Hidden Profits: Monetizing “Unsellable” Parcels

I can't.

I once dined on steak with a candle's soft glow, but the bill left my savings despairingly low. Now wisdom has taught me, so simple, so grand, Eat baloney, buy land. Oh, eat baloney, buy land. Trade the fork for the deed in your hand. Skip the filling, let the sandwiches stand. Your fortune will grow when you buy your own land.

Hey everybody, welcome to Land Geek Nightcap. Cheers. Good to see you all.

Cheers.

Tonight we're talking unsellable parcels. But what if I told, what if we told you there's really almost no such thing as an unsellable parcel, only unoptimized ones. So we're gonna talk about how to turn these problem properties into profit. And we're gonna talk about some strategies that we've all used through the years to sell land that we thought maybe would never sell. Maybe we made a mistake on our due diligence and we bought a property and we're like, ah, I shouldn't have bought that. Or maybe we just bought a property, maybe we kind of inherited a property. We all run into those situations where we maybe acquire a property from someone's portfolio that's a little bit iffy. So we're gonna talk about that stuff tonight. And we got the crew with us. We got Mike, Michael, it's actually Michael Ralph Zaino. With us tonight, the Zen Master. Good to see you, Mike. Uh, we have John Burnett, uh, 8 is Enough, Handsome Rob Burnett. John, how are you?

I'm great, how are you?

I'm doing well, good to see you. And we have the man himself, the Godfather of Land Investing, keeping us all in line over here, Mark J. Podolsky.

You guys are so good for my fragile ego. Cheers!

She is.

Kathy Hollingsworth is here! I'm so excited. She hasn't been with us for like last few weeks. My fragile ego couldn't take it.

I know, it's been sad not seeing her in the comments. Um, am I the only one having a beer over here? An alcoholic drink?

I'm having, uh, I've got hot water. It's, uh, it's, it's like, it's like Uh, it's like you take a lemon LaCroix and then you just smash hops inside of it. It's not very good.

I don't recommend it.

Mike Zadel, what do you got tonight? A little wine?

A little red wine, can't go wrong.

Nice, I'm not alone.

Well, look, I mean, this is, this is a poppy. A prebiotic soda, but I thought I would lace it with just a touch of fentanyl. See what would happen.

Yeah.

And yes, I am watching Euphoria.

It's probably the healthiest way you can consume fentanyl.

Oh, man. Because I'm not happy with my waistline, I'm having the Corona Premier tonight.

Oh, yeah.

No light beer for you.

It's like half a beer. With a healthy lime in it. So, uh, well, before we get to the topic, uh, maybe we should do something we haven't done in a while. Maybe should we just talk about, uh, some land wins this week, uh, to, you know, let the, let the public know that we're also doing deals? What are your thoughts? Huh?

Sure.

So, so, John, John Burnett, what's the, what's the current state of your land business? How are things going the last couple weeks here?

It's good. We've been, uh, man, let me pull up—

he's pulling up numbers.

Oh, uh, so I've got, um, we've got a good chunk of property. So we bought, um, 6 properties today, and then we've got another 10 that are like— or I guess 11 quote unquote under contract. Some of them are verbal agreements. And then, um, let's see. And then I think last week we did Ah, let me see. Let me get the right view.

Don wants you to straighten your hat up. Don Thrasher, straighten your hat up, Don. There we go.

Is that good?

There you go.

We'll just do—

are you gonna tell us how many sales you've had now and make us all depressed?

Yes, sorry. I, uh, so last week I did, um $47,500 in sales.

I was just saying 47 properties.

No, not that. So, and then I had a, I had a couple wholesale deals, uh, as well on top of that. So those were retail sales, and I did 2 wholesale, um, sales through wholesale.thelandgeek.com.

Wholesale.thelandgeek.com.

I sold 2 properties. So one of them was the Tate.

Doesn't count. That doesn't count. Look, a sale's a sale.

I don't think— reached out to me, he's like, do you have any wholesale? And I just sent him the wholesale.langi link and I said, this one.

So nice.

Wow, amazing, amazing.

It's a nice platform. Uh, we've got, we've gotten a sale off there as well. So thanks, Mark, for putting that together. Mike Zaino, any land wins this week or last?

Yeah, a couple cash sales, probably, you know, you know, one I bought one day and sold a couple days later. And so that was pretty good. And, you know, I've got a bunch of purchases underway, I'm deploying some capital. And so it's pretty exciting.

Deploying capital.

I am deploying capital.

I love it. I know I love it.

You know, I love it too.

Uh, yeah, we've had some small— I think we had some small wins the last week or two, a couple wholesale, uh, uh, sales, uh, some owner financing deals as well, uh, you know, some base hits, and then a couple bigger deals. Um, we had a deal recently that sold for 700 a month, which was pretty awesome.

Yeah.

And, uh, but what I really love, what I've really been kind of thinking about and I'm thankful for, it's just, uh, deal flow is just consistent, right? So, so for everybody watching, make sure you're mailing because people are selling right now. So you can find some really awesome deals.

I think people are buying and people are selling. That's one of the things you hear other whatever. Some people talk about, oh, the damn business— it's, it's always happening if you're consistent with mailing and marketing. It's literally always happening. Like, it never really stops, slows down, and we go through all the markets. So just kind of interesting, isn't it? It just keeps rolling.

I love it.

I like—

all right, can I talk about my win?

Well, I'm coming to you next.

All right, I'm very excited about this win because it's not mine. It is Valerie Youngs. Can I read it off?

