fields that have done well and maybe they’re retired or maybe they’re just a little bit done.
I was done with accounting. I’m a really good example of a Land Academy member, not a ton of a real estate experience, but just done with accounting. So you understand processes and you have some patience and some life professional experience.

Jill K DeWit:
And numbers.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah. Or we have a ton of lifelong corporate career salespeople that do incredibly well here, people like Joe. Call us. You’re welcome. This is not a sales pitch, but if you’re just trying to figure out what you want to do for the rest of your life, there’s tons of other things to do out there.
Let’s take a look at one of our favorite land acquisitions from our weekly Thursday member webinar.
All right, pretty good deal. I have to wonder what the net effect is of us saying don’t apply.

Jill K DeWit:
Oh, you know what? I’m okay with that. This has always been-

Steven Jack Butala:
You and I are okay with it, but I think…

Jill K DeWit:
… a small, tight, really exclusive kind of little club, which is all what we want. I want to be able to help everybody. People are like, “I love that…” You’ve probably heard this a lot now, but it’s Land Academy 500, not Land Academy 5,000. I want to be able to help and work and coach and mentor the right people-

Steven Jack Butala:
And share really, that’s what I want.

Jill K DeWit:
… and share the wealth with the right people.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s correct.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s it. There’s a lot of people out there doing it wrong and I’m really happy with that. You guys have that.

Steven Jack Butala:
We probably sound-

Jill K DeWit:
We’ll be over here.

Steven Jack Butala:
We probably sound overly confident, but here’s why. Two times a year-

Jill K DeWit:
Because we’re going on 10 years of this. We can be confident.

Steven Jack Butala:
Two times a year, Jill and I teach a crammed full class called Career Path. It’s not cheap, it’s an eight-week course, four hours a week, and it fills up every single and when they’re done with it, everybody’s like, “What’s next? I really want to continue this.” So our confidence is rooted in reality. Let’s put it that way.

Jill K DeWit:
I love that. That’s our new thing, by the way. You just said it and I decided it.

Steven Jack Butala:
What is it?

Jill K DeWit:
Career Path is now in the spring and the fall and that’s it. Seriously.

Steven Jack Butala:
Let’s take another question posted by one of our members on the Land Academy Discord online community. Again, if you want to sneak peek, go to landacademy.com. It’s free. Jill, I love that.

Jill K DeWit:
So Alan wrote, “I got my first accepted offer.” Yay. “Here are some questions. So it’s two side-by-side lots, each are one acre and there’s a single wide trailer on one of them with all the utilities, but it’s right in the middle.” Okay. So it’s straddling both parcels. Got it. “So the tenant was paying a note to the land owners.”

Steven Jack Butala:
This is great.

Jill K DeWit:
“And then she disappeared back in June and then they can’t…” This came up on the Thursday call, didn’t it?

Steven Jack Butala:
Yep.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay. Yeah, and then they can’t locate the lady. Oh, this is funny because we have new information on this. She also owes some taxes, so I guess she was paying taxes on the land for them. I don’t know. “So if I buy the parcels, is the trailer, i.e. single-wide mobile home kind of thing, legally mine and can I resell it as is?”

Steven Jack Butala:
This is what you all can expect when you send out a bunch of mail. And this is a great situation to be in. So number one, there’s two side-by-side parcels. Most of the time there’s two APNs, assessor parcel numbers. In this situation, I don’t know. Very often people combine them. It’s very easy to take two adjacent properties in most places in the country and combine them. And so hopefully that’s the case. Lucky for you, this has got a mobile home on it. Maybe not so lucky, there’s a tenant that kind of went rogue. We don’t know yet. But the good thing is, if the numbers work, that rickety old mobile home is going to make it a lot more attractive to a new buyer than if it was just vacant land.
So my question is, and I’m going to kind of leave it on this, unless Jill has something to say, if the numbers work, if you’re going to buy this property for if $10,000, let’s say, or $20,000 and you’re going to sell it for $40,000 or $50,000, then all those things, within reason, can be pretty seriously solved. If you’re buying it for $2,200 and selling it for $6,000, along the lines of what we’ve been saying in this entire episode, I think you’re better than that. I think it’s too small of a profit margin. If this is your absolute first deal, this is great. It’s a first deal and I think that’s why you’re in this community to ask these questions and work this stuff out. And can you imagine doing this by yourself?

