From Zero to Land Investor: The Beginner's Roadmap to Getting Your First Sale

Sa.

You're staring at your computer screen, overwhelmed by all the real estate investing options out there. House flipping, rental properties, commercial deals. Each one seemingly requiring more money, more experience, and more risk than you currently have. But what is the simplest path to real estate success is the one most people completely overlook. There's a little known approach to land investing that requires no credit checks, no contractors, and can be started with as little as $500. Yet it's responsible for helping complete beginners close their first profitable deals in as little as 30 to 60 days. And in today's episode, we're laying out the exact step by step roadmap that turns complete beginners into confident land investors. Welcome to Nightcap.

Cheers. Cheers.

Amazing. I get drawn in when you say the whole intro just drew me right in.

That, that's the whole point.

Keep going.

Let's. Let's do it. Let's keep going.

What do we.

Who are we?

I'm. I'm joined this evening by Handsome Rob John Burnett, professional investor. The Zen master. Breathe in the mailing. Breathe out of the marketing. Mike Zano and dude Buddy, the nightcap OG Scott Bossman. We're all professional land investors. What does that mean? It means that we buy land, we sell land, we make a cash flow like a rental home. So a lot of people think, oh, it takes a lot of money or a lot of experience to get into this business. But for beginners, let's give them the roadmap. What it really takes to be a land investor. So, Handsome Rob John Burnett, let's start the beginning of the road on, on this. And what, what does it really take if you're just starting out? What, how much time, how much money?

What is it?

So as far as like, time is concerned, you know, you can really start this out with five to ten hours a week. Right? And that's, that's effectively what you need to, to take action consistently and build. Now, it's important as you're putting in five to 10 hours a week, you got to focus those five to 10 hours on the right things. Right? But with focused effort on this, like each individual area of your business, you could do that with five to ten hours. And then as far as five to.

Ten hours a week. Hours a day.

I know, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's funny, I tell people that and they're like five to ten hours a day. I can't do that. I'm like, well, yeah, exactly.

Nor should you.

No. And then as far as budget is concerned, so this is something that, that Mike said once And I'm gonna steal from him. I, I steal this all the time. But it's a very good, insightful thought, I think. So basically, like, early on when you're, when you're building your land investing business, from my perspective, it's more about building the machine than about doing the crazy big home run deals, right? You could buy properties for $500 and you could buy properties for $5,000. Right. Both of those price points work. Right. And as you're building your business, you can do that with a lower budget where you're buying properties at $500 and you're just cycling and building. Right. And you can do that on a lower budget because really the focus is, Sorry, there's a loud car driving by, but the focus isn't, isn't on again, like hitting that one home run deal. It's about building the machine, building the business itself. So that's my thought. Whenever somebody's on a tighter budget, I just say, like, let's focus on smaller properties. We, we can sub in bigger properties or more expensive properties later on.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. I mean, Mike Zaino, the Zen master, the, the myth is that you need like 50 grand to start in this business. And in traditional real estate, that's not even that much money. What is, what. How much would you say someone should start with if they want five to seven properties?

That's.

Yeah, that's a good question. You know, people often ask us about the budget they should set forth. And, you know, it's tough for me because I started really small. Like, I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to exclude anyone because I started with, you know, as, you know, Mark, 40 plus thousand dollars in debt. And I focused on these tiny properties that, you know, you guys are talking about these $500 deals. I mean, you have to have some money for mailers, you know, but, you know, LG Pass is what, like 68 cents a letter now?

It's pretty.

I think it's in that range. It's a crazy deal we get. So you don't need too much money to start sending out a few hundred opera letters a week. And yeah, I mean, you can start, like John saying, building momentum on small properties. The success you build on small properties and momentum is going to carry forward, I mean, to bigger deals. So I don't think you need too much, Mark. We often say, you know, if you're going to go through flight school, we think five grand's a good number to start with. There's a capital budgeting process in the session, one where you allocate a certain percent to mailing and the rest to acquiring those properties. But since you can buy properties in such a wide range of 500 to 5,000, you know, even if you had a small amount of money, you can still buy multiple properties at the smaller range and you can still build the momentum that John's talking about and proof of concept. And once you have that in dialed in now you have like confidence. Like, even if you did a 500 deal and you doubled your money, you sold it on owner financing and forexed it, that confidence is going to carry into the next deal and you're going to start building momentum step by step by step. So I don't think you need a ton of money, Mark. I think you just need a ton of drive and desire and, and just the will to, you know, make something, create something new, right, that's going to truly change your life. So I don't know, I think 5,000 is a good number if you're going to go to flight school for sure. But I say that knowing that you could do it less, like someone could use a, you know, use a 0% credit card and go into some, get some training so they can get fully prepared and educated and then just take a few thousand dollars and they truly could start getting some momentum in my mind.

No, I, I love that. And I really think we, before I, like give my color on it, we gotta go to dude buddy while he's sober. So as nightcap, you know, continues on through the night, he's pounding beer after beer after beer, you know, we. This is like the, the golden sort of time to ask while he's ready, cognitively difficult questions such as how much money should you start with?

