Land Academy Show

Professional Land Acquisitions Step by Step (LA 759) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. Entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting back in beautiful southern California today. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about professional land acquisitions, a step by step approach, and here's what you have to look forward to. The way Jill and I buy and sell land, and the people in our group buy property is the single best way, hands down, to buy real estate for anyone. It is the same way that real estate investment trusts buy property. It's the same way ... I used to work for these kooks, so I learned all of this ... it's hard for me to quantify it. We're exposing the whole industry, quite honestly. Jill DeWit: Well maybe we should just stop right now. Steven Butala: Stop the show right now? Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: Why? Jill DeWit: I'm joking. Steven Butala: What does that mean? Jill DeWit: I'm joking. Giving away all our secrets? Steven Butala: No, no. Jill DeWit: That's what it sounds like you were meaning. Steven Butala: No, I'm just saying, there's no better way to buy real estate. This is how the big guys do it, too. Before we get into it, let's take a question, posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Katrina asks two questions. Question one, "I have a land deal I'm selling via land contract. I have a few questions about the land contract closing process. Number one, do you record land contract? Two, if you don't record the land contract, do you record an affidavit of the land contract so the terms of the deal can be hidden? Three, do you not record anything at all?" So that's part of question one. Do you want me to answer the whole thing, or do you want to answer that first? Steven Butala: I'll answer these, okay. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: Right now. There's a second part of the question, that's why Jill says that. "Number one, do you record the land contract?" That entirely and completely depends on what state it's in. If it's Arizona, no. Her second part of her question is, "If you don't record the land contract, do you record an affidavit?" Again, it depends on where you are, and the answer is no in Arizona and California, and pretty much out west. Colorado's got some strange laws, but you have to really ... my point in all this is you've gotta check- Jill DeWit: Depends on the county. Steven Butala: What the rules are. And number three, she says, "Do you record anything at all?" We don't. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: It all gets recorded when the last payment's made. Jill DeWit: My way of looking at this kind of thing, is I only record things that I absolutely have to, or when I'm completely done with the transaction, and I want to be out, removed from any tax liabilities. Not that it matters, but just have it all up to date, recorded the right way. So anything that I'm ... any special circumstance that I have made available to my buyer, I like to keep it between my buyer and me, until we're all done and everything's cool, because you know what?

Land Investment Opportunity Zip Code by Zip Code (LA 758) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 beautiful San Francisco, California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about land investment opportunity zip code by zip code. Hey, it's like Fourth of July today, right? Jill DeWit: Fourth of July, I was just going to say Yay! Happy Fourth of July. I wonder how many people are listening because no one's going to work today. Steven Butala: Yeah, so either a lot of people are listening, or they have better stuff to do, Jill DeWit: Exactly. Maybe they're all listening around the barbecue to this show right now with a beer in their hand- Steven Butala: That'd be good. Jill DeWit: ... and a red, white, and blue hat. Steven Butala: Maybe they're on the land that they bought- Jill DeWit: Celebrating. Steven Butala: ... cooking hot dogs with that- Jill DeWit: I'd love it. Steven Butala: ... worn-out baseball hat, and just a hat full of happiness because they saved half price on the property they have. Jill DeWit: I think that's awesome. Steven Butala: I do, too. Before I paint a different picture like that, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Nat asks, "Hi, guys. I have a deal that I'm about to pull the trigger on, but it's a step out of my traditional purchase criteria. I bought all small info lots up until now, about 20 total. Steven Butala: Good for you. Jill DeWit: This one is $10,000 for 10 acres and without physical access. I did make a three to four minute video so you can see, to make it easy for you. If you don't mind watching it and letting me know if it's an issue, or if you think that it's fine, and if you have any advice on final due diligence that I should complete before proceeding." He put in here, this is so great, the video link so everyone on that thread could look at the video and look at the property and all that good stuff. Steven Butala: I've watched it, and Jill hasn't, and that's okay. Jill DeWit: Do you want me to keep reading? Steven Butala: Yes, absolutely. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: I'll talk about it at the end. Jill DeWit: Okay. Now it goes on to say, "Here are some side questions that I have. The seller says it's behind a locked gate, so I don't know if I'll be able to get a photographer in there before we open escrow. Does that concern anyone? I think it's fine, but I'd like photos before it's closed, or at least before it's listed. What other due diligence would you do? I plan to double-check what the deal is with the wells in the area, septic in the area, and zoning. Taxes are okay, and I'm closing with title. Thanks, Matt." Steven Butala: All right, Matt, I watched the video, and I think it's a fantastic property in a fantastic county, in California I think it is. I think that, in a different situation, it could be a multi-million dollar property. I think it's got some elevation issues that you probably can get around. It looks to me like it's got legal access, but not physical access because of this gate situation. I'm not going to give you just an absolutely you shouldn't do it,

Land Investment Opportunity County by County (LA757) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from beautiful San Francisco, California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about Land Investment Opportunity County By County. Yesterday we talked about it state by state. All week this week, it's land investment by the numbers, let's say. Before get in to the topic, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Cathleen asks, "I'm about to post my listings on Land Watch. I have them posted everywhere else including my website. Looking at Land Watch, I came across a very similar parcel in the same county listed by Land Century. Okay. No problem. As I was reading the description, it all seemed very familiar. Apparently, whomever at Land Century that wrote the description for their parcel actually copied word-for-word my description for my parcel from my website and Craigslist listings with all the taglines and descriptive phrases. The only thing they changed was the legal description. Literally everything copied word-for-word. Granted, our written descriptions [inaudible 00:01:17] protected. Or, are they? If the content was developed by me and published on my website with no usage rights indicated, do I actually own it? Other than being pretty irked by this, I feel like I need to rewrite my description before advertising on Land Watch. However, I have the parcel advertised all over the place and really don't want to go back and change all the listing because Land Century decided to lift my descriptions." Thoughts? Steven Butala: Yeah, here's my thoughts. You have enough to do. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Here's how I see this- Steven Butala: And, I think you were there first, so it's their bad, not yours. Can you go after them? Probably not. Jill DeWit: Here's how I see this. Copying that, it really is sincerely the best form of flattery. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: They really did. I would not go change it. Steven Butala: No. Jill DeWit: I wouldn't even care. Steven Butala: Me, either. Jill DeWit: You know what's great? It's like, obviously, they can't write their own descriptions. You're obviously killing it. We know that one. Who's to say, by the way, every buyer that comes along, hopefully they're reading yours first. I'm going to trust that. You know what? If you have the exact same size property and everything like that, undercut them by 50 bucks. Steven Butala: Yeah, for sure. Jill DeWit: Just do that. Steven Butala: Yeah, I would spend more time adjusting the price than anything else. Jill DeWit: Exactly. It'll sing to them. Steven Butala: You ever notice that recently, in the last few years, you hear all these bands remaking old songs? What happened was the trademark laws changed that you don't have to get permission. This person didn't break the law. What they're supposed to do is pay royalties, so that's why bands can just go copy another person's song. They don't even need permission, but they do have to pay them a percentage. There's a very- Jill DeWit: How do you know this stuff? Steven Butala: I don't know. Isn't that sad?

Land Investment Opportunity State by State (LA756) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting this time from beautiful San Diego ... Excuse me. San Francisco, California. How funny is that? Steven Butala: Today Jill and I ... We're having so much fun she doesn't know where we are. Jill DeWit: I don't know where we are. Steven Butala: That's really what's happening. Jill DeWit: Yep. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about land investment opportunity, state by state. I'll call off the states. We'll talk a little bit ... Like for example, is Montana a good place to start buying and selling land? Is Ohio? Jill DeWit: Idaho. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: New Mexico. This'll be fun. Steven Butala: It should be fun yeah. Jill DeWit: I love it. Steven Butala: It should be not boring. Everybody has to live in a state or two. Jill DeWit: They do. It helps. Steven Butala: Turns out, I have a lot to say about this. Just like most things. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Before we get into the topic today though, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Nick asks, "I relisted and sold a property this Friday afternoon to someone that happened to be a neighbor." Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "Real nice guy. Excited to get the property. Met him at the bank, and closed the deal. He went to the property today, which is Sunday to discover that the defaulted buyer has his truck, fifth wheel and dog on the property, so he is squatting. I never knew he was living on the property and don't think he moved on until after he defaulted. I called the sheriff's department to go kick him out, but the deputy called me back and said it was a civil matter and I needed to foreclose on him by filing through the William Justice Court. Is the deputy wrong and just being lazy? Or do I need to get a court order to vacate? He said it was a landlord/tenant issue. The property's in my name, he was going to get deeded the property after the final payment in full was made. I have the original copies of all the paperwork, including all electronic correspondence. I'm no lawyer, but it seems that he is criminally trespassing on property and the sheriff's department should remove him." Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "I was under the impression that by using a land sale contract, it negated the need to go through foreclosure." Steven Butala: That's correct. Jill DeWit: "I would appreciate any insight on this issue from anyone that has dealt with this issue before in ...", do you want me to say the county? Steven Butala: In a northern county in Arizona let's say. Jill DeWit: There we go. "I'm meeting with the buyer tomorrow night after work to give him his money back." Aww. Steven Butala: Aww. That's the real tragedy there. Jill DeWit: Yeah. I hate hearing that. Steven Butala: Me too. Jill DeWit: What do you recommend? Steven Butala: I'm not an attorney either. I have to say, this is a very, very rare situation. If you're a new person listening,

Grow Your Wealth by Buying Related Companies (LA 755) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 beautiful South Lake Tahoe, we've been here all week. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about growing your wealth by buying related companies, related to real estate and online sales potentially. We're going to go through a few companies that we've purchased that worked out great for us, and we're going to go through a few that are no longer in operation for a lot of reasons. Jill DeWit: And ones that you've talked about that I've pleasantly reminded you "Do we really want to go there?" Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Ariel asks: "I've been looking at listings to get a feel for prices in some California counties. Looking for lower priced areas and smaller parcels for an offer of $500,000, could be 10 to 20% of resale value. I'm finding parcels that meet this are small and way out of in southern California desert areas, which seems like there is a lack of attributes. Can offers as low as $500,000 work in areas that I see are listed at much higher prices? What's been your highest resell value for an offer this low? Thanks for your help." Steven Butala: This is a great question, Ariel. Jill DeWit: I love it. Steven Butala: I mean it. There are a lot of people that come into our group, and for whatever reason they receive this message from me, and I do the best I can do undo this message, for some reason they get this. You can buy property anywhere for $500, because people just sign the offers, they just want $500, and they don't really care about their $350,000 [inaudible 00:01:47] lot in Hollywood. That couldn't be further from the truth. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: It's just not. You're wasting their time, you're wasting your time and money on postage, and, no. Can you buy $500 to a $1,000 quarter-acre lots in California City? Maybe. But do you really want to? You want to buy a $1,000 lot and resell it on the internet for $1,500 constantly? It's a long road to retirement. Does it work? Possibly. Once in a great while you're gonna get somebody who signs it and sends it, and everything works, and, yeah, and you do well. But, you would do much, much, much better, and I say this truthfully ... I use $500 in the example in chapter five in the first Land Academy program, and I think that's where this message gets convoluted. That's for practicing, just do a few deals like that just so you can understand the process, and make sure it's something you want to do, make sure you can handle some of the backlash or the hate that you get from some angry sellers, because it all happens, and everybody needs to be aware of it. Jill doesn't let me talk about it on the show too much. Jill DeWit: Oh, it's fine. It's not that big of a deal. Steven Butala: But once you're done ... The most successful people in our group buy 30, 40, 50, $60,000 properties and sell them for $120,000. Jill DeWit: Or even a $1,000 property, or even like a couple thousand dollar property- Steven Butala: Like $5,000. Jill DeWit: Yeah, let's say $3,000, $4,000, sell it for $12,000, those are great things people do all day long. I don't ... I guess ... yeah. I think you're getting a little- Steven Butala: It's too low-

No One Finds New Acquisition Markets like You Do (LA 754) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello! Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWitt, broadcasting from gorgeous South Lake Tahoe. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about no one finds new acquisition markets like you do. This is so important, Jill, because what this show is really about is confidence-building. So, when people are brand-new, it's like, "Oh, I sent this mailer out. It's been out there for two weeks. I wonder if I did it wrong. If I could just ..." or they say something like this. "Oh, great, Steve and Jill have a fantastically-profitable business. Congratulations. I can't do it, because I don't know what a good acquisition market is!" Well, that's a bunch of malarkey. You absolutely know what a great ... and, if you've made it this far, and you're listening to this show, or even if you're a member, you innately know about real estate, and you already know you can make a fortune doing this. So, I bet you a dollar you know what your house is worth, or you know how much land is worth two counties over. You know a lot more than you think. That's my point. So, my point is, nobody can find new acquisition markets like you do, because you're coming to it from a unique set of eyes, and a unique concept; and I love this concept, because it's like releasing the stuff inside of you that you didn't even know was there. Jill DeWit: The releasing the stuff inside of you. Steven Butala: Oh, my gosh. You're so derogatory! Jill DeWit: Wow! I sorry! I know! I'm like, "Wow! I could really ... There's a lot I could do with that that I'm not going to." Steven Butala: Wow, let's cut her off there. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Steven Butala: Before we get into this, let's take a question posted by one of our members on thelandacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Reid asks, "Currently, I'm in the process of evaluating 2.25 acre lots-" Steven Butala: Quarter-acre lots. Jill DeWit: "... in a small, downtown, low-income area of town. I have offered to pay their back taxes of $70 and $300, respectively, to acquire their land. As I look at these properties in-depth, comps that have sold are between $11,000 and $26,000 for approximately 800 square foot San Francisco homes." Okay. Steven Butala: Hold on a second. The houses are selling in San Francisco for 26 grand? I'm confused. Go ahead- Jill DeWit: Comps? Yeah, I'm curious, too. I wonder what the specific area is. In San Francisco County? I don't even think it's- Steven Butala: Maybe San Francisco County. Jill DeWit: Is it San Francisco County? Or is that ... I think it's a different county name. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "My question is as follows. If the cost per square foot for homes-" Steven Butala: Oh, $11,000 for foot? No, no, no. Go ahead, Jill. Jill DeWit: That could be. "If the cost per square foot for homes in this area-" Steven Butala: Oh, okay. Jill DeWit: "... is around $20, am I wasting my time acquiring these properties, even if they are as cheap as $70 a parcel? If I resell the property to a builder, I'm assuming it's near impossible to build a home of this size, and make a profit. If anyone has any insight on a similar situation, I would really appreciate it. Thanks." Steven Butala: Okay, so,

