This is episode number 2184. Jill and I are talking about how we can reach landowners who are motivated to sell their property below market value. Isn’t this the whole point or the magic to this whole thing?

To us, it’s like, “Duh.” For the planet, it’s like, “We need to unpack this because there’s a lot there. You guys make it sound like it’s so easy.”

This part of it is that easy.

We know how to reach them. It started with you.

Real Estate Market Inefficiency Creates Opportunity

We’ll get into that in a second. I want you to think about this until we get to the topic. Imagine that a share or stock is trading on the NASDAQ or whatever for $100. Somebody calls you and says, “I know you have the share of stock. I’ll give you $30 for it right now,” and you do. That’s a ludicrous thing. Why would someone ever sell a piece of stock or share of stock that’s worth $100 for $30? They wouldn’t.

They wouldn’t because the stock market is what I would call an efficient market. It responds in real-time to pure supply and demand. Real estate is an inefficient market, which creates an incredible amount of opportunity for people like us and, hopefully, for people like you. We’ll talk about this in more detail in a second.

Real estate is an inefficient market, which creates an incredible amount of opportunity for people like us—and hopefully for you as well. Share on X

Mailer Week Outline & Upcoming Topics

All week, I’m calling it mailer week. In this episode, we’re going to talk about how to reach landowners who are motivated to sell their property below market value. On Tuesday, we’ll talk about the power of the right land mailer message. On Wednesday, the power of the neighbor letters comes once you buy property and send a bunch of letters out to people who live close by.

On Thursday, why most people price their land mailers or land offers wrong. Friday, finally, the real cost of sending a land offer campaign mailer. It’s way cheaper than you think. 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.

Success Story: How A Well-Timed Mailer Leads To A Big Deal

Matt wrote, “I got a call today from an estate agent who wants to sell a property that is in probate. The attorney handling the probate told her to call and see if I would extend the period on the contract so that it would be long enough for the probate court to approve the sale. The property is zoned industrial and is worth way more because of it.

There’s another heir who is also in agreement on selling it. I have a call with the attorney to see if I need to list both heirs on the agreement. I sent the regular offer letter with a purchase agreement for this one, but part of me wants to use the contract that I have, which is a little bit more detailed,  so it seems more legit. Am I overthinking this? This may be a five-times-my-money type of deal.” How great is this?

We’ve done this many times.

My knee-jerk response is if they’re not asking for a more in-depth contract, don’t make it more in-depth.

That’s my answer, too.

I love it when you said, “Do you want me to put both of them on there?” I’m assuming the answer is yes.

I would do that anyway. When you sign your name to an agreement, I believe there’s some psychology that begins. This is the beginning of selling this property subconsciously or buying it if you’re the buyer. That’s a race to the finish line.

What a great situation. Matt’s letter and offer in the mail arrived in the middle of all this. The two sellers talked about it and said, “Let’s go. Here’s the situation. Can you wait an extra X number of days while we’re getting the probate done? Then, we’re ready to sell this to you.” I love it.

I do, too.

They don’t even care. They’re not even going to try to slam more money out of it. Whatever. You’re solving this problem.

The Core Strategy: Triggering Motivated Sellers With Mailers

This is why I chose this question specifically, because this is the power of the mail. When you send thousands of letters out, this is the kind of stuff that comes back. Yeah. Sometimes, it’s great. This sounds great. Even if it’s $10,000 and you pull $50,000 out of it 5 times, that’s standup double. Congratulations. I’m glad it’s working out.

The topic is how to reach landowners who are motivated to sell their property below market value. That is the big question. When I’m ever in a social environment and people ask us what our business model is, I quite simply say, “We buy a piece of real estate and sell it for more.” Everybody stops what they’re doing. They stop all their conversations and say, “What’s that all about? I want to do that.” It doesn’t matter if they own their own jet. They want to hear what this is about.

In its most basic form, that’s what this topic is all about. It’s how you get to those people on the buy side. Everybody knows the sell side. If you get a piece of property that’s undervalued, you list it on the MLS against all the other properties in the market. If it’s a nice piece of dirt and it’s priced very well or priced below the rest of the properties that are like-kind or worse, you’re going to sell it quickly. That’s our business model. How do you get these landowners? How do you reach the landowners who are motivated to sell? They’re usually motivated to sell before they get our letter. Our letter is the trigger point.

