How to Start Land Investing with $5000 (And Never Lose Money)

What if I told you that you don't need a fortune to start investing in land, just $5,000, and that there's a simple system that helps you avoid ever losing money? Sound impossible? In this episode, we're going to break down exactly how you can safely start land investing with $5,000, even if you've never done a real estate deal in your life. Stick with us because missing this could cost you years of wasted time and thousands of dollars. Joining me tonight, Landon AI Harris, the aquatic investor. Landon, how are you?

I'm well. Well off of vacation and back at it, so I'm loving life right now, though.

I love to hear that.

Love to hear that.

And he just turned the big five zero, buddy. The nightcap og I'm speaking extra loud for his older years. Scott Bossman. What's up?

What's up, fellas? I joined. Yeah, I joined the. Joined the 50 Club. So exciting stuff.

Welcome to the back nine. It's really nice over here.

Thank you.

You know, you get that you get to 50, you just don't care anymore, right?

I don't care.

You know? Yeah, it's incredible.

I was looking forward to that point in my life.

Yeah.

Good.

It's all good. So I think we got a great. A great topic tonight. How to start land investing with $5,000 and never lose money. So, Landon, how much money did you start out with?

But, you know, 5K. It's doable.

Very.

Doctor.

Yeah. Dude.

Dude, buddy, what'd you start with?

So I think I'm gonna say we started with about 3,000. Maybe, maybe three to 4,000. I was kind of bound and determined to make it work with the. With the investor toolkit. And once we did a deal after a few months, then I found more money.

So amazing. I started with $3,000, so. But that was in. In 2000. So, Landon, if you starting today with $5,000, what's the game plan? So you can. You can buy property. You're not going to lose money.

Not lose money. Well, all right. So one of the things like this is, to me, like, you just. It's so important. And I use this, and I'm not just saying it because. Because of what it is, but education. You gotta learn. Like, it's so important to, like, know what you're doing going in. Like, if I went into it and we hadn't gone through the program and hadn't figured this out, like, struggle, because I don't know what I'm looking for, and I don't know where these little niches And I don't have the community and I don't have, you know, I just didn't have the direction to kind of figure out what I don't know. And that's, that's the really thing. So one of the things is, yeah, I just got to get educated, got to learn. I got to know what I'm needing to find out. So that one's probably a big one for me. A really big one for me.

Yeah, dude, that's a great one. Good buddy.

You could buy something like the Dirt Rich starter kit, which I think is a really great product for beginners to, to get your weekends right. Virtual, Virtual boot camps, which are just three days of, of high intensity learning about land investing. And, you know, you go to one of those weekends and you just, you just learn so much. I kind of think of it like as a physical therapist. I used to have to go to all these continuing education weekends, and you would go in and, you know, there was this topic you were going to learn, and you came out three days later so much smarter. And you were able to apply that to being a clinician. It's the same thing with land investing. If you start on your own a little bit, work it on your own a little bit, and then you're able to come to one of those weekends or some type of networking event, man, it just, it just really helps propel you forward, I think. So. I, I agree with Landon. I think, I think if you could reserve a little bit of that money of $5,000 for education, I think that's a really good idea.

No, I, I 100 agree. But, you know, this could be the shortest nightcap ever. It's like, just invest in yourself. You're good. But. Okay, let's assume that they've invested themselves.

Yeah.

They've gotten some education, and now they've got $5,000.

Yeah.

Capital.

Okay.

And buy land.

Right.

So, Landon, you got five grand to go buy. You don't want to lose money.

Yeah.

What do you, what do you do? Where do you start? Okay, what's your. What's the plan?

I'll tell you one that I start with, but we're still doing this to this day. We are getting people who are just delinquent on their taxes. And this is the craziest thing about it. I look at it, it's like, okay, they're behind about two grand. This is. They've been going on for years. I can pick this property up for maybe a hundred bucks, because maybe that's all the properties I'm willing to pay for the property, right? I mean, maybe it's two grand, maybe it's a thousand, I don't know. But whatever that is, I could get it for virtually nothing. I pay the back taxes, you know, I reach out to the county, I go, hey, I'm assuming this property, I'm going to pay this property off. I will pay it off in segments. You don't have to pay it all off right away. You can just pay it off in small segments and just start getting, now you have a tangible property, you can just start marketing immediately and start to make money off of the investment and then you get the cash, you get the terms, it's paying for itself. And all you did was reach out to somebody who, you know, had either decided I don't want this property and so I'm just going to let it go back to collections. They were willed it, you know, from their parents or family and they just said, you know what, I'm never going out there. So now you have, you have something that, you know, where it was worth nothing, become something that's worth a lot and for you and what you can do with it and you move it on to somebody else who is actually wants it, loves it, who's willing, you know, who really has an invested idea of kind of what I could do with this property. Maybe it's a home they want to build, maybe it's investment for their family or. And like I said, I'm dealing that today. Matter of fact, we just did this deal like last week, a couple of deals like that last week, got a few people, they had some back taxes on it, said sure, I'll take over. It called the county and I said, hey, we're going to take it over. They were happy to get it when it was going into collections, talked to the collections, they were grateful and they were willing to work with me. And I said, yeah, we'll pay this off over, I don't know, a couple months. They were thrilled. We'll let you know about some other people that we have that are in the same situation. So now I've got a connection with them that they're going to let me know about some other properties.

So thinking about a five thousand dollar budget, I do have some things in mind like thinking, you know, how would I break all that up? How would I budget $5,000? I, I mean if we want to stay on this topic, this is one of my strategies, right? I'm gonna, I'm gonna mail a county, but I'm gonna mail A county after I do some careful research. And I'm probably not going to be mailing a county where I have to buy land for 5,000 bucks.

I'm.

You could do that. That's another topic. But something that's within my budget county where I can buy land for maybe 500 to $1,000. There's hundreds of areas out there. You can do that and find an area where there are other land investors working in that area. Right. And I would pick a very small area within that really large county. So these counties are huge. It's better if you're going to send out a mailing campaign, pick out a small area subdivision, something like that, and just send out some. Send out maybe a thousand offers. Dedicate a thousand bucks to sending out some offers in that area and, you know, Maybe price them 25, 35 cents on the dollar and sit back and wait to get some hits, and you'll get hits. So. So that's the first thing I do with a thousand bucks. Landon, we have a question from chicks with brass. How do you find your delinquent properties? Do you just mail an area and then go after and then interact with people who are delinquent, or are you finding these delinquent people before email?