Jill K DeWit:
Remember NPR and they would have that segment, “And now the rest of the story?”

Steven Jack Butala:
No, I don’t remember that.

Jill K DeWit:
You don’t know that? Okay, so what’s funny is, this is-

Steven Jack Butala:
Is this now the rest of the story?

Jill K DeWit:
This is now the rest of the story because I’m remembering this came up on our Thursday call last week where the person, the individual, I don’t remember who wrote the name of the question, but anyway said, “Hold on a moment.” Alan. If it is Alan.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah.

Jill K DeWit:
Okay. Alan’s like, “You’re not going to believe this, but I just got a call,” while I’m on the Thursday call with you guys, I got a call from the seller because the tenant showed up.” I’m like, “This is great because a lot of the questions are being asked to the extent of…” Let’s back up, two side-by-side parcels. Awesome. One or two APNs. I love two APNs. I’ll take whatever I can get. That’s great. We got the trailer in the middle. Cool. Now it’s even worth more, all the utilities are there. Yay. All good news. Someone was living in it. Great, then I know it’s inhabitable. The water works, the sinks work.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah. That’s true.

Jill K DeWit:
I mean there’s a lot of positives there, whether or not the person’s in town right now or accepting phone calls, I love that someone’s been living there, there’s stuff there. That’s even better. So now the tenant thing, everybody gets all hung up on the tenant. Well, let’s not get hung up on this yet until we even know, is there a lease? What’s written in the lease? You got to get your hands on some of these documents. You can’t assume the worst or the best. I don’t want you to assume anything until you get your hands on it and often it’s not as bad as you think it is.

Steven Jack Butala:
There’s a huge reward.

Jill K DeWit:
Yes.

Steven Jack Butala:
A massive financial reward for learning about this and figuring it all out.

Jill K DeWit:
You know what’s funny? All of a sudden people go to the bottom, like, “I got to evict someone, I got to do this, I got to do this.” Well, hold on a moment. There very well could be a lease where everything’s spelled out. If you don’t pay by this date, here’s what’s going to happen and here’s the recourse and it’s all very cut and dry. You don’t have to panic or assume or just go there. And maybe it’s just me, but I do assume the best and it often works out, like you said.

Steven Jack Butala:
Here’s the thing about tenants in general. This is not called Tenant Academy. Here’s the thing about tenants, it’s like a gambling story. So you never hear bad gambling stories. All you ever hear is, like DiamondBacks are in the World Series right now. By the time this airs, they may have won it or lost it. We don’t know.

Jill K DeWit:
True.

Steven Jack Butala:
But I keep hearing all these gambling stories about the payouts on if you chose the Diamondbacks to win the World Series opening day of the regular season, this $5 bet’s worth like $20,000. It’s crazy. So you hear those stories, but you don’t ever hear the stories about, “Well, I chose the Cubs and they didn’t win, lost my five bucks.” It’s the same thing with tenants only in the reverse.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s good.

Steven Jack Butala:
You never hear… I’ll tell you a tenant story. Ready? Jill and I have three townhouses, they have tenants in them. I’ve talked to the tenants maybe three or four times in my entire life. We have a common friend who loves maintenance and they’re related. So anytime there’s issues, they call this guy, he comes in and there’s never any issues. It’s a condominium. And we get the checks and the cash and stuff very regularly, no one’s ever been late in their rent, and so no one talks about those tenants.

Jill K DeWit:
True.

Steven Jack Butala:
They all talk about that one tenant they had to evict or they had to pay to leave.

Jill K DeWit:
True. Good point.

Steven Jack Butala:
So tenants can be amazing. They can pay your mortgage off, they can pay your personal mortgage in another house that you own and all of that. So please don’t be afraid of this stuff. That’s why we’re in this group. We’ll help you.

Jill K DeWit:
It’s a good one.

Steven Jack Butala:
Today’s second topic is called Moving Through the 10 Step Process of a Successful Land Flip. Here’s the 10 steps. I’m going to go through them kind of slowly and Jill sees things differently than I do sometimes and she’s going to interrupt me and say, “Yeah, well, but…”

Jill K DeWit:
Okay.

Steven Jack Butala:
That’s my goal.

Jill K DeWit:
So okay, you want me to, so I’m allowed to this time. Don’t wait for the end? You all heard that.