Yes.

Okay, so she wrote, "Win," and this was last Friday. So for those of you that are not in coaching, in our WhatsApp group of our coaching clients and Unfair Advantage clients, we do our wins of the week, and we also talk about our struggles, uh, for the week, and we all kind of cheer each other and commiserate with each other. It's awesome. But this one I really love because it is a Milestone win. So she wrote, I finally broke $10K passive a month and have around $750,000 in loans outstanding. Pretty cool to think that will all be repaid within 5 years. Struggle: I'm going to be back below $10K passive because I'm losing a buyer. Super rookie mistakes all around. Hard to have when building a business based on trust. Mistake number 1: never use ACH for down payment even if the buyer insists. Like ever, mana caused a lot of problems that would have all been avoided. I will rebuild. So she's giving a nugget of wisdom while she's sharing her milestone. And I like to live vicariously through my clients. These are my wins.

Yeah, I love that.

Cheers.

That's amazing. Yeah.

And by the way, I think it was a huge win having Don Thrasher last week. How great is that? That was a huge win.

It was a huge win for all of us.

He's in demand. People message me, can I talk to Don? Like, I mean, is it me?

Like, we should have him on every week. Like, that voice is insane. He's got a radio voice.

He does have a radio voice.

I mean, he had like color lights in the background. He looked like he was in a spaceship.

It was very exciting.

He does. He had some pretty awesome lights, I do have to say.

Yeah, yeah.

No, that, that was, uh, awesome to have Don on last week. And, um, you know, the, the proof is in the story, right? As you always say, Zane. Oh, we love the stories and we love the real-world results and the The real-time buying and the real-time learning and buying and selling of land. It's just all, it's all what I love about this community. We see it every day. So yeah, awesome. Well, we have, we have comments coming in from folks. Always good to see you, Scott Elliott, Kathy Hollingsworth, Don Thrasher. Jason Bone Steel is here. Mike Caviez here. Mike, good to see you. Brad Kelly. Uh, we got some, uh, faithful viewers, uh, watching with us tonight.

So, well, Alicia had a question that we have to answer. Why do you love deploying capital?

Oh, where's that?

It's talking about me.

Yeah, but like, why do you love deploying capital, Mike?

Because it's the beginning of making money. It's the very first step in making a whole bunch of money. You know, when you buy, we make our money on the buy, you know. And so it's a huge— I think if you're not excited when you buy land, something's wrong. I mean, you know, I mean, the numbers aren't right. You should always be excited when you're buying the land because we're buying them at a steep discount. And so I am excited because I'm putting money to work and I'm going to make a nice return. And it's just, uh, it's pretty, pretty cool. I don't know, I can't say it any other way. You know, it's just nice to, uh, this is the beginning of the process. Step 1, deploy capital. Step 2, make money. Step 3, repeat. It's pretty simple.

That's right.

We say simple, not easy. I always tell people, it's like, you know, everybody knows how to get jacked and in shape and eat right and healthy.

But who does it?

How many people do it? It's the consistency that's difficult, right? So a lot of things in life are simple but not easy.

Absolutely. Easy choices, hard life. Hard choices, easy life.

It's so sad. I like that. Yeah, very nice. Wow, can I— do you mind if I, uh, do you mind if I brown nose a little bit? You look really young tonight.

Wow, thank you. You know, I saw in the comments how young John looks. Well, John is young.

Yes, he should look young.

He should look young.

I mean, I'm not that young. I'm just young compared to all of you.

Ah, the best.

Yeah, I was at jiu-jitsu once and the guy's like, that guy looks like crap for 35. I'm like, I'll take it.

Yes, are you kidding me? I'll take that all day.

I'll be a crappy little 35-year-old.

Amazing.

Oh man. Good stuff, good stuff. Uh, yeah, so now that we're done talking about, uh, Mark's eternal youth— you do look very good, Mark. I saw a video of you today actually where you used to have like a— you had this like really short buzz cut. I'm like, is that Mark? You remember back in the day when you used to cut yourself?

I mean, yeah, back in the day before COVID I was just— had the attitude like I want to get ready in like 2 minutes. So I don't want long hair. And then I couldn't get a haircut during COVID So I just let it grow. And I'm like, oh my gosh, at my age, I have hair. I'm going with it. More time, like gelling the hair, you know, shampoo and conditioner.

What you do is you go to the YouTube channel. I don't think Mark's gotten rid of them. You just go way back to the oldest videos you could find. And you know, it's a whole different mock you see way back. I mean, when you first started, Mark, right, way back in the day. Those are still up, right? I don't think they've gone—

they're unwatchable. They're—

no, no, you all have to watch them. They're great.

Yeah, the, the best comment was, this guy looks like he's got bodies buried in his backyard. Is that a legit comment? No way, it's a legit comment.

Oh man, what's that?

I can still teach you how to buy and sell land.

What's the point?

Yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean, you know, the information was good. The delivery was just like— even the first podcasts were unlistenable, but they were good enough. And that's— and it's kind of, uh, the moral of any startup that you do. You're gonna suck in the beginning. You gotta embrace the suck. You get your reps in. And eventually, you become like the four of us, unbelievably polished professional speakers.

Oh, man. All good.

If you go back and you look at those, and then fast forward to how many people have literally retired because of the things that you've shown. And that's the humble beginning. It, you know, it really is pretty cool.

