How Do Land Investing Deals Work?

Well, let's just go through my first deal. I told you I was a house wholesaler. I was army officer, working 12 hours a day, and I was sending out postcards. And really how I stumbled on land is I was searching for answers, listening to all the podcasts, reading all the books, and I heard a gentleman talking about buying land at crazy discounts and flipping it and doubling, sometimes like quadrupling his money overnight. And I already had the postcard. It was as simple as saying, hey, my name is Brent. If I'd like to buy your house at 123 Main street, call me or text me if you're interested in a fair, all cash, no hassle offer. So I just changed house to land, and I got the tax delinquent list. Actually, I'd already had the tax delinquent list. People that were behind on their taxes for the entire county for properties. And I just had to figure out which one was land, which one was mobile homes, which one was houses. Well, I was only mailing the houses, so I was like, okay, which one's the land? So we figured out, we looked at the percentage of improvements, which was zero. And some counties have dollar improvement, which was zero. And then some counties have like a three digit code. It's like 2, 3, 1 is land. 2, 3, 2 is mobile homes. So some have a legend on the assessor's parcel number that they make it really easy for you or the schedule number. So we figured that out, and I used my virtual assistant in India. This girl was literally getting her PhD. So she's like way smarter than me and she's scrubbing my list and I'm paying her $5 an hour to do it. So I'm like, thrilled as I'm working my army officer job. So she shot me back that list. It was 687 records of people that were behind on their taxes for their land. I had my mailhouse send that postcard I just gave an example of, and my phone blew up. And the first, I remember the first call, I called the guy back. I'm hiding in the locker room because, you know, we're not supposed to have jobs as army officers. So I'm like trying to keep this on the down low and that. It was a retired cpa. Nicest man ever. I ended up meeting him for coffee at this coffee shop right outside of the gate of Fort Carson, Colorado. The coffee shop was closed because it was too late. So we sat on the, the, like the deck. And I still owe that place so much money because I can't tell you how much business I did after hours there. So I really should go and give them a big, big chunk of change just as a tithe or something. But I digress. He told me the price. He's like, look, I'll sell you the land for $285. It's not buildable. I'm behind on the taxes, I'm about to lose it. And I was like, let me just go look at it. So me and my wife and my newborn baby in 2016 drove to this land, it's about an hour away from us, that overlooks the Pike National Forest. Two lots actually not buildable. And I had no clue, like, what it was worth. So guess what? I called the best person I could think of. And that was a. There was a real estate office down the hill. It's like as if God himself planted that office for me to call. And I mean that with all sincerity. So I call on a Saturday and there's a realtor in there. And she answered the phone and goes, you know, how may I help you? So I told her the situation. I'm buying this land. What is your 30 day blowout price? What is your get it done now price? I want to like, because $285. Back then, Lars was a lot of money for me. And I hate to say it, but I was not going to waste it because that's diaper money. We just bought a new house, we just moved across the country and I have a wife and she likes to spend money on food and stuff. So she goes, I don't know about get it done now price, but I think you can list it for about ten grand. And I was just over the moon. I was like, this is incredible. I'm buying it for 285. It's worth 10 grand. I thanked her for a time. I told her I'll call her back as soon as I buy it and hung up with her. Well, she calls me right back immediately. Within five minutes, while I'm explaining this to my wife, she goes, brent, what if I bought it from you? I was like, what are you offering? She said, five grand. I was like, when can you close? She said, Wednesday, four days from now. I was like, great, please just send me the purchase agreement. By the time I got home, the purchase agreement was in the email. I signed it, I called the seller, I said, hey, can I pay you on Tuesday? And so I did. I brought on the check. He brought me a notarized quitclaim deed. I drove to the Title company and got my $5,000 check on Wednesday. And then that next week I did another deal. But this one, I sell her financed because I didn't think the land was that good. So I sell or finance it for 500 down. That's what I paid for the land. Got my money back out of the deal and got $400 a month for the next, I think 11 and a half months, 12 months, call it. Sold that one for five grand, too. And that's the one that changed my life because that was covering my truck payment now and seller finance. So I had already owned, I think I owned five or six rentals at the time. One of them was a triplex. And I wasn't making $400 net on any of them. Maybe I can add a couple of them up and that would have added $400 a month net. But that land deal was like, holy crap. I didn't have to borrow the money. I didn't have to insure this house. I didn't have to beg for a loan. And I'm netting 400amonth, really positively netting it. And that's where I just kept doing it and doing it and doing it. Before I knew it, six months later, I had replaced my entire. My entire expenditures. So it's financial free. I got the first one out of the way and that's the rest is history. I hope that gave you. Well, how did I sell it? Craigslist. Both or. The second deal I sold on Craigslist. I hope I gave you all the nuts and bolts and how it worked.