Yeah, yeah. There goes my reputation again, thanks to Mark. No, I'm just kidding. At least I'm fun after a few beers. I don't fall asleep like some guy on the call. I won't name names, but just saying. So here's what I think. You need a few things to get going in this and I don't think you don't have to have really special skills, right? You need to have a little bit of time, you need to have a little bit of capital. You need to have the drive, right? You need to have the grit. It's grit work, not grunt work. It's grit work, right? And really, I do believe, like what I loved about you, Mark, is you had so many even, even 10 years ago, you had so many podcasts online. Right. And you were the guest on a lot of different podcasts. So if you're interested in this business, listen to the podcast. You'll learn a lot from these podcasts. And I think if you can dedicate a little bit of time once, you know, an hour a day to learning and a little bit of time, an hour a day to taking action. And it doesn't have to be perfect action. You could be a property owner before you know it. I mean, you, you could buy, you could do it. You could listen to a few podcasts about county research. You could go to our Facebook group and see, oh, you know, oh, there's Mike Zano. He's selling property in this area. That must be a good area. Right. And you could pick up a property from Mike. Mike's been doing this 10 years. He's not going to lead you astray. He's working in areas that are, that are conducive to making a good return in this business. And you know what? Take, take a chance with a little bit of learning and a little bit of action. Take a chance buying a property, land arb or wholesale or take a chance maybe mailing that area like was like Mike was saying. So it's just about, you know, gaining momentum, moving your feet like my coach said back in the day. Scott Todd, and just dedicating yourself to this daily for a while. And if you do this daily for a while, it's going to result in some pretty amazing results down the road.

Yeah, I agree with what everybody said, but I think, Scott, you really hit.

It on the head.

If I'm a total beginner, really, I don't need much time, let's say an hour a day. And to Mike's point, like, I don't even know if I need money for mailing because I could just go buy a land arm deal. So let's break down what land arbitrage is and give the listeners that roadmap of okay, I don't have a lot of time. I don't have a lot of money. Or I have time and I have money, but I just want to dip my toe in the water before I go deeper into this model. So the simplest way to get started, I think is. Is land arbitrage. So, John, can you explain it? Because I'm already sick of my voice.

Yeah. So land our. I've done landar dozens of of times where I've acquired property via owner financing. So land arb is where we buy property with owner financing and then we sell that same Property, typically with owner financing. Right. If you sell it for cash, then you just pay off the rest of the owner financing. You pocket the profits. If you sell it with owner financing, then you effectively are making all of the profit. You're making your payments, people are paying you, and then you get to keep everything that's left over. And when you net everything out, the returns are enormously high. So I agree, Mark. I think it's a great way to get started. It's something where you can effectively acquire a property for, you know, 50 to 100 bucks a month, and then you've got something that you can market right away. Right. And so you can. You can market that immediately. And then once you sell it, then you've got those. Those profits right away.

Yeah.

I mean, just to sort of expand on. On what John was saying and just kind of break it down as a case study. So we'll use the Zen master, Mike Zano. So Mike has bought a property for, let's say, $5,000. And he bought it three years ago. He sold it. He got a thousand dollars down, and he's been selling it for, like, 399amonth. And after, like, let's say, two, three years, his money's out of it. He's gotten his capital back. Maybe he's made a little bit of a profit. And then the buyer defaulted on Mike. So Mike's like, well, okay, Scott Bossman just joined the Lanka community, and he's. He, you know, he doesn't have a whole lot of capital. And the retail price on this is, say, $10,000 now. So I'll say to Scott, hey, look, you don't have $10,000, and you don't want to start doing mailings and try to acquire it from somebody else for $5,000, whatever it may be. Maybe you don't even have enough capital to buy wholesale. You can control this property, and I'll just let you control it, because I've already sold it for $400 a month, so you can have for $200 a month. And Scott's like, wait, I can control this $10,000 piece of property for 200amonth? Mike's like, yeah, no problem. You go out and market it.

So Scott's like, great.

So he then immediately starts selling it or marketing it for $400 a month. He sells it, he gets $400 down. He gets $400 a month, and he's making that spread the arbitrage of $200 a month without having to come out with hardly any money. Out of pocket. Didn't have to do any mailings, didn't have to do any due diligence. He really simplified it. And then to John's point and Mike's point, with that burning desire now, that confidence and that extra capital, he's going to go on and maybe buy a wholesale. Maybe he's going to buy retail during a mailing campaign and really grow his business. And then to John's point, started building those processes and systems as well and really create a business so it's scalable. My equivalent mess.

I think you nailed it. I think it's all about leverage. You're leveraging the community, you're leveraging. I mean, look, real estate is all about control as like you're saying. And you, if you can control a property for a small monthly payment. That's incredible. This, when we started doing this, it was like genius. You know, this is just a way for somebody, literally you can come in here once you understand the mechanics of it, and you could just say, you know what? I'm not going to put money in the mailing. I'm just going to go buy a bunch of land arbitrage, get proof of concept, make a nice spread. The, the ROI or the yield is insane. I don't know, Scott, does that even come. You can calculate once you have, you know, because you're so little into the property, right?

Well, yeah, I mean, if you sell it, if you sell it in the first month, your return is infinite. But it's interesting like when you calculate out the yield, if you sell it in month one, month two, month three, month four, all the way up to month six, even if you sell it by month six, your return is crazy. Like Mike, if you're paying me 100 bucks a month for a property, right. And the property's worth five grand or whatever. Right. And I sell it in month six. Well, it's still gonna, it's. It's only gonna take me six months to recoup my capital. And then after that I start making.

Profit on that carrying costs.

Even if it.

And we.