So, good question. There's two ways to do it. Be honest. The best way we've done it is just mail the. We mail to a lot of people. Like, just like you said, we kind of find that area, that small pocket, and we just start mailing. But I mean, to be honest, it's simple ways to call the county, ask them to send you a delinquent list. You can part of it in the IHJ as you move forward. But, you know, like I said before, the best way that I've done it is find the area, mail them, and when they respond back, because they do, they know they're a delinquent. You know, they're willing to. I would say they're. If they're. They're willing to take a little bit of money and turn it over to you instead of just getting nothing for it. So that, to me, it's the easiest way to do it.

I love it. You know what I would do if I started today with $5,000? I'd buy confidence with it. I would do. I would actually do the education piece, and then I would. That's gonna give me his confidence. Like, okay, I've got this community. I've got. I've got, you know, experts who are kind of watching this, and I've Got knowledge. Right now I'm gonna take that knowledge and apply the knowledge towards a land Arb deal. So I'm just gonna, I'm gonna use like a hundred bucks to control, let's say a five thousand dollar property and then I'm gonna flip it. Now I'm gonna get my reps in, right? And I'm going to learn the marketing piece and the sales piece. And then once I have confidence with that, then I'm going to do maybe a wholesale deal with another thousand dollars or fifteen hundred dollars. And now that's gonna give me a little bit more experience with just doing due diligence. And now I'm practicing again my marketing, my sales. I've got my due diligence under my belt and then I'm going to feel really confident about doing what you guys are doing, which is the retail piece, sending out my offers, doing my due diligence, getting that property and now selling it. So if I had $5,000, I might, that might be my strategy. Poke holes in it.

Yeah, I think I would start with land Arb as well, Mark. I think, yes, starting with land Arb for sure is a great strategy. You could test multiple areas you can buy with a thousand bucks. You could buy five or ten land or property. And you know, but, but even if you bought, let's say you bought three land or properties all at 100 bucks a month. Now if, if you budgeted for, okay, I'm going to give myself three months to sell these properties. So that's 300 per property. So about 900 bucks, right? That, that's going to, that's going to push you out three months. The time horizon on those three landlord properties is three months. For 900 bucks. You're bound to sell one of those in three months if you're marketing like you should be. Right. And then, you know, maybe you try a few different areas and see which one really kind of resonates with your buyer and, and take notes on that and then maybe maybe steer your mailing toward that direction. So. So I do agree. I think I probably would start with a land or somewhere.

Yeah. And Landon, I feel badly because I feel like we're talking inside baseball and someone's watching this right now and they're like, what's land arm? What's wholesale, what's retail? So would you mind just kind of breaking it down, what each one is real quickly.

So let's say you've gotten to the community and you are. Let's just start with a wholesale. I love the Wholesale because to me the ARB is kind of a spin off of the wholesale. So with a wholesale, basically you're getting a property that someone else has already found and they are willing to sell it for you for 50 cents or I would say 50 cents off the, off of the original market price and they're willing to leave enough meat on the bone that they can actually, you can actually make money off of it. Now you may not make the 4x but you're making something. You're at least making 50% more than what you had actually purchased it at. So the wholesale method is fantastic. I love the ARB because the Arbs to me are just, these are just fun to me. And I say it's fun because you don't have to put a whole lot of skin in the game. You're, you're putting in a little bit of down payment and you're really just taking the rights to actually market a property. You're paying a little bit a month. So let's say we're going to take a property and we are actually going to sell it on terms for let's say, you know, 300 down and 200amonth. Well, I'm probably going to pay my investor who is actually arbing the property. I've set up an agreement with the, with the investor. We're actually probably about a hundred dollars a month. I'm going to mark it up just a little bit more and now we can pay 200. So I get to pay my investor and I get like I collect extra 100amonth. So it's a really simple method but you don't have to put a whole lot of money down. You really get up, you're really able to start with just like I said, very little. So the art method for me, super fun. Especially since you're just starting and a lot of these properties, they've already. The due diligence is done. You don't have to go through, I don't want to say you don't have to, but it's. The due diligence has pretty much been done. They've already mailed, they've already got that out of the play. And sometimes these properties are, they come with photos. You've already got marketing package to start with. So you really come with a lot, a large package to really get started in the business. So wholesale are great way places to start. Great places.

Yeah, yeah. And then dude, buddy, what's a retail deal?

Yeah, so I'm going to buy that property ideally, ideally through a Mailing for, for, you know, at a deep discount, 25 cents on the dollar. And then I'm going to turn around and sell it at market value, cash. Those are sweet deals, right? Say I buy for 2,500 and I sell for 10,000 cash. Sweet deal. Or we might own or finance it over time for $10,000 and try to get as much on the down payment as we can to decrease our cost basis in that property. So, you know, I think we talk a lot about let's get, let's get 15, 20% down on what we paid. So if I paid $2,500 for the property, I want to get 4 or $500 down, ideally. And then you structure the deal in a way where you get your money out in 10 months or less. That makes a pretty sweet deal. Right. Every once in a while you get the humdinger. Right. Where you get what you paid on the down payment. Those are pretty sweet deals. So if I pay 2,500 for the property and finance it for 10 grand, but I get 2,500 down, that those deals can move the needle. Now they don't happen all the time, but they will happen if you're consistent. You're going to get these little, these little golden nuggets every now and then.

Yeah, yeah. And I want people to understand that a land arb deal, as great as it is, they're not plentiful like wholesale and retail. Because the only way you're going to get a land about land or deal, the only way someone's going to let you control a piece of property for $100 down, $100 a month, is that they've already sold that property maybe a few times and they've lowered their cost basis to the point where they're in profit now and you're just a better buyer than in a faster buyer than what they could do back in the open market. And they're happy to do it for you. And so I wouldn't, I don't want people to think, oh, there's just this plethora of land arm deals. There's not wholesale and retail. Absolutely. But when I say I'd start with land arm, well, it's not as easy as I make it sound like they're not that plentiful. But is that a fair statement to make?

That's fair.