That— yeah, see, that part is— the why is amazing. And that, that mission has not changed. And it is very humbling. It is very humbling. And I will say, you know, as the years have gone on, I'm getting better at actually metabolizing the gratitude, where before, when I was, you know, when I was younger, and people's like, oh, you know, you know, this business changed my life, thank you so much. Um, I really like— I couldn't really feel it, you know what I mean? It was sort of a weird surreal thing. And now I guess with a little more age, I can, I can enjoy it more, where it's like, thank you so much, I'm going on to the next thing, you know.

So I like the way you put that, metabolize the gratitude.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, you guys hear a lot too. I mean, how many of you guys hear it from our clients? Like, you know, it all started with a conversation with Scott, Mike, John, and now, you know, I quit my job, or my spouse was able to quit their job, and life is just so much better. We have more time, we have more energy, we have more of a bigger purpose, and it all started with that talk with you guys. And inspiring them and showing them like, you know, this is the best business model if you're going to follow this recipe and commit.

John, you know, earlier today we were talking and Mark was talking and metabolizing, but earlier he was feeding his AI, Mark AI. So he's got this food thing going on. Mark AI needs to feed. Okay, well, don't bring him anywhere near me.

Talk about Mark AI.

People don't know what I'm talking about. That's kind of a cool thing that you're doing, and it's getting better and better, right? I think the more time goes on, the more it learns and, uh, evolves, right?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I, I think it's— is it just for our flight school students? Who's it— who gets Mark AI?

The Derbridge Starter Kit people.

Derbridge Starter Kit. Okay, yeah, they have access. So, so basically we took all of our training videos, YouTube videos, FAQs, podcasts, so thousands and thousands of hours of content and teaching went into my basically Mark clone. And you can call my Delphi clone. It sounds just like me, you can have a conversation with me and ask me about anything. You know, and anything, but like mainly land, uh, and it's, it's really cool. And if I don't know, I'll just say I don't know, and then I'll actually get an email saying, you know, this— you couldn't answer this question, or they'll answer it and updates the, uh, the Mark AI. You can text it, you can chat with it, you can call it. My parents hate it, by the way. They think it's so weird.

Do you—

are you on screen talking yet?

No, no, I'm not on screen talking, but it's— when you see my face and like, it's like, you know, there's like a little graphic when I'm talking to you. Nice. Yeah, but that, you know, you can do that. I, I've seen that where people have actually done that. That's really freaky.

We could have fun one night and bring Mark AI on a separate screen and just ask questions and let Mark AI answer them. That'd be kind of fun for one night.

Yeah, that would be fun.

That would be fun.

What about Coffee Talk? Don Thrasher, he's back in the Coffee Talk episodes here.

Coffee Talk, you had your, your walking desk.

Yeah, I remember the walking desk and the, uh, I'd be out in the backyard and do Coffee Talk.

Those are cool, the Coffee Talk.

It was fun, it was fun.

I like the walking desk era, that was a good era.

Yeah, now I'm getting knee injections at the orthopedic surgeon. It is actually too many miles.

Did it end up being unhealthy?

I mean, I don't know if I think it's healthy, but I just think I wore my knees out.

You need to get the elliptical desk. That's the next step up.

Okay, that's a great idea.

It was a good idea. I'm going for the pogo stick desk. That's my investment.

Oh man, nice. Well, we should maybe get to the topic. So let's talk about the topic at least for a few minutes, and then we'll go back and we'll go back and hit up some of these comments and questions because we got quite an interactive audience tonight. But so, so let's, uh, let's talk about unsellable land for a few minutes. John Burnett. Have you ever had a piece of land that you thought was unsellable? And if so, what was your strategy with offloading it? Did it cause you sleepless nights and night sweats and that type of thing? Do you have a story for us regarding an unsellable plot?

Story time? Yeah, I've got a few that come to mind. Um, one was— so one that comes to mind is, uh, it was one where I kind of branched away from the model a little bit. So shame on me. And so I ran into an issue, right, where I bought this property, uh, it was in Indiana, and it was in this area where if you, um, uh, it was impossible to get a septic system. On this property. And so it was completely unbuildable. And the person I bought from knew this. They tried to sell it themselves, I found out, were unable to sell it, and so they sold it to me. So, but it ended up being fine because I bought it— I bought it for $5,000. I thought I was getting a smoking deal and I would sell it for $30,000, and instead I sold it for $17,000 to somebody who just wanted a spot to put a barn on and put their toys in.

Right?

And so, um, like, when I found out about that, it's like this pit in your gut, right? And you're like, oh no, right? Um, so, um, so that's one that, that comes to mind. Another one, um, I bought for somewhere between like 6 and 7, and it was in this, uh, this subdivision in Texas I'd never invested in before, and Came to find out that there was really big issues with the roads, like as in giant chasm that you must leap across. And so, so it was one where we just kind of disclosed it. We discounted the price heavily and I sold it for 9, you know. But I bought it at enough of a discount where I still had— like, I mean, that's kind of what it comes down to. Like, if you're buying at 25, 35 cents on the dollar, or even 50 cents on the dollar at wholesale, there's enough margin for you that you can, you know, you can reclaim that. So those are— I guess those are two, but I got more. But you guys should talk.

Well, I think, uh, what, what You said one thing that resonated with me, and that's the pit in the gut. So I've felt that a few times in this journey, right? Like, what have I done? Or going into it, I think it's a good deal, and then I find something out and I get this little pit in my gut. So Zaino, have you ever felt that? And how did you navigate those waters with whatever property you felt it with?

