This is episode number 2237. Jill and I talk about the best way to find off-market land deals in 2025. Off-market land deals are our middle name.

That’s it. That’s pretty funny.

I have to tell you.

I don’t know what else to say.

I accidentally fell into buying property off-market in the early ’90s. We didn’t realize that what I was doing was buying real estate that was off-market. Because of that, it was grossly undervalued. Here we are.

Do you know what’s funny about this? I used to have a thing. If I ever found myself on the phone with an agent, I would say, “Never mind,” and get rid of them. Nowadays, I still have conversations. I’ll find out if there’s any juice there because there might be a situation where it’s been listed for the third time. They’re done with it. Nobody seems to be able to sell it. It’s because every time, the agents always list it way up here. The seller’s able or considering now to take my low offer. I will have a few-minute conversation. With off-market, I got them off the phone that fast. “Somebody else got there first. See you.”

The Fundamental Advantage Of Off-Market Deals

Here are some sentences that no humans have ever said. “I don’t like off-market real estate deals. I would much rather buy this real estate deal on the market through a real estate agent.”

No one’s ever said, “I don’t like off-market real estate deals—I’d much rather buy on the market through an agent.” Share on X

Is that all the taxes are? Are you sure you didn’t miss any? What else?

“I want to buy a car from a dealer at full price. I don’t want to buy that car over there, down the street from John Smith, for half the price of the same car. That’s an off-market deal.”

Of course, I want the extended warranty on the batteries.

Jill and I bought a sailboat. We were on the dock with the broker. Boats are very different. It’s a whole different acquisition process. There’s a lot of other stuff involved. We went to look at a listing that he had. Jill and I didn’t like it at all. This is after looking at twenty boats, which is way more tiring and unfun than it sounds. He said, “What do you want?” I described it to him. He said, “I’m talking to the seller on this boat right down the dock. Let’s go look at it.” It was nine slips away. We bought it. It was an off-market deal. Jill negotiated an amazing price. The broker was still involved, but it never hit the market. I’m very confident. If it had hit the market at that price, it would have been sold within a few days.

Everybody won.

That’s the way we buy real estate, minus the agent’s involvement. We have built this entire company and business model around off-market deals. Getting there first is what we used to call it. You need to get there first. If the agent got there, he got there first, or she got there first. Off-market deals are amazing.

We’ll talk more about that in a minute.

Each day on the show, we answer a question from our Land Academy member Discord forum. We take a deep dive into land-related topics at your request.

Addressing Seller Concerns In Off-Market Deals

Trace and Dave wrote, “Hi, Land Academy community. I’d like to have a clear understanding of what it looks like to the seller if we get our deal funded. Do they need to sign a new contract once we find a funder, or do they even need to know we have a funder? I’d like to understand, so I can navigate the conversation and have their experience as smoothly as possible. Thanks.”

One thing you can do ahead of time, Trace and Dave, is this. If you’re on your purchase agreement and you know right away, “We have no money. What we’re mailing for are all ‘buy for $60,000, sell for $150,000’ kind of thing. This whole area we’re mailing, we know we’re going to be using other people’s money going into it,” on the actual purchase agreement, you could put the buyer is you or your company, whatever you usually put it under, or assignees, if you want to do that. It’s not a deal breaker, but if you did that ahead of time, that would be cool, because an escrow could use it like that. Behind the scenes, for the seller, they never need to know, nor do they usually care.

They don’t care.

It’s really about the money. As long as the dollar amount doesn’t change, that’s all that matters. I would always say, “We have a partner who takes care of the money piece.” That’s it. They don’t know if that person is sitting in your office. Wherever it is, they don’t know. It’s your partner who takes care of the money piece. No problem. As you’re going along, you open escrow. You get a money partner. Let’s say it’s us. I put it in X company name, whatever it is. The escrow says, “That’s fine. We need a new purchase agreement.” You’re like, “No problem.”

All you’re going to do is make a new purchase agreement, swap the name out, and call the seller, “I just want you to know. I’m sending over a new purchase agreement. We’re going to move this into a different company’s name, so I need you to sign that. It’s a DocuSign. When can you get to that?” “I can do it today at 3:00.” “Okay, I’ll watch for it.” It should be that easy. They don’t need to know anything about what went on behind the scenes. That’s all the escrow company needs. No one ever needs to know our relationship, how much money you have or don’t have, what I have or don’t have, or why we’re even doing it. That doesn’t matter. That’s what the seller cares about. They’re going to get paid the amount that you agreed upon on the day that they expect it. That’s it.

Another thing is this. This happens sometimes, where last minute, I’ve been pulled in, “Jill, I need a funder. Something happened with our guy. It’s going to close next week. Can you do this for us?” I look it up. I’m like, “Yes, no problem.” We do the same thing. Here’s what we’re going to put it in. You tell the seller, “We’re changing the entity. We’re putting this in. Here’s a DocuSign.” Again, they don’t know the other guy fell out, and I’m the new guy. Everything goes as normal.

There’s nothing fishy about this. I don’t know. It gets new and Green Escrow agents confused by it. The fact is this. Let’s say Jill and I put under contract a house because we want to buy it and live in it. Halfway through the deal, we realize, “We should put the house in the trust.” That’s the equivalent of it.

It is very common.