It doesn't take six months to sell a property. But worst case scenario, it takes six months.

Worst case, I'm. Then worst case, I made for six.

Months and I'll recoup those quickly.

Yeah. And then worst case is if in six months you haven't sold the property, give it back to me. It's fine.

Right.

You can default it if you want. Yeah. Remember, remember when Matt Forbes. Matt Forbes bought a land, our property from us one time?

Yes.

And he, he, he tried selling this thing for about five or six months. He's like, bossman, I'm done with it. I can't stand this property. I, I want it out. He's out five or six hundred bucks, right. We sold it the next day.

No, there's the kick.

Oh, my God.

I love you.

We love you, Matt. Yeah.

And we never let the truth get the way of a good story here. So.

But, but another thing is Mark, he was out five or six hundred bucks, but he wasn't out thousands from a failed mailing campaign or. You know, sometimes, sometimes when we send out mailers, it takes a little while to get to know the area. You know, we, some of us get lucky on our first mailer, but, but sometimes it just takes a little while to get to know that market. And it might take a few hundred or maybe even a couple thousand bucks to really learn that area before you can start gaining traction with your mailings. Yeah.

I mean, this is what I call the abm, the ankle biter model. You're just a little baby. You're a little ankle biter.

Right.

And this is not. We're baby proofing the business for you. Like, here's the way to use as little capital as possible, control as much property as you can, mitigate your risk and get your reps in, and then you build that confidence and you go deeper into the model.

Jeez, that's crazy. Mike. You think someone had, you know, if someone had $5,000, how many properties could they control through land arbitrage? It's mind boggling.

Yeah. I mean, 50. 50. It's a lot of land, a lot of inventory.

Maybe we all need to land our.

I mean, you know. Okay, but let's, let's be realistic, though. Like, we have set expectations.

Yeah.

Because if you remember the beginning of the scenario, Mike's already made his money on that property.

Right?

Yeah.

So you've got to go to an OG like Mike or John or Scott, who had been doing this business a while, because you, if you go into a newbie group and someone, they're not going to sell it to you, Lander, because they haven't made their, their money yet.

They might be selling it retail. You got to be careful, you know?

Gotta be very careful. Yeah, yeah, for sure. And, you know, oftentimes you'll listen to a podcast like this or you're watching a video like this, and you'll, you'll, you'll get this disease that we call gotta have landitis.

Yeah.

And you, you're gonna miss some steps because you have, you have. I gotta have landitis, right? And you, you realize, oh, wait, maybe I overpaid for the property. Or, you know, you know, I Matt Forbes it. Like, I, I just hate the property. Don't resonate with it for whatever reason. So as a beginner, that roadmap is make sure that you're properly trained and you understand the business enough, and then you're comfortable enough like, okay, since that, I mean, I'm comfortable like taking the risk of 100 or 200 bucks to control this property. And I'm comfortable that I'm not going to be taking the time away from my, you know, my family or, you know, an important job that I'm doing because, you know, I only need an hour or two a day to do this business. So when you combine those two things with a burning desire, it is life changing.

Yeah, you bring up a great point, Mark, because the Facebook group is a free group. You know, years ago that was a small group, it was a paid group, but you opened it up, so it's free. We have, I don't know, is it 13,000? 14,000?

Over 15,000.

15,000. Okay. So, you know, you get a lot of mixed opinions there. But what I always tell people, when you get into our mighty networks, when you get into rich starter kit, when you get into flight school and you're into coaching and you get into our mighty networks now, you start to engage in a tighter community of people that are singing from the same songbook, and you can start to have a lot more trust than. Not that it's a. The group is great, but it's a free group, so you let it, you know, we don't know everybody who's in there, so you got to be. You got to do your own due diligence there. But when you get into the mighty networks where our true community lies, then you know, you have much better odds of getting a good deal and really dialing into something.

Yeah, that's a really good point. Can I tell you guys a little secret?

Let's hear it.

Like a little behind the scenes secret.

Yeah.

All right.

It's just between the three of us.

So.

So to Mike's point, so to Mike's.

Point.

Like that Facebook groups like the Wild west, and it's free. And you don't, you know, we don't know who these people are. And they're. They're coming in and, you know, they're selling wholesale property. But maybe it's wholesale, maybe it's retail in the beginners, the newbies don't know, and they don't know who to trust. But they're like, oh, they're in this group. So we are creating badges. So if you have a badge that says, oh, I'm a. I'm a Mike Zano, Scott Bossman, John Burnett, OG you get the OG Badge.

Okay.

OG Badges, like the trusted, you know, land seller. If you have gone through flight school, you're gonna get that flight school badge or coaching. That badge. That badge. It's like, okay, These people know what they're doing. They're in the community, they've invested the time and are doing the business versus, you know, someone else who is just like, oh, look, I got some land here. Let me see if I can get the little ankle biter to buy my land. And maybe, you know, it's not a great idea.

That's a great idea. Yeah.

So we're working on that right now. And it'll be in mighty networks and the Facebook group. So if you don't have that badge, you don't have that badge.

OG.

Badge. Whoa.

Secret soil land company.

Interesting.

Not our typical land deal. Do you see that, Mark? Has it popped up?

Oh, yeah. Hey, guys. About to do my first New Mexico land deal. We agreed on 50k for 55 acres, has two wells, septic and electric. So this is. Yeah, to your point, Mike. Like, this is not our typical deal.