Yeah, well, I would say the worst property I ever bought, we made the most money on, and I've already talked about this in the show, is involved you. I mean, and, and the reason we sold it was a neighbor sale. It was like, you know, I think what happens a lot when we mail to people is sometimes we uncover that they have other properties in their inventory. They may not be where we're working, right? So what was the name of that type of— we had a name for that, right, Scott? You offer them like a low amount. Was that one of our Is that the $1 Skittle?

No, the $1 Skittle. What's that?

The $1 Skittle. They owe a bunch of back taxes and you say, hey, I'll take it over for a dollar. That's the one though. Isn't there one though when they have one that we don't really want? The deflator maybe? I don't—

yeah, I can't remember the name of that one. I'll have to go back to the archives.

Well, anyway, there's this property that the guy said, do you want? I looked at it, it was like all wet. It just looked gross and didn't look like anything appealing about it. And I just happened to be talking to Scott, and he's like, well, we should buy that. I'm like, you really want to buy this? He's like, yeah. And then the guy ended up selling it to us for like $100. It wasn't like we were getting a bad deal, it's just that we didn't want it. We thought we'd never sell it. Like, really, we're not going to sit on this thing forever. So we bought it for $100, right, Scott? And then what happened? The neighbor contact— oh, we contacted the neighbor.

I called the neighbor.

Yeah, Scott called the neighbor, and we sold that for 10.

He offered us—

yeah, we sold it for 10 grand and we bought it for $100. And we thought this is the waste of $100. I've never wasted 100. It's not like it was a— so it's not like we bought some property that was a lot of money. It's just the fact that we bought this property that we— I didn't want it. I was like, this is crap, I don't want this. And Scott's like, we should buy it. And I'm like, really? Like, there's no value here. We paid him $100 and then Scott had some initiative and called.

Well, and the interesting thing is there was no value to the seller either.

Right, right, right.

But there was significant value to the buyer because he was on the neighboring parcel. And just want to know, now he's going to look out on this. Maybe, you know, maybe he's a hockey player, maybe you wanted a pond in the winter, because that's what it was like. It was a, it was a pond pretty much. Adjointing his property. So that kind of shows you what goes on in land, right? It's just one of those inefficient markets where people are going to pay what they're going to pay. People feel like the parcel next to them is worth, you know, a million dollars more than the neighbor next to it. It's just kind of interesting. So, but—

Scott, the fact that, you know, you think about this, someone once said this, it's like, All these parcels are owned by somebody, so somebody at some point— like, they're all owned by somebody, which means— so there's always a buyer out there because they're already owned by somebody who bought it in the past, right? So it's kind of interesting when you look at it that way, right? Every property out there is owned by somebody.

Yeah, and, and every, every, uh, property nightmare that you have, there's a neighbor next door. That owns those parcels, right? So, I've gotten out of nightmares with neighbor sales. You know, John, you bring up the unpassable road, right? Not only did I have a property that had an unpassable road where a lady went, lady tried to go out there and she like, the axle of her truck broke. And she's sending me pictures and very upset and I felt horrible. Then I had an even deeper pit in my stomach. Then I find out that the property that they were going to go visit was what I thought was a beautiful buildable property was one big slab of rock. And like, you're not gonna be able to use this. So what I did with that property was I, I did a bundle deal, right? Buy this property over here, but I'm gonna throw this one in for free. And I just fudged the numbers in a way where I made a little bit of money. And the guy was happy. He's like, yeah, I love that property. I'm like, you know, you can't do anything with it, right? He's like, yeah, but I'll go out there and camp or whatever. So, the neighbor strategy is a strategy for these unsellable properties. I think bundling, you know, bundling the property in with another one. I think getting creative with your marketing, you know, We've all heard Scott Todd's story of buying the Florida swamp and how he thought he was never going to sell that. And who'd he sell it to, Mark? Like, uh, one of those swamp buggy guys, right?

Yeah, yeah, it was crazy.

I—

did I ever tell you guys a story about— I don't remember all the details of the numbers, but we made a huge mistake in due diligence on, uh, on these properties in HOA. And they all had liens, they all had encumbrances, and like, it was, it was unsellable with these liens and encumbrances based on the market value. So, um, I remember years and years and years ago flying out to Pennsylvania to speak at a Joanne Musa event. Remember Joanne Musa, the tax lien lady? Well, at that event was this guy named Rick Dawson, and Rick Dawson had a course called Hooked on Overages. So it turns out that if you have this unsellable property— there's a whole strategy basically— but what I did was I just said, okay, these are unsellable, let's let them go for taxes, and then the county will sell these for whatever they get for, for the taxes, and then we get the overage. And it turned out the county sold my land and we made like, you know, 200% on the deal. And then this unsellable property— I don't remember all the details of it, but it's because it's quite a few properties. I remember being very angry and very happy.

Yeah, I mean, that's a strategy, but, you know, don't pay the taxes and let the county sell it for you. Let the county sell it for you. That's definitely a strategy if there's an, you know, a true unsellable property. But I think they really do all sell. And I think also, you know, the other thing to do is to just get more creative with your marketing, right? So if you're selling a property, if you're marketing a property, and then you find out something's wrong, turn that wrong into a right. Right, Mike Stadel?

Turn that wrong into a right. But I think, Mark, what you're pointing towards too is why we teach now the importance of due diligence. So basically, there was a mistake in the due diligence, right? Where you—

there was a mistake. Yeah, yeah.

It's got to be— I mean, I have a progression of what you do when you buy a property, and you can't miss any of the steps.