Steven Jack Butala:
Step one, and as I go down this list, I’m going to say, who should be doing this in your life for the rest of your life and the rest of your successful land career?

Jill K DeWit:
Okay, is this a game?

Steven Jack Butala:
Well, you already know the answer, so step one is find and test a location, a zip code, a county, a state. Find and test a location to send mail. You don’t do this with dartboard, you don’t do this with your feelings. You do this by looking at and analyzing data, number of properties sold-

Jill K DeWit:
Or a list that someone gave you. Seriously.

Steven Jack Butala:
You don’t do this with any emotion. You look at data that we provide you, or in some cases wherever you find it-

Jill K DeWit:
Well, we show you how to get.

Steven Jack Butala:
We show you how to get it. We’re licensed providers of this data, and you’ll always do this. You’ll never outsource it. Probably your wife can’t do it. Maybe if she’s smarter than you, then maybe she should be doing it, you’re going to have to decide that, but this is not something you have an employee do or you have a virtual assistant do. This is not how to get rich quick. This is not a side gig or you’re never going to own a Ferrari because you outsource this stuff.

Jill K DeWit:
So picking an area to operate in is you, as the owner.

Steven Jack Butala:
And you have to make a decision at the end of this process. “I like this zip code over this zip code and I hate this zip code over here.” It requires decisiveness and if you have experience in life making decisions, it’s shocking to me how many people don’t.

Jill K DeWit:
True.

Steven Jack Butala:
If you are able and happy and feel good when you make a decision, not, “Oh my God, did I make a good decision?”

Jill K DeWit:
Did I make the right decision? What if I picked the wrong one?

Steven Jack Butala:
Did I choose the right girl? How’s this going to go? This is going to be a tough for you.

Jill K DeWit:
Right.

Steven Jack Butala:
Number one, find and test locations to send mail. You’ll do this forever. Number two, order or create the mailer itself, which requires a tremendous amount of Excel experience. If you hate Excel and stick your middle finger up to all of this in general, these first three or four steps because you’re a career salesperson and you already have an amazing amount of success somewhere being that type of person, find somebody else to do this part. You can outsource this. We have a company called Concierge Data in response to the fact that so many successful people have joined our group with corporate sales history. There’s a huge part of this is talking to sellers and arranging things with people. There’s a people part of this business.

Jill K DeWit:
Well, the other part is we have a lot of people that are like, “I’m better than that. I don’t need to download. I picked the area. I know exactly what I want to mail, this size to this size. Here are the zip codes. This is the criteria I want, but I’m better than going in and downloading the data, putting in the spreadsheets, scrubbing out this, updating that. I’m better than that because I run a business, I know I shouldn’t be doing that.” That’s part two of that.

Steven Jack Butala:
Number three-

Jill K DeWit:
Not that you’re afraid of it, you know that you shouldn’t be doing it.

Steven Jack Butala:
Price the mailer.

Jill K DeWit:
Yeah.

Steven Jack Butala:
It doesn’t do any good to go through all this work, find out where to send mail, hire out somebody to process all the data for you, and so you’re staring at the spreadsheet or the database saying, “I don’t know if these prices are right.” This is something you need to do yourself, not forever, at some point you will find either a partner like me or there will become a reliable way, there is not one now, a reliable application that’s API driven that can actually price your mailer within reason. You have to take responsibility for that, direct personal responsibility. If you send out an overpriced mailer, which happens often, I mean we show you exactly how not to do that, but it happens often because people don’t test-

Jill K DeWit:
Look for an easy button.

Steven Jack Butala:
Yeah. If you price it right, you’re going to do okay. Number four, get the mailer in the mail. Geez, Jack, number two, three, and four have to do with the mailer? Yeah, they do. I could say number two is, do a mailer, but the fact is then I’m allowing you to not make decisions. Well, I don’t know how to do a mailer. It’s three separate parts. Manage the mailer, create it yourself, or order it out. Number one, well, number two, it is, number three is price it yourself and get it in the mail. It’s shocking to me how many people price the mailer, they test it for a reason, and they just don’t get it in the mail.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s good.