That's fair. You don't find a lot of those in the. Just out there. You actually, you have to search a little bit. You have to connect, get, you know, give me connected in the community, know who you're going to actually speak to. And you know, they, you know, they've got to fit. It's got to fit, you know, even within your own county, the county that you're actually working in. So no, I agree with you. They're not a, they're not plentiful, just all over the place. But they're there if you look. They are there if you look.

Yeah, and that's what I think. The education piece and the community piece is so important because you're in the community that that investor already knows you're educated and you're a good person to sell that property to because the likelihood of you defaulting on them is really small. So they're willing to do it with you and help you out. But if you're a total stranger watching a YouTube video like, hey, can I get a land arb? You're like, well, who are you? It's like, probably not.

Dude.

Buddy, what are your thoughts?

Yeah, I mean, I think, well, I, I think you can find those properties by being hungry as well. So, you know, just, just make it make yourself known that you want a landar property in a particular county. You know, go, go post it somewhere and maybe go drop a few land investors a line and say, hey, you know, would you happen to have any land or properties in this state or this state or this county or this county? I get, I get requests like that all the time. I'm happy to work with people with that if I know that they're, you know, part of the land investing community for sure. And you know, people, this, you know, another really cool thing about buying a property, land arb. Through another land investor or wholesale from another land investor is by doing that you just learn a lot, right? You just learn the mechanics of, okay, how does this all happen? I don't really know what I'm doing, but I'm going to pay land and 100 bucks a month for a property. But I'm going to watch what he does and I'm going to, I'm going to, you know, really learn, okay, the process that he took me through and I'm going to see what documents he provides me with and I'm going to pick his brain for, you know, why is this a good property? Or, you know, have you had experience in this area selling and what does that look like for you? What's your typical buyer in this area? So you can learn a lot from the people you're buying from, obviously be respectful of their time. But a few Questions. Can. Can really get you a long way when you, when you take, take the leap and buy one of these land art properties or wholesale.

I love it. I love it. Let's flip it on it. Let's flip it on its head. Landon, what's the biggest mistake you could see somebody making with $5,000?

Okay.

Okay. Biggest mistake, you jump in and you start getting all these tools and all these systems and all of these extra things and you're not even there yet. And you're spending all your money on websites and tools that you don't need yet and air tables and you name it, like. And while these are all important things, they're all important, you know, aspects that we all have in our business in the beginning. You don't need them. And to be honest, you can make it without it. They're. They're, they're nice to haves. I'll say it that way. They're nice shiny objects. They're nice to haves. But I find that, you know, sometimes we just get excited about, yeah, and I need this and I gotta have that. And no, really, you just need a way to take a down payment and a way to be able to market. Like those are the, those are important things. And obviously mail. And so you've, There are some things that you do need. Yeah. But for the most part, you don't need to spend on all of these extra tools. When you get started it there, you keep it simple. I would probably just bring it back to that. It's keep this thing simple and you can do really well. And as you gradually get better and improve and you see problems that you need, then, you know, you start to add these other tools that are necessary. But I think jumping in too soon with too many extras and shiny objects, good way to lose money and spend money that you don't need.

I love it. It makes me think because you're a, a swim coach. So I don't know if everybody knows like Landon, if you wanted to be an Olympic swimmer, you'd go to Landon, he would coach you. And it makes me think like, okay, here, Landon, here's my kid, I want him to be an Olympic swimmer. And you're like, okay, we're gonna spend a thousand dollars on all this extra equipment before we teach them just how to do a proper stroke. Like, no one would do that.

I've got the fifty thousand dollar goggles and the super speed suit and I just spent 500 on that. It's like, yeah, but we just gotta get you to point a to point B first.

Right, Right.

Yes.

I mean, you know, when you're at that level. Yes. Maybe that, that fifty thousand dollar goggle could make the difference between gold and silver, but how about just, you know, doing it correctly.

Right.

And somebody helping you. I, I love that, I love that you said that. That's a huge mistake we see people making. They want all the bells and whistles and they don't need it. Dude. Buddy.

Yeah.

What about you? What's the biggest mistake you see people making?

Biggest mistake people make. I've talked to numerous folks in the past who have sent out 5,10,000 even more mailers. Like all one on, on, on one on one attempt and they end up with nothing. And you know, I just, I'm just of the opinion that there needs to be some strategy with your mailing and you need to kind of go low and slow initially. So earmark a thousand bucks, see how that goes before you start sending out. Mass mailing. And every once I'll see a post where somebody says, I sent out 30,000 mailers last week. 30,000 mailers.

Like that's 30 grand, by the way.

What's that grand?

Yeah, it's like 30 grand a mail.

Yeah. So they, they maybe have a lot of money. So they're not the $5,000 investor at this point. But, but even still, I mean, so I, I think you need to take a measured approach. I, I really like with $5,000, make sure you do take a hybrid approach. Don't put all your money in mail. Don't put all your money in buying wholesale properties. Don't put all your money in buying land or because you could buy 20, 30, 40 land, our properties and then maybe get a little bit overwhelmed with too many properties. So, so dip your toe in with all this stuff and yeah, don't send out 5,000 mailers on your first attempt.

Yeah. So between, you know, sending out too much mail and number one, like, yeah, you're gonna get deals, but then you can't close the deals.

Yeah.

Because you're overwhelmed with due diligence. Yeah. You're like the dog chasing 10 rabbits and then they don't know what to do when they catch one.

Right.

You know, and then all the, all the bells and whistles and all the toys and all the software and all the systems, all the processes, you don't need it in the beginning. I remember old Black back, back long time ago. I had a client that told me, you know, I don't want to, you know, sell a piece of property until I Look professional. I want to get a logo and I would have a website. And I'm like, you're not a professional until you make money. So that's what a professional is. They make money doing this. That it's not. They don't look a certain way. They're the ones doing it and no one cares. Yeah, Josh wore a Robin flower. Okay. Come on. Is that a real name kind of name? Is that Joshua Robin Flower. Hello from above the Arctic Circle. Excited to meet y'. All. November 3rd, coming to Dermot Summer, Joshua and Robin Flower. I will remember you. Dermich Summit, because your name's amazing. Thank you for all the info and everything you all do. Thank you. Big hug.