I would think most escrow agents wouldn’t say a word at that. The fact is that what we do is we buy it. It is what happens in our group and our environment. It is not just us, but in the Land Academy environment and real estate in general. I’ve got an LLC. That’s the one where all the offers went out. It’s XYZ LLC. This property came up in Montana, and we have a Montana LLC with some other assets in it. “I’m going to take out XYZ and put it in a PDQ. Let’s transfer it now, and then that’ll do the deal. Whatever we need to sign, let us know.” There’s a culture of explanation that escrow agents, a lot of them, especially newer ones, believe that they’re entitled to. They want to get to know you and find out if you’re screwing the world over.

I haven’t had it lately, though.

I know. It has changed.

I haven’t had it as much. I don’t.

Here’s my point. I just want to deliver this point, Jill. Don’t sweat this. We’re not going to buy it in our individual names. We’re going to put it into a trust. Please put it into a trust, Escrow Agent X. Thank you.

That’s it. That was going to be my last piece, too. Whatever it is, Trace and Dave, with confidence, tell the seller we’re changing the name. Tell the escrow person we’re changing the name and here’s a new document.

That is great, Jill.

Thank you.

The Land Academy’s Proven Method For Finding Off-Market Deals (Vs. Alternatives)

This episode’s topic is the best way to find off-market land deals in 2025. If you know a better way to find off-market real estate deals than the following, please let me know. Heavily researching a place where properties are selling to meet your expectations delineates the people who own real estate there, who might be willing to sell. Send an offer to all of them, every single one, in a specifically priced offer that encourages them to call you back. Send those offers out.

A very predictable and consistent number of people will call you back either to A) Yell at you, B) Kiss you, or C) Talk about the price because they do want to sell. They don’t want to adjust the price. If you can’t get a collection of off-market deals that way, there’s something going on. One of those pieces is missing, or more than one. Here are some other ways you can get off-market deals. You can get in your car and drive around a neighborhood. Look at houses and land that look like they’ve fallen down or are unwanted. Go back. Collect all the data, the data you’re going to collect anyway. Send them a letter, or skip trace them and call them. After the tenth call, you’ll never do that again. That’s driving for dollars.

I got to go on record saying to you, what’s so funny is like, “It’s the weeds or whatever. It’s unwanted.” Guess what? So is the property next door that they’ve been lovingly caring for. They don’t want any more either. They just didn’t know they didn’t have to.

Let me finish this thought. Here’s another way you can get off-market deals. You can put up what’s called bandit signs. You’ve probably seen them if you live in a bigger city. You stop at a stoplight. Somebody took a Sharpie and said, “Call this number if you want to sell your house.” None of those ways work. You can send out postcards at $0.05 a pop or whatever. “To whom it may concern or the current resident, we would like to buy your house.” Throw it away. There are a lot of ways that you can get off-market deals. I’ve tried them all. Our way is the best.

What will happen is you’ll get people calling you back, but you haven’t smoked out the price. It’s time-consuming and wasteful for everyone involved when you send a postcard saying, “I want to buy your house.” Someone is like, “$3 million, it’s yours.” You don’t want that call. When you’re thinking $300,000, they’re calling you with a make-me-move number. That’s the thing, too. Can I jump in here?

Yes, sure.

I have three things I want to say. The whole point that Jack’s trying to make, though, is what are we doing? How do you fund these off-market deals of any type? Number one, they do work for any property type. Number two, you’re creating the deal yourself. That’s the point, Jack. You are putting yourself out there, saying who you are with your contact information, what you want to buy, and how much you’re willing to spend, and letting them come back to you in a very respectful, calm way. You’re blanketing a county kind of thing.

How are you finding these off-market deals? First, they work for any property type. Second, you’re creating the deal yourself. Share on X

The third thing I was going to say is, what’s the best way to do these? We’ll show you. We do it at Land. We have the Land Academy. We have the House Academy. We’re here every week to help you and show you the way. We’ve done a lot. Nothing’s better than new members coming in and telling us how great they’re doing. That’s my favorite thing. We have a person in particular. I’m thinking of a strong, successful woman who had a lofty, six-figure goal for herself and hit it in 2024. She’s got a new goal for 2025. She’s on track for that. That’s why we’re here.

If there’s a better way, please let me know. Once in about a month, I get into a conversation, usually with young people who laugh at me and look like I’m a dinosaur. “What do you mean? It’s 2025, and you’re sending mail out in the mail? Do you think there’s a better way? Can you text them, email them, skip trace their number, or get a better data set?” You can do all of those things that are heavily regulated and all end down a path of litigation or some version of an actionable type of lawsuit.

Do you remember the guys in the elevator? I can end on this. It reminds me of these guys in the elevator I was in. We were traveling. I think I was in the library using the internet. I was in the elevator on the way down. These two guys were talking. They happened to be in real estate. He was talking like, “My assistant has figured out a way to get this information and contact these people.” He’s like, “What are you talking about? What do you mean? Do you reach out to them?” He was going along the right steps. It was impressive.

When he was following up with them, I was like, “No, that’s not going to work.” I was sitting there going, “Do I say something? Do I not?” As I was exiting the elevator, I was like, “I have to say it.” I said, “Try this. Do this. It’s only worked 16,000 times for us. That’s all I know.” The door closed. I can’t even imagine what just happened. I was gone. It was funny.

Join us in the next episode where Jill and I talk about Off-Script Friday. We’re going to try it for the first time with Jack and Jill.

It’s a Jack topic. This will be fun.

This was not my suggestion. You are not alone in your real estate ambition. We are Jack and Jill, information and inspiration to buy undervalued property.