How a Broken Leg Turned into Passive Income Through Land Investing

Hey, it's Mark Podolski, the land Geek for the very niche real estate website thelangic.com and on this week's Art of Passive Income podcast. I am delighted. I'm excited to have back on the podcast now retired land investor Sid Christianson. Sid, welcome.

Thank you. Yep. I don't know about retired. I don't know if I like that word retired, because I'm still. I'm still going hard. So anyway, but that's good.

That's good.

So work when I want. When I want.

Yeah, yeah, let's define it. So just for everyone that doesn't know, let's just rewind the tape and. And talk about sort of your journey. I mean, you started, you know, we'll just start. Like, how did you start with land geek? What coaching program did you go into? And where have you built your business to where? I would just say you're retired.

Okay, sounds good.

Well.

Back up in about 2018, I was looking into life insurance pretty heavily, and I came across wealth without Wall Street. Got on a call with Joey and we set up two policies, one on me and one of my wife, a whole life. Life insurance policy. And after that, their program is, you know, find other ways to generate passive income and use the life insurance as your capital to use to put into those other passive income opportunities. And so I started looking at different passive income opportunities at that point. And Joey mentioned you, the land geek, and he's like, this is really interesting, this land business where you buy and you sell raw land. And in my mind, I'm like, okay, that sounds interesting, but it sounds like a lot of work. And I looked at it a little bit. I'm like, oh, you're just buying these little parcels and selling them on terms. And I just like, oh, that sounds too work, too much work. You got to worry about paperwork and deeds and just a lot of things I didn't understand. Right, right. So I'm like, yeah, I don't know about that. So I actually decided to go buy a turnkey rental property. And I was looking at that, and I was almost to pull the trigger on one. And this is in, let's see, about 2019. So this is next year. And so I was looking heavily at the turnkey real estate opportunities, looking at a house, I think it was in Birmingham, just, you know, sight unseen, just you have an operator, you got a trust operator. And looking at buying one of those, and something happened in my life that, you know, changed the directory of it. I'm sure people have heard this story before, but I'll go ahead and share it. I. Me and my family, we like the snow bike. And what a snow bike is, is a dirt bike where you take the tires off and you put a snowbill track on the back and a ski on the front.

That's so. That's so cool.

It's so fun. I love it so much. It's. You know, we get awesome snow here in Utah, and we go, you know, a lot of powder days, and you go up and there's no one around. Just. No one's touched the snow. It's just. It's beautiful. And one of these days, we were up there in 2019, and it had snowed, like, I think, like 2 or 3ft. And the trees were just packed with snow, and it was just an awesome day. It was kind of cloudy, but just tons of powder. And so we were just boondocking through the trees, and I think my. My dad and my brother were with me, my younger brother Taylor. And we. We were stopping, had a snack, and then we took off and started weaving through the trees. And my brother, he came behind a tree, and I didn't see him because his trees were so packed with snow. He came and he T boned me on my left side, and it broke my leg up in the mountains. And why. You know, I threw through. Threw me off the bike. The bike. Actually, the bike was totally fine. I took most of the brunt of it and didn't realize my leg was broken. Tried to stand up and like, okay, there's something wrong with my leg. And anyway, we looked at it, I'm like, oh, yeah, it's broken. So we're up there in the mountains in the snow, and like, crap, how are we gonna get out? So my dad, he went up and got on top of one of the ridges called Lifelight to come and get me out in the force or the search and rescue. And I remember while I was laying in the snow, I had been thinking about the turnkey and the land business, and I was thinking like, well, now I have time to study the land business because I'm not going to be able to work for a while, because I. I do. I did construction for. For my job. And so that was very physical. And you can't really do that with a broken leg. And so I remember laying there, I'm like, well, now I have time to learn about this land thing. And. And the life flight came. They hauled me away, and I got a. Got my leg fixed in the. In the hospital. And when I Got back home, I got on a call with Scott Bossman and he talked me through, you know, what the land business was about. And my initial goal was to generate enough passive income to get my wife to be a stay at home mom. And so I'm like, well, if we could get, if we get $2,500 a month in passive income, I figured that would be enough to have my wife here full time. And being a mom is a full time job. We have, we have four, four kids. And I can't imagine trying to work two jobs, raise these four kids and, you know, just having time with each other, it just, it would be tough. And I remember oftentimes we would pass each other because she worked nights, I work in the, in the daytime. And we would, A lot of times we didn't see each other, we just say hi and bye. And then she was off to work and I was home with the kids, just passing the baton.