This is a great deal.

It could be a great deal. I mean, absolutely. But, you know, to sacred soils point, like, they're not an ankle biter. Coming in as a very, very beginner with very little capital, very little time. Like, this is a more advanced land deal. So I don't know what the if secret so has a question for us. But I think it does bring up.

A good point, though, Mark. Some people think that, you know, we still do bigger deals. It's just that we don't rely on them. You know, we. We build up our recurring monthly income because that's what we can count on at this. I always tell people that's a window to a bigger opportunity. You can do bigger deals. But I had 40 acres in Pueblo market for a cash sale. It took over a year to sell. If I was relying on that for my family, for my. For my income, that being a problem. But, you know, when you have the recurring income coming in, 10, 20,000 per month, at that point, yeah, you want to do a big deal, sell it, wait the time, get the money, infuse it back into the business to buy more small deals. It's definitely an option. Our systems are the same, the same people that work for us, you know, we just might go to title on the deal. But I just like to bring that up, you know, that, you know, because you hear this. Cash terms, we love terms, but it's not that we don't do cash deals, so we focus on terms deals. But we're very capable to do both.

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think at the end of the day, cash flow is the antidote to financial insecurity. Yes, cash is great. I'm not going to poo poo it. I'll take it. But I really think that cash flow solves so many problems. And knowing that, I mean, you know, I remember when Scott Boston got sick and he was like, well, this is great. I had monthly money coming in, I didn't do anything. And it's, it's an incredible feeling of security. And so many people in corporate America, no, they're scrimping, they're saving, and they're putting their money in the stock market. And then they wake up one day and, you know, somebody says a t word and 50% of their value goes away and they're, they feel insecure where if they have 10,000, 20,000amonth of passive income coming in and you have a machine built, well, you know, that's like having six, seven, eight million dollars in the bank. How long is that going to take to save up, invest and do. Right, right. I mean, for John Burnett, that might be six months. For the rest of us, it's a long time. Yeah, long time.

So I think.

Yeah, I think that.

That'S really true as well. Like just the idea of having security. Like, I like doing some of these big creative deals, but I've talked to people that do like million, multi million dollar deals, extremely profitable. And one thing that somebody told me that stuck with me is he said, you can easily go bankrupt waiting on a million dollar payday in that business. And so it's nice just knowing my bills are paid.

Right.

And so as I, as I'm pursuing these deals, you know, sometimes that cycle is long. Right. There's a lot of variation in those deals. And so it's just nice to have consistency and income in the middle of all that.

Oh, 100%. I mean, money loves speed, dude. Buddy, what are your thoughts on this deal? Oh my. He muted himself.

It was such a delay. I thought I was the only one that couldn't hear him. I'm like, oh, you guys must be hearing them.

Yeah, that's so Weird. Okay, I'm back. So. So he or she is looking for some guidance on, on how to do this deal. Right. Like, what are the next steps? And I would just say also, you know, this, this is a little bit outside of our normal deal. I just, you gotta be sure of your numbers. Right? So if she wants to sell it to you for $50,000, what are the comps in the area? Right. I hear New Mexico right now And I hear 50 acres. And I think most areas in New Mexico guys would probably be around a thousand dollars an acre or something like that. Right. Maybe even a little bit less. So, so I would just, you know, what are the parcels like in that area? What are properties selling for, similar properties selling for in that area? You know, are you going to be able to get this thing at 50 cents on the dollar? Which would probably be, I mean, I don't know if you'd get it much less than that. Maybe you would. And then to think about, you know, I know there are a couple wells on the property, there's a septic tank on the property. Questions I have hearing that is sometimes those things can be liabilities if they're really old. So, you know, what are, like, how old are these things? Are they brand spanking new? Well, that adds a lot of value to your land. Right? So those are just some of the things. And then, you know, I think that I love buying property for two to three thousand dollars. Cause I know it's going to sell quick. Right?

Right.

Now, buying a $50,000 property, we don't know when that might sell. Could be, like Mike said, it could be a year. So are you prepared to wait around for a year to find a cash buyer for that property? So those are just some things I think I would, I would recommend.

Yeah, no, absolutely. And you know, your next steps are. Well, first of all, you could use an attorney for this real estate deal for sure. But you want to go through title company number one. Yeah, that's for sure. Mark, I've listened to dirt rich about 400 times with me today. He must be so. Or he or she. She's so sick of my voice. I apologize, but thank you.

Thank you. Now, members of the community, Mark, they get your voice all the time, which is very exciting. What do you mean? That's right. Yeah, the AI Clone.

Story. Every night. Every night. Mark. Mark, tell me a bedtime story about every night.

You know what? Let's call it. I'm gonna, I'm gonna do that right now.

I'm about to ask her to tell me a story.

Let's.

Let's see what.

I want to hear your voice. I want to hear your voice first. I wanted.

Okay, let's see.

This is Mark. That's crazy craziness.

All right.

I think we should call it back. Let's call it. Yeah.

All right, so I'm going to call it. So here, here. I'm calling the clone. Start a call, and then let's see if you can hear it. I have to allow it to the microphone. Hi, I'm Mark Podolski.

What can I help you with?

Could you tell me a bedtime story? Hey, I'm not sure about that one, but don't worry. A member of our team will be reaching out shortly with an answer. Keep an eye out for Mike.

Mike's gonna reach out.