Recruiting is Your New Full Time Job (LA 753) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show. Entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit. Broadcasting today from gorgeous sunny south Lake Taco, Tahoe. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about recruiting is your new full-time job. Jill DeWit: Oh, I love it too. Steven Butala: What does that mean? Jill DeWit: Isn't that great. Steven Butala: What it means is this: Congratulations, you've done enough deals, and this is now your career, buying and selling real estate, and you need some help. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: I mean, man, is getting the right help imperative to making this a full-time gig. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: We are literally at 11 to 1. For every 11 people we hire, 1 person sticks. It's tough. So we're gonna talk a little bit in the show about what we've learned. We're gonna share the positive stuff, and some of the negative stuff, and hopefully you can learn from it. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm. Steven Butala: Before we do that let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Sarah asks, "Hi all, when selling a property I typically send the deed straight to the county recorder for my buyers, but occasionally they request I send it straight to them, or I've met a few people who purchase lots locally and gave them the deed. There were around eight people who just never got the deed recorded, and I continue to get their tax bill. Some are about to lose the property. I've contacted all of them letting them know a few times, but I don't want to spend much time on it. A few just lost the paperwork, so I would resend it, but I was wondering how often do any of you all buy back the lots from people? One of the guys who bought locally called this week and said he's low on cash and would sell it back to me for half what he paid for the property. Well then got-" Steven Butala: We met. Jill DeWit: "We met, sorry. Got the notarized deeds back and I paid the taxes on it, and will resale. Can't complain about that. Does this happen to many of you, and do you find it usually a cash thing, and people are willing to sell it back to you? Thanks." Steven Butala: I love when people ask questions and then they answer it for themselves. Jill DeWit: This is true. Steven Butala: This is exactly what we do. You can bank on 5 to 15% of the properties that you deed to other people, they just never record the deed. What you don't want to do is sell it again for, and I'm not going to go into why. There's a thousand reasons why you shouldn't do that. But, if you wanna send them a check. Jill DeWit: Can I back up on this here? Steven Butala: We just pay them for the back taxes is what we do sometimes, go ahead Jill. Jill DeWit: That was confusing to me, so I wanna reiterate. So what we're saying is, these examples are people that didn't record the deed. So they said, "No just send it to me, and I'll get it to the county," or maybe that's your policy. Your policy is, you send them out the completed deed with the recording instructions for them to then turn around and mail it to the county, get it all recorded. And now, the transaction's over with. So there's two parts to talk about here. So,

Planning for Retirement: Working Numbers Backwards (LA 752) Transcript: Jill DeWit: Jill and Steven here. Steven Butala: Take it away, Jill. Jill DeWit: Jill and Steven here. Steven Butala: Hi. Jill DeWit: Welcome to The Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Jill DeWit with ... Steven Butala: I'm Steven Jack Butala broadcasting from Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Jill DeWit: Yay. Today, Steven and I talk about Planning for Retirement: Working the Numbers Backwards. Steven Butala: Exactly, Jill. Jill DeWit: This is show want 752. Amazing. Steven Butala: Spoiler alert. We're going to talk about math. We're going to say things like this, "Well, I need five million bucks to retire, so I don't have to work anymore." We're going to divide by 12. $166,000 a month, and then divide by ... No, it's a math situation. Jill DeWit: Am I going to need a notepad and a calculator for this? Steven Butala: No. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: This is 35,000 foot discussion. This is the fun stuff. Jill DeWit: Okay. Great. Steven Butala: There's no hard work here. Jill DeWit: All right. Well, this is all part of this whole topic this week, which is: Your Real Estate Investment Career. Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Steven Butala: Luke asks, "Have any of you used a property tax reduction service? If so, which one would you recommend?" This is a great question, Luke. Probably Luke Smith, right? Jill DeWit: I'm guessing. Steven Butala: Here's the deal. All over the country ... and there's different laws in every state, and sometimes there's municipal laws, where you are allowed to and usually encouraged by the people at the county to contest your property tax bill. It doesn't happen too much for the rural vacant land, because literally the property taxes are $10 a year or 20, or even a couple thousand, which is really no big deal. I'll tell you, on a primary residence, let's say in California, you can actually go before a judge and say, "Look, I just don't think that this increase in my property taxes is justified, and here's why." The numbers are staggeringly in your favor. My parents, my mother specifically, did this every single year from like 1980 on. She got to know the judge literally, because there was a real small community in a suburb in Michigan. She won every single time. They became friends. Jill DeWit: Well, let's be honest. They often don't know, and I think you're right, I think that they encourage and appreciate you coming to them and you have do your homework, have to have comps in the area, really showing that, "Here's why I think my house is only worth X. This one two doors down sold for this. This one across the street sold for that. This is why I would really like you to please revisit the assessment value here, and let's get these numbers back in line." If you have some good comps, there's nothing they can say. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: It's funny how many people, A, don't know you can do that. Steven Butala: Exactly. Jill DeWit: And, B, don't take the time to do that. I have to tell you, I honestly ... I'm going to admit this. I didn't know that there was a service that I could give properties to, and they would do this for me. I think this is brilliant. It makes me think of,

Accumulating Equity in Real Estate Wholesaling (LA 751) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. Entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting today from beautiful sunny, gorgeous, south Lake Tahoe. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: I am looking out the window at this view, Steven, and it's breathtaking. Steven Butala: Jill and I are on vacation, but sort of not. This is what we always do. Jill DeWit: Here we are recording on vacation. Steven Butala: We're recording on vacation, we're having a lot of fun, and we're looking at real estate. This has been our life since we met. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: It turns out, this is long before we even started Land Academy. It turns out people have some fascination with this. Jill DeWit: What? Real estate? Steven Butala: Just with our silly little way we do stuff. It still just cracks me up. Jill DeWit: This is true. Steven Butala: Lake Tahoe in Neva ... I mean Devada, has a zero percent income tax. You don't file a ... I don't know if you do file a tax return here or not. Jill DeWit: There's no state income tax. Steven Butala: California's is 13%. If you make a million dollars in real estate, you pay $130,000. Jill DeWit: In income taxes. Steven Butala: In income tax in California. You pay exactly zero in Nevada. Nevada's actual real estate, property tax rate is literally higher than California's. Properties cost so much less that it ends up being, from a money standpoint, way less. Jill DeWit: It works out. Steven Butala: That's why we're here. Jill DeWit: Yes. Steven Butala: Plus we're not suffering from lack of fun. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Thank you. Steven Butala: Before we get into the topic ... Oh, today's topic is accumulating equity in real estate wholesaling. Wow. Could that be any more generic? Jill DeWit: Oh my goodness. Exactly. Steven Butala: I wrote the title. Jill DeWit: I'm sure we have a lot of listeners that sought that out. Steven Butala: I promise you we will make this fun. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: I promise. Jill DeWit: You promise me? Steven Butala: Yep. Jill DeWit: Okay, thank you. Steven Butala: I promise the three or four people that are listening to this, I promise. Jill DeWit: Oh, good. Steven Butala: Before we get into the topic, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Andrew asked, "I'm having trouble targeting an area by APNs for my next mailer that I entered into CoreLogic with RealQuest Pro," which we provide. "I was wondering if someone else had experienced sending mailers out by APN. How successful and resourceful is it? What is the next best option?" I mean, do you want to explain an APN? Steven Butala: Yeah, assessor parcel number. What he's doing is probably taking one of the suggestions that I've been making over the years,

Planning for Inevitable Real Estate Recessions (LA 750) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk, we hope. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I love that, "We hope it's entertaining." And, I'm Jill DeWit broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about planning for the inevitable real estate recessions, plural. Jill DeWit: Like, how many are we planning for? Steven Butala: All of them. Jill DeWit: Oh. Steven Butala: This is some good stuff. Jill DeWit: Do you mean because of different areas? You mean different decades? Steven Butala: Different decades, so it happens between every 12 and 15 years, really tied to investment ... availability of capital, more than anything, and predatory lending. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: There's all kinds of ways that you can see into the crystal ball, and a lot of them have to do with tracking really large home builders. It's really simple stuff, if you just put it in your calendar to look at it every week, spend five minutes, you can see the downturn coming. Jill DeWit: Such an interesting time right now, because the unemployment rate is so low, so people obviously have money, they have jobs, so that's why the interest rates just went up. Is this trigger A of 10, trigger one of 10? Steven Butala: Yeah. There are more jobs now than there are- Jill DeWit: There- Steven Butala: Go ahead. Jill DeWit: Yeah, there are more available jobs than there are unemployed people. Steven Butala: Right, that's the first time that's happened in our lifetime ... in my lifetime. Jill DeWit: Exactly, so it's harder to hire. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: The people that don't have jobs, there's a reason why they don't have a job. Steven Butala: Right, but we actually have to do a show here. Jill DeWit: Oh, yes. Steven Butala: Before we actually get into it let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Tim asked: "I'm located outside of the USA. Should I set-up a virtual mailbox in the USA for sellers to mail the signed acceptance letter of my offer, or do you think they will mail to my location in Canada? I want to remove all the barriers that could prevent customers from accepting my offer. However, I'm not sure if using a virtual mailbox presents any other issues down the road for this type of business. I would appreciate if you would provide any direction. Thanks." Steven Butala: Yeah, so I covered this in the first Land Academy education program, and we, also, ... Jill and I have live events, which we don't probably talk about enough. Jill DeWit: We do this year now. Steven Butala: This is how to set-up your whole entire business, not just this little part of it. I cover all that. To directly answer your question, we have a mailbox. We have a virtual mailbox, and here's why: because we have sent letters. I've been sending ... millions and millions of letters have gone out- Jill DeWit: Since the '90s. Steven Butala: Since, the early 2000s ... Man, we still get some of those signed letters back fro...

Choosing the Right Business Partner (LA 749) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about choosing the right business partner. Jill DeWit: Not life partner. Steven Butala: Well, it's gonna become that. Jill DeWit: Business partner. Steven Butala: Both of us said right before this show, "I have a lot to say." Jill DeWit: Ha. Steven Butala: So we both have a lot to say. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: It's all good stuff. Before we get into the show though, let's take a question posted by one of the members, one of our members on thelandacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: J.T. asks, "Hey all, I've been investing here in Texas over the past year, and have done well, picked up around 10 properties"- Steven Butala: No he's speaking like a Texan ... he's typing like a Texan ... "Texas over the past year and I have done picked up around 10 properties, selling them all for cash"- Jill DeWit: Oh! Okay. "Recently, however, I have become very interested in terms properties. It seems like, here in Texas, you can sell a property on financing, but the deed will go into the buyers name and you would hold the note like a bank. I really like the sound of the Arizona land contract that Jack and Jill have talked about on the podcast. My understanding is that you have the contract and don't deed the property until the full amount of the terms have been paid." True. "My only concern is just that because of the successful mail campaigns of Land Academy members the market in Arizona might be over-saturated as far as cheap rural land is concerned. I might be entirely off-base with this, but my question is: Has anyone over in Arizona sold properties on very friendly terms, I.e. $99 down, $99 a month, and if so have you found it sells quicker than all cash? Additionally, has anyone sold properties on terms in any other states that you do a land contract similar to Arizona? Appreciate any response or any opinions on this." Steven Butala: Okay, here's the deal. There are two types of ways ... two ways to sell property on terms. Land contract which he's calling the Arizona way. And a deed of trust which is how you usually purchase a house. You buy the property it gets put in your name and there's a lien on it and the bank holds the lien until it's paid off. Those are ... local laws and rules dictate which way you do it. In Arizona, it's legal to do it both ways, but there's ramifications for both ways, like everywhere. In some places, it's not legal to do it the land contract way or it's not allowed. Is it enforced? No. Do you drive 75 in a 65 every single day? Yep. It's the same thing. Jill DeWit: Isn't that funny? Steven Butala: Am I advocating breaking the law? No, I'm not advocating breaking the law. What I'm advocating ... I'm just here to tell ya the truth. And I want you to check into it before you go gun slinging 'cause you're in Texas. Jill DeWit: You bring up a valid point. You need to be aware of everything, slash, however, whatever agreement ... it's like if I wanted to sell my brother-in-law my car and I accept $100 a month for 3 years or whatever it is that's between us. Steven Butala: Yeah, well, you're probably breaking the law.

Diversifying Your Real Estate Investment Company (LA 748) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala ... Jill DeWit: ... and I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about diversifying your real estate investment company; why it's so important to keep growing, but then branching out into doing your things. And the real reason is, as much as you really think it, that things are going to change, there's always somebody who figures something out that's younger, and more aggressive, and willing to replace you, or attempt to replace you. It's just the way human nature is. So, if you have six, or seven, or 10, or 12 lines of income coming in in all different markets around the country, it's just that your chances of- Jill DeWit: Safe. Steven Butala: ... success are so much higher. Jill DeWit: Exactly. And if one thing goes sideways, or one area, who knows? You have 11 others to carry. Steven Butala: And here's the good news. I mean, like we said yesterday, if you can buy rural vacant land inexpensively and resell it, I mean, the world's your oyster. You can do it with houses, then. You can do it with info-lots. You can do it with apartment buildings, or lots. Jill DeWit: Big ranches. Steven Butala: Or ranches! Yeah. So, that's the good news. You've figured the first one's the hardest. Jill DeWit: Yep. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, though, let's take a question posted by one of our members on thelandacademy.com online community. It's free; and, before Jill reads the question, I'm going to share a sentence that Jill said to me right before we started recording. "Can you tone down the negative relationship stuff? It's not as funny as you think." You know what that makes me want to do? Jill DeWit: Tune it up- Steven Butala: ... Kick it up three notches, yeah. Jill DeWit: Oh, that's not good. That's really not good to relate ... Let me give you some relationship advice. Don't do that. Steven Butala: Because I love you, I will not talk about the negative aspects of a relationship this entire episode. Jill DeWit: Save it for the Steve Bashes show. Steven Butala: Oh, we need a Steve Bash show! Jill DeWit: Yeah. Then you can save it for that. That would be fine. Steven Butala: All right. That's great. Jill DeWit: I'm okay. You can do that anytime you want, and I won't be here. Okay. Brandon asks, "Hey! Haven't been on in a while," meaning in our online community. "Super busy with that last mailer hitting. I sent out 1,600 mailer-slash-units, and I got six hate voicemails, four counter-offers that might be reasonable, four-" Steven Butala: Jeez! Jill DeWit: "... signed agreements that died during due diligence, and eight accepted purchase agreements. I have picked the two I liked best, and I am closing soon. Hope to make 300% ROI on terms with them. So far, so good. The rest, I can't buy. I don't have any more cash! Thought I would offer up the contracts. I want $500 each. I have looked at each, and estimated what I think they are worth, but take that with a grain of salt. I'm still new. If I'm way off, please help me know,

Why You should be Working on Acquisitions Only (LA 747) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steven and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill Dewitt, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about why you should we be working on acquisitions only. This week, the theme is, so you've done a thousand deals, you're past that thousand deal mark, what do you do now? Jill DeWit: What do you do? What do you do? I would like to personally know. Steven Butala: You know what I do? Jill DeWit: Yeah. What do you do? Steven Butala: Very little, because that's what you should be doing. That's what ... Thank you, Jill. This is exactly what this show is about. You should only be working on acquisitions, because you figured everything else out. Everybody else is gonna do the heavy lifting for you. You know there's a lot of places on this planet, in this country, where that gets frowned upon. Jill DeWit: What? Steven Butala: Like, here's a cliche that I'd never understood. "Oh, you so you get other people to do your dirty work." Yeah, I get other people do my dirty work. Jill DeWit: It's called staff. Steven Butala: Why would I do my dirty work? Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Why would I do any work in fact? Jill DeWit: Yeah, if I own the company. Steven Butala: If I'm smart enough to do startup, I'm smart enough to look in the mirror and say, "I'm actually probably better than everyone else." This has always just, this is what this show is gonna be about. Jill DeWit: That's hilarious. Steven Butala: Is it conceded or cocky? I don't know. I don't think so. Jill DeWit: No. Steven Butala: I just, I've never struggled with this concept. Yeah. I'm smarter than everybody else or maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm not smarter, I just make different decisions that everybody. Jill DeWit: That could be too. Steven Butala: I'm not gonna do any work. I'm gonna price my mailers, and then I'm going to go out on the boat. That's what I do. Jill DeWit: I know that. I know that. I have a secret to share about you have, which is fun. Not only are you so good at doing your job, I mean you have it down to where, this is great, you spend a lot of time, like once a month- Steven Butala: Once a month. Jill DeWit: -and that's it. Steven Butala: I spend one day. I spend one day, once a month doing all the mailers for the whole month. Jill DeWit: So I'm sure a lot of people, like Monday might be acquisition day, Monday might be getting their mailer together or something, I don't know, pulling the data and everything for that next week and they do it every single week. Well imagine this, spend more time on it and do it once a month. Spend two days once a month, and then you're really can coast, which is really fun. Steven Butala: I spend more time on this podcast than I do on the mail. Jill DeWit: That is true. Steven Butala: And this podcast makes exactly $0. Jill DeWit: I love it. That's true. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on t...