Yeah, that, that sounds stressful.

Yeah, it is. Yeah.

Yeah.

And so I, that's why I was looking heavily at finding some alternative source of passive income to where she can get home. So that was my goal in 2019. We got started with the. I think we jumped right into flight school. We got the toolkit. I went through flight school, started mailing with Scott Todd, and that was just awesome to have just step by step direction of what to do. Because, you know, there's a lot of questions, there's a lot, everything you can find on the Internet. But it's like, what is right? What's the next steps? And that's the hard part, right, is narrowing it down and finding the next steps. And that's what was the, the good thing about the toolkit and flight school. Like, we cut through all the fluff, we get right to the meat, and we just go step by step by step and we follow the recipe. And so I did that and I think we got our first deal. I bought a wholesale property right off the bat in Arizona. Didn't realize it was in a flood zone, had problems with it. But anyway, I just, I jumped right into it and we actually ended up selling this one. And the guy told me it was in a flood zone. Like, oh, I didn't know. You know, I don't, I didn't do much due diligence. I just bought it.

Right.

And you know, that was a learning experience. But the funny thing is we sold it actually to another person for more. And I said it was in a flood zone. They didn't care. They just liked where it was at. So I'm like, holy crap. Even if you buy a, like a headache property, you could still make money on it. And so after that, I was like, this is. This is awesome.

See, no. No one believes me in the beginning when I say there's a pig for every barn. There is a pig for every barn.

There is. Yeah. And, you know, I buy. I buy treasure properties. Properties with treasures on them. I like the call. There's like trailers and junk, and those are people's treasures. It's like a treasure hunt for them. And they get excited about it, so. Which is crazy. Anyway, but my first deal, so I bought, let's see, I ended up buying three properties, and it took me probably five months to sell them. So it took me a while to. To sell. And so that was probably the like, is this really going to work? Type of thing. And I just kept at it, kept marketing, kept, you know, posting on Facebook, doing all the free stuff because we couldn't afford the other stuff. And eventually we found a buyer, and then another one, and then another one. And then we had people start responding to our offer letters and kept buying properties and buying them. And then pretty soon we were out of money. So then we borrowed money from my parents to do it. And then they were like, what are you doing? So we had to explain what we were doing. And so they were like, they didn't understand it and a whole lot, but they trusted me, so I was able to buy more property. And, you know, step by step, we slowly grown the business where we were able to get my wife home. And I was like, oh, we did it. We got you home. But I'm like, well, let's try and get me home. So we just, you know, worked our hardest at it, me and my wife, and, you know, step by step, we finally accomplished our goal. So.

Amazing. Amazing. So looking back now, like, how. How is life different for you? I mean, you're both at home, you're with the kids, you're still working your land business, but how many hours are you in the business? And what. What is life like now for. For the Christensen family?

Yeah. So typical day is we wake up, we get the kids ready for school, send them off or ready for the day, and. And then I. I come work on the lamb business. I probably work 20 to 25 hours a week in it, just. Just wanting to grow up more and. And develop more. And I actually still work for my dad a little bit just to get me out of the house. And we. We're. We move dirt so we do construction where we move dirt with big equipment. And so it's kind of fun. It's like a sandbox. But doing that every day, you know, gets old, so. But it's nice to do it every once in a while.

Sure.