Into something land investing or financial freedom related. What's on your mind? Oh, I got. I got some bedtime stories, but I can trade it.

I got it to tell a story. I did it.

Did you really? About land.

I said, tell me a fairy tale about land investing to help me understand.

Did it.

Okay.

And it did it.

Okay.

Okay.

Should I read it around?

All right.

Well, cool.

Yeah, it's getting smarter every day.

Read it. I'd say read it.

Okay, here we go. You guys are probably gonna want to stop me at some point. All right. All right, John. Let's dive into this land investing fairy tale. Once upon a time, in a kingdom called Opportunity, there was a young adventurer named Alex. Alex was tired of the daily grind. Working long hours for a boss who didn't appreciate him. He dreamed of freedom. Freedom to spend time with his family, travel the world, and live life on his own terms. But Alex didn't have much gold in his treasure chest, just a humble 3,000 coins. One day, Alex met a wise mentor who told him about a magical realm called Rawlandia. In Rawlandia, there were vast stretches of land that people had forgotten about. Land that could be bought for pennies on the dollar. The mentor explained. Alex, this is the secret to building wealth. You buy the land cheap, and you sell it for more. Sometimes you sell it for cash, and sometimes you let people pay you in small amounts every month. Either way, you win. Excited but nervous, Alex decided to take a leap of faith. He ventured into Rawlandia and found a parcel of land for just 300 coins. He bought it, and with the mentor's guidance, he listed it for sale in the village marketplace. To his amazement, a buyer appeared and offered him 1200 coins for the land Alex had just made. A 300% return on his first deal. Encouraged by his success, Alex continued to explore Rawlandia. He discovered that some villagers preferred to buy land on terms, paying a little each month instead of all at once. This created a steady stream of income for Alex, like a magical river of gold flowing into his treasure chest. Over time, Alex automated his work, hiring helpers to send letters to landowners, research properties, and market his land. He built a system that worked even while he slept. Before long, Alex was no longer just an adventurer. He was a land baron, living the life he had always dreamed of. And the best part, he didn't have to deal with tenants, termites, or toilets, Just the simple, beautiful business of buying and selling land. The moral of the story. With a little courage, a proven system, and the willingness to take action every, anyone can find their happily ever after in the land investing business. And then it says, so, John, are you ready to write your own fairy tale? Let's make it happen.

So good.

Amazing.

My daughter walked up and was listening.

That's incredible.

Okay, so first of all, I have a lot of thoughts, but the. The entrepreneur in me is like, okay, I'm definitely taking that fairy tale and making it a children's book. How good would that be as a children's book? Who doesn't want to go to Rawlandia and.

Right.

And get more coins? I only had like 300 coins, and I got now 1200 coins.

Mark, you could gamify this. We've always talked about that.

Say more.

This could be a great game.

Like a video game.

Ra. Yeah. You go in.

Oh, like. Like the canop game.

What's Monopoly? But it's a land game.

Oh, we can do that, too.

Good.

Oh, yeah. You have two types of deals. You can have cash flips and terms deals. Every turn, you get a.

You collect your cash flow, guys run out of money.

You sell a note.

Yeah.

I mean, you know, these kids today, they need to learn about, you know, cash, cash flow, passive income, you know, getting out of what I call solo economic dependency, which means if you're not personally not working, you're not making any money. John, thank you for the fairy tale. You're welcome.

I mean, it's you. It was your fairy tale. Straight.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know why.

Reading the kids when they go to bed. We know what stories. John's reading them.

Yeah, exactly.

Around kids.

That's right. That's amazing. I think we need to get back, though, too.

Kind of stole the show with that, though.

I know. Should we just end the podcast now.

That'S like a mic drop, you know?

You know what I think we should do? I think we should do the rapid fire segment again like we did last week. That was kind of fun.

Oh, yeah. I love the rapid fire.

So who wants to be. Who wants to rapid fire tonight?

Oh, yeah.

We should start with. I love. Okay.

I think the person who actually, you know, volunteers in a person has to do it, definitely.

Mike, you're doing it. Mike, you're doing it.

Okay, so that's karma. You can just see Mike as a little kid, you know, real easy.

Rapid fire round tonight. Questions center around doing your first deal. Okay.

Okay, you ready?

Here we go.

Let's go.

Mike. Mike Zano, first county you targeted. Gold mine or ghost town?

Oh, ghost town.

Oh. Best marketing platform for selling land.

Moto.

What's more nerve wracking? Making the offer or closing the sale?

I think making the offer in the beginning.

Oh. One word to describe your first deal.

Eureka.

And this one. You can expand on this a little bit, Mike. Biggest rookie mistake on a mailer.

Biggest rookie mistake on a mailer not including any offer price.

Who's done that? I've done it.

Remember that? It was way back, John.

Have you done that yet?

I don't think I have.

I remember Mimi did it and she.

Got deals because people are like, what's going on here?

Yeah. This is the most forgiving business in the world.

You really can't mess it up. You just got to be. You can correct it and make it better, but you really can't screw it up.

Right.

You just.

Yeah, I mean, you can't really. There's only like the big. There's only a very, very few ways to knock yourself completely out of this game. And in our model, it's very, very difficult because we're not telling you to go to Ohio or Pennsylvania or New Jersey and buy land in a super fund site. Because if you buy in a superfund site, then you're responsible for millions and millions of dollars of cleanup on that area. So you just go to epa.gov and make sure you're not in a superfund site. But short of that, I don't know how you knock yourself out of this game. If you've got the grit.