Yeah. That's awesome. Coming from. Have you ever had anybody come to a live land geek event from above the Arctic Circle? I don't know. That might be a first.

That is pretty cool.

Yeah.

Right now.

Yeah. We're excited to meet you.

Yes.

Awesome. Very cool. Yeah, I think too, Mark, what you said about all the tools and technology and all that stuff, you can definitely bootstrap it with some of that stuff, right? Like, Yeah, I tell people all the time, why you, why paying 120 bucks a month for the CRM when you could have a free CRM right now with a notebook next to your desk? Just go old school for a little while. Just like that's what I did when I first started out. I had a notebook next to my desk and I had hot written at the top for hot leads. Right. Keep track of them, do it on your computer or whatever. But you don't need all these fancy tools. You can do free landing pages. You can do free email campaigns. You can, you know, you don't need a fancy website. You don't, you don't need fancy CRMs and all that stuff. So Google Voice is free, right? You don't need an answer service.

Exactly. You've got Excel. We don't need all these other extra tools.

Like you said, they're nice though.

I had, I had exactly. Had a lot of pen and paper in the beginning. Oh, I had a pen and paper. And they're all posted up everywhere. But you know what? Help us get moving. And that's what we needed. Didn't need to spin on all this extra stuff.

Yeah, yeah, it's, yeah, it's. I, I, yeah, it, I get, I think I get it though, right? Because I think there's, there's a tendency to think if I don't have these things, then I'm never going to Be as big as Scott Bossman or. Or Landon Harris.

Right.

So I want to be them right out of the gate and. And you're excited, but just get the fundamentals down first. I remember reading about John Wooden, who. If you're not familiar with John Wooden, he was the basketball coach at ucla. He's like the winningest basketball coach ever. I think he went like 11 straight championships and coached. His name was Lou Alcindor at the time, but it became Kareem Abdul Jabbar, and he would start practice. He's got the best talent in the country. You know how he started practice? Any guesses?

No idea.

He. Guys. Men. Here's how you put on your socks, and here's how you tie your shoes. And that's how they would start the most basic of fundamentals and then go from there. Can you imagine?

I didn't know that. That's crazy.

That's a fun fact of the day.

Yeah. No, it is the fundamentals. And it's just about getting, you know, and that's the other. You need to have the discipline to do this right. So you, you know, you need. You need to. You need to carve out an hour a day and need to do something every day. If your intent is to, you know, eventually replace your income. Right. Quit your job, retire your spouse.

You know, aspects that we all have in our business in the beginning, you don't need them. And to be honest, you can make it without it. They're. They're. They're nice to haves. I'll say it that way. They're nice, shiny objects. They're nice to haves. But I find that, you know, sometimes we just get excited about. Yeah, and I need this, and I got to have that. And. No, really, you just need a way to take a down payment and a way to be able to market. Like, those are. Those are important things. And obviously mail. And so you. There are some things that you do need. Yeah. But for the most part, you don't need to spend on all of these extra tools. When you get started, you keep it simple. I would probably just bring it back to that. It's. Keep this thing simple, and you can do really well. And as you gradually get better and improve and you see problems that you need, then, you know, you start to add these other tools that are necessary. But I think jumping in too soon with too many extras and shiny objects, good way to lose money and spend money that you don't need.

I love it.

It makes me think, because you're a swim coach, So I don't know if everybody knows like Landon, if you wanted to be an Olympic swimmer, you'd go to Landon. He would coach you. And it makes me think like, okay, here, Landon, here's my kid. I want him to be an Olympic swimmer. And you're like, okay, we're gonna spend a thousand dollars on all this extra equipment before we teach him just how to do a proper stroke. Like, no one would do that.

I've got the fifty thousand dollar goggles and suit and I just spent five hundred on that. It's like, yeah, but we just got to get you to point A to point B first.

Right? Right, Yeah. I mean, you know, when you're at that level. Yes, maybe that made that fifty thousand dollar goggle could make the difference between gold and silver. But how about just, you know, doing it correctly?

Right.

Somebody helping you. I, I love that, I love that you said that. That's a huge mistake we, we see people making. They want all the bells and whistles and they don't need it. Dude. Buddy.

Yeah.

What about you? What's the biggest mistake you see people making?

Biggest mistake people make. I've talked to numerous folks in the past who have sent out 5,10,000 even more mailers. Like all one on, on, on one on one attempt and they end up with nothing. And you know, I just, I'm just of the opinion that there needs to be some strategy with your mailing and you need to kind of go low and slow initially. So earmark a thousand bucks, see how that goes before you start sending out mass mailing. And every once in a while I'll see a post where somebody says, I sent out 30,000 mailers last week.

30,000 mailers, like, by the way.

Yeah, yeah. So they, they maybe have a lot of money. So they're not the $5,000 investor at this point. But, but even still, I mean, so I, I, I think you need to take a measured approach. I, I, I really like, you need to put an hour a day into this learning or doing or implementing. Like with $5,000, make sure you do take a hybrid approach. Don't put all your money in mail. Don't put all your money in buying wholesale properties. Don't put all your money in buying land or because you could buy 20, 30 land, our properties and then maybe get a little bit overwhelmed with too many properties. So dip your toe in with all this stuff and yeah, don't send out 5,000 mailers on your first attempt.

Yeah. So between, you know, setting up too much mail and Number one. Like, yeah, you're gonna get deals, but then you can't close the deals.

Yeah.

Because you're overwhelmed with due diligence. Yeah. You're like the dog chasing 10 rabbits and then they don't know what to do when they catch one.

Right.

You know, and then all the. All the bells and whistles and all the toys and all the software and all the systems, all the processes. You don't need it in the beginning. I remember old Black back back long time ago. I had a client that told me, you know, I don't wanna, you know, sell a piece of property until I look professional. I want to get a logo and I would have a website. And I'm like, you're not a professional until you make money. So that's what a professional is. They make money doing this. That it's not. They don't look certain way. They're the ones doing it and no one cares. Yeah. Josh wore a robin flower. Okay. Come on. Is that a real name? What kind of name is that? Joshua Robin Flower.

Maybe.

Hello from above the Arctic Circle. Excited to meet y'.

All.

November 3rd, coming to Dermot Summer. Joshua and Robin Flower. I will remember you at Dermot summit because your name's amazing. Thank you for all the info and everything you all do. Thank you. Big hug.