And I just kind of figured, like, I'm a professional dirt mover, either in equipment or land, so. So anyway, so I do that and then when the kids get home, I spend time with them, do projects around the house. Like I have a big to do list I can't wait to get to, just fixing things around the house. And I like working with my hands and stuff. And so now I have time to do it and I'm excited to accomplish all my little tasks that I have lined up for me. So.

Amazing. How's it different for your wife now? Because I could imagine with little kids before, if you were at, you know, you were moving dirt with, doing the construction and she wanted to run out. That's a whole thing to get four kids out of the house into the car. You know, it's, it's Utah. Could be cold. They got to get bundled up just to go to the grocery store. Could take 30 minutes to an hour just to pick up a few things where now someone's home. Yeah, you can just run out like, you know, but so is. What's it like for her now?

Oh, she loves it. Yeah. I mean, it's an event, right. To go anywhere with kids. It's like you got your, you got the Cheerios packed, you got your, the shoes on, the coats and. And then you get there and guaranteed you forgot something, some kid has forgot their shoes or their coat or, you know, just something's bound to happen. And so just like they said, just to go to the grocery tour store, it's like a, an hour long event just to run and grab some eggs. But now it's, it's nice. She could just run, do that and come back and she's not worried about having to get, you know, a babysitter lined up and whatnot. So it's nice to. That she's able to run through things. I'm able to run, do things and not have such a time constraint on our, on our, on our own time, which is nice. And it's, I mean, it's. We have more time with each other. We're constantly, you know, doing things as a family now instead of just, you know, getting home, eating dinner. All right, let's get the kids to bed. And I mean, that's that alone. It's still an event to get the kids to bed, but there's two of us, so it's like, all right, bedtime. It's know it's an event to, to do all that, but it's, it's nice that we have time to do it. And we're not as stressed about money as much as we were in the past because we, you know, now we're just more focused on raising a family, trying to teach them proper principles and, you know, talk about passive income. My boys are a little young. They don't know what I do exactly. I'm like, I'm selling land and see this piece of property right here on the map. How much do you think we could sell it for? And they're like five quarters, pretty much. We bought it for a quarter, we'll sell for five quarters. Right, right. But trying to get them to understand it, they're like, where's the land at? And it's just, you know, it's not as exciting to them because, I mean, construction is awesome. They love, they can see the dirt moving and stuff. But the land business is just, you know, paper. So they're not as excited about it right now. But they will be.

They will. Yeah, they will be after their first bad job. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I, I, you know, it's so funny because Joey's daughter is, you know, Annie is in high school and she started the land business, I think when she was 14. She's 16 now. I mean, I think she said 2,000amonth in passive income. That's a lot of like, that's a.

Ton of money for that.

A ton of money for it. Yeah. At that age. Right?

Yeah.

So, I mean, yeah, it's incredible. Okay, so tactically speaking, right, if I'm new, I'm listening to this. Why are you successful? What is the difference between you and other people that, that start the business? They get frustrated, like, screw it, ATM investing.

Yeah, well, I mean, looking back, I've had my fair share of mistakes in investing. I remember my we, we had some invention that we came across and we went through the motions. We got a patent on it and we had this company say, we're going to get a patent and we're going to make all this money. And, you know, there was no like, like how. And we didn't understand the process. And so we got this patent, but we didn't know how to go any further from there. So it was pretty much just we bought the patent and then it died because we didn't know what, what else to do. There wasn't a step and roadmap. And so that was a mistake we've had. And there's a few other mistakes, but not like anything like the sink our ship, so to speak, but this land business, because I had a path set before me, I knew what to do. And I've seen other people doing it as examples. I knew there was something to it. And once I did my first deal, you know, bought and sold the property, I'm like, okay, this, it actually works. I just need to stick to it. And there's. There was hard times. Like, you know, you look at the, you have expenses at first and you look at the money going out versus coming in, and there's a lot more going out than coming in. So that's, that's hard to, you know, swallow at first Is like, okay, we're, we're putting all this money into it. Is it really going to work out? And I think just doing the small steps and just trusting the system is what helped me the most, is just, okay, I just gotta stick with it. Just do step by step, just do the small things and keep moving forward. And I mean, this. Just doing that is hard with anything in life. But because there was a path laid out, I had a direction. And I think that was mainly the main difference for me versus, like, that invention and patent. I had no, no direction. So now that I had a direction, I knew exactly what to do. I just needed to trust the system and stick with it and know that it will work out.