Good question mark. Where can they find your clone?

Okay, so the clone is right now only for customers. So we're not. We're not giving that out. And you know, you can if you. You know, you. To learn more shameless plug, go to language.com forward/training and hey. And Learn more.

It's not shameless though, Mark. Like, we've all done the training here, John. Myself, Mike, we've done the training. Like, yeah, we learned through you. And it helped us become good, you know, it helps us become land investors. It helped us buy our time back.

No, absolutely. It's not. I mean, I'm just, you know.

I hear you though. Yeah.

I don't like, like for nightcap, I don't want to be so self promotional.

Right. Oh, yeah, for sure.

It just, it feels unseemly.

But anyway is pretty awesome. Yeah.

Here's something you can't have. It feels terrible.

I brought it up. I slapped my hand. I'm sorry.

No, it's very new. It's very geeky. Maybe we can have an instance where we do have a free version.

Yeah. So this is from Mike Bennett. Mike, what's up? Just finished session seven in flight school. So he's about halfway through his 16 week program. 600 offers mailed. He has one land arb deal, he's closed three wholesale deals, he's working on three more. So he owns four properties by week seven. That's pretty good. I'd say working on three more. First mailer responded with a counteroffer today in one of the subdivisions I own. In one of the subdivisions I own. Do you own a subdivision, Mike? That'd be awesome. But I, I mean, so Mike, this, this is, this topic is, is really, you know, it's, it's really relatable to you because you are very much a beginner. You're only seven weeks into this, but look, what, you're an ankle biter. But he's dedicated the time and a little bit of capital and he's got the drive and he owns four properties by week seven. He's coming up on three, you know, possibly seven properties in, in, in seven or eight. Seven or eight weeks.

Yeah.

That's amazing.

And the mailer responded. So maybe, yeah, eight properties. Mike Bennett. Crushy.

It's crushing it.

Crushing it.

But now I, I hear, I hear a little anxiety in this. Waiting. Waiting on the first sale.

Yeah.

So maybe we should talk about that for a minute. For, for our new land investor. What are we going to do to get the first sale? You've acquired the property, right? Or multiple properties now. Now how are we gonna, how are we gonna get that thing sold?

Yeah.

Okay, so I have thoughts, but I don't wanna. Enough of me.

Enough.

John, how's he gonna get that first sale?

Gotta post an ad. So that's, that's the biggest thing, like, you know, I guess for me, when I jumped in, into lane investing, there every time I. You hit a new phase is like that little.

You get a little.

Like, I. Well, at least I did. I got little butterflies in my stomach just getting ready to take that first step. And. And marketing a property was the same thing. So I think, like posting ads, Facebook at Marketplace is a great place to start to post your ads. You could do it for free. You can get rolling right away and start marketing that property. You can throw it on land moto. But the key is to start marketing, to set yourself a deadline and get those ads rolling. And then you just, you need to be responsive as people respond to your ad. As those leads come in, you need to get back to them. Like, I can't tell you how many times we talk to people. We send them, we will call them and they'll say, you're the first person that's called me. Right. And so just being a responsive seller puts you ahead of a lot of the other people out there.

There.

Amazing. Amazing. Zen master Mike Zena, what's your advice?

Yeah, well, here's the thing. We first, we get results on the buy side because that's what comes first. And I see a lot of people that they get their properties and they start to panic a little bit when they're starting out marketing, but they forget that it took the consistent effort to get the deal in the first place. And we need to take that same mindset and apply it on the sell side. So we have to be marketing constantly. So I think, you know, yes, whatever platform you choose, just do it. Whoever. I don't know who wrote that, but it's perfect advice. If you're nervous to post an ad, you don't want to do it anyway. Marketing consistently brings results. That's the truth. You know, just. It doesn't matter if it's a class, you know, the best ad ever. It doesn't just put it out there to the people. Then you get someone on your buyers list, which, by the way, is when people respond to you. And perhaps they don't want to buy this property, but you let them know that you are a land investor and you buy similar properties every week. Would you like me to engage with you and let you know when I get these deals and I'll give you a special price. And they say yes. And we've had people that get one or two people on their buyers list. They send out a buyers list blast rates of fear and missing out because these two people One or two people don't know they're the only ones on the list. So they see this great deal and they scoff it up and buy it. So some things to think about, right? Start putting that out there, start talking to people, add them to your buyer's list, and then start up right away. I don't care if there's one person on your buyers list, start sending out that buyer's blast each week. Because we've seen people crush it with just one person on their list.

I love it. Dude, buddy, you want to land the plane on this?

Well, Mike, I'm glad you liked that saying because I wrote that.

And amazing.

All I'm getting at, all I'm getting at by saying that is we all talk to a lot of people. We all talk to a lot of beginners, right? And how many people do you talk to who they have five or six or seven or 10 properties. And you ask, well, how's the marketing going? Well, they say, I haven't started yet. When did you get your first property? A month ago. You haven't started marketing yet? Like the M M's, right? Mike Zainoff, the M and Ms. You got a mail every day, and you got to market every day. And you know what? If, even if you don't want to market today, you have to market today. So. So reserve 15 minutes every day. Today you're going to do Facebook Marketplace. Tomorrow you're going to do Craigslist. The next day you're going to do an ad on Land Moto or Land Search, right? Which are probably one of the cheaper platforms. I think you can do some free ones on there. The next day you're gonna. You can maybe do Zillow. Even if it's a Zillow area that's free. Like, the next day you're gonna send an ad to your. To a buyer's list to. To the 1 or 2 or 10 or 20 people on your buyers list do something every day, and that will yield results. You're planting seeds with the marketing to yield the. The results later. So take the emotion out of it if you're nervous. No, don't. Just do it if you're. If you don't want to. No, you gotta do it. Just do it every day.