Yeah, absolutely. And so I don't know how it happened, but you know, you love mistakes, right? That's how you learn from them. But then you get real resourceful and, and you, you solve it, uh, for sure.

Um, I've had some mistakes come up where I was like, man, if I had known this, I wouldn't buy it. And then I bought it anyways. Then I made a bunch of money.

Yeah, I mean, this is the only business I know of where you learn from your mistakes, but you can also profit from them, right? Oftentimes you, you know In other real estate, it's just like you make the mistake and you lose money. Here we make the mistake, but somehow we still make money. It's insane. It's an insane business.

Yeah, I think too, like, one of the things that you talked about, Scott, was the idea of like adjusting your marketing, right? And one of the things we've talked about before, like, sometimes if you've got a property that's been sitting for a while, it's just that you're not marketing it for its highest and best use. You know, you're like, you're pitching this as the ultimate spot for your dream home, and it's like, it's just clearly not, right? And so if it's, if it's sloped like this, you know, or if you've got a, you know, a giant wash that runs across the entire property and it floods every year, or whatever the situation is, you just need to pivot and you just say, well, who is this property for and how do I market it to them specifically?

Yeah, no, I love that. And to really get into the headspace of who would buy this thing, right? It's so important. And then, you know, a lesson I learned also is, you know, I bought this property And I actually kind of, it was a kind of a package deal, inherited this property that I'm like, who's gonna buy this, right? And I sat on it literally for a year. I didn't market it for a year. Now it was like a $300 property, but I marketed it and I sold it within like 1 or 2 weeks for $1,200, right?

[FOREIGN LANGUAGE] You get these properties again, ones that you picked up from somebody who's selling you a property where you mailed to, you pick up some other ones, you're just like, yeah, whatever, I'll deal with those later. Then you come to find out as soon as you're marking them, they're super attractive. Bang, sold.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a form of a land snob. I was a land snob.

You were a land snob?

Yeah, I was.

Recovery now.

Uh, well, uh If anybody in the chat is, is struggling with what they think is an unsellable property, uh, ask us a question about it. We'd love to, we'd love to chat about it. But, um, oh, you know, going back— go ahead, John.

Oh, sorry, I was going to say one of the other things, like, I've had, um, I've had, uh, sometimes like an area where I'm like just trying to figure out how to market in this area, right? And sometimes I would test out an area and buy property there. And, you know, sometimes there were other investors that clearly had it figured out, right? Like, they're selling like crazy, right? And one option that you have too is wholesale, right? Like, you can wholesale a property. So that's one way to sell. Like, sometimes you're struggling with this product type, right? But somebody else knows how to sell it like crazy, and they'll pick it up for you and make a good profit.

So I love it, I love it. Uh, we have, we have a couple new folks watching tonight. Uh, Alicia is here, and, uh, I, I think I'm gonna count that as a shout out. That's a shout out when I am, uh, when my name is mentioned. Hi, Scott. She called this, she called this, uh, she called this podcast the Guy Gathering, which I thought was kind of funny and appropriate because A lot of guys gathering, hanging out. Uh, but good to see you, uh, Alicia. Let's see who else is here. Uh, oh yeah, is Burnett like 22 years old? He's young, but he's not that young.

He's not that young.

When I take off my hat, it adds another 10 years.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, you know, Jason, John does have 6 kids. I don't know if you knew that or not. So I mean, that would be A lofty— a lot of math.

22. Better not be true.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Uh, very good. Um, all right, go ahead, Mark.

No, I'm just gonna say, like, you know, considering the stress of 6 kids, that is amazing, right? Like, like, that is, that is a charmed life right there.

It's a fun life. Yeah, yeah, it's a very—

I was just thinking that the guy gathering, you know, we have so many successful females and women in our group, we need to bring— we need to bring them on to the nightcap. Um, that's a really good point to get some female energy in here. We have so many women that are crushing this. Um, we should do that soon.

I think Valerie Young should maybe be, uh, next in line, don't you guys? Right?

Yeah, that would be great.

Juliana Scolari.

Juliana's killing it.

Killing it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

She would be a lot of fun to have on as well. So, all right. Our next student spotlight, we're gonna have one of our very successful ladies on the show. I love it. Very good. Well, should we get to some of these comments, guys? Do you feel like we've covered the unsellable properties enough? Any more you would add?

Yeah, it's like, yeah, I know you guys have heard me say this before, but after doing over 6,500 deals, they all sell. There's a pig for every barn. Mistakes in due diligence, they can all be, uh, they can all be resolved. And even like an IRS lien, it's not a problem. Uh, you know, let's just Take swampland. Swampland, like, oh, unsellable property. No. Highest and best use for swampland: shiitake mushrooms. Go out, mushroom farmers, here's your land. So, uh, there is— yeah, I mean, there's, there's just a pig for every barn. They all sell, right?

So I guess here's a question. Is there like— I mean, obviously if you're dealing with, you know, you've got a property that retails for $2,000 and there's, you know, $10,000 in liens, you're probably not going to be buying it. But outside of that, where the property's underwater financially, is there a price point where you will buy virtually any property?

I, I will. If you can't get to the property You can't access it, I won't buy it. That's a due diligence, uh, red line for me. Yeah, for sure.

There's a neighbor though, Mark.

There is a neighbor, but if they can't access it— so I'm thinking of the, the neighbor that's gated the property.

Yeah, I gotcha.