Yeah, I mean, you know, and you also made a big bet on yourself in coaching. Which, which coaching program did you go into?

I don't know. It was. I think one. It was just coaching. I think it was a couple months after flight school. I went to a boot camp and I had a few cells before then I had a cell right at boot camp. I remember. And then.

Magic.

Yeah, it was. Yeah, it really works.

Yeah.

And I remember I. I do remember testing a few, like, sales calls on a few people. I had a few people, like, get mad at me because I was too pushy. So you gotta kind of figure out like, how to sell, you know, get, get in a groove. I remember after one of this, after one of the days of boot camp, I called a guy and really tried to push a property and like, well, that didn't work.

So.

Because he got like way mad, way frustrated. Never heard from him again. But this other lady, I sold the property to her and I was able to, you know, just. It takes practice to learn how to sell land. And you know, you know, she, it's crazy. She had a brother in jail or something and they wanted to purchase this land and the brother in jail said, just buy it. I'm going to be out soon. And so she put the down payment on it and, and then they made a few payments and defaulted. But I needed that cell at that time because it gave me so much more, so much confidence in, in the business, you know, and every cell starting out is just like such a confidence booster and you make mistakes, but then you get some wins and you slowly, you know, move forward. But I think the coaching program, I don't know, I didn't know you had more than one, but it was the next step, I guess.

Yeah, you know, there's just, there's just levels of, of one on one coaching. There's like order of magnitude and there's epic, which is, you know, the, the, the one which you go into elite week, which we don't really talk about. Oh, too much. So I think, I think you did the order of magnitude 1. Who, who was your coach again?

Eric.

Eric. Okay. Yeah. What, what was that like? Because, you know, again, in the beginning, it's hard to sort of stay emotionally stable when you start a new business. You've got all these things going on. You got four kids, you got a wife, you want to retire, you've got money going out, you don't have enough money coming in. And it can be frustrating, you know, but having someone to help you stick to that recipe and, and keep sort of helping you go through those challenges, not just tactically, but also emotionally. I mean, what was that like?

Well, it was just like having a, you know, support system in your back pocket. I remember had a question on a. I was looking at buying three properties and it was a, you know, at the time, it was a huge deal for me because these properties, I'm buying them for a really good price. I'm like, at this point, I know I could sell them for a good price. And the problem was is they were, I think it was a joint tenants of ownership. Right? And it's just a simple question. I'm like, how do you do that? And I called up Eric, he's like, well, you know, there should be a termination of joint tenancy. You need to record before the deed. Like, oh, that's it. And it was just so simple. So I remember doing that with Eric and like, oh, that's just, it's so nice just to have him. It was just a quick question, but you know, I could have spent, you know, two or three hours researching this on the, on the computer trying to figure out, you know, what. And then like, is this right? Still in the back of my head, I'll be thinking, is this correct? But with Eric, I got an answer instantly. And I was able to buy those, those three properties and I sold them and, and resold them after people defaulted on a few of them. And, you know, just, it's just having that in your back pocket was nice. And then having the. I think you have like 60 modules that you work through just to go in a deeper dive on due diligence pricing. I can't remember them all, but it was nice to go through week by week and have something to work on to sharpen the saw to, to make you a better land investor. And I'm actually starting to go through them again now just to see if I pick. Could pick up any other nuggets that I've missed along the way just to tweak my business. And I'm always listening to the podcast and just looking for new ideas, new ways to be better at the lamb business.