So You Have Completed 1000 Deals Now What (LA 746) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about "So You've Completed 1,000 Deals, Now What?" In fact, that's the theme for this week. You've completed 1,000 deals, now what. Jill DeWit: You know- Steven Butala: Here's the truth of the matter, Jill. If you've completed 1,000 deals, and we have a lot of people in our group who have, we certainly have, you're probably not listening to this. Jill DeWit: Ha. Steven Butala: You're done. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: You're done with us. Jill DeWit: You're done with us. Steven Butala: All you do is you maintain your membership with us probably because ... well for sure because you need- Jill DeWit: You need the tools. Steven Butala: You need the tools, and specifically, access to the cheapest, best data on the planet- Jill DeWit: And you're sending mail. Steven Butala: And printing. Yeah. Jill DeWit: And you're doing your due diligence, or at least your team is. Steven Butala: And you know more than we do. Jill DeWit: Ha. Steven Butala: And you're smart enough not to have your own show. Jill DeWit: I would like to say one of the things that I want to talk about when we get into the meat of the show is the 1,000 deals, it's sneaks up on you. Like, this show. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Today's show is 746. Steven Butala: Yep. Jill DeWit: That sneaks up on you. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: You know? Steven Butala: A lot of stuff sneaks up on you, you know? Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: Like, this big belly I have snuck on me. Jill DeWit: I was just going to ... that's not funny. I was going to say like a saggy butt. Okay. Got it. Steven Butala: Before we get into our failing bodies, let's take a question posted by one of our members on our Land Academy online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Matt asks, "I'm getting a very good response on my infill lot mailer in Middle, Tennessee-" Steven Butala: So were we, actually. Jill DeWit: "And have closed on one-" Steven Butala: A huge response. Jill DeWit: "I have one other option: I have three currently in the title process about the close. I'm buying between $3,000.00 and $5,000.00 with county assess values more than four times that purchase price. I don't put much stock in those, though they too tend to be on the conservative side," of course. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "Comps are between $15,000.00 and $30,000.00 for these lots," boy that's pretty easy to double your money and get out quick then. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "Thoughts on how to creatively market these lots outside of Zillow, Craigslist, Facebook and Flat Fee MLS?

How to Buy Land in Bulk using a Release (LA 745) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about how to buy land in bulk using a release. Air quotes, release. It's one of the greatest things ever. You don't have to come up with all the cash. You get to pre-sell it. The seller's happy 'cause he's getting tons of payments, maybe over a year. I'll explain it all. Jill DeWit: It's so darn cool. Steven Butala: 1.2 million bucks I did on a release couple years ago in New Mexico. Jill DeWit: I can't wait to hear about that. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, though, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Jeff asked, I just priced out my offers and would like to get some input on my approach since I believe pricing's what led me astray on my first campaign. Steven Butala: It almost always is pricing. Jill DeWit: First, for each county, I looked up all the comps on LandPin, with similar acreage to the properties I'll be mailing and calculated the price per each. Steven Butala: Okay, stop right there for a second, okay? Jill DeWit: Yes. Steven Butala: Do not use LandPin for comps. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: LandPin is a site that Jill and I own that is free to our members where they post a property, it helps them create a template so they can then go and post the property all over the internet. Jill DeWit: And drive traffic back to their website. Steven Butala: Where they check out. So, what you're doing is now pricing property probably too low, because Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: You don't want to look at our group, because we're the ones on the planet who are doing it right. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: So, we're the ones who are buying it as cheap as possible, and we're doing it the right way. You want to look at the average schmo, like on LandWatch or Land and Farm, they're just regular people, sometimes Jill DeWit: That's kinda your competition. Steven Butala: They're even realtors a lot of them. Their listings and stuff, so that's a real value. LandPin is cheap, okay? LandPin's where you could even buy property there for that price. Jill DeWit: Totally, you don't want to commit and undercut, 'cause you're right, it's way too low. All right, second, I sorted all the land for sale with similar acreage to the property's I will be mailing on LandWatch. That's better, yes. And I calculated the per acre prices Steven Butala: Good. Jill DeWit: Listed for the cheapest five to ten properties available. Steven Butala: Excellent. Jill DeWit: Great. Third, I calculated the average and median price per acre prices for one, the properties on LandPin listed as sold, two, the unsold properties on LandPin, and three, the lowest priced properties on LandWatch. Steven Butala: Okay, now you're pricing, I can tell, is way low. Go ahead.

What Your Average Work Day Looks Like (LA 744) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about what you're average work day looks like. Jill DeWit: It's probably not what ours looks like. Especially based on today. Steven Butala: If you're not bright ... Jill DeWit: What's your day look like? Steven Butala: If you're not really bright, you have a podcast. That's what my work day today looks like actually. Jill DeWit: Wait but I made breakfast. Steven Butala: The theme for this week is: so you've done 100 deals, now what? Today is, what does that work day look like? And I'll tell you what, my feet are up on the desk right now. Before we get into it, let's take a question. Posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Matt asked, "Hey everyone. After a successful first year trying out the land investing business, I'm hoping to scale up. Jack often says that the most experienced members of the group have scaled up from the $1,000 Profert Properties to $10,000 Profert Properties or higher. I would like to sign properties for cash. And so I'd like to find a balance between time on market and profit per deal. Has anyone experienced where the tipping price point might be for cash buyers?" Steven Butala: Yeah. Good question. Jill DeWit: "Obviously fewer and fewer people kind of buy for cash the higher up you go. I'd like to hear from people's experiences where that might fall off. I made these numbers up, but for example: a $5,000 selling price for a $10,000 market value, property flies off the shelf. $10,000 for a $20,000 market value sells for fairly quickly as well. But $20-$30,000 selling price takes a little longer, takes a long long time. Most cash buyers are $10,000 or below, or something along those lines. Please reference your selling price and your determined market value. Thanks in advance for your time and consideration of this question." I didn't read the whole thread too by the way. I'm gonna go back and see what people have said their experiences have been. Steven Butala: What better to answer this question than to just give you an example. If you go to LANDiO, L-A-N-D-I-O, dot com, we have no affiliation. And his name's Tory, who owns this property, owns this [inaudible 00:02:24] company. And he's been a member now for over a year, and he went from zero to making exactly what you're shooting for here. And he makes six digits a month. He's easily made a million dollars so far. He's a perfect working example of pricing and sales. And here's what his trick is. He's a fantastic marketer. Look at his posting. Look at the graphics that he creates and the way that he sells his properties in a video. That, more than the selling price, is gonna make these things fly off the shelf. You have to post them really well. Especially this higher, expensive property. Try to send a mailer off for 10 grand, for property that you know you can sell for 50, that's probably worth 100. $10,000, when you get a letter in the mail that is offering $10,000 to sign your name, it's very compelling. I don't care who you are, 10,000 bucks for a piece of property I'm never gonna use? Do I want 10,

Choosing Your Land Acquisition Niche Specialization (LA 743) Transcript: Jill DeWit: Are we sure it's okay? Sorry. Steven Butala: Steven and Jill here. We're keeping it. Jill DeWit: Oh, good. All right. Hello! Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill Dewitt ... Fighting, I don't know if it's a summer cold or what it is and broadcasting from sunny southern California Steven Butala: After all, we are just real people. Jill DeWit: We are. Steven Butala: We don't just have the show. We have life. Today, Jill and I talk about choosing your land acquisition niche specialization. I like this topic a lot. Before we get into it- Jill DeWit: It's wordy (laughs). Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free and this question is long. Jill DeWit: Thank you for prefacing that. Joe Asks, "Hi all. I wanted to provide an update on my first mailer. I Join Land Academy as a silver member in mid December and my first mailer went out the first week in January." Steven Butala: Right! Jill DeWit: "Last week I received a call from a seller and his message was clear. I accept your offer. During due diligence, I found out that he owned four more properties in the same area. I called them back to discuss other properties and he agreed to sell them all. Now for the best part, I purchased five parcels, 39 point four acres in total for $16,000-" Steven Butala: Just like yesterdays! Jill DeWit: "All five of the parcels are over four acres and the cheapest four acre parcel for sale in the area is $49,000 on-" Steven Butala: Oh my gosh, he's going to make a quarter of a million bucks here! Jill DeWit: Right. "The cheapest four acre property sold in the last six months, went for $42,000. Recent comps suggests at least one of the parcels has a market value of over $100,000-" Steven Butala: These are the kinds of deals Jill and I do- Jill DeWit: "I paid $3,000 for it. Insanity. One of the other parcels is eight point one acres and does not have road access, but as accessible by ATV via an old logging trail. I wasn't thrilled about this one, but I wanted to go easy in the seller for giving me such a smoking deal, so I just bought them all-" Steven Butala: Good! That's the right thing to do. Jill DeWit: "The most significant challenge I faced thus far is trusting technology. Google Earth, GIS, Instead of going to look at the property myself. My wife says I have control issues, but she never says what I want her to say anyways. Deep down, I know that I'll never be able to scale this business if I don't learn to trust Google Earth and my data-" Steven Butala: Yeah, you're wife's right- Jill DeWit: "Besides the insane ROI potential in this deal is I didn't go to look at the properties even though they're less than an hour from my house." I love it. I love his wife too, this is great. "Perhaps my experience- Steven Butala: No, no- Jill DeWit: "Perhaps some experience in beginner's luck- Steven Butala: Nope, you're not. This is how it goes- Jill DeWit: "But I've been sending out a mailer every two weeks and plan on sending out 6,000 on Monday, so only time will tell.

Leave Your Job When it Starts Costing You Money (LA 742) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about when to leave your job when it starts costing you money. Jill DeWit: Yep. Remember that? Steven Butala: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Learn how to read, Steve. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: The title is ... Jill DeWit: I wasn't going to ... I'm just going to let it go. I figured it'll fix itself. Steven Butala: It'll fix itself. Wow. Wouldn't that be great if that's true? Jill DeWit: I do this often, by the way. You just don't know it. Steven Butala: Leave Your Job When It Starts Costing You Money. That's the title. Jill DeWit: That's a little bit better. Steven Butala: Fix itself. Jill DeWit: Want to leave- Steven Butala: I had an old Volvo 240, the square kind, and I swear that car was self-healing. Jill DeWit: Oh, really? Steven Butala: Yeah. Something would go wrong, and like two weeks later, it would just be okay. Jill DeWit: Really? Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: You know what's funny I found about cars? When you think ... Every time I've had a car, when it's gassed up and clean, it runs better. Have you ever noticed that? Steven Butala: We're experts at avoiding talking about real estate. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Speaking of talking, can you tell I have a little bit of the raspy thing going? Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: We had a little bit of a rough weekend. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Because, we had some friends in town all last week. Steven Butala: Yeah, both of us. Jill DeWit: Yeah. It was a little much. Steven Butala: Best thing you can do after a rough weekend with friends is get yourself a podcast to avoid work. Jill DeWit: There we go. Steven Butala: That's what this is right now. Jill DeWit: That's good. Perfect. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's post a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Charles asks, "Steve, Jill, and fellow community members, thank you for your expertise. I'm extremely luck to have learned from you all. I invested at the membership program around January or so, sent out my first mailer in February, and made my first purchase in March." Steven Butala: Picture perfect, Charles. Jill DeWit: This is great. "The gentlemen ... they were cousins ... that were selling the property fit the ideal scenario. They inherited the land in the '80s, never did anything with it besides keep the taxes current, and were motivated to sell. I sent the mailer to one of the gentleman's mother, who happened to be deceased, but her name was still on the property. The seller called me and mentioned he received the mailer that I sent to his mother, and asked if I was interested in buying three additional separate parcels in addition to the one I...