Yeah. That's awesome. Coming from. Have you ever had anybody come to a live Land geek event from above the Arctic Circle? I don't know. That might be a first circle.

That is pretty cool.

Yeah.

Right now.

Yeah. We're excited to meet you.

Yes.

Awesome. Very cool. Yeah, I think too, Mark, what you said about all the tools and technology and all that stuff, you can definitely bootstrap it with some of that stuff. Right? I tell people all the time, why paying 120 bucks a month for the CRM when you could have a free CRM right now with a notebook next to your desk. Just go old school for a little while. Just like that's what I did when I first started out. I had notebook next to my desk and I had hot written at the top for hot leads. Right. Keep track of them, do it on your computer or whatever. But you don't need all these fancy tools. You can do free landing pages, you can do free email campaigns, you can, you know, you don't need a fancy website. You don't. You don't need fancy CRMs and all that stuff. So Google Voice is free, Right. You don't need an answer service.

Exactly. You've got Excel. We don't need all these other extra tools, like you said, they're nice, though. I had, I had exactly. Had a lot of pen and paper in the beginning. A lot of pen and paper, and they're all posted up everywhere. But you know what? Help us get moving, and that's what we needed. Didn't need to spin on all this extra stuff.

Yeah, yeah, it's, yeah, it's. I, I, yeah, it, I get, I think I get it, though, right? Because I think there's, there's a tendency to think if I don't have these things, then I'm never going to be as big as Scott Bossman or, or Landon Harris.

Right.

So I want to be them right out of the gate. And, and you're excited, but just get the fundamentals down first. I remember reading about John Wooden, who, if you're not familiar with John Wooden, he's the basketball coach at ucla. He's like the winningest basketball coach ever. I think he went like 11 straight championships. He coached. His name was Lou Alcindor at the time, but it became Kareem Abdul Jabbar, and he would start practice. He's got the best talent in the country. You know how you start practice? Any guesses?

No idea.

You guys mentioned, here's how you put on your socks, and here's how you tie your shoes. And that's how they would start the most basic of fundamentals and then go from there. Can you imagine?

I didn't know that. That's crazy.

That's a fun fact of the day.

Yeah. No, it is the fundamentals. And it's just about getting, you know, um, and that's the other. You need to have the discipline to do this right? So you, you know, you need, you need to, you need to carve out an hour a day and need to do something every day. If, if your intent is to, you know, eventually replace your income, right. Quit your job, retire your spouse, you need to put an hour a day into this learning or doing or implementing.

Right.

So. And that's free, right, that discipline. I mean, there, there's, you got, there's a saying. What is it? You got to pay the rent. Right. But, but in essence, you're spending your time to do that. And there's no inherent cost to that today to do that, to reap a reward later.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So, you know, even when you're thinking about, you know, if you have $5,000, you know, marketing is an important part of what we do. Let's say you pick up the property, what do you do? With it, you got to market it. But guess what? Facebook Marketplace is free. Oh, and by the way, that's still our best platform by far, still our top platform that we sell on all the day, all the time. And if you don't have any money, you don't have to have a ton of. I got to get this website and I've got to pay for, you know, this land site. And they're great. They're awesome. But if you're not there yet, start with the free Craigslist.

You can.

You can market on Craigslist still. You can mark it on Facebook Marketplace. I mean, it's. It's. And if you're consistent and you know what to do and how to really do. And it's really. Actually, to be honest, those are actually two real simple ones to really kind of get you started. If you're trying to just start this with, you know, a little bit of money just getting going. And 5,000 is not a little money, but it's. It's enough to get started in what we do. It is enough to get you moving forward and get you what you need to know in this business. So there's. There's just. There's just so many different ways to get this going. And it's actually just. To me, it's was one of the coolest things about this. You can just do this with just a little bit of money in your pocket, you know, and just kind of start the process, get it moving, still make some money and develop and become an actual solid land investor and really move forward with this. It really is.

No, I love it. I love it. Should we answer chicks with Brass's question?

Yeah, I think we should. But let's say one other thing, and that is we have proof in this community that you can do this with a thousand dollars. Right. And you really can. Like, you could buy three or four properties land armed with a thousand dollars. You could do a mailing campaign. A thousand dollars. Eric Peterson, one of our land geek coaches, he. There's a YouTube series out there, guys. Go look it up. Maybe. We talked about this last week. I can't.

Yeah, yeah, it's him and his son going after competing over a year of A thousand dollars.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, he did that. Thousand dollars. Made a hundred thousand dollars over the year.

Yeah.

I think his son lost money.

It was actually kind of fun to watch.

Yeah. Now his son's a land investor.

Yeah, right. Yeah, yeah.

That's a concept.

His. His son had a. Well, yeah, he had a crypto strategy. And a short sale strategy. And initially he was a little bit ahead of his dad, but then Eric pulled away and man turned a thousand dollars into a hundred thousand dollars. So look, look him up on YouTube. What is it called? Mike Mark, the Father Son YouTube channel.

Yeah, Father Son challenge. And just look up Eric, Eric Peterson. E, R, I, K. Peterson. P, T, R, S O, N. Put that in the.

On a banner here.

Yeah, so.

But anyway, now, now we should answer Chicks with brass question. I wonder if she's like a trombone player. I'd like to know.

Oh, yeah, I'm curious.

Yeah, trombone player. I'm a partial trombone. I mean, it could be trumpet, could be tuba, but trombone, let's face it.

So, yeah, I think, I think she should answer that question first.

But.

So do we need to have a company formation from the get go for offers on letterhead? Landon, do you need to have a company formation from the get go?

The answer is no, you don't have to. You can start this with just your name only. You know, is it nice to have.

Yeah.

And is it helpful? You know, yeah, but. And I'll be honest, that's really not even that expensive. Even if you do need to start with your company name. Like, you can probably get that done for 150, 200 bucks. But the answer to the question. No, you don't. You can start just. You. You can start with Chicks with Brass. You can beat that and go. It's just that simple. Just that simple?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's. Again, eventually you're going to have to have a company, especially you start automating with geek pay. You have to have a company. And you would have a company for lots of various reasons. I mean, the number one being taxes. But. And then of course, you know, liability protection. So they can't go after your personal assets. God forbid something goes wrong. It's very rare. But it's always nice to have that, that limited liability protection. But from the get go. No, just start doing it. It's a. Again, it's another nice to have.