I love it. I love it. What are you doing now that, now that you're out of coaching that you're like, oh, this, this really moved the needle for my, for my business.

Got to think about that doing now.

Or you just, Are you just sticking to the fundamentals?

I just.

More of it.

I'm just sticking to the fundamentals. I'm doing more like, I'm buying more land, but it's still the same fundamentals. I, I try, I'm focused on. I, I focus my sales on terms. I'm trying to sell everything on terms. I get maybe two cash sales a year, not very many. But I price my properties because I want, I want people to be in terms because that's. I think Tate says it's a. They're like ATM machines, and the more ATM machines you have, the, the more money you'll have coming in. So, you know, I, I like to have the opportunity or have properties be on terms because I'm like, okay, with this property, I could get this much passive income. And, you know, I could do that for 72 months or whatever. And then if people default, I can start it over. It's just like getting like. They're like ATM machines that just keep printing money for you. And I look at land as like an asset that I don't want to lose. So I, I don't want to ever sell for cash. So I'm always Trying to sell on terms of, you know, I do. I mean, every once in a while people offer cash and like, oh yeah, I'll sell it for cash. I mean, you're selling, you're. I'm selling at a higher cash price, but you know, it makes it worth it at that point. But I think that, so I'm really focusing on that right now on the terms.

So I do think terms is the antidote to financial anxiety, that passive income every single month. Because you can, you can forecast it out if something happens, right. Like, God forbid you get sick or, you know, there's something happens and you have to take your eye off the business for a little bit. You've got Runway to do it and you, you know, cash sales are great, but then it's just another job of, okay, now I get another cash deal, now I gotta get another cash deal. And they're not as dependable as the cash flow. I, I'd way rather have cash flow than cash. And then if you need money, well, okay, I can sell a note or two.

Yeah.

And, and then in the, the math is amazing when you look at it. I mean, emotionally it's hard to do for sure. Nobody wants, nobody wants to give it up, but you know, just because it's the most rational thing to do, it may not be the most reasonable thing.

Yeah, yeah. When it's starting out, it was nice to get cash sales because you needed that influx of cash to, to purchase land. And then, I don't know. Finding money for this has been easy. I mean, I, I offer, I think it was like 8% interest payments and you know, sometimes 6%. But that's like awesome for people because, you know, the bank is giving them pennies. I mean, the interest rates have gone up a little bit for like CDs and stuff, but, you know, it's easy to beat that and people are excited about that. And it's, you know, my parents, my wife's parents have been really good to invest in the business. So at first it was really nice to get that influx of cash. But now with terms, focus on terms. I have, I have an idea of how much money I want to spend on land every month. And with that money I want to have create this much passive income just to keep the, the business flowing as is now, but also growing. So kind of, I don't know, reverse calculated it to figure out like where I wanted to be and all that with the terms and notes.

I love it. I love it. So what's your one tip to a newbie investor.

I just. You gotta stick with it. I was gonna. I have a few tips of the week, but one of them, I was thinking about this quote, and I'll just say it now. It's by Heber J. Grant, and he says that which we persist in doing becomes easier. Not that the nature of the thing has changed, but that our ability to do it has increased. And I love that quote because everything we start, it's always hard. When you first start, it's always hard. The lamb is. It was hard to start. But if you persist in doing it, just keep at it, keep learning, keep, you know, sharpening the saw, that thing will get easier. Just like, like lifting weights. Anything in life that. The thing that you focus on, you'll eventually make it work. But you got to put in the. Your reps, right? You got to put in your time, gotta put in the effort. And you know it. That thing will become easier, more natural for you. So I think, you know, those new land investors, you just gotta stick to it. You just gotta continue to learn, continue to grow, try different things. Just test the market. If things aren't selling, you gotta test the market. That's one thing that's always being brought up, you know, in our business is like, what's working, what's not. You know, how can we change things? It's. That's a constant thing. But you just gotta continue to, you know, persist in doing those things.