So You Have Completed 100 Deals Now What (LA 741) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about: "So You've Completed 100 Deals, Now What?" Incidentally, that's the name of the theme this week. So you've completed 100 deals, what the heck do you do now? Well first of all, congratulations. I know exactly what it feels like to complete 100 deals. Jill DeWit: I know what I would tell people to do. This ties into something cool, by the way. Steven Butala: Incidentally, next week is: "So You've Completed 1,000 Deals, Now What?" Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: That's the theme for next week, but back to 100 deals, how much money should you have if you've completed 100 deals, Jill? Jill DeWit: Oh my gosh. Steven Butala: Let's say you make two grand per deal. Jill DeWit: Don't ask me to do the math. Steven Butala: It's $200,000.00. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: You should have a quarter of a million bucks in the bank- Jill DeWit: Okay, thank you. Steven Butala: If you've done 100 deals. Jill DeWit: That's what I was going to say, but I look at it like two becomes four, becomes eight, becomes 16. I go ... I look at it that way, so you could have even more. Steven Butala: Some of our members refuse to do a real estate acquisition unless they make $10,000.00 a deal. Jill DeWit: I have two members ... well, actually it's these two gentlemen that are our members. It's part of a team of three people working together, and they just shared with me in one with us they are in the millions with an "s", not just one. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: More than one. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: It was really cool, so I had a call with them the other day. What I want to say is this ties in perfectly with what we have coming up. We are the first time ever going live, and for people who have completed more than 10 deals, even ... let's even just say that. You're in it. You're growing your business because a lot of what we're going to talk about today is tied into the content for our Intermediates Live Session. So, can I explain it? Okay, so here's what's going on. We are going live. If you go to LandInvestorsLive.com, you will find details for a September 21-23 event, and also, that's for beginners, new people to Land Academy. Our brand new "do this", you know, just someone who's never done this before, and you've been thinking about it. You want to be a member, you want to do this stuff. You can go right there, check out, and now you get the program and all that good stuff. But, there's a live event. We're going to be doing it in person. So, that's the first event. Where it ties into this show today is we decided, last minute, to do [inaudible 00:02:39] schedule an Intermediate [inaudible 00:02:40] for all of our members that have been cruising along, they're doing deals, they need some help taking it to the next level- Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: So, that's kind of what this week's about too,

Land Business Automation (LA 740) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about land business automation which wraps up this week. The theme for this week is, So You've Completed Ten Deals, Now what? Automating, all of this stuff is one of the greatest things about this business. Jill DeWit: You know what's interesting is I don't think that people think of this as something you can automate. I'm sure they think of making a widget, making sunglasses, making any kind of a product. Of course, you automate that. Maybe you started a soap business in your garage like we see it on Shark Tank all the time like, I'm making my own lavender soap. And then at some point you can't make your own lavender soap in your garage. That's not going to work. Steven Butala: Exactly. Jill DeWit: But you perfect the recipe and you [inaudible 00:00:54] this now you've got to automate it. Get the right machines in place or you're never going to grow. Steven Butala: That's right. Jill DeWit: And this is the same thing. Steven Butala: Yeah, you can't do every single thing in your business or you're just going to stay where you are forever. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Like a barber in a barbershop, he's got a couple of people working for him but he owns the place and he works there every day. And that's about it. Jill DeWit: And then if he wants to get bigger, now he's got to remove himself from that one barbershop and buy another barbershop and another barbershop and another barbershop and start to franchise. Steven Butala: Right and then you become a business owner and not a barber. Jill DeWit: Correct. Steven Butala: And so that's what we're talking about here. It's good to learn this stuff. You should learn it in the beginning, in the first ten deals that you do. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: And then more importantly, what I think the show is really about is using our experience, Jill and I, to decide what's okay to automate and what's not okay to outsource or automate. Now, I don't care how big you are, there's some stuff I think you should never automate. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question, posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Ray asks, I heard on the podcast that you guys send mail every week. I was just curious how much do you send out each week or month, how many deals does this usually get you? I'd like to hear from others as well as how much mail they're sending in deals they are closing. Steven Butala: Good simple question Ray, I love it. I never get tired of this question. I never get tired of data or mail questions ever. Number one. How much do you send out each week or month? For houses, every Wednesday we send out about between two and five thousand units, which buys us one to two houses per market. There's lots of markets. For land, here's the ... just the glaring truth, the vast majority of the acquisitions that Jill and I do are from the millions and millions of mailers that we've sent out since the early 2000s. That said, and we do a lot of deals and I'll explain that in a second in question two. But we do n...

Land Business Source of Assessor Data and Bulk Mail (LA 739) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about your land business source of assessor data and bulk mail. These are two tools, your data, stuff that you use to, the data that you, land ownership data that you use to send out offers, right? Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: And how you get those offers in the mail. Jill DeWit: Things you cannot ... Steven Butala: How fast you do, how cheap it is. These are things that- Jill DeWit: Can't live without. Steven Butala: Thankfully, Jill and I have worked out to the end ... I mean, there's no better place to get data or send out mail, specifically for this. If you send out a mailer for a church, there's going to be better places to go and better ways to send out a newsletter... Or a grocery store, but for sending offers to owners, we've got it figured out and we're going to share it with you. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Steven Butala: Before we do, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandInvestors.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Jason asks, "This is my first acquisition since signing up for sliver membership and it looks like it's going to be 120 acres at $250 an acre, which is $30,000 in an area where the low-end comps for similar acreage are $880 an acre or $105,000 plus, and the parcel could very easily be subdivided into three, 40 acres with the low-end comps for the 40s at $1,000 an acre." Steven Butala: You're looking to buy a property for 30 grand and sell it for 120. Jill DeWit: 150 or 120, depending if you want to divide it up. Steven Butala: 105. Jill DeWit: Oh, 105? Excuse me. Steven Butala: Let's just say if it all kind of goes sideways, 120 grand. You're going to make $100,000 on this deal. Jill DeWit: This is the best thing. Steven Butala: This is why we started Land Academy. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: We had to start it to buy $500 properties and sell them for 1,000. That's a great way to learn, a fantastic way to learn, but this is what this is all about. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: You do 10 deals like this. Hold on a second, Jill. Then there's a bunch more to this question, but I really, I want to make this huge point. Jill DeWit: Okay, it's your show. Steven Butala: If you do 10 of these deals this year, and it sounds like you're all set up, because Jill's about to say this guy's got more property if it all works out. You're going to make a million bucks this year. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative) Steven Butala: I want that to sink in. He just signed up for membership, he went through the program, he's going to make a million bucks. He might not do it in 12 months. He might do it in 18 months or 24 months, but he's got all mentally set up to make a million dollars. Jill DeWit: Well, let's just say this, if you want to dissect this. If he just does it the easy way, buys it for 30 and sells it for 100,000, huh. That's one deal, $70,000 profit. I could do 10 of ...

Land Business Marketing and Sales (LA 738) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show entertaining show and investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit Broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today jill and I talk about your land business, marketing and sales effort. What the heck good is it if you can buy cheap property if you can't sell it? People ask me this all the time, to which I laugh. Jill DeWit: It's kind of funny, this is important and I'm glad we're talking about it and I'm going to share why we don't get hung up on it. Steven Butala: Yeah, and what your mindset needs to be. The theme of this week is, so you've completed 10 deals now what? And you should probably, since you've completed these 10 deals know all the answers to most of this anyway. Marketing, selling property is so easy. Even in a really bad market. Jill DeWit: I know. Steven Butala: As long as you buy cheap. Jill DeWit: It's so funny. I mean, what I'm going to share in this show is just three little things that to us are little, everybody should know. And everything I get a call from somebody that's hung up on this, they have a property, maybe they said, "gosh, I'd love to do this. I understand where you guys are coming from. Man I don't know how this works because i have a property and I've had it for six months and it's not selling." Well one of my three things I'm going to mention here, once I say these three things they go, "Oh, okay, got it. Now I know." There's three things and they're doing them wrong and they're like, "Oh, duh." I'm, "Yep, thanks. We can help." Steven Butala: How many times have you answered this question and while they're asking it the property sells. Like right during the conversation, "Oh wait, forget it, then. It just sold." Jill DeWit: That's with our members. That's a whole different thing, because I know they're doing it right. They just get hung up ... you know what's funny? Our members are doing it right because they know how to do it. What they get hung up on, "It's been five minutes and they didn't check out." Well come on, give it more than five minutes. And they go, "Okay, an hour and five minutes, now it's gone. Thanks." Not that fast, but you get. Steven Butala: Before we get into Jill's suggestions lets take a question posted by one of our members, atlanta.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay, Rob asks, "I'm a real estate broker, full time, who invests in land on the side." Steven Butala: Good Rob. You are in the minority. Jill DeWit: You should be the majority. "I would be curious to hear any strategies real estate agents are using to cultivate listings from your investment mailings." Steven Butala: Great question. Jill DeWit: "As I'm sure you know I come across a lot of property that is not a good fit on the investment side, because of the numbers, however, many of these properties would make nice listings. Any thoughts on turning that corner?" Steven Butala: Yes, you just answered your own question. You should never let this mail go to waste. So if there's properties that just don't fit your acquisition criteria from specifically from a price standpoint, I think you should practice in the mirror that conversation. "I'm sorry seller, that just doesn't' work for me and my investment group. However, there';s a guy down the road that I sell a lot of property to just like this and I know this is in his price r...

Land Business Legal and Tax and Corporate Setup (LA 737) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Good Day. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWitt, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about land, business, legal and tax corporation setup. [crosstalk 00:00:18]. If you listened to our show yesterday, we totally covered this topic, so we're going to change it up a little. Jill DeWit: Are we? Steven Butala: If you really want to know about land, business, legal and tax, please listen to yesterday's show. It's show 736. Jill DeWit: Shoot, I wanted to talk about this more. I really like this topic. Steven Butala: I know you love talking about taxes. Jill DeWit: Man. I've been waiting for this. Steven Butala: We set it all up yesterday. We got into this, we went ... oops, too late. We ran over in time and we decided that we're going to in detail cover today how much mail is too much. Jill thinks you should send out 50,000 letters and just deal with it. Jill DeWit: And jam up the system. Steven Butala: Jam the system up. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: Be on the phone all day and so, I completely disagree with that. Jill DeWit: Not necessarily. Can we do both, because people are going to be looking for this show. Can we do a little bit of recap and do that too? Steven Butala: Sure. We'll recap. I'll recap in just a few sentences your legal situation, how you should set this all up after you've done 10 deals. That's the theme of this week. Jill DeWit: Thank you. I'm happy now. Steven Butala: Before we get into that, let's take a question posted by, as if this isn't confusing enough. Let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Isn't that the greatest thing in the world, by the way, when a woman says I'm happy now? Steven Butala: It really is. Jill DeWit: I'm surprised you didn't stop and go, "Wait, wait." But you can also play this back often if you want. Steven Butala: That's a whole different topic. Jill DeWit: I'm happy now. Steven Butala: What do you think the problem is? Jill DeWit: I am happy. Steven Butala: That's a lot of women. Jill DeWit: Oh, they're unhappy all the time. Steven Butala: I know. What is it? Jill DeWit: I don't ... that's just their DNA I guess. Steven Butala: I know. It's so ... they learned how to do it? Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: They're born that way? Jill DeWit: Must be. Yeah. I think there's people that are born that way. They're born that they're just never satisfied. Kind of like you're born high maintenance. I've seen that. Steven Butala: You know how we have all this experience buying and selling land and houses and stuff. And we have a show about it? Jill DeWit: We do? Steven Butala: I secretly- Jill DeWit: We do? Steven Butala: Yeah. It's a show together. Jill DeWit: Oh. Steven Butala: Actually, it's just a daily meeting that we have.

So You Have Completed Ten Deals Now What (LA 736) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. Entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from beautiful southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about, so you've completed ten deals, now what? That's incidentally the name of this week. I think that that's the theme for this week. Jill DeWit: But now what? Now what? I like ... Now what? I love it. Steven Butala: Do you remember at that point ... can you think that far back? Jill DeWit: I can, but you know what's funny. I had you, again. Let me back up, I had you, so I felt like I was a little bit cheating. It wasn't brand new for me, you filled in all the pieces. I'm convinced that's what a lot of our members feel like. If not, they should, and I hope they do. I feel like they have us, so it's a little bit cheating, but it's not. It's called doing it correctly. Don't try to reinvent the wheel. So ... you're rolling. At 10 deals you should be rolling, and I know we're going to talk about that. Steven Butala: I did, this is a spoiler, well this is what I'll talk about during the meat of the show, but I did a pretty large acreage deal in Arizona, doubled my money. Realized that there was some dough there, and I called a guy that owned a bunch of property, because I pulled the tax records ... I pulled the assessor database. Just called him, and he sold me all of his properties, like for $400 and up, a unit. I did one deal, and then I did about 80 properties. Then from there it was like, "This is it." Jill DeWit: That's exactly the conversation I had with someone the other day. That's what very well could come, and I've seen a lot of members have. Every once and a while you're going to get a letter in to the right hands, and you're going to get a broker, or someone calling you going, "We have 500 properties. Let's work something out." Next thing you know you're never buying from anybody else again. You're just buying as fast as you can from the same guy, and you're set for a couple years. It's awesome. Steven Butala: Exactly. Before we get in to the real topic though let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay, Brock asks, "It's okay if you aren't a lawyer, I still want your opinion. I'm going to set up a LLC, and I have a couple of questions." Steven Butala: This is perfect for this topic today. Jill DeWit: "One, According to the internet, Nevada, and Wyoming are the friendliest LLC states. My partner and I live in separate states. Don't intend to always remain residents of these states, and are doing most of our meetings, and deals in other states. Do we just go with a friendly state like Wyoming? Number two, we know you need to pay taxes to the states in which you do business, but what counts as business? Buying a property would require us to register for taxes in a given state I assume. What about selling to a resident of another state?" Steven Butala: Okay, Brock this is such a fantastic question. It's one of these questions where if you get 10 accountants in a room, or lawyers in a room, you're going to get 10 different answers. Jill DeWit: That's so true. Steven Butala: But you're stuck with us for the next few minutes so- Jill DeWit: And we're not attorneys. So here you go. Steven Butala: I used to be sort of an accountant.

This Should Come Naturally Not Forced (LA 735) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about This Whole Thing Should Come Naturally, Not Too Forced. Jill DeWit: Do you want me to share now, or do you want me to share- Steven Butala: I do. Yeah. What do you- Jill DeWit: ... or do you want me to share at the meat of the show part? Steven Butala: Go ahead. Jill DeWit: I do not agree with this title. And, I have to share that right before this show started, Steven came to me and said, "Oh, hey, by the way, I picked this one for you. Just heads up, this is kind of your show, kind of your thing." I looked at the title, and I said, "This is not at all how I would word this. I don't agree with the title." I will expand on that here in a few minutes. Steven Butala: At which time, I clicked the red Record button, and here we are. Jill DeWit: He said, "Too late. Here it goes." Steven Butala: Before we get in to it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Merritt asks, "I'm wondering what others' experiences have been using only one website to buy and sell, versus two separate websites. I notice that at least a few Land Academy members have combined websites, and I'm curious if y'all started off that way. More importantly, though, I thought it might add unnecessary leverage to the potential seller for negotiation price. (If they see you have a similar property for sale in the same county, for instance, it might give them more gumption to bargain you up.) But, I'm finding that two separate websites, business names, phone numbers, etc., is a bit ridiculous for a simpleton such as myself to keep up with, not to mention the cost of maintenance, rather spending it on advertising or selling. I'm certainly willing to keep two going, but in the interest of minimalization, thought it might be worth asking the group's opinion. It would be great to hear if anyone has started off with two and then dropped one. Has your negotiating with potential sellers gotten more difficult/expensive?" Steven Butala: What do you think, Jill? Jill DeWit: Well, we still have two. We have the shell of one from years ago. That's still there. I'm not afraid of it. Let's maybe back up. We've done two, and we consistently maintain two. One is, like I said, it's the [inaudible 00:02:31] for the sellers to look up and see that ... because, they may have an old letter from 2005. They want to go to that website, it needs to still be there, and it is. Steven Butala: You nailed it. Jill DeWit: They can look and see, for consistency purposes, it's there. Now, we also have a totally different, totally separate land selling website. Let me add this piece in the middle. If they Google our names, they'll pop up both places. It takes them five minutes to Google us- Speaker 3: Sorry. I don't understand. Jill DeWit: ... and find out ... That's funny. It takes them five minutes to Google us and find out ... Steven Butala: Who we are. What it's all about. Jill DeWit: Who we are, and what we're selling, and all of that. So, I'm not afraid of it. It's never come up. If anything,