Steven Jack Butala:
Got to make a decision. Number five, this is where Jill comes in, my business partner, Jill. In the 10 step process, I’m out now, you know what I do when this happens after number four? I go back to number one because I know Jill’s got it. Number five, manage the flow of inbound responses. I cannot say how important this is and you either love this step if you’re Jill and just can’t wait for the mailer to hit or it’s not your thing, like me. My entire life, I’ve had someone do this. Right now for the last 10 or 15 years, it’s been my business partner. Before that, it was an employee. At the very beginning, I did it myself and realized I never want to do it again.
Number six, now you’ve got a bunch of deals you’re staring at, you forever will manage which properties you want to buy or which properties you don’t. You’re going to have to make a decision. You’re going to hold yourself accountable about whether or not to buy properties. “Jack, I’ve never bought a property before.” Great. You’re in the right place because you’ve already been successful at something in your life. You know how important it is to take responsibility for your own decisions and you have a massive peer group where you can run the decision by everybody else who’s been in your shoes for months or years or decades, like us, to say, “You know what? I’m not sure I’d buy this deal,” or find out these three things. Your pricing looks great. Find out these three things and then if those three things pass, I’d buy it. Or hell no, get out of there. It’s the worst property ever. That’ll never change your entire career.
Number seven, you’ll get to a point on six, where Jill and I are, where in 30 seconds you realize, yeah, we’re going to move forward or we’re not. After a bunch of-

Jill K DeWit:
You’ll get fast.

Steven Jack Butala:
… deal experience, the fastest way to get to that point is be in a community like ours.

Jill K DeWit:
True.

Steven Jack Butala:
Number seven, buy the property. You can hire somebody out to buy a property all day long. Real estate agents do it with title companies. The process of buying a property can be the worst experience ever or the greatest thing on the planet. If you know a real estate agent or a bunch of them, ask them if they know how to buy a property. Ask them that question. “Hey, I know you’re a successful real estate agent. Do you know how to buy a property?” They’re going to say yes, but they don’t know how because they have their best friend, Sally, at First American Title, who really knows how to buy a property. Real estate agents don’t know how to buy properties.

Jill K DeWit:
It’s true.

Steven Jack Butala:
They think they do.

Jill K DeWit:
That’s kind of funny.

Steven Jack Butala:
This is cash out. This is your cash leaving. You have $100,000 in the bank, you’re buying a $30,000 property. If it’s your first one, you’re going to go through trauma. It took me this long to save $100,000. I’m going to spend $30,000. I’m going to have $70,000 left. What if I never see this again?” Well, we don’t want that to happen to you and neither does anybody else in Land Academy. We try to take the trauma out of that. Your cash is going out. You should, in your soul, if you’re like me, want that money back as fast as possible.

Jill K DeWit:
Can I pause real quick here? You should feel great about it. I got to tell you, we are so good at making these decisions. I’m happy when the money goes out. I want to pause for a moment. I’m the happiest when the money goes out.

Steven Jack Butala:
I know you are.

Jill K DeWit:
That means I got a great deal. I know it. I wouldn’t have done it, and then when it sells, “I knew that.” I knew that’s how it was going to go. I was happy to acquire it so it is lovely.

Steven Jack Butala:
There are more happy moments in my life than when cash leaves my bank account, but that’s why I have Jill as a business partner.
Number eight. Now the cash is out, you own the property. You are clamoring to get that money back in your account times two. I spent 30, I want 60 back and then I’ll have 130 instead of 100. That’s what this is all about. Number seven, I’m sorry, number eight, I’m going to find a real estate agent who I don’t loathe and who is actually capable, which is a lot harder to do than I’m-

Jill K DeWit:
It’s not just picking up the phone.