I love it. Such. Such wise words. I'm. I'm stealing that quote. That's such a great. That's such a great quote. I'm going to put that in the. The digest. Perfect for this week for sure. All right, well, Sid, your. Your mentorship, as always, has been invaluable. But now we're at that point where I'm going to ask you for your tip of the week. A website, a resource, maybe another quote, a book, something else actionable for the art of passive income listeners. Go improve their businesses, improve their lives. What have you got?

Yeah, so I, I mean, this, this tip of the week, I've had a hard time coming up with it because all the tips of the week I get from this podcast and I apply them. So I'm not sure if this one has been brought up, but when you first start out in the lamb is. It's hard to keep track of all the, like, the money flowing in and out. And so I really like using this budget app called Ynab. I'm. I'm not sure if this has been brought up before, but you can use it in conjunction with profit first. Okay, what Ynab does it is it.

W, Y N a B. Yeah.

Y N a B. Y, N A.

B. I'm going right there. Okay.

Yeah. And so what Ynab does it, you can connect like all your bank accounts and it brings all the like what you have your money. Well, all the money you have just in one list and one. And then you take that money and then you put it in different buckets or budget it a certain way. And so I used Ynab app with profit first because I thought it was annoying to have all these bank accounts set up for profit first and it just got way cumbersome. It's hard to edit, you know, if you have. It's hard to change things with that. But with Ynab you can set up all these different categories so you could have your opex account, you can have your op. Your like a payment to your investors or whatever bucket you want to divide up your, your money into your taxes money to buy more land, you could divide it up in these buckets, you know, and every month when I, I have all the income that has come in for that month, I take that and then I divide it up in all these buckets and then I know, you know, it's just like, it's just like budgeting but on, you know, a lot easier, user friendly. And then you could use it with profit first.

I love it because I, I do profit first and I, of course I've got, you know, all these companies, all these bank accounts. Like it's, it's annoying, you know, to do all the transfers every two weeks and you know, this would make it way easier. This is a great tip of the week. I'm signing up today. I'm going to, I'm going to simplify my life so much more.

It is simple and, and you can more companies, right? You have like your land business, your other land business, you know, another business. You could have multiple budgets for each business and you could just toggle back and forth between those different budgets. And so you keep things separate. You don't have to have it all in one, but you can, you know, all the, like, all your land business stuff, you go in one, you have a personal one and break it up. It's. I find it a lot easier to use the profit first method than, you know, setting up all these other bank accounts. So.

Yeah, absolutely. So I know which bucket it's in. And for cash flow, I'm not doing bank, you know, accounting bank balance accounting Now. All right, this is fantastic. Well, my tip of the week is. Sid, where should we send people to your site to learn more about you?

So my. My land site is high creek land.com.

High creekland h I h h I g h h I h I g h I creekland.com Buy some land from Sid. Invest in some land from Sid. High creekland.com Check it out. I want to just, you know, give a shout out to our sponsors whose flight school. If you want to start out and learn how to be like Sid, Sid, schedule a call with our sales team. And I know what you're thinking, you know, what about the investment. It ain't going to cost you nothing. Guaranteed you're going to make it back 180 days or less. Just show us your work and, and start being on that. That path to not just solving your money problems, but also your time problems. And then you can, you know, do what you want, where you want, when you want, with who you want, and channel your. Your. Your inner Sid Christensen, which is great. So do that. We'll have a. A link to schedule a call and find out if the land business is for you. If you're getting value from the podcast, do me a favor. Follow rate, review the podcast, send a screenshot of that review, Support the Land Geek.com we'll send you a free copy of Dirt Rich signed by me. All right, Sid, are we good?

We're good.

All right. I want to thank everybody. And 1, 2, 3, let freedom ring ring. Thanks, everybody. Thanks, Sid.

Yep.

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