It Takes Two Years to Get Traction in Anything (LA 734) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talking. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And, I'm Jill DeWit broadcasting from gorgeous southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about, it takes about two years to good traction in anything that's worth while. Jill DeWit: It's true. Sometimes longer, depending what it is. Steven Butala: That scares a lot of people. Jill DeWit: Like, some professions and... Steven Butala: It sounds daunting, it's 2018 now. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: What do you mean it takes... So, you mean in 2020 I'm going to start making money or doing well at this? No, that's not what I mean at all. It just means that, in every project that you've already taken on, school's a good example because everybody can relate to it. There's a point where it's like, wow this is hard! I'm not sure I can do this. Jill DeWit: In the beginning. Steven Butala: Yeah, and then you do it and a couple times. Okay I got it, I think I got it. Maybe it's a fluke, maybe it's a one off, maybe I got lucky. I'm not sure. I'll try it again and see. But at some point you're like, you've solved about ten problems, you're doing well. And, you took a look back, for me it's like looking at the bank balance. It's like, you know what? Maybe I've got this worked out. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative) Steven Butala: That usually ha[[ens for me like in two years on any big project. But, before we get into it, Let's take a question posted by one of our members. On TheLandAcademy.com, online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Matt asks, this is a good one too. So, I'm gonna read the questions and then there's little parts where people weighed in on it. So, it's kinda part of the whole thread here, which is awesome. Thank you, producer. Steven Butala: That's kind of the point to this whole question, I think. I've cleared it over a lot of the other ones. It's a really good use of LandInvestors.com. Jill DeWit: That's true, which is our online community Matt asks, "Hey guys, I have a deal that I'm about to pull the trigger on. But it's a step out of my traditional purchase criteria. I bought all small infield lots up until now, about twenty total. This one is $10,000 and 10 acres without physical access. I made a three or four minute video to make it easy for you. If you wouldn't mind watching that and let me know if you think it's an issue, or if you think it's fine. And, if you have any advice in final due diligence that I should be completing before proceeding." And then, he put a link for the actual video in the thread. Steven Butala: If you want to watch the video go to LandInvestors.com and just keyword search, something thar is unique in this whole thing. Something like, map. Or, the website that he posted on is called Useloom, U-S-E-L-O-O-M. Just keyword search that, and you'll be able to find a link to the video and watch that. Jill DeWit: And see the whole thread. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Yep. I can't wait to hear what everyone has to say. Here are some of my side questions that I have. "The sellers say it's behind a locked gate, so I don't know if I'll be able to get a photographer ...

You Need Time and Smarts More than Money (LA 733) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny, Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about ... you need more time and smarts and you actually need money and we'll explain that in great detail. It's "I wish somebody would've told me all this stuff" week. Jill DeWit: I can't. It's "Duh, I wish somebody would've told me all this stuff" week. Steven Butala: Jill, literally, literally just got done painting her nails. Jill DeWit: I did. Steven Butala: We joke about it all the time. She's bored, she's gonna paint her nails, she's gonna let me talk about real estate. Jill DeWit: Today, I actually did. Steven Butala: It actually happened for the first time. Jill DeWit: It did. Steven Butala: She took a picture- Jill DeWit: I'm stinking up the studio ... I hope that's okay- Steven Butala: That's fine. Jill DeWit: With my nail polish. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Stephen asked, "I came across a property the owner's letting go (just started first year of tax delinquency) that I can get cheap because he was frustrated 10 years ago in gaining access to the lot (and has not been back since). I checked with the county and when the plat was done, all lots are granted legal access." Steven Butala: Ding, ding. Jill DeWit: "So, ultimately, the neighbors cannot stop someone from getting to the lot (a road is drawn on the plat map, but not totally present at this time from the Google Earth image from what I can tell)." Steven Butala: This is very common. Jill DeWit: "The neighbor, who is the main issue, has apparently been scheming to force a tax foreclosure to pick up at auction per the county, the current owner's opinion, trying to decide whether to pick up for 500 to $1,000 for 10 acres and be upfront with the limited amount that I know about the situation. Thoughts from the gallery?" I like that. Steven Butala: What do you think? Jill DeWit: This is so common, it's hilarious. Well, my first thought is we already have the buyer. We know who wants it. It's the person who's trying to forcibly take it over. Why the buyer, the next door neighbor, has not gone to the person himself, I don't know, unless it's a Hatfield and McCoy thing. Steven Butala: You took the words out of my mouth. Jill DeWit: Then, the Hatfield neighbor, one of them, that McCoy does not wanna sell to the jerk, which I wouldn't either at this point, but I also ... the guy obviously, he hasn't been to the property. He doesn't care, he doesn't go there. So, it's not like he lives there. Right now, he's done with it. He just doesn't wanna deal with the situation. You know, this is- Steven Butala: This is personal preference. Jill DeWit: That's what I was gonna say. You took the words out of my mouth 'cause you can go both ways with this. Steven Butala: I wouldn't. Jill DeWit: You wouldn't do it? Steven Butala: Well,

First Deal Should be a Huge Disaster Mess (LA 732) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWitt, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about your first deal, should look like a huge disaster mess. By the way, it is a ... man I wish somebody woulda told me [inaudible 00:00:19]. Jill DeWit: It's hilarious. Just give me a description of what this should have physically ... if i have, if an image comes to my mind, should you see someone ... I mean what should be happening? Paint the picture. Steven Butala: I'm gonna ask you to describe your first deal, I'm gonna certainly describe my first deal in the meat of the show here. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: It's gonna make ... I guarantee you this, it will make everyone ... Jill DeWit: Feel better? Steven Butala: Yes. Jill DeWit: Good. Steven Butala: I mean yours ... your deal probably smelled like roses and looked pretty. Jill DeWit: I know, I'm trying to rethink back. Steven Butala: But you had me helping you Jill DeWit: I know, that's ... Steven Butala: I'm sitting at a coffee table, sitting at a coffee table with a full time job all stressed out ... Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative) [inaudible 00:00:59] what I just do. Steven Butala: ... in Ohio, trying to close an 80 acre deal in Arizona, and I've never done this before. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: I have a lot to say. Jill DeWit: I know you do. Steven Butala: I know, I snoop for you. Jill DeWit: You usually do. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members. On thelandacademy.com online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Milan asks "Long story short: I bought 40 acres a few months ago for 4,000 dollars. Did all my due diligence and all was good. Count and recorded it, and I was a proud owner. The land wasn't selling. Thank God it wasn't, that would have been a serious mess. Last week I received a letter from the law office telling me that my property will be auctioned at a certain date. I can pay the lien of 4,000 dollars, not too big of a deal. The point is, if I resold the property, that would seriously destroy my reputation selling property to clueless, excited buyer. I'm learning intensively how to check for liens now, what is your process? There are a lot of questions about liens in this forum but no one really answered it." I do have one thing I would like to add first here, Steven. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: I don't know how or where Milan is doing his due diligence because I know he doesn't have the tools that we have. Steven Butala: Oh, he's not a member? Oh, Milan! Jill DeWit: No, he's not. He doesn't have the title pro 24/7. He can't pull a lien report like we all can in 30 seconds. Or 10. Steven Butala: Okay, so his long story short ... my answer's gonna be short. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: Become a member, and this would never happen.

Make Mistakes at 100 Miles an Hour (LA 731) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi! Steven 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 sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about ... if you're going to make a mistake, make it at a 100 miles an hour. Jill DeWit: Like on these shows? Steven Butala: This whole show is one big, long mistake. We are on episode 731 of our long mistake. Jill DeWit: And we're still making mistakes. Maybe by a 1000. Make mistakes at a hundred miles an hour and 731 times. Steven Butala: Actually that's a pretty good pre-lit into this whole thing. Jill DeWit: There we go. Steven Butala: No, this show ... we all know what the show's about. You don't want to be timid. You want to go into something barrelling through it. I'm going to tell some old sports stories when we get all into the show. Jill DeWit: Oh, I'm glad I have my nail polish. Steven Butala: I know, exactly. Oh my God, you do have nail polish today. Jill DeWit: I do have nail polish. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Gary asks: "Hello, everyone. All of my sales to this point have been in the range of $2,500 and under. I recently been making purchase in higher price points. I now have a parcel for sell, which is in our contract to sell for $7,999, and the purchaser wants to use a title company to perform the closing. They've agreed to pay all the fees associated with the title company," it's going great, "My purchase price for the property was only $1,999, so I did not pursue title insurance when I purchased. I'm wondering if this will become a problem with the title company. Does anyone have the name of a title company in Arizona, which is good to work with in regarding land transactions, but-" Steven Butala: Yeah. Well, I'll answer the last question first. Call Dora Goodmiller. They cover the whole state of Arizona, but they are out of- Jill DeWit: Is she like Apache or way up that area? Steven Butala: It's closer to Vegas; Kingman. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: There out at Kingman. Her sister Denise used to be the treasurer from Mohave County and that's how I found out about her. And she's jumped around from titles ... if you just Google her, you'll find out where she works now, but I've closed, I'm not exaggerating, maybe five to eight thousand transactions with her, and please tell her we sent you there. In fact, I just bought a property from a direct competitor. Jill DeWit: Oh, really? Steven Butala: Yeah. Three days ago I was doing research and it's funny how, like, I get every- Jill DeWit: How come? What was it? Steven Butala: It was a piece of property in northern Arizona, but I ... about once a month somebody emails me and they say, "We're buying a property and you're in the chain of title," like you and I are. Jill DeWit: Oh yeah, yeah. Steven Butala: One of our companies, so it's just funny. Like, here's your signature, I can see it in the chain of title. Anyway, my point is this world that we're in is smaller than we ...

Regret or Reward a Few Years from Now (LA 730) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about regret or reward a few years from now. Which one would you rather have? Jill DeWit: Boy, that's a big, big, big question. I don't know how we're going to do this in one show. Steven Butala: I have a lot of personal questions for you this show. Jill DeWit: Oh, this ought to be good. Steven Butala: You can decline them, if you want. Jill DeWit: No, no. I like this. Steven Butala: Plead the Fifth. Jill DeWit: Oh, no. It's all good. Steven Butala: Decline. Before we get in to it with Jill, let's take a question posted by one of our members on thelandacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: I'll answer anything, as long as it doesn't appear to be throwing me under a bus. Steven Butala: Oh, my gosh. I would never do that. Jill DeWit: Okay. Thank you. Do you regret, or are you rewarded with X? Okay. Savannah asks, "I'm curious as to why the purchase agreement template suggests that the seller can retain mineral rights. I'm working on a deal in Texas, and the seller wants to retain mineral rights. Doesn't this mean that the seller wants to have the right to drill for oil even when the property is owned by someone else? If that is the case, who would buy this property?" Steven Butala: Okay. The reason that that's in there was because I was tired of answering the question, "Hey, can I keep the mineral rights? Can I? Can I, Dad?" That's my way of saying ... and here's the methodology behind it. We're not in the mineral business. We're not miners. There are tons of people in the planet who are miners. They are in the mineral business, and they hate surface rights. They hate our business. They don't want any part ... It's actually a burden to them to deal with owning the property and paying the taxes, and stuff. They would rather lease the surface from you and do their business under there. Which, frankly, I would rather do that, too, because I am not in the mineral rights mining business, and I have no interest in that. Jill and I just did a deal last year where there was an existing lease ... I think it was natural gas well on a property that we bought. All it did was complicate the deal. This is what we like. Jill DeWit: Everybody got all hung up on it. Steven Butala: We like to buy a property for 20 grand and sell it for 40. No leases, no mineral rights, no problems, nothing. Just a lonely little piece of beautiful property that nobody knows about, that we bought for half price. Jill DeWit: Right. Someone could put a cabin there, and enjoy it, and love it. That's it. Steven Butala: Yeah. Little House on the Prairie material. Mineral rights complicate everything. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: You know what? You can have your mineral rights. That's why it's in there. It's not for everybody, but it works for us. Jill DeWit: Right. By removing us from that whole issue, Savannah, we just never talk about it. We never even ... If I bought something with mineral rights, and I'm trying to sell it with mineral rights, hey,

Path of Professional Real Estate Acquisitions (LA 729) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWitt broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about the path of the professional real estate acquisitions. Jill DeWit: Is that a person? Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Cool. Steven Butala: Every real estate company. Jill DeWit: Path of a professional real estate acquisition pro. I feel like pro is in there twice, but there you go. Steven Butala: Path of a professional real estate acquisitions executive. Jill DeWit: There we go. Steven Butala: Every real estate investment trust, every wall street fund, every institutional investor, they have a guy sitting in a corner, I used to be this guy. He's called the Vice President of Acquisitions. And his job is, that's what this show is all about. Jill DeWit: There you go. Steven Butala: His job is to find property that nobody knows about, off market property, and provide a clear running stream, a flow, a pipeline of deals to the guys that make decisions at the top. Jill DeWit: I have something funny to add. Why the heck does this not make sense? And because I've been spending a lot of time in Bigger Pockets too lately. Every single person in Bigger Pockets says we want off market deals. And you ask them, where do you go looking for deals? MLS. Steven Butala: MLS. Jill DeWit: (Laughs). Steven Butala: (Laughs). Jill DeWit: We did not rehearse that. That was so funny. Like what the heck? You can't expect it to work if you're not looking in the right place. Steven Butala: Everybody wants to kiss a pretty girl. How many pretty girls- Jill DeWit: How many have you dated? Steven Butala: Have you walked up to lately? Oh, none. (Laughs). Jill DeWit: Zero. (Laughs). Oh, my gosh. That's so good. Steven Butala: So this show is a story of if you want the ...I don't know why you would want that position. You know here it is in a nutshell. Land Academy itself is me, sharing my experience as a professional real estate acquisitions executive for years and years and years. And taking all that high level, go pro type methodology and the tools and stuff, and making it available to everybody. Making it available to a kid who wants to buy, in the beginning, a five hundred dollar piece of property and sell it for a thousand, and then parlay that into skyscrapers or whatever. Yesterday we talked, the question was, why the heck is everybody kind of branching out into other stuff after they get the hang of it with land? Because that's what it's intended for. Jill DeWit: Because they can. Steven Butala: That's the intention. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: The intention is to learn with land. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: Learn with with your own money. Learn how to use data and then go do what makes sense to you. Jill DeWit: Yeah, your whole goal should not be to do, I'm doing a thousand now, five hundred dollar transactions I sell for fifteen hundred do...