Yeah, and you just can't get to it, or I don't know, maybe it's super steep. I don't, I don't like the slope for whatever reason. There's just the highest and best use is, I don't know, you know, taking John's kids and rolling down the hill. Um, you know, maybe, but even then, if I'm getting 25, 35 cents a dollar, to your point, the neighbor will probably buy it. I have a, I have a super, super embarrassingly low bar. Yeah. It's pretty much if you can get to the property and there's— if it's profitable, I'll, I'll buy it, right?

Yeah. Well, we have a, we have a win from Rick, uh, Colcock. Rick, good to see you. Uh, last week he sold his first unsellable lot, no deeded access. Buyer went out to the property to look at it. The state road crew told the buyer he could not open the only gate to access the property because it required a permit. He was telling me this and I was sure the deal was dead again because of ask sets. Then he said the magic words, but I'm still interested, and he sold it.

Wow, there you go.

Rick, I'd love to know the number. Tell us the numbers if you don't mind sharing. We love, we love seeing that as well. That's amazing. Yeah, I've had properties like that as well. And, you know, I think that, that's the avatar also that, you know, we sell to just land bankers, landholders, right? They just like to hold land. And you never know what's going to happen in 10, 20, 30 years, or after they pass it on in 10, 20, 30 years after that. So that's another buyer, I think, for these properties that are maybe less marketable, uh, than some others.

And if you think about it, like, land is a finite asset, right? And it's a tangible asset, right? So you actually own a thing that exists. And so even if it's landlocked, right, you own a thing that actually exists, and there's actually value in that. So I think that, you know, you can sell properties as an investment that have, that have no value outside of the, the sheer fact that they exist.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. Uh, Brad Kelly had a buyer investor Zoom call this afternoon that went great on a development property he'd been sitting on for almost a year, so Nice, that's awesome, Brad. Good for you.

Did you see Rick's numbers?

No, I didn't.

Oh my gosh, he land-armed it. One's a land arm.

Only $1K into a $17K, uh, retail deal.

Those are pretty good margins.

Pretty good margins. That's awesome, Rick. Rick, you're going to be a coach. Who's going to be at coaching live? Like, say no. So next week, uh, we, we have a, we have a live event in Scottsdale, uh, right near Mark, which is exciting for all of our one-on-one coaching clients. So the rock stars will be there— Valerie and Rick and everybody who's, you know, Juliana, um, and, and our coaching clients. For, for those that don't know, these are folks that are on essentially a 2-year journey because they get started with our Land Geek Flight School program, which is 4 months, and then they go go into this 18-month coaching program, and it's a 2-year scale-up process, which we may not talk about enough because, you know, people, people get some really amazing results from these programs. So next week, uh, how many of us are going to be there, Mark? Do you know? Do you have a final number?

I, you know, they told me, I want to say in the 50s.

Wow, that's amazing.

I know, I don't really know. Nothing, I don't really remember all the details. I get the gist of it. There'll be people. Kathy Hollingsworth's gonna be there.

I'm like Sinatra, I just show up.

Yeah, I'm just— yeah, exactly.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's gonna be a— that's gonna be a great, uh, high-level, uh, I guess mastermind weekend, right? Coaching mastermind weekend.

So yeah, yeah.

Uh, Rick says his mom is very pleased with him for starting the new land business. And he thanks us for, for the help on this. Love, love it when Mom's happy, Rick.

Yes, Mother's Day is coming up.

When is Mother's Day?

Is it the 10th?

So what is it, the second Sunday in May? Is that when it typically is?

Yeah, I think it's May 10th, right?

Something like that.

Yeah.

Yeah, don't forget your moms.

Yeah.

Uh, let's see what else we got here. Rick wants to see the cold plunge desk.

Mark, that would be amazing. I think, I think I could see Zato had like the barrel, but you know, could you, could you work while you're, you know, in the cold plunge?

I don't know, you have to like write a certain amount of words before you can get out.

Yeah, yeah, I'm not making it up till I sell the property.

Oh man, I love this. Brad Kelly says, let the property— unsellable properties now— let the property tell you the best use for it. I like that.

Oh, it's like if you buy it, they will come.

Yeah, yeah.

Uh, Jason Bone Steel, the Land Geek book number 3, Mark, is that coming?

You—

yeah, that's coming. It's— so I'm working on a title, maybe Nightcap, thinking like Dirt Rich Forever, um, you know, Nightcap, uh, Ground Up because of the Ground Up newsletter on Substack. Uh, somebody had a really good suggestion today, I forgot what it was, but, um, but it's, it's not, you know, it's, it's going to be more of a mindset book. So I'm probably gonna have Zeno write the foreword to it. He doesn't know it yet. But it's more, it's more like a memoir, don't make these mistakes type of book.

Yeah, I love it.

It's, yeah, it's sort of like Dirt Rich, here's the land business, Dirt Rich 2, you scaled your land business, you solved your money and time problems. And then the third book is okay, once you've solved your money and time problems, Now you gotta deal with you, the existential crisis. Here's what I went through. Can you be like a duck, calm above the surface while fiercely paddling below?

I love it. I'm looking forward to that. Um, Justin Wiley is here. Justin, good to see you. Started flight school yesterday. Grats, Justin.

Justin's great. I actually, I actually met him in Boston. We were in Boston, he came in and we met. Had a little dinner. He was a great guy.

Nice.

He's gonna crush it.

That's awesome.

I'm still waiting.

That's hurtful. You've never invited me.

Always.

I've always been that guy when, you know, when can I come visit? And it's just crickets, right? You know, John and Scott are emailing me every week.