Yeah, yeah. Matter of fact, I think we started that way, but just, just our name alone and, you know, we got three or four properties under our belt and eventually transferred them over to the company, but just started that way. It was just that, Just that simple. We wanted to get going immediately, so. Yeah.

Yeah.

I love it.

Dude, buddy, how long before you became a, A big walking corporation?

Well, we actually had one in place because we were on the verge of buying a duplex or buying a multifamily home considering it. So we had the LLC formed and ready to go.

Okay.

But. So. So that was quite convenient, but Landon's exactly right. Just start by doing. And that's one of those things you can do down the road to make things a little bit easier. But definitely don't need to do that to buy a property or to start a mailing campaign.

So do you and Aaron ever, during pillow talk, look at each other? It's been like a. Like a bad week of land sales and be like, damn it, we should have bought that duplex.

Never. Never. In fact, it's because I have a friend who does it, and she is. Yeah, she's had it. She's done. And she got in. She got into duplexes about the same time we got into land investing. So every time I see her, I'm like, hey, how are the duplexes going? You know, they have. They have a bunch of properties, but they're just constantly dealing with headaches. Many, many, many headaches and emergencies and court dates and evictions and furnaces and ACs and water leaks and roof repair. And. I mean, the list goes. The list literally goes on and on and on. But what? Like, when you think of a headache of a land deal, like, there's such a short list with that. And it doesn't happen very often.

It doesn't happen very often. It's. It's usually they dump something on the property.

Yeah.

They. They built something they weren't supposed to, like a. Like. Or a code violation. It's so rare. I mean.

Yeah. It's like one out of every couple hundred deals. Maybe there's an issue. Yeah.

And it's not like you're evicting somebody. It's not like you're taking someone out of their home.

Right.

And it's not like there's no emotion to it. It's like, hey, look, if you don't fix this, my quality of life is greatly diminished because of you. Landlord, right?

Yep.

It's like the land. It's like, oh, hey, can you clean that up? No. Okay, well, then you gotta leave.

You gotta go.

Yeah.

Right.

Okay.

Yeah. Yeah. Or maybe they defaulted. Like, ah. And then I think about it, oh, yeah.

But they lower the cop base. It's like, oh, making more money. That's the case.

I'll just resell it.

Yeah, resell it.

Make more money.

It's just that easy. Yeah.

We got a bunch of questions coming in now. So I like it when the audience is interactive, so I love it. First of all chicks with brass is not a brass player. Much to my chagrin. She's. It's more about firearms, I guess. Concealed carry.

Okay, I get it. Makes sense.

Okay, can we. Can we talk firearms for a second?

All right. We gotta talk firearms for a second. You're right. Mark and I. Mark and I have.

We.

We got a playdate. We. We gotta get out the range. Yeah, we gotta get out to the range.

It's.

It's happening. It's happening. I got a good range. We're about to go out there and just. Yeah, nice. Fire off a few guns. I got some. I got some in the stash. So I'm like, mark, we got. We got to get out there and go.

Yeah, he's playing it down. Let's put it this way. Of all the homes in Scottsdale that you would not want to rob, it's land and trias. So, Teria, like, first of all, if you haven't met Terea, she's like the sweetest, kindest, gentlest human on the planet. That being said, she's former military, and she looked me dead in the eye. She's like, mark, I have a weapon in every room except for my laundry room. Every room there's a weapon. Yeah.

This is new. New news to me. I can see.

I know, man.

It's. It's.

When you get, you know, semi retired, you go, well, I got things I want and I got, like, yeah, I need new toys. These. These have become. They're not toys. Well, let's. Let's get that clear. They're not toys, but I enjoy it. I enjoy shooting. I enjoy getting out there. It's kind of fun. It's kind of cool. Yeah, it's kind of cool.

Nice. That's awesome. Well, should we. So Daniel Bryan has two quick questions that hopefully we can help him with. So, Landon, first of all. So he's new land geek, and a couple things he's run into since he started. How do you show properties remotely to buyers? Is the first one. So let's go over that real quick.

All right. One of the ways that you can show properties. Okay, so with most folks, you know, you're just like, hey, you're. You're available to go out anytime. Just give me a call, let me know you're going to be out there.

Are you kidding right now?

Yeah. Look.

Are you serious right now? You're gonna show property?

You know, if I'm showing a property, I. I don't actually. I don't physically talk them through it. I have to Talk this. No, we're not actually going out anywhere.

Oh.

Yeah, let's be clear. I haven't said put on any property.

Okay, okay, okay.

There's not one property I've actually my foot onto. Yeah, I've been in the state.

Yeah, so.

But no, like you can tell them, hey, you know, go out to the property. Matter of fact, when you get out there, give me a call and we'll talk about it as you're walking through it. Or, you know, a lot of times we've done this before, we've gotten on FaceTime with somebody just like, hey, let's get on FaceTime. We want to walk through the property. You know what, Give me some photos. I, I'd love to see some photos of you out there. Matter of fact, I'm going to use those for marketing them down the road. But that's, that's down the road. But it's great to be able to have somebody get out there and go, they want to take, you know, take a look at it. I'm going to give them GIS photos. I'm going to give them, if I have a photographer out there, I'll send them photos that we have. We're going to give them four point locations so they can find the corners. Like I said, they can match it up with the GIS so they actually get an actual representation of what that property is going to look like. So, no, I don't personally get out there, but these are, that's just one way that we kind of, you know, get folks if they want to actually go out and see the property before they actually buy it. Never had a problem with it. Never once have had a problem with it.

Amazing. Amazing. Dude, buddy's leaving. Okay, so, you know, the way I would show properties remotely to buyers is not giving the GPS cord and say, here you go.

There you go.

Go on an adventure.

Yes.

And if you need help, you know, maybe contact a local surveyor, they could help you, maybe a local broker out there, pay them a couple bucks, they can take you out to the property if you're, if you're feeling a little uneasy about it, but otherwise, go on an adventure. Here's the coordinates. Because sometimes, you know, they can't reach me because there's no self service.

That's true.