Real Cost of Not Educating Yourself (LA 728) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Good day. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show entertaining Land, investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from beautiful, sunny, southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about the real cost of not educating yourself, not just with real estate, but anything. We've got a bunch of funny, good examples ready. Jill DeWit: This is going to be good. Steven Butala: How costly is it to not teach yourself to drive? Teach yourself to drive, get in the car, get on the expressway, and get in an accident. How much does that cost? Jill DeWit: Every job has training. Every single job. Just think of the new employee that just started last week. It was a pretty good, long week training. For one entity. Not even the whole big thing. Steven Butala: We also have a list of things that, for whatever reason, education is not associated with. And how awful they turn out. Like raising children. Jill DeWit: Say that again. What did you say? You have a working example of what ... Steven Butala: We have lots of examples of ... You don't get any education about raising children. You just use your own experience doing that. It often turns disastrous. Jill DeWit: Repeating the same mistakes. I'm not going to do that, and guess what, you just did it. Yep. Steven Butala: Before we get into that, let's take a question posted by one of our members on Land Academy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Jeff asks: hello all, I listen to many podcasts (yes I was the one that Jack and Jill had fun with, my name Jeff Yu). Steven Butala: You remember that? Jeff Yu. Jill DeWit: Jeff Yu. Thank you Jeff. I forgot about that. That was so darn funny that day. Jeff Yu. You just started it again Jeff. Now we're going to walk around the house doing that to each other. Every time this happens too, our kids are like oh no, here they go again. Don't make eye contact. Steven Butala: Don't encourage them. Jill DeWit: Exactly. I have noticed ... I'll get back to the real question. I have noticed that a lot of people that have been in the land business for some time end up either moving into a totally different direction in real estate, or they keep the land business going and dabble in other areas of real estate. Steven Butala: Yes. Jill DeWit: This is really, really, really, really good. Steven Butala: Just like us. Jill DeWit: Example, I know Jack and Jill are now also getting into houses. Yes, they are still going strong with land. The other land investors get into apartment or house renters, et cetera. My question is why? Steven Butala: I'm so qualified to answer this. Jill DeWit: I have thought about this and come up with a few possible reasons such as, they want to do less buying and selling to make the same amount of money, partially. Maybe, it's about diversification. Steven Butala: Yep. Jill DeWit: They feel like maybe land sales will slow down in the future. If they own other types of property that will allow them to diversify. Steven Butala: That's part of it. Jill DeWit: What are your thoughts? Steven Butala: Here's the real answer, and it's short.

Land Academy vs Self Starting (LA 727) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 beautiful sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about Land Academy versus self-starting. Really, just getting some education, where no matter where you get it versus self-starting. It's land education week here on the podcast. Jill DeWit: Yes, it is. If that's not exciting, I don't know what is. Isn't that funny? It's like when you meet people, they're like, "Hey, so what do you do?" "Land." "Well, nice talking to you." Steven Butala: Yeah. "Good to see you." Did you ever sit in a class in high school and you're staring at the teacher whose about 180 years old, and you say to yourself, "How can this guy teach this stuff every single year talking about the same stuff?" Jill DeWit: Oh, this long. Good point. Doesn't algebra get old? Steven Butala: When you're a kid, you're like, "Oh, he must really be into it." But then when you get a little older like we are, you realize it is just as painful, maybe more, for the teacher to teach that stuff and talk about it over again as it is for you to sit there and listen to it. That's not too far off for what's going on for us here. Jill DeWit: I've told the kids, they're like, "Oh, my gosh, right now, the end of the school year is coming. I can't wait." And I tell them, "Your teachers feel that way too. Cut them some slack." If there's a movie day, there's a reason why. They're sick of you, too. Steven Butala: There's probably a heroin day for your teacher. Jill DeWit: Crazy. Steven Butala: Let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com, online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steve asked, "I'm running into limitations with my ACH provider relationship my bank is using. No recurrent withdrawals for non-business relationships and limited list of approved banks for my buyers." That stinks. "What are the other options out there that you are all using to do ACH transactions? Viewpost.com is what I'm most familiar with. I looked into Zelle, but that does not meet my needs. Thanks for any feedback on this, Steve." Steven Butala: We use Heartland [00:02:18]. Jill DeWit: And credit cards. Steven Butala: Yeah. In fact, I love where you're going with the ACH and I understand it, but I prefer to take credit cards for a lot of reasons. And it's a little bit more expensive. I know. It's actually a lot more expensive for us, but it turns out we have our property priced so we take that into consideration, so it's no big deal. And for a lot of reasons, I like it. Jill DeWit: There's a layer of security with credit cards verus ACH. Steven Butala: I think so, too. Jill DeWit: I hear ... Steven Butala: Yeah. There's charge-backs. I'm very familiar with all the pros and cons, but - Jill DeWit: I'm not a huge fan. I hear people want ACH just because it's cheap. That's the only reason, and I'm not a fan for going with the cheapest because the cheapest is not always the best. Steven Butala: That's for sure. Jill DeWit: Thank you. I had to get that out. Like jewelry,

Why Land Flipping Education is Imperative to Succeed (LA 726) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Hi. Jill DeWit: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Steven Butala: And I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Jill DeWit: Today Jill and I talk about why land flipping education is so imperative to succeed. It already sounds like we're going to talk about ... This is a one big half hour commercial for our crap. Steven Butala: It's not. Jill DeWit: But it's not. It's never a commercial, either. Steven Butala: No, it's like ... I think we're going to talk more about education period. Jill DeWit: We are. Steven Butala: I mean, it doesn't really matter what it is. Jill DeWit: Just get educated, is the whole point. Steven Butala: Exactly. Jill DeWit: It doesn't have to be from us. Steven Butala: No- You want [crosstalk 00:00:35], that's fine. If you don't, you don't. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Cool. Steven Butala: Don't ask your spouse, that's for sure. Jill DeWit: Ha ha. Steven Butala: Anyway. Before we get into it, lets take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay, Joshua asks, "We are relatively new to the business, and potentially over-cautious." Steven Butala: Good. Jill DeWit: That's a good place to be. "But, those wholesale deal looks suspiciously like a potential fraud (I'm not accusing anyone, just our thoughts)." Steven Butala: Good. Jill DeWit: "Here are a few questions we have for the group: 1. Are we completely off base here? 2. What do you typically require from the seller when purchasing a wholesale property, specifically one that is under $5,000.00, and you would not get title insurance? Some of our thoughts were to have a signed contract, releasing payment once the data's recorded and possibly ask to see their Articles of Incorporation and make sure the person trying to sell the land is legally allowed to. 3. Are there certain [inaudible 00:01:37] that you look for when doing business with other land investors? Thanks for any input." This is funny. Steven Butala: You want an answer? Jill DeWit: Go for it? You want to start? You start. Steven Butala: First of all, there needs to be some trust. I can tell you that we have not gotten stung like you're referring to in all the almost 16,000 deals we've done. Here's why, some of it's a feeling. So, if you're dealing with a person that's nowhere on the Internet, they don't have a website, you found them on Craigslist, or in the classified ads or something, and it's just not clicking with you, don't do the deal. I know that sounds like a silly answer, but it's true. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: Make sure that all the stuff ties. So, you're going to go to the county website and see who owns the property, if they own the property. That's good. If it's in an LLC, that's great. Ask for the LLC documents, or look them up online. Nine times out of 10, you can really quickly see who the managing member is and see if it's the person that you're talking to on the phone. If...

Land Business Expenses Line item by Line Item (725) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. I think it's Friday. Jill DeWit: I hope it's Friday. Steven Butala: Entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from beautiful, sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about, well, we finish what we started yesterday. Land business expenses, line item by line item. Jill DeWit: Because Jill got a little ahead of herself. That's the reality here. Sorry. Steven Butala: This wraps up the velocity of money week here on the Land Academy Show. Jill DeWit: Totally. Steven Butala: Before we get into the actual topic, or finish, I should say, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Cool. All right. Luke asks, "I got a deal to buy a lot made up of three parcels for $20,000. There's one smaller lot in the area for $20,000 listed no stream. Mine is on a creek and a paved road"- Steven Butala: Oh my gosh. Jill DeWit: "Power line and water hookup. The road is right on one side of the creek, and the majority of the land is on the other side." Steven Butala: Oh. This is great. Jill DeWit: "Bridge, anyone? Or, is that too much to ask for in a buyer? Could"- Steven Butala: Okay. Jill DeWit: "A bridge to three lots, could build a bridge to three lots and sell two to pay for it, and then some. Any thoughts?" Steven Butala: Yeah. So- Jill DeWit: This is a little- Steven Butala: This is a great deal. This is, not run to the bank, but this is a deal where you ... remember that property we had a while ago where you needed a boat to get to it? Jill DeWit: A whole moat. Pretty much. It was hilarious. Steven Butala: How fast did we sell that? Jill DeWit: It was hilarious. It was beautiful. Steven Butala: There are people, buyers and users out there, that want to get lost. Jill DeWit: Yeah. They want it- Steven Butala: Water- Jill DeWit: They won't want the bridge. Steven Butala: Water access only is, yeah. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: This is a buy it as is, sell it as is, and mark it. This is probably mark it the heck up. Not even double your money. This is so special- Jill DeWit: You got two water front properties. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Because one of each side, by the way. Thank you. Steven Butala: There's limitless uses. I haven't told the story in a while. I bought a property that was the side of the Grand Canyon, literally. Rock climber. When it was subdivided, it eroded after that, and I couldn't keep that in the inventory. Rock climbers love to stick a plaque on the wall that says, "I climb on the rocks that I own." So, yeah. This is- Jill DeWit: Thank you for not being a rock climber. Sheesh. Could you imagine? Steven Butala: No. No, I can't. Jill DeWit: You come home on those funny shoes, and a bag. You have a pouch with the bag of powder hanging from your hip...

Real Expense to your Business Overhead (LA 724) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill, here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. It's velocity of money week, here. Entertaining land investment talk, we hope. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from beautiful, sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about the real actual expenses to your business overhead. It's going to get a little money driven today, here, and that's okay. I like it. Jill DeWit: It's velocity of money week. Welcome to Land Academy. Steven Butala: Jill's all set up to do her regular show during this whole show, I'm just going to sit here and talk. Jill DeWit: What do you mean? Oh, wait, wait. I'm gonna talk about my day to day stuff? Steven Butala: She's got her email. Yeah, no, no- Jill DeWit: Oh. Steven Butala: I think you're gonna clear out your email. Jill DeWit: Oh. Steven Butala: She's just gonna work Jill DeWit: I'm gonna work on the grocery list? Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: Oh, yeah that's exactly Steven Butala: Like real life stuff, not show stuff. Jill DeWit: Oh that's exactly what's gonna happen. Steven Butala: Before we get into it lets make a question, post about one of our members on the landacademy.com online community, its free. Jill DeWit: Okay, I'll take a break from my other job here for a minute and I'll help with this question. Steven Butala: Alright, I know you're answering that email. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Elis asked "Hello, I'm a serious newbie to land investing so bear with me, I have a highly motivated seller who's leveled motivation makes passing on this deal extremely difficult." Steven Butala: I bear with me, how do you spell bear with me? Like bear like are in the woods? Jill DeWit: I..I think its like this, I think its like this Steven Butala: Bare like bottom? I do to. Like in the woods. Jill DeWit: Okay can I answer the question now? Steven Butala: Sorry, Yeah. Jill DeWit: Do you want to critique anything else here? Do you wanna- Steven Butala: I'm great at math but at spelling, no. Jill DeWit: Okay. Steven Butala: Not so much there. Jill DeWit: Got it. Alright so- Steven Butala: I already forgot what the right answer. Jill DeWit: I know I can help you here. Okay so lot size is 1.25, one and a quarter acres. Its out in the Texas country side, the lot shape is long and skinny. These are hilarious ones. Eighty three feet of road frontage and six hundred feet deep. That's hilarious. There's enough room for a manufacture / modular home. On the other hand it appears from the county website that there mare be some encroachment on the slot from the house on the left. Bear in mind I don't have a survey and I'd rather not pay for one. Few questions, will an encroachment hinder me from selling to an manufacturing modular home owner? Will an encroachment hinder me from selling to a new build home owner? I would imagine so if the lenders involved. I almost feel like my only hope is to sell to one of the neighbors. Maybe the one that has already crossed the line.

Better ROI with Land or Houses (LA 723) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Good day. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about, do you get a better ROI with land or with houses? Or with mobile homes or with skyscrapers. Or apartment buildings. Jill DeWit: Or apartment buildings Steven Butala: Yeah. You got it. Jill DeWit: Or gas stations, or industrial. Steven Butala: Why do you guys just, did you guys choose the land over apartments because you get a worse ROI? I don't think so. Jill DeWit: Good point. Steven Butala: Is this all happen on accident for you, Steve and Jill? Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: Were you just sitting around and kinda fell backwards into buying and selling land? Jill DeWit: Yes, I just kinda ... Steven Butala: Just hope for the best. Jill DeWit: Yeah, I just ... what's it, swing hard? Steven Butala: Swing hard and hope for the best. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: It's how I play golf. Jill DeWit: Yeah, you know, it was either this or, you know, that cleaning service that we talked about. I don't know. Could you imagine? Steven Butala: I owned a dry cleaner one time. I'll tell you about that in a minute. Before we get into this, let's take a question posted by one of our members on LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: I do remember you saying something about that, by the way, and every time we were anywhere near a laundromat you'd look at those coin machines like, oh, like your eyes light up. Like people put money in for this. Steven Butala: So, I owned two laundromats. I was very young in my early 20s. And one with a dry cleaning service and then later in life I owned a dry cleaning drop off. Talk about printing money. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: But like the houses, every time we buy a rental house, we own it for about five months, do the math and say, “If I keep this rental house, I can sell it right now for three times what I paid.” Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: "Or whatever the numbers are. Or I can just rent it out forever and just collect the money. I think I'd rather sell it. It's gonna take me like, I'll be dead before I actually make my money back." Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: So we would just sell it. That's what happened with all those laundromats and everything. Jill DeWit: I understand. All right, so here's David's question. Hi everyone. I'm getting ready to send out my first mail campaign. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: I live in L.A. I know I don't need to market close to home, but if at all possible, I'd prefer it. I want to be fairly close to a big city and I also want a place where the land is relatively inexpensive so I can afford to get into the game, buying up multiple properties in a short period of time. What criteria do you all typically use when researching and choosing an area. Population?

Cash Deals Make More Money over Terms (LA 722) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 beautiful, sunny, Southern California. Steven Butala: Not so sunny today. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about cash deals actually make more money over terms. That redefines arithmetic. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: It has to do with the velocity of money. Jill DeWit: I love it. Steven Butala: So if ... Well I'll talk about it later. Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members. On thelandacademy.com, online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Okay, Matt asks: "I have heard that the state of Arizona limits, has limits to how many properties one can buy or sell in a year. I think they said it's six-" Steven Butala: Wrong. Jill DeWit: "I'm not sure if this pertains to certain counties. Is this true?-" Steven Butala: Nope. Jill DeWit: "Do any other states have this limitation?-" Steven Butala: Yes. Jill DeWit: "Perhaps I misunderstood. Or it could be bogus, not sure that's why I'm asking the experts. Thank you. Of course if this is true I would assume that I could purchase six in my name, six in my LLC, and create other LLC's when needed. Thanks." Steven Butala: Thank you, Matt, for asking this question. This is masters degree, maybe PhD level question and I'm happy to answer it. Arizona has something called bulk sales act. It's directly in response to in the fifties and sixties, groups of people buying a bunch of property, huge acres of property, sub dividing it because there were no rules back then, and then advertising in a magazine. And cold calling people in eastern part of the country, and selling them bogus ... selling them property five and six and ten times. So, it gives us a bad name in this industry. Jill DeWit: It's true. There was a whole scam back then. Steven Butala: There was a movie about it. What is that movie called? Jill DeWit: I can't remember. But yeah, they would have- Steven Butala: Glengarry Glen Ross, that's it. Jill DeWit: They would have signs up, they oh yeah, it was just- Steven Butala: Rio Rico. If you haven't seen, if you're in the land business you gotta see Glengarry Glen Ross. These salesmen sit in a room in the fifties and just scam people out of their dough. Jill DeWit: I know. Steven Butala: So, Arizona's answer back then was to pass a law called bulk sales law. So, and it says you have to file a public report- Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: Anybody can file a public report on property that they own if you're gonna sell a single property in a sub division. I'm gonna get tons of mail on this because that law is not clear. What a sub-division is, it's not clear. But, what they say is if you have, I don't know, 25 properties in a subdivision you have to sell them off in sixes. If you only own one there, like lets say you own a house for instance, you don't have to file a public report when you sell your house do you? Jill DeWit: Right.