100. Can I, can I give Mike some. Some land therapy?

Oh, yeah.

Just.

Just to easy the anxiety after doing this.

Now you're talking to me. I was all excited.

Therapy.

Now.

Okay, here, here's. Here's the secret, okay? They all sell. They all sell. There's a pig for every barn. And even if they don't sell right away, you're locking in at it. You made your, you already made your money on the buy, so it's just a matter of time. And as an ankle biter, you're getting your reps in on learning how to market. And so you're gonna get better and better at it.

In time.

But in time, as you're getting better and better at it, guess what's going on, going on with that price. There's a little thing out there called inflation, and the price just continues to go up. But just like Southwest Airlines, where they're buying, you know, gas prices, 10, like right now, 10 year contracts. So they're locking in their price. So that's how Southwest Airlines makes money. We're doing the same thing in land. We're locking in our price. And then if it takes longer time than what you arbitrarily think it should, it doesn't matter because you've already made your money on the buy. So congratulations at week seven, you've already paid for flight school and more, and you just don't even know it. You just don't even know it. So, Mike Bennett, sleep well tonight, brother.

It.

You just have to follow that recipe. Do exactly whatever what John, Mike and Scott have been telling you to do with your marketing. But I'm telling you, they all sell. They all sell. Even properties that you would think no one would buy. There's a pig for every barn. They all sell. So just show up consistently and you're gonna be like, this is the greatest business ever and possibly the greatest podcast on YouTube.

Definitely. You know, I was talking to Nick today. He's just recently went through flight school and he was talking about the, this very topic. He had a property, side of a mountain. He's like, who's going to want this property? Guy called up and was like, I love it. I want it. I have, I have dogs. I want to live on the side of the mountain. And my dogs, a bunch of dogs, I want them to run around. He's like, mike, you guys always say it, but it truly is a pig for every barn. There really is.

Yeah, it, it's crazy.

I mean, and, and don't make the mistake I made. I mean, I can't tell you how many times a number of years ago, because you come into these properties sometimes, like, they're, they're, they're almost like, okay, I'm gonna buy a really great property for somebody, but they have another one somewhere that they're they're just like throwing in for free almost, right? Or for a couple hundred bucks. And then, and then I'll be like, you know what? I'll take it, but I'll give you a hundred bucks for it. I'll give you a couple hundred bucks for it. Like, I'm not excited about it. And the more I look at the property, I'm like, this thing's never going to sell. Like, like, it's never going to sell. Like, who would want this? And then it sits in my. Sits in my inventory for a year. And I'm like, maybe I should. Maybe I should market this. And then you market it and it sells within days. Days.

Yeah, it is. It is a different lens on life because it's, it's just. It's just such an interesting thing where just because you don't like it doesn't mean someone else wouldn't love it. And I always go back to that. You know, I'm a food snob. Like, my mom's like, you're such a food snob. I am a food snob. Like, I don't eat McDonald's. I mean, look, but billions of people do. It's delicious. It's just. I don't eat it. Nothing wrong with it. But if you told me, oh, there's a McDonald's franchise available for you in Scottsdale, Arizona, I'd buy it. I just want to eat there. It's the same thing with some of the raw land where it's like, who's buy this? Yeah, exactly. Don't be a land snob. Don't be a food snob either. Food's delicious. But especially, don't be a land snob. It's going to cost you money or it's going to cause you anxiety needlessly. Sleep well tonight, John.

What are you doing? Don't be an alcohol snob either, Mark. I quit.

Look, I quit drinking, but this is fine water. I'm drinking out of a glass bottle. No more plastic for me, thank you. Those microplastics.

Oh, man.

Yeah.

Did you see it? Did you see that comment from Billy Swinton? He said that. Well, first of all, Billy won the two free years of geek pay, which, which is. Which is awesome. But he says this is the only YouTube he watches live, which. Thank you, Billy Swinton. Thank you, Bill. Wow.

Can we, can we, can we bring it in, Billy? Can we do a virtual hug?

I'll do virtual knucks.

Virtual knuckles. Virtual hug. Hug it out.

Virtual 5.

What are you gonna do, Mike? What's your virtual.

Cheers. Virtually.

Oh, there you go.

Kind of cold. That's cool. That's cool. Not judging.

No judging.

A little baby.

Yeah.

Not judging.

Harshly, I should say softly. Judge me.

Quiet judgment.

Judge me to yourselves.

Just cheers.

I think we should come back to this quick. Before we sign off, let's give Mike one more piece of advice here. So, John Burnett. Mike's been marketing. He's been, he's been taking the emotion out of it. He's just marketing every day. He's getting clicks.

He's.

He's not getting leads. So no reach outs. So suggestions for, for Mike in that scenario.