Steven Jack Butala:
… describing. It’s not just step eight. It’s not just picking up the phone. I’m going to find a broker, your employee, or you have to do this yourself in the beginning, at some point that key employee, employee number one is going to be real capable of finding a broker for you, maybe because they’re a former broker themselves and they know all the tricks.
Number nine, manage the sale of the property. Well, your employee can do that too. Now in the beginning, you’re going to have to do it, and this is harder than it seems. Escrow agents fall asleep, brokers disappear once the property goes under contract. It’s herding cats, so to speak, in managing the property, the sale. I see a lot of people, a lot of us, a lot of investors lose interest at this point because it’s real fun, like Jill said, it’s a blast to buy property. It’s a blast for me to do a mailer, I just tend to forget about, at these end stages, forget about getting the money back in your account.
You got to manage the sale of your property actively or you got to hire somebody out to do it. It’s really easy to get an employee/transaction coordinator to manage the sale of this property on the sell side. They want to get it done too. That’s how they get paid.
Number 10, this is the last step. Sell the freaking property. This is when your cash come back in. This is what you’ve been waiting for. You should be pushing everybody, in the most politically correct way, pushing them and nudging them and encouraging them to get that money back in your bank account.
10 steps. If this excites you, or a portion of it excites you, this is for you. If you loathe putting this all together like a big puzzle and it’s a lot of work, then this may not be for you. It’s working for a ton of people in our group and it’s working for even more people who have said, “I know so much. I’ve made so much money. I just don’t need to be a Land Academy member anymore. Thanks very much.” The same way you would get a Master’s degree anywhere and it’s time for you to get a job.

Jill K DeWit:
That was awesome. Thank you.

Steven Jack Butala:
You either got bored or-

Jill K DeWit:
Well, no, it’s okay. It’s all right. You know what? You had a lot to say and I tried to interject. It’s okay.

Steven Jack Butala:
Oh, really? Did I stop you?

Jill K DeWit:
It’s okay, and I realized, “No, just you…” And so that was awesome. Thank you very much.

Steven Jack Butala:
Jill, I’m sure you have something inspirational to share.

Jill K DeWit:
Well we’re going to do one more thing from our weekly member webinar?

Steven Jack Butala:
Oh, yeah. Let’s take another look at one of our favorite land acquisitions from our weekly Thursday member webinar. Sorry, we’re running out of time. Do you have something inspirational?

Jill K DeWit:
How about you? I’m going to do for you today. I did a lot in the beginning of the show. I want to hear more. I know you have a good topic that you want to wrap up with us for today, so let’s go right into that.

Steven Jack Butala:
Here’s what I’ve noticed lately, and I’ve noticed it from employees, recently former employees and from people in general, and I took this for granted my entire career about being money driven. My partner here, my business partner, I don’t think she’s as money driven as I am.

Jill K DeWit:
It’s true.

Steven Jack Butala:
I think she’s very deal driven. She loves to get stuff acquired.

Jill K DeWit:
This is good.

Steven Jack Butala:
She loves the process of going through stuff. It’s not to the point where it’s crippling her by any stretch. She likes the money too. She likes the end result of the money. For me, it’s just about the money. That’s it. I am absolutely driven by making money, and that’s what this Enneagram test is about. I hope that you can go take the Enneagram test or please look it up or Google it because you’re going to find out what kind of person you are.
We’ve had employees in the past that are really interested in being the boss. They like to be the leader and the boss of a small group. It says so right in their cup. Just ask them, do you like being a boss?

Jill K DeWit:
I’ve never had a cup the mug that says, “Boss lady,” but we’ve had people that have done that in our office.

Steven Jack Butala:
Best boss ever.

Jill K DeWit:
I’m like, “No, never had that.”

Steven Jack Butala:
And that’s what drives those people, and so people like that, just to give you a great example of a brief example, there’s a million examples I could give, are not motivated to get things done like I just described in that 10 step process. They’re motivated to work on stuff and to draw things out and to have people like them and respect them as a leader or whatever it is that’s going on in their head, which I’ll never understand because my whole process in life results in more money. And then I’m done and then I go back and get more money, and then I go back and try something else and create a new product or maybe buy a house this time instead of a piece of land, but I know it’s done when the money’s back.
So you have to ask yourself. I think that going through those 10 steps that I just described, and if you’re not processing the money along the way and getting your money back and then putting it into another deal and making more money and then putting it in another deal and making more money, more money means happiness for me and ending it really, really, really motivates me. And it’s a lot less, I think people are born with that. It’s a lot less prevalent than I thought.

Jill K DeWit:
I think that’s good, and I think you’re right. Don’t forget, you can reach us for help or questions or more information just simply by sending a note to my team via support@landacademy.com.

Steven Jack Butala:
Join us next Wednesday for another interesting episode. This is where we buy land cheap and sell it for more on the internet.

Jill K DeWit:
We are Jack and Jill.

Steven Jack Butala:
We are Jack and Jill. Information…

Jill K DeWit:
… and inspiration…

Steven Jack Butala:
… to buy undervalued property.