Return on Investment Analysis per Land Deal (LA 721) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show. Entertaining land investment talk, we hope. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: Are you alluding to the show? And I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about return on investment analysis, per land deal. Jill, could it be anymore- Jill DeWit: What the heck? Steven Butala: ... boring for you, today? Jill DeWit: What were you thinking when you came up with this title. Steven Butala: This is stuff that we need to know. Jill DeWit: Wow. Steven Butala: This is stuff that we need to talk about, and that's why you're here, to lighten this whole thing up. Jill DeWit: ROI analysis. Oh, this is going to be fun. I'm excited. Do I really have to be here? Can I just go? Steven Butala: We can shorten the show. Here's the spoiler alert. When you sell land, you double it, you double your money. So, you buy it for four grand, you sell it for eight. That's 100% ROI ... That's my knob. Jill DeWit: Oh, sorry. Steven Butala: I know. I actually changed it up on you. Jill DeWit: Oh, you did? Okay, thank you. Steven Butala: She just turned it up so loud that I can't even hear myself talk. Jill DeWit: I am so sorry. Anything's better than this show ... Just kidding. Steven Butala: I'm old and hearing loss has set in, quite honestly. Jill DeWit: I'm sorry. Steven Butala: Spoiler alert, you get 100% return, and we almost ... The challenge is to keep it at 100, instead of making it 200, but we'll talk about that in a minute. Jill DeWit: Cool. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Jay asks, "I've been coming across some counties which are starting to not share the owner name on their assessor, or appraisal, district website for privacy." Steven Butala: California? Jill DeWit: Hilarious. Steven Butala: I come across the same thing. Jill DeWit: This is awesome. "If this trend continues, will that make getting data, to mail these counties, more difficult in the future?" Steven Butala: No. Jill DeWit: Nope. "Just curious if others are seeing this trend of hiding owner names in other counties, and if there are any consequences for us as land investors? Thanks." Steven Butala: No. This is a great question, Jay. It's right up my alley, because as we all know, data's my thing, and I had the same concern because Kern in San Bernardino, who apparently have the same IT department, or similar people, decided about a year, or two years ago, to stop sharing the name. But, by the way, the law requires that this is public information, but the law doesn't say make it hard or make it easy. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: There are some counties in Arizona, not anymore, but it used to be, I had to drive up there, I don't even know if Jill knows this, this is before Jill's time. Drive up there, sit at a IBM System 36 terminal- Jill DeWit: I remember you telling me.

Who is set up to Succeed the Most (LA 720) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I am Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about whose set up to succeed the most in this crazy business we've chosen for ourselves. Jill DeWit: It's not the guy with the most money. Steven Butala: Nope. Jill DeWit: It's not the person ... I'm trying to think of another funny ... What do you think? I think people think the most money is going to succeed, and it's not. Steven Butala: Yeah, it's not the dreamy ... it's not any of that stuff. It's all set up for biz. Jill DeWit: And it's not the one that walks around with the most positive attitude. Could you imagine? Steven Butala: Life is beautiful, man. Jill DeWit: Oh, that's okay. Just write him a check. Steven Butala: Don't get mad at that guy, he's okay. Jill DeWit: Money solves it all. Steven Butala: God, we live in Southern California. Jill DeWit: I know. Steven Butala: I'm a little tired of that. Jill DeWit: Hey- Steven Butala: There's a happy medium to everything. I guess that's what we're going to talk about. Jill DeWit: Yes. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. You're just gonna ... Gimme it. Give it to me. Jill DeWit: No. Steven Butala: [crosstalk 00:01:11] just a second ago. Jill DeWit: David asks, "1. What criteria do you all use to identify motivated land sellers?" I think the go-to is tax delinquent. Steven Butala: Oh, I can- Jill DeWit: Are there any other search filters people have had success with? Steven Butala: David- Jill DeWit: Number two ... Steven Butala: Wait a minute. Jill DeWit: I don't think this person is a member. Steven Butala: I don't think so, either. Jill DeWit: This is fun. I like this game. Hey. Number two, "To get tax delinquent lists," because David's hung up on this. He doesn't know us. "I know direct from the county is the best and most accurate approach," David really does not know us. Steven Butala: Oh, David. Jill DeWit: We can really help you, David. "I'd like to work in a few counties and move around regularly, trying different areas." This would be extremely time consuming, that's one of the reasons we don't do it. "So, I'm wondering if a lot of you just skip the county and go directly to a provider," see, this is how I know he's not a member. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: "Like, List Source [inaudible 00:02:13] 24/7, or something alike. If so, which one do you like best? Thanks, David." This is perfect. Let me back up by saying this is exactly why we have this on the community. I am so glad you posted this question. Steven Butala: And why we have this show. Jill DeWit: This is what most people think, David. David,

Why Some Members Fail (LA 719) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steven and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about why some members fail. It's truth week. [inaudible 00:00:15] about truth investing week here on the Land Academy Show. Jill DeWit: I'm trying to think of some funny things before I get to the real things. Steven Butala: Yeah, failure is not that funny. Jill DeWit: I know, well- Steven Butala: But, it's necessary. There's the spoiler alert. Jill DeWit: This is not just fail ... why some members fail, not ... I took it as not an individual transaction like big time fail, like- Steven Butala: Yeah, they sign up and it doesn't work. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: Or, they don't sign up or they don't try. Jill DeWit: Right. Steven Butala: The chances are if they're failing at this they're failing at something else. Like a lot of stuff. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Why is that funny ... Truthfully funny to you, isn't it? Jill DeWit: It is. Steven Butala: We're gonna bring marriage into this at some point. Jill DeWit: Good thing we're not married. Steven Butala: Before we get into it let's take a question posted by one of our members on landacademy.com online community, it's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Tina asks: I've been using a popular CRM for the last couple of months since I started land investing, and while it's very easy to work with it is also pretty expensive, and I think I'd rather put that money towards actual land deals. How do you organize all of your leads from initial receiving, to purchasing, to sale? Doing it on Excel seems very daunting to me, unless there are some tricks that I don't know about to make the information more manageable, and I like the idea of paper records even less. Any recommendations? Steven Butala: May I? Jill DeWit: Please. Steven Butala: For years and years I ... We were using a proprietary system that was written in sequel for us long before a Windows environment ... a web-enabled Windows environment was popular. You can imagine how long ago that was, and it cost me a quarter of a million dollars. We were running it on a Windows 2003 XP server until very recently, and I bagged it all ... drum roll, for what? Excel. One single Excel spreadsheet. There are three tabs at the bottom. The first one's called acquisitions, the second one's called- Jill DeWit: Engineering. Steven Butala: Engineering, and, the third one's called sales, and that's it, and everybody loves it. Now, here's the thing. When you have a big staff, or staff of more than three, they have to be relatively educated on how to use this because it's disastrous, they can go in there and wreck the whole thing in 10 minutes. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: CRM's like Salesforce, and I think there's this one guy, I don't remember who, that's probably who you're talking about, Tina, who's got a land-specific CRM out there that he manages himself,

How Much Money You Can Really Make per Year (LA 718) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Good day. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy show. Entertaining land and investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about how much money can you really make per year buy and selling land. Jill DeWit: You can make as much as you want or as little as you let happen. Steven Butala: Here's the spoiler alert. I'll tell you the difference between land and just about every other real estate type or niche that I know of, including commercial real estate. All the other types, flipping houses, buying and selling mobile homes, or even skyscrapers and stuff at that way high end, is very consistent. You know what you're gonna buy it for within reason, and you know what you're gonna sell it for. Rarely do you come across an opportunity where you can just knock it out of the park, where you buy a piece of property for 20, 30, $50,000 and sell it for half a million. You think it's gonna be worth 80 or 90, and you find out, you get in there, it's worth way more. There's something about vacant land, because it's the primary residence for a seller, they're tired of getting the tax bill. They're never gonna use it. They just don't care. Jill DeWit: It's true. Steven Butala: That's what it all boils down to. A fantastic opportunity for people like us. Jill DeWit: You know what's interesting though? When you started to talk, you said just about talking about real estate, I know of no other business that has the same consistent or more than consistent return on investment, but that's nothing you have to still work at it. I think people think that, oh, I'm gonna do nothing like that guy. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: They don't know what that guy put into it to get to that point. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: You really do have to work at this, so when we talk about how much money you can really make it in a year, don't just think you're gonna buy one and sit back and watch it happen and just, your balance is just gonna do it. You gotta work at this. Steven Butala: Right. We'll get into it. It takes a certain personality, and I'll tell you what it doesn't. If you like HGTV, HGTV show flips and interior design, this is absolutely not for you. Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Rod asks, "Hi. I am selling a cheap property. The buyer enlisted a buyer's agent and title insurance. I'm receiving requests for disclosures and seller's information from both the agency and the title company. I cannot answer 99% of the disclosure questions with a yes or no question, nor do I care to certify it." Steven Butala: Exactly. Jill DeWit: "Is all this typical?" Steven Butala: Yes. Jill DeWit: "I feel ethically bound to the buyer, but honestly, I wish I would've declined from the agent from the beginning. Can I or should I still back out?" Well, actually you can. Steven Butala: What would you do, Jill? I know what I would do. I bet it's the same. Jill DeWit: Yeah, I actually probably would say, "You know what? This is not how I do things.

How Much Money Does it Take to Get Started (LA 717) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit, podcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about how much money does it really take to get started. I'll tell you, we have answered this question quite a lot, but it warrants answering again, because we get it so often. Jill DeWit: I'll tell you, it's not zero. People think that- Steven Butala: It's not zero, and it's not 100 grand. Jill DeWit: Oh my gosh. People will be like ... I usually get both extremes. People say, "I've heard you need no money at all to get started at this." I'm like, "Hold on a moment. That's bad advice, number one. Don't go down that path, and certainly don't take out a new credit card or a second on your house to do this." And then the other thing I've heard is, "Oh, I can't possibly be an investor. I don't have enough money." Well, hold on a moment. You probably can. Steven Butala: Well, as a twist I'm gonna add- Jill DeWit: But some money- Steven Butala: I'm gonna add some flavor to this in the meat of the show. There are people who throw a ton of money at this and do extremely well. They take assets from somewhere else in their life and they pour them into vacant land and flip it, and end up making millions. So, I want to talk about that in a minute. Jill DeWit: But, they also have to be educated. Just because you have a lot of money in here doesn't mean you're gonna do well. Steven Butala: Exactly. And I'm gonna give you the profile of somebody who's like that with several real examples. Jill DeWit: All right. Steven Butala: Before we get into that though, let's take a question posted by one of our members on TheLandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Matt asks, "Hey everyone. I just bought a property from XYZ Company, and John Doe sold it. I got the articles of organization from John before he sold it, confirmed that he was the only guy that needed to sign to sell the property on behalf of the company, and I got the deed signed." Steven Butala: Good. Jill DeWit: "Is that sufficient to transfer the property"- Steven Butala: Yes. Jill DeWit: "Or should I have him sign some sort of affadavit confirming he's the right guy to sell? Will a title company potentially push back on this down the road? Should I follow the articles of organization with the deed at the same time, or a separate document, or just go ahead and send the deed in and keep rolling?" Steven Butala: Go ahead, Jill. Jill DeWit: It's the ... This is your classic, Steven, you answered your own question. You know what, you did confirm it. You don't have to go that far. That's one of the beautiful things here. Steven Butala: You already did enough. You did too much. Jill DeWit: You did. Steven Butala: Not too much, but safe stuff. Jill DeWit: And honestly I love it. This is how I do. I like to play it safe, and that's exactly what you did, Matt. You said, "You know what, hey John Doe, I appreciate you are the sole managing member of XYZ Company, but I kind of need to check it myself. And by the way a lot of these, you can go online and find this and confirm it yoursel...

How to Avoid Deal Theft (LA 716) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill, here. Welcome to the Land Academy show, entertaining land investor talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWitt broadcasting from sunny, southern California. Steven Butala: Today Jill and I talk about how to avoid deal theft. Well what is it, first? Jill DeWit: Like car theft? Steven Butala: Yeah, it's only worse, and more expensive. Jill DeWit: Can I go somewhere and report a deal theft? Steven Butala: And you can't get insurance. Jill DeWit: Can I? Shoot. I- Steven Butala: Yeah, you can report it to me. Jill DeWit: I would like to file a report, please. Someone stole my deal. Steven Butala: It's funny that you say that. That's exactly why we're doing this show. Jill DeWit: I wish there was a thing. Steven Butala: One of our members emailed me and said, "I'm wondering if you guys can do a show about deal theft, because I just lost 30 grand. Jill DeWit: That sucks. Steven Butala: With no insurance, like but you lose, somebody steals your car, at least you have a chance of getting some money back. Jill DeWit: A chance. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Mark asked, "I was wondering if it's a normal practice among the group to search not only for liens under the county APN, but also under the owner name, as some liens get recorded against the name only, not only, and not against a particlular property. Thank you. Steven Butala: All right. This is a fantastic question, and it's, if you're new in the business, I want you to close your ears, because this kind of stuff doesn't matter. It's so infrequent that, and it's only if you're doing your own deals, and if you're not using a title agent and all that stuff. But if you're a pretty seasoned investor, you've done at least ten transactions or more, or you're like us where this is your business, you should know that there's a couple types of liens on real estate. Two big picture types, like Roman numeral types like Roman numeral one, and Roman numeral two. Number one is, liens that stay with the property. The most common type is set property taxes, so if somebody stops paying their property taxes on a piece of real estate, eventually the county is going to foreclose on the property, but there's no repercussions to you as the owner. They're not going to look up your credit score, your credit report. It's not going to damage your credit. What they're going to do, they're only interested in the property. They're going to take the property back, and resell it to somebody, however they do that, just to get it back on the tax rolls. That's the first type of lien that stays with the property. The second type of lien is a lien against the owner. A personal guarantee it's called, or there's a lot of different names for it based on geography around the country. A good example of that is an IRS lien, so if the tax people come after you, they want all your assets. All the real estate that you own, anything that has any value. Or, a popular one these days is a healthcare lien, where you just didn't pay your hospital bill, and we all have and no people in these situations. So does it ever get enforced? Is it real? In my opinion, in my 15, almost 16 thousand transaction opinion,