To do that. So we try to give them as much direction as possible to get out there and go on their own adventure. But yeah, Landon's point, like, we're not, we're personally not going out and taking anybody out their property.

No need no need. It's just dirt and I hate this. I'm not saying it's like not important, but it's dirt. You know, it's, it's one of those things like if you have the proper GPS location and you got the Google coordinates, Plug that in your phone nowadays you can actually, it will actually pull you to the exact point of where your center point is and where the corners are. That's, I mean, that's really all you need. It's really all you need. So I, like I said, I, I've never had anybody ever go, well, this is a problem. It's not a problem. It's, it really is that simple. Just plug it in, just send them out there. So I'm with you. I'm with you.

Yeah. And, and people don't have real high expectations for that much hand holding. It's especially for the, you know, the pricing we're at.

Exactly.

Piece of property, 200 island, 200amonth.

Right.

That's like, that's like Walmart pricing. You're gonna get Walmart service, right? Basically.

Exactly, exactly.

Yeah.

It's, it's one of those things, like, I think of it this way too. It's like, what am I going to show you? It's not like it's a home. I need to show you the walk in closet in the kitchen. And here's the. You know, I don't, there's nothing I really can show you. It's. Here it is. This is, this is the land. And you know, once you've seen what the dimensions of the property look like, you have a good picture of kind of what it is. And then you start talking about, well, what is it that can do with this property? There's a lot of things we can.

Do with it, but would you rather eat a bowl of cockroaches or show somebody seven homes in a day?

Get that over quick. Seven homes in one day.

That's a lot.

It's a lot of showing. It's a lot of showing. I don't have the patience. You know, they're like, they come in the house, you're the realtor, you're looking for the commission. Like, oh, yeah, I don't, I don't like these countertops. Well, you know, you could change them out. I don't want the dimensions. Not feeling it. There's not enough light. It's like, oh, let's go to the next one. Let's go to the next one.

Let's go.

Give me the cockroaches.

Exactly.

Delicious. Let me go on with my life. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Daniel. Bryan. Oh, no. Scott, do you want to take this one?

Sure. Sorry. A little smoke detector issue over here.

Oh.

So, thoughts on attorney closing states? My state mandates that. So, I mean, I think we typically stay away from attorney states in land investing. There are a few I can think of off the top of my head in North Carolina and New York. I don't know about other ones, but if you're in New York or North Carolina, you can do this in other states. It's no big deal. Right. I'm in Wisconsin, and I don't do deals in Wisconsin. So it's a great. It's a great thing that you can do, really, from anywhere. And that, you know, kind of goes along to what Landon was talking about before as well. Like these. These areas we're working in, once, you know, one parcel, you know them all. And, you know, it's really easy to work in these areas for an ongoing period of time, so. And you'll have to look into your rules and regs in that state if it is an attorney state. Here's a good question. So Brenda's new to land, just started a text campaign. Any thoughts or suggestions on mailers versus texting?

Oh, I have.

Mark, you love.

Yeah, you got to go in on this one.

I love it. First of all, Brenda, fantastic. Fantastic. But it's not either or. It's. And so the way the strategy is that you're going to send out a mailer and then you're going to text them. Hey, just sent you out an offer on your land. Let me know when you receive it. Right. Then you wait and you text again. Just following up on that offer I sent you on your land. And so from that. So I think that's. That's the way you do it, is you can. You could do all of it, right? Then you can call them and leave a voicemail. So now, like, you're real.

It's like, oh, my God.

Brenda really is a real person.

She.

She texted me, then she sent me a letter, then she called me, then she texted me again.

Right.

If, you know, you know, the average person that's sending out an offer is just sitting on an offer. They're not. They're not going that extra mile, and you are. And yeah, it might cost a few more shekels, but your response rate is going up way higher, which is going to be a better yield on your investment on that mailing. So I. I love that strategy. In fact, we're gonna. We're working on a deal right now for LG Pass to have that built in that texting piece and start teaching these strategies.

That's amazing.

That is. That is.

You know, direct mail still works really well. A lot of people ask me all the time, does direct mail still really working? It's still working really well. Yeah. So, you know, if you are short on shekels as Mark says, you know, maybe, maybe pick the cheaper route and go from there. But yeah, I love the, the dual prong approach for sure.

Yeah. And Brendan, you just gotta be, you know, aware of the little bit of risk in texting and TCPA. You don't want to text it after 9pm before 8am Those types of things. So just be aware of it. Oh my gosh. Can I say his name?

Say it.

Josh War A Robin Flower.

An awesome name.

What a great name.

It is. All right, Mark, talk about what no one ever talks about. Taxes. Is every land sale considered capital gains taxable?

Why are you picking on me? Why not Landon?

Landon. People love hearing from you, Mark.

Yes, they do.

All right, dude, do you want me to answer it? I'll take, I'll take it, man. You want me to take it?

I do. I would love to hear your, your point on this one.

Let's talk taxes. Okay, Come here, come here. Just between us. Okay. So here it is. Every sale, if you are in the business, you are a dealer of buying and selling raw land. There is no capital gains treatment. This is not an investment. So there are certain rules. That is a dealer versus investor. I don't want to get into the, you know, because I'm not. I can't give you tax advice, right? But I can tell you from the tax advice that I've been given, I'm a dealer in raw land.

I'm.

My full time job is buying and selling raw undeveloped land. And therefore I'm a dealer, just like a car dealer. However, there is an exemption in the tax code for the installment sale for dealers in land. Now if I was a car dealer and I sold, you know, a thirty thousand dollar car, I would, even though I only got, you know, a thousand dollars down and 200amonth, I would have to book the full, full $30,000 of sale and pay tax on it. I wouldn't want to be a dealer. It sucks, right? But in land you don't. You pay tax as you get those games. Now there are different ways that you can mitigate taxes in this situation. So for example, if you use a self directed IRA vehicle, you can use A Roth or sep. You could grow your profits tax free or tax deferred, depending on that vehicle. You can use something called infinite banking concept that Russ and Joey from wealth about Wall street talk about, which I love actually. Where you can invest in life insurance and borrow from yourself and then have this passive income coming in as well, so you can get creative with it. But if you are looking for depreciation like a typical real estate investor, this ain't it. Right now, all my, all my friends who do multifamily, they don't pay any taxes and I'm jealous. And then we start talking and then they're jealous of me because I don't have any. So you got to pick your poison, right? But ultimately for me, there's other things that I do on the side to, to mitigate my, my taxes because let's face it, they're my. They're our partner. They're a terrible partner. And so everything that I can do within the law that I can to make them a better partner for me, I'll do. And it's my biggest, it's by far my biggest expense as a business owner. So it's, it is important. It's a great question. Joshua A. Ravenflower. I'm glad you asked it, but unless you're gonna bifurcate that deal, which means that you're gonna hold that land a year and a day and you're gonna say this piece of land versus all my other land is an investment, you might be able to make that argument if you got audited. I don't know if you'd win.