Landowners are usually motivated to sell before they even receive our letter. Our letter simply flips the switch. Share on X

That’s a good point.

The gun’s already loaded. Our letter pulls the trigger. Is that bad?

I don’t know. I’m not sure. The YouTube comments section will let us know if that was over the line or not. I prefer to say they’re warmed up to the idea. They get our letter and are like, “Heck yeah,” and then pick up the phone.

The popcorn machine has popcorn in it. Our letter turns the switch on. Is that better?

Yeah, it’s much better.

Is it more rated G?

That’s much better. That’s good. Even though we have the G rating on here, I hope you know. Give me more.

Why Direct Mail Still Works: Targeted Outreach Beats Mass Marketing

How do you reach anybody who wants to drink a Pepsi? Pepsi, for a million years, has been, “We’re going to do some amazing Super Bowl commercials. People, over time, when we barrage them with enough messages, will consciously or subconsciously drink Pepsi.” That’s unfortunately or fortunately true, depending on how you look at it.

We have chosen not to carpet bomb the entire world with this message. What we like to do is narrow down who we think is a logical seller through database manipulation and scrubbing. We have a good, clean list of, first, everybody who owns a property that I would think I would want to purchase, and we send them a letter in the mail.

Some people are like, “Jack, it’s the 21st century. A quarter of the 21st century is over. You’re going to send somebody something in the mail?” Yes. I started my career, without boring everybody in a grandfather-type way, by sending automated faxes overnight to people who owned long-term care facilities. It was an overnight success. It proved to be incredibly efficient from a time standpoint, a money standpoint, and all of it.

I would send a fax, at the time, to the closed database of about 12,000 facilities in the country. I could send 2,000 or 3,000 faxes a night. In the morning, there were several phone calls waiting. The faxes said, “Do you want to sell your building?” I would get phone calls the next day, and we would quickly put deals together.

I reached the right people. I sent it to every building owner. Some people called back angry. Some people said, “I’ll do it for the right price.” Some people flat out said yes because we caught them on the right day. There is no difference between what I did there to what I do now. It’s 35 years later. The vehicle is mail. Can you send faxes anymore legally? No. That was way before spam laws. Can you send emails and texts? No, not legally.

That’s the thing.

There are more efficient ways to communicate now. In the future, probably at some point, this will be replaced with something. For the moment, this is an incredibly efficient, effective, and predictable way to do it.

One of the things that we don’t talk about, and what you’re saying made me think of it, is having in your hands a tangible piece of paper that you have to get your pen out and sign says versus a fax or a text. Think of a text that says, “I want to buy your house,” or whatever, versus a letter in the mail with my signature on it and a place for you to sign. That’s powerful. I don’t know if we’re going to talk more about that in the next episodes.

People sell their real estate below market value because they're experiencing a life event. Share on X

We are. We’re going to cover all of this in separate topics. The natural human response that Jill and I have been getting after ten years of instructing Land Academy is, “How can we make this mailer a little smaller? I want to send out ten letters and do a deal.” I do, too.

People are like, “Why do you guys send out so much mail?” It’s because we need to.

In the question, this guy, Matt, reached somebody whose property was in an estate scenario or a probate scenario. The owner died, and they’re probating all the assets. The heirs are going to get the assets, and they’re going to sell them all, probably, or keep the ones they want. If I sat around and said, “People who are in probate, I don’t think they should get a letter from me. I’m going to make my mailer smaller. I’m not going to reach them.” It’s all about reaching everyone who’s logical. Everyone who owns land could be a logical seller and reach those people. You don’t know what their situation is.

If you’re new to this, Jill and I have said this a million times. I’ll end on this. People sell their real estate under value because they’re experiencing a life event or they want full-blown convenience. Jill and I, as sellers, have been in both of those cases. I would argue that probably everybody reading has knowingly sold an asset, even if it’s in a garage sale, way under value because you want to get rid of it, you’re tired of it, you’re tired of looking at it, your wife’s telling you about it, and all of that. It may be a car.

Reach these people through the mail very consistently. Send out mailers every two weeks or every month or so, and you will get motivated sellers. They’re already motivated sellers. They received your letter that day. Join us in the next episode where Jill and I talk about the power of the right land mailer message. You are not alone in your real estate ambition. We are Jack and Jill, information and inspiration to buy undervalued property.