Signs you have Arrived in the Land Business (LA 715) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about the signs that you're experiencing, that you may have arrived in a land business. Jill DeWit: You've arrived. Steven Butala: I saw you furiously take notes. Jill DeWit: Oh, I have some good things [crosstalk 00:00:28]. Steven Butala: Most of the time you take no notes. So, you must have an interest in this topic today. Jill DeWit: I do. Nothing better ... No, seriously. Steven Butala: Jill's got nothing better to do right now than do this show. Jill DeWit: Yeah, nothing better to do. That's what I meant. Steven Butala: You know, this reminds me of those old Jeff Foxworthy jokes where, "You might be a redneck-" Jill DeWit: Oh yeah? Steven Butala: "Signs you might be a redneck." We'll get to it in a minute. Jill DeWit: Signs you're a real grown up investor. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Okay. Greg asks: "I got a letter today saying that a survey is required to transfer the appraisal and tax account to my name. The Deed has already been recorded. I've already sold the slot and five others in this neighborhood. They were all cash deals. Have you seen this before? Am I responsible for paying for six surveys? This could really hurt. What if it grows to 12 next year, then 24 the next? This is the first one." Steven Butala: May I? Jill DeWit: Yes. Steven Butala: There's a small chance that you're buying and selling these properties in a HOA ... In a subdivision that comes with an HOA, a Home Owners Association, or an LOA, Land Owners Association, or a POA, Property Owners Association. There's a small chance that ... There's a very small chance that they require a survey to transfer the property. I don't know why they would do that to themselves because now they're really punishing people for buying and selling land, and that's how they make money, right? Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Steven Butala: So, I say small chance. What I really think is going on is this is a bunch of malarkey. Somebody who makes money doing surveys is saying you have to do it. Jill DeWit: Yeah, that's true. Steven Butala: That's what I think. Jill DeWit: You know what? There's just so much to that, too. There's a list- Steven Butala: Well, its public information when you record a Deed. You just gotta know where to look for it. Jill DeWit: Yeah, because we have it. We're all using them. Steven Butala: Yeah. Exactly. That's how we ... The data subscriptions we use at Real Quest, Title Pro and Data [Street 00:02:30], that's this. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative), exactly. Steven Butala: I told this story probably two weeks ago last week. [inaudible 00:02:36] office buildings, and I found out looking at our financial statements that there was a comp...

Business Signs Tell You to Go from Part Time to Fulltime (LA 714) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to The Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about business signs that tell you you should go from part-time to full-time wholesaling land or houses. Jill DeWit: I have a good list. Steven Butala: This is a good week. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: This is the kind of week I like. This is Business Week. It's Get Your Business Kicked Up to the Next Notch Week, or whatever ... I don't know. That's not the formal name. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: You got all that stuff, though. You got all the things that, in the beginning, that just trip you up. You got your wits back about you. You got your confidence. You know the business works. Now, it's just all about doing some deals. Jill DeWit: You just passed all your tests, whatever your personal tests were. Sometimes people question- Steven Butala: You convinced your wife. Jill DeWit: Well, they question not only, "Is what we provide ..." but, what you can ... How do I say this? It's not just about if the business is a viable business. It's, "Are you a viable candidate to make this business work?" They both have to be on the same page. Steven Butala: Right. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Steven Butala: Jill and I just got off the phone with a guy who already has a business, and he's going to add this to it. Which, I think, he's already knocked out that whole attitude part of it. His attitude is correct. Jill DeWit: Do you remember we had that list a while back, though? We thought about, "What are the top three things of all of our most successful members?" Steven Butala: Yes. Yeah, go ahead. Jill DeWit: Number one was they know how to run a business. They've been a business owner. They are a business owner. You have to have that mentality and have to be able to know to get things ... If you have a successful business, you've been through a lot of crap. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: You know how to cut through it, and to- Steven Butala: Cut through it. Get over it. Jill DeWit: Power through and get it done, and get there. If you didn't have a successful business, like you never conquered accepting credit cards for your business, it wouldn't work, kind of thing. So, you've got through all that, and there's always obstacles. The second one was understanding data. You have to be able to ... Steven Butala: Spreadsheets. Jill DeWit: You can't say, "I just finished Excel 101, now I'm ready." Steven Butala: Yeah, that's not going to work. Jill DeWit: Then number three was you really have to have some funds, or access to ... We want to be honest. I don't want you to come here with $80,000 in debt, and you have one credit card left that you're living off of. This is not for you. You need to be able to- Steven Butala: Yeah, you got some other stuff to do first. Jill DeWit: You're not going to be able to sleep at night, and that's not the right way to start something.

How to Scale Up After 10 Deals (LA 713) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steven, Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I am Jill DeWitt, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about how to scale up your land operation, after those crucial first 10 deals. This topic ... I have to tell you, I'm a little biased. Jill DeWit: Really? Steven Butala: I love, people who have made it [inaudible 00:00:28] to this point. Jill DeWit: Oh, oh, yeah. Steven Butala: There's no more whining, there's no more, “oh, my god, how do I do it”. What happens, all their hurdles and the hard stuff's done. Now you're staring in the mirror saying, “you know what, I didn't know this could work”. Jill DeWit: Right. I have 10 examples showing that I did it. Steven Butala: And then you start doing some math, saying all you really even need to do is just 10; if I make 10 grand a transaction and I do one transaction a month, I'm going to make $120,000 this year. You're staring at yourself in the mirror; that's a good moment. Jill DeWit: Yeah, exactly. Steven Butala: And then, if I can do one deal a month, I can do two, and now I'm making a quarter of a million bucks a year, now I don't need a job. Jill DeWit: Ding ding. Steven Butala: That's how it starts. I love this point. This is the excitement and the whole scaling it up, what do I have to do, just tell me what to do. Jill DeWit: Yep, love it. Steven Butala: Before we get into it (we really just did), let's take a question posted by one of our members on landacademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: Alright, Jeff asks, “Hello all, I have a question about sending offers. If you send 1500 offers and someone with some land sends a signed one back in, are you not obligated to buy the land? Has anyone ever cried foul, or more than cried, in times where you go back and decide not to purchase? Thanks, Jeff". Steven Butala: Go ahead, Jill. We're going to say the same thing. Jill DeWit: Totally. One of the things that we do- Steven Butala: It's a good question, by the way. Jill DeWit: It's a great question. And you know what, Jeff, the answer is, anybody can back out at any time, and it happens not just with land. Even with houses, you could be in escrow and you know - Steven Butala: It could happen at the altar. Jill DeWit: It could happen at the altar! Steven Butala: You know, it turns out [crosstalk 00:02:13] that I just don't want to get married. Jill DeWit: And you know what, all that happens is how much do you want to pursue and make that person, I mean, do you want to chase that person and bring legal recourse or attempt to bring legal recourse to them? No, because then it's going to cost you both money, and that's really not the answer. Let me just simplify and make it really easy though, what we do, because it doesn't usually get to that point, obviously. With land, one of the things that we have on our mailer is, at the bottom, there's like five or six conditions there that we have put, that this is contingent upon the taxes being current or in a whatever situation, up to us, by the way, and it's dependent on it meeting our acquisition...

Sources of Investment Capital for Land Acquisitions (LA 712) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hi. Steven 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 sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about the sources of investment capital for land acquisitions. You don't necessarily have to have your own money. Jill DeWit: A rich uncle. Steven Butala: You don't have to have your own money to do this. In fact, I have a saying that goes like this, "Never, ever let a good acquisition go to waste, especially if you don't have the money." Because everybody in our group, go poke around for free on LandInvestors.com. You'll find some guys that'll love to share in your profitability, your real estate. They lurk there. They love it. Jill DeWit: Mm-hmm (affirmative). What I meant too, was when I said, "rich uncle," you don't have to have a rich uncle. Steven Butala: It helps though. Jill DeWit: And actually ... But you know what's so funny? There's a lot of people that I know, they'll think, "Oh, I can never get in the game because I don't have any money." Steven Butala: You know, it just occurred to me that we are somebody's rich aunt and uncle, a couple people. Jill DeWit: We are. That's very true. Steven Butala: If my niece or nephew came to me and said ... Jill DeWit: I need for money for x. Steven Butala: "I need some money. Look at this deal." Jill DeWit: I'd be like ... Steven Butala: "And you can't lose on this thing. We'll just sell it immediately." Jill DeWit: Yep, we'd be in. Steven Butala: I'd be, "Sign me up." Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Plus, it'd be fun. Jill DeWit: Totally. Steven Butala: It's fun to watch little kids be successful. Before we get into it, let's take a question, posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: It's better than watching little kids fall down. Steven Butala: I mean, little kids like 22-year-olds. Jill DeWit: All right, thank you. All right, Luke asks, "Hey, all. I'd love to hear ideas and input on whether to offer refund/money back guarantees. Do you guys do that?" I used to. But when you get a number of people taking advantage of it, it really sucks. Steven Butala: Here's what we do, we don't post it anywhere, this is for land only, not for houses, not for Land Academy, not for House Academy, not for Parcel Fact, not for all the services we provide, I'm talking about land sales only. We offer, like a diamond dealer does, an unconditional no questions asked, money back guaranty lifelong, but we publish what I just said no where. We don't give anybody a reason to go look it up and say, "Yeah, you know what? It turns out I need to that $10,000 that I bought for this property 10 years ago from these guys." If they go to look it up, they're not gonna find it anywhere. But I'll tell you this, all the problems that arise from the Department of Real Estate in any state or county, they're all complaint driven. They don't have police officers driving around seeing if you're complying. They only respond to problems. And problems start where there's money involved. Jill DeWit: And unhappy people...

Land Orders online vs on Phone (LA 711) Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk, or at least we hope. I'm Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I'm Jill DeWit, broadcasting from sunny southern California. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about land orders online, taking your land orders online versus on the phone. Jill DeWit: This totally confuses people, and I have some ... Steven Butala: This is a spoiler alert. I'll give you a spoiler alert. It is inefficient as hell to talk on the phone. Jill DeWit: Yes, this is true. Steven Butala: 90% of the time. Jill DeWit: We're talking about business-related, not just dating, right? Steven Butala: No, I think that's inefficient, too. Jill DeWit: I knew that. Steven Butala: Want to get down to business when you're dating. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Less talking. Love it. I get it. Steven Butala: Before we get into it, let's take a question posted by one of our members on the LandAcademy.com online community. It's free. Jill DeWit: That's funny. Steven Butala: As she pins the microphone to her chest. Jill DeWit: Okay, Matt asks, "Hi, everyone. I'm buying a property and the vesting deed is a tax deed to purchaser of tax defaulted property in California." Steven Butala: We just bought 20 of those this week. Go ahead. Jill DeWit: "Besides checking the legal description, is there anything else that I need to double-check for the title? The deed is between the tax collector and the current seller. I think it's as good as any deed, right? And the chain of title before it is disregarded because it was foreclosed on due to overdue taxes. Is there anything else to look out for?" Steven Butala: Classic. Classic answer your own question at the end. I love it, Matt. You answered your own question. I love buying tax deeds, because they went through adverse possession for you for free. Jill DeWit: They did all the work. Steven Butala: Yep. They had to ... Jill DeWit: Posted it in the paper and did all the ... Steven Butala: When the county takes a property back for back taxes, they have to go through the same rules that we do for adverse possession. They have to find out if there's anybody that has any interest in this property, any interest in stepping up, paying the taxes, and taking the property over, in Arizona anyway, including going through the whole seven-year tax lien process. By the time you get a tax deed, it's pretty darn clear, almost without exception, almost without exception, that nobody has a real interest in the property. Usually they're just not alive, that's the real truth of it. Jill DeWit: Exactly. Steven Butala: Should you be concerned? No way. Jill and I built a whole company a long time ago on tax deeds just like this, and tax liens. And subsequently found out it's way more efficient and faster to buy property from people. Jill DeWit: Can I add one little item? That what you need to do when you convey the property, because I did this the very first time, years ago. I was so ingrained in my head to copy the deed from before, just mirror it all, change the grantor-grantee, right? Legal's the same, everything they have on there's the same, just copy that over.

3 Biggest Road Blocks Creating Real Estate Wealth (LA 710) Transcript: Steven Butala: Steve and Jill here. Jill DeWit: Hello. Steven Butala: Welcome to the Land Academy Show, entertaining land investment talk. Happy Friday. I am Steven Jack Butala. Jill DeWit: And I am Jill Dewitt, broadcasting from beautiful sunny Southern California. Steven Butala: It is perfect today. Jill DeWit: It is. Steven Butala: Today, Jill and I talk about the three biggest roadblocks in creating real estate wealth that we see. We are actually qualified to do this show. Jill DeWit: We are. Steven Butala: 'Cause we see ... We deal with a lot of people- Jill DeWit: And we've had- Steven Butala: At all different levels. Jill DeWit: Yeah, and we've been there. Steven Butala: Yeah. Jill DeWit: That's even better. Steven Butala: And we've experienced all these roadblocks, and believe it or not, we experience 'em all the time. Jill DeWit: Yeah. Steven Butala: As far as you get, there's still is stuff that stands in the way. Jill DeWit: Totally. Steven Butala: It's the norm actually. Stuff standing in the way is a norm. Why's that so funny? Jill DeWit: I don't know. It's just funny. Steven Butala: Before we get into why Jill's laughing, let's take a question posted by one of our members on LandAcademy.com online community, it's free. Jill laughs all the time by the way. Jill DeWit: I do. Steven Butala: She wakes up laughing. Jill DeWit: Thank you. Steven Butala: It's really- Jill DeWit: Not for the reasons that you might be thinking. Steven Butala: Oh my gosh. Jill DeWit: No. Matt asks- Steven Butala: She's laughing at me. Jill DeWit: No, I'm not. Matt asks, "I have a deal that is .11 acres near a lake-" Steven Butala: I like it. Jill DeWit: "I've got it under contract for $1,000, and I haven't seen anything sell less than $3,500-" Steven Butala: Congratulations. Jill DeWit: "In the last three years with most selling for $5,000 to $7,000." This is starting out fantastic. "This lot is a bit of a jungle though with lots of landscaping to make it build-able, I imagine. Considering the lot is only 50 feet by 100 feet, would you pass on this deal? I imagine that if it cost a lot of money to clear the lot, then it's resale value is shot. Thanks for the advice, I'm new to the group, so sorry if I'm posting in the wrong location. I'm still figuring out the forums." That's cute. Steven Butala: This is good. Jill DeWit: Good Matt. Steven Butala: So the three rules of real estate are, go ahead, location, location, location. If you have point ... Notice they're not size location, location, or location, location, size. They're location, location, location, so I rather ... Would you rather have .11 acres near a lake with a lot of foliage on it- Jill DeWit: Cheap. Steven Butala: Or 80 acres in the middle of the desert that you need a helicopter to get to, which one, Jill? Jill DeWit: Let me think, let me think, the first one.