A fantastic answer.

See, that was an amazing answer.

I would have never been that great at it.

You gotta answer questions. Come on, man.

You guys are making me blush.

Kay Hampton, throughout the Star wars reference. This is the way she must be talking about land investing. So. Gotta love that. Yeah. Any other questions out there? I think we've hit. We hit all the ones that were up, so. But good topic tonight. Boot camps in a couple days. Virtual boot camp.

Landon, are you excited?

I am so excited. I love boot camp. Like it's even still to this day. Like we've been in this almost seven years now. Even to this day, I still get amped up and I come back out and it's like I got more ideas and I'm more motivated and I want to get into. And it's, it's. And it's fun to go back and forth with just like minded people who just are so interested in learning about this. Like, and they Go. Wait, how does this. Wait, really? That's what it is and it's, it's really cool. So no. Yes. Yes. The short answer is yes. I'm super excited about it. So it's gonna be cool. It's gonna be really cool.

I love it. Dude. Buddy, what's your favorite thing about boot camp?

I just love, I mean, Landon's right. We continue to learn things at every boot camp, without a doubt. But I just love the stories. I love, I love seeing how far people have come in a really short period of time. It's just, it's motivating. Even 10 years into this, it's motivating and it's really. Because there are some really life changing stories in there for people that have been doing this one year, three years, five years. And that just motivates you, right? And just the community is, is just so phenomenal. I mean, that's, that's one of the reasons I, I continued doing, continue doing this early on was just the, the support of the community and the people that I met who made me smarter. And you will meet people at boot camp who will make you smarter. You'll definitely meet people at the live event will make you smarter or who you can make money with. Right? So, so it's a, it's a good, that's a good investment. Those, those live events are great investments. So if you're, if you've got the first weekend in November free, I would highly recommend trying to, trying to attend a Land Geek event in Austin, Texas.

Absolutely. Live events change lives, even virtual events, because we have those breakout groups. You get to meet people and you see where they're at. You're not lonely with it, and it's amazing. But you know, to your point, like, not only do we get smarter and not only are we inspired by the stories, but you make a new friend and you don't know what's going to come of that. I mean, sometimes they're real friends, sometimes they're deal friends, sometimes they're deal real friends. You just don't know. And it's.

Yeah.

And they're smart. I think. I think. Look, I'm gonna give myself some credit here, calling myself the Land Geek.

You.

We attract geeky people who are really smart.

That's true.

And they, they're happy to, to share their talents and their expertise and no one's holding on to their knowledge. Everybody's got an abundance mindset.

It's great. A lot of Dungeons and Dragons players.

Awesome.

Oh, I'm just kidding. Did you Ever play it, Mark? Did you ever play Dungeons? That's something I never got into.

Oh, it's great. It's so fun.

I flirted with it for a little bit, and then I. I couldn't keep up with it. Started swimming. It's too much.

Woke up one day. He's like, oh, yeah, girls. Yeah.

There's a reason to come out of the basement. Oh, my gosh. James Lockton just signed up for Austin. James, how's it going? There you go, James.

Nice.

Is going through flight school right now. Just had a coaching call with him yesterday.

Nice.

They're. They're moving forward and doing awesome, so.

Will not regret that.

And chicks with brass. Jamie is. Is also coming to virtual boot camp.

So let's go, fuzzy slippers.

Let's go. Wait, what's. What's the fuzzy slipper thing? Am I missing.

No, she had it up in her chat, her comments.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, I thought maybe Mark knew something I didn't.

Inside baseball.

Of course.

It's something I. I can't tell you. Between me and Chitcher Frost.

I gotcha. I gotcha. Yeah. Okay. Between you two, that's fine. Secrets don't make friends, in my opinion, but that's fine.

There's an in group and there's an out group.

Yeah.

And chicks with rats and I are in the injury.

There you go. You guys are real friends. And deal friends and real deal friends. That's the new thing. I like that, Mark.

Yeah.

So, Mark, there is a little sad news, though. You're leaving us next week.

Yeah.

For a while.

Okay, so let's talk about it, because it is the summer of Mark, and.

So.

I always take July off, But this year, I'm. I'm gonna be working June, but I'll be in Europe. And so it's like three in the morning, European, time to do nightcap. Now, that being said, there is a part of me thinks I can set an alarm and show up disheveled and then go back to bed. There is that part of me that thinks I could try. Then there's the other part of me. It's like, I think you guys got it.

We got it.

You got it. I know you guys have it. And I think it's actually better. Like, less me is probably better for the community. I'm sick of me. So. So June, July, August. Now, in August, I could, you know, now I'll be in. In Southeast Asia. So in Southeast Asia, I. I might be able to make it that time period. So that'll be morning. My time is in at 6 o' clock in the evening, so I might be able to make it in August. So we'll see. But for sure, I'll be back in September.

Awesome. Maybe you'll be missed. We could always. We could always move nightcap to a much earlier time in the day if you wanted to make one. Not everyone, but Mark's like, no, you're fine.

It's a show. Like, people are drinking. No one's. No, it's not. It's not Munchkap.

I mean, it could be. Yeah.

Coffee? No.

All right.

Okay.

Yeah.

But I'll miss you guys.

Well, we'll miss you too, Mark. And for those coming to virtual boot camp, we'll see you in a couple days. We've come up on an hour here, so thank you, Landon, for joining us tonight in. Happy to be here in absence of Mike Zano and John Burnett. Appreciate you being here.

Happy to be here, man. It's fun.

Yeah, it was fun.

I get that bike to come back again, of course.

Oh, absolutely. For sure, guys. Let freedom ring.