So it probably means that there's something going on with your ads, right? So you should revisit that. Generally, my perspective is a lot of times the clicks have to do with your picture, right. And then the leads have to do with what they see on the other side of that click, right? And so what you might think about doing is look at sold properties in this area and start clicking into those ads and start seeing what those look like. You know, not to copy it, you know, exactly. Or anything like that, but just to see, like what are the, how are people getting people hooked on these properties, right? What are their, you know, what are their selling points? Who are they marketing it to? Those types of things. And see if you can get some, some insight into your, into your ads. So that would be my thought.

That's gold.

It is gold. Gold. It's from a guy who sold a lot of land.

That's a guy who sold a lot of land.

Yeah. 1200 coins worth if you believe it.

In Landopia.

That's awesome. Rawlandia.

Landopia is Eric Peterson.

That's already taken. Yeah, it's awesome. What about you, Mark?

Mark?

Mark.

Right now?

Yeah, Right. What are you doing, Mike? You okay? You all right? Mark? Mark, I love your, I love your marketing segment at boot camp. There's so many golden tips in there over the hour that you present. So, so give us, give us a 30 second, a 30 second synopsis on what you might do or what you might recommend to Mike for his marketing.

Okay, Mike, this is between you and me. Everybody else, you can leave now because I'm going to give you gold.

Okay?

Spend 80% of your time on the headline. Really, really craft a beautiful, compelling headline. And to John's point, look at those headlines that you clicked on or that you know sold through. Take that headline, put it in the chat GPT and start asking it questions. This property sold on this platform. This was the headline that got the sell, help create 10 headlines that are similar to this and focus on this avatar. This person's a 43 year old male. They make $52,000 a year. They grew up hearing that, you know, buy land, it lasts forever. They like to hunt, they like to fish, they feel insecure about the economy and what would that headline look like? Kind of thing. And then just keep prompting, keep playing with it and go deeper and deeper and deeper. But spend time on that headline.

Love it.

Not, not two minutes, not five minutes. Mike Bennett, 12 to 15 minutes. Really go deep on that headline and then see what happens.

And then report back to us next week with your sale and then.

Yeah, and tell us about your sale. Absolutely. But ultimately too, like you got, I mean, you know the price. They all sell at the right price. Like, I don't know what your pricing is either, because if you're asking for a really big down payment, you might be pricing yourself out as well.

So.

But I would say that in marketing, to generate interest, to get those leads, really spend a lot of time on that headline first and then let the market give you and give you more information and you can make adjustments from there. That's my, that's my golden ticket. Thank you. Thank you.

That was an amazing way to end the show. I think a lot of good, actionable, actionable items in tonight's podcast, I think, I'd say so.

I think this is a great ankle biter podcast.

It's a great ankle.

People just right because they get, they.

Got the road map.

They know, okay, I don't need much money. It doesn't take much time. You know, I've got to have grit, I've got to have persistence, mindset. They all sell. What did I miss?

I, I think the only thing I would recommend is just like get in touch with us. If you're interested, drop us an email, go to the website, I'll throw our email addresses up here. And all three of us would be happy to talk to any of you who are interested in getting into the land business. It changed our lives. It can do the same for you. So we're happy to, we're happy to chat with people. It's fun stuff.

And honestly, you know, I have a very fragile ego. So if you would, that'd be amazing. If you have one friend in your life or one family member of your life that you know could really benefit from solving not just their money problems, but also their time problems, forward this podcast to them, just one person. It would mean, mean the world to us. And. And you could actually hopefully be influential in that person's life and help us help them and change their life as well, because that's why we do this.

Cheers to that.

Cheers.

Cheers, everybody. Michael. Cheers.

Cheers.

Thanks, everybody. We'll see you next. Oh, should we tell them what, should we tell them what next week is? Let's do that quick. Oh, next week is another. I think it's another student spotlight. Next week. Oh, no, no, no, never mind.

Let's see next week.

Next week we're gonna have. We're gonna try to feature a coach and we're going to talk about the dirt simple path to 10,000. $10. 10,000 monthly land income.

I love it.

I love it. That'd be sweet. I love it. All right, should we. Should we do this as a group?

Yeah, let's do it.

One, two, three. Let's let freedom.

Freedom.

I mean, Mark and I were in sync, but you guys were like two seconds behind. I don't.

I don't get it. Yeah, Scott, you.

You and I are.

Yeah, good. I don't know about you guys, but I'm gonna be watching andor tonight.

Don't lie to me. Don't, don't. I mean, you've been saying that for watching.

I mean, Ando is good, but what about Mobland?

Oh, Mobland.

Tell me more with Tom Hardy, the new.

Oh, is that on Paramount? Plus P.S.

Bronson. Oh, my God.

Come on.

That does look good.

Come on.

I saw it.

Come on.

And anything with land in it, like Landman. Mobland. You gotta watch Land.

I gotta watch Landman. That's on my.

That's on my next Land man. Oh, that man's fantastic. Taylor Sheridan just is unbelievable with the shows that that guy creates.

Yeah, it's truth.

He's. He.

He's figured out the recipe.

I'm still just watching Frasier.

Hey, that's all good. That's a classic. The Frasier reboot. Because it just came out like last year.

Yeah, we started the Fraser reboot and then we just went back to Fraser reruns.

That's a great show. It's a great show.

That's fantastic. No, no wonder you. You lit up when I said land therapy.

Yeah.

All right, fellas, have a great night.

Thanks, everybody. Have a good night. See you next week.

We're still live.

Peace out.

Yeah.