Please, Mark, please, please come to Idaho.

Yeah, yeah, Potato Fest. Yeah, Potato Fest.

That's literally all we do. I eat potatoes for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Raw, raw.

Yeah, raw.

Yeah.

Oh man. Uh, well, I think we pretty much got through the comments. Any questions out there tonight from anybody? I mean, maybe you're new to this whole land investing thing. What questions do you have for us at the onset of your journey? Maybe you just found Mark yesterday, maybe you found the book "Dirt Rich" yesterday and you have some burning questions. No land investing question is a bad land investing question. We love them here, we love to help.

[FOREIGN LANGUAGE] Interesting, Scott, is I always forget how many people don't watch us, listen to us. So like, I was gonna call today, she's like, oh, you're— you're— are you one of the— I'm like, yeah, because they, they, they hear the voice but they don't, they don't see us. And I don't really— I didn't realize how many people just listen and don't watch, you know.

Uh, so I wonder what they imagine we look like. Like, I know, like, have you ever— who's the guy who did Prairie Home Companion?

Oh yeah, Garrison Keillor.

Garrison Keillor had a voice that looked different than his face.

You're totally right. And for years and years, it's one of those things where for years and years you hear the person and you're like, this has got to be what he looks like. And then you see him and you're like, really? It does not match.

I'll tell you what, when you guys come to Dirt Ridge Summit in October and meet us in person I'm just warning you, the three of them are big guys. Like, that's Scott.

Scott's 4'7".

Yeah, that's Scott.

But like, yeah, uh, I always forget how big Scott is, so I don't like—

Jesus, dude, buddy, I have a short torso, so on the Zoom calls, you know, you guys outshine me.

But John and Mike, you guys are tall.

Eh, eh, not sure.

Okay, not sure.

Oh, let's, let's get deep for 2 minutes, Mark. Yeah, could you share your thoughts on this sector in an economic collapse? I love that question.

Oh, I love it. Let's talk macroeconomics, shall we? Okay, for those of you— by the way, how many of your eyes glazed over when I'm like, okay Now we're going to start doing some graphs. Let's talk about an economic collapse, shall we? So this is, this is what is most likely going to happen with the Strait of Hormuz closed. You are going to go into inflation, right? Um, for a number of economic reasons, but mainly because you have supply and demand. If you can't get the thing, right, prices go up. What's most likely going to happen is we're going to start feeling it because the rest of the world is already feeling it, but we're going to probably feel it in the next few weeks. Um, we're feeling at the pump a little bit, but we're going to feel it more. But we're really going to start to see it in food prices are going to go higher as, uh, farmers can't get food wet. So anyways, economic collapse, uh, is most likely not necessarily going to happen, but if it did let's just say it did, right? Well, all of us who are land investors, we're buying this asset 25, 35 cents on the dollar. Now it's a fixed asset, which means in an inflationary environment, our, our prices are going up. So this is not a paper asset. So as the stock market goes down, right, and you're already seeing it today with smart money, what is, what is the, like, huge bull run, bull run, bull run, right, has been gold, which has been historically extremely boring. And we're in the same sort of economic bucket as those commodities. It's commodity, essentially. And so you will start seeing a flight to safety as paper assets continue to depress, real assets will go up in value. And we are in that, uh, in that, you know, lucky part of the economy where we will actually benefit. It's hard— it's, it's kind of terrible to say, um, because there'll be so much suffering going on that we will actually— we kind of benefit from it. Um, but we do. And one of the other things that we don't really talk about here is just the lack of debt. So interest rates can do whatever they want, where, you know, if you're a multi-family operator and you are invested in that piece, you need it by your debt and it's floating, you're going to get crushed. And a lot of operators have already been crushed, um, the past few years with interest rates. So essentially what you'll see is that um, there'll be a flight to real assets. We have a fixed asset, and certainly when you have a housing crisis like we have in this country, even rural land will continue to go up in value. And you have the winds in our sails with Starlink as well, tiny homes, all the technology. It's not going to be too far-fetched where drones will deliver things to you. And this, you know, inexpensive rural land will again continue to go up in value simply because more people are going to want to go there and live there and actually prosper there. So I know I said a lot there. Does anyone want to not concur?

Not concur?

I mean, I'm just gonna—

of course you are, Zeno. Well, then I'd better concur.

I will also concur. Yes, but I think like the, the inflationary point is, is a good one too, Mark, because like we all experienced that already. Like we've already gone through a decent run of inflation and my property is also inflated, right? Like, and that's where, you know, we don't really do an appreciation play with our properties. Like we're not buying aiming for them to like rock it up in value. But I can't tell you how many times I've, you know, like had somebody default on a loan and then I take it back and I'm like, wow, this is worth a lot more than it was when I sold it last time, you know.

So yeah, and that's a, you know, we should do a nightcap just on, on the default economics because, you know, again, it's not something that we want, but it's just a reality. And so if there is economic collapse, we are going to get a lot of defaults, which, as John said, it's going to lower our cost basis because they've already made a bunch of payments on the land, and now the, the prices are higher than what we even paid for it. So it's, it's, it's just, it's— again, we don't want it, but it's just the reality. I mean, John I think he made like a quarter of a million dollars on defaults.

Yeah, it's more now.

It's real money.

Now that I have the dashboard, I can look at it every day and see how much I made on defaults.

But pay.io, let's go! Shameless plug time on the podcast.

Today's managing my endnotes with GeekPay.

Yeah, today's pod is sponsored by geekpay.io. Set and forget it payment system.

Awesome. Thank you guys for that. We're coming up on an hour here, but I thought we do have a question from— is it Lana? My eyes are getting bad. It's Lana, I think. Iana. It's Iana. So, Zeno, you're good at the 30-second— the 30-second fast is what we call it. So in 30 seconds.

Oh boy. Okay.

I want you to describe to, to Ayana, uh, what is flight school. Can you do it? Should I time you?

Yeah, sure. Tell me when you want to restart.

All right, hold on, sir.

This is fun. Can I time too?

Okay, ready, set, go.

We believe success leaves clues, so if you combine 3 core elements: a blueprint, a dialed-in process, that can give you the actionable steps to build your land business. You combine that with systems, software, processes, the CEO mindset, and in the middle, support it with high-level support— support with support— if you have high-level support and underpin it with an agreement of accountability, that you can build your land business in just 16 weeks.

25 seconds.

I mean, I told you, he's He's the king of the 30-second fast. Yeah, I love it, man.

So many big words in those, right?

Seconds.

It was very impressive.

It's— it seemed much longer than 26 seconds, all of the fancy words he said.

I even paused here and there.

I knew I had it.

No, that's amazing. And, and Ayana, I think if you're interested in the flight school, uh, you know, go to thelandgeek.com I think /flightschool and /training.

You can schedule a call with one of the Jamoots.

Schedule a call. Yeah, awesome.

And we'll give you the 30-minute version.

The 30-minute version.

Yes. One minute.

Look at this.

I'm gonna give it—

Mike, I know you're jealous because I got a little bit of a shout out earlier, but Hollingsworth, Mike, the man.

Oh, the Hollingsworth. I love you guys.

I did set you up for that though.

Just It was an alley-oop.

Let's just remember. Yes, let's just remember who said—

yeah, I don't play sports. Is that an alley-oop?

No, it's a line.

It's a line.

Yeah, it's a smack.

Okay, what's alley-oop? I slam dunk it? No, that's not alley-oop.

I mean, I guess it could be the alley-oop.

Yeah, I think you could be an alley-oop.

Yeah, lob is good because it refers to my land business. That's kind of cool. Double Double entendre.

Double entendre.

Awesome, guys. Well, we've come up on an hour. I don't see any other burning questions in the chat, but we're always here to chat land investing. We love this business. We love this community. It's a really amazing community where you will— if you tap into the community, you can grow so significantly as a person, and your business can grow as well. And, you know, Mark, as always, thank you for putting this all together and even giving us the opportunity to be here. We love being here every week, and we'll come back next week with another good topic.

And that was my little idea. I don't think we're— and we're not ready to maybe institute it yet. Is that the right word?

Or bring it into play?

But remember, John, you were saying maybe Oh yeah, ask people what do they want to hear from next week. Yeah, sort of get some feedback. Do we want to just— for— yeah, yeah, we can make it work. Like, does anybody have any thoughts about what we should talk about? I know we should bring the female power out, that's for sure. Uh, but other than that, anybody has some topics that they would like to see us talk about?

Mike Caviey, what's on your mind? What do you want to talk about? Brad Kelly, Waking Up Wisdom, Kathy Hallingworth, Don Thrasher.

What do you want us to talk about?

I think John had a— had a bolt.

Oh yeah.

Oh, okay.

1 minute 30 seconds. Oh, 30. Anybody? Anybody? Going once.

Brad Kelly, what do you mean? What do you mean by markets?

Okay.

Um, but no, I do like that. And maybe next week we will give some reminders through the show. Yeah, to be thinking of topics they want us to talk about, uh, in the following week. Uh, women in the business, I like that. Mike Caviey, women in the business.

Are we taking next week off because we're going to be like—

is—

oh, coaching live, because we'll be heading out Wednesday morning. I don't know, uh I don't know. What are we doing next Tuesday?

I don't know.

I mean, Mark's not traveling anywhere.

Yeah, easy for me.

I could probably pull off next Wednesday. All right. Yeah. Okay, next week if you can. It's, it's okay.

I just don't know. I like my travel agent. I don't know when she's sending me out, but, um, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know.

Good, bad, slow, fast, etc.

All right.

Oh, as far as markets, good markets, bad markets, slow markets, fast markets. Ooh, it's like a Dr. Seuss rhyme. Good markets, bad markets, slow markets, fast markets. I love that.

All right, that'd be great.

Yeah, talk about your biggest success in the land business and your biggest failures. Good topic. Taking it to the next level. Good topic. Basic steps on tax sales of land. All right, awesome. We got some ideas here, fellas.

I love it.

John Burnett, you're brilliant.

I'm so smart.

You are.

Cheers to John.

I concur.

Cheers to John. I see him once at the end. One sip for the baloney.

Uh, all right everybody, thank you for, uh, thank you for a fun hour. We will see you next week, uh, with another fun topic.

Listen, they never see the baloney at the end. If they're listening, they never even know what we're talking about. You guys gotta watch.

I just had an idea, which is that I think that the nightcap drink should be a dry martini with just a strip of baloney inside.

And an olive. Yes, of course. Or maybe— yeah, what do you call the baloney with the olives in it? There's a special term for that.

Yeah, and cheese. Blue cheese and baloney stuffed inside of an olive.

I mean, that sounds good. Sounds good. Uh, All right, awesome. Thank you guys. Uh, everybody have a good night and we will chat with you next week.

Thanks guys, good night.

Cheers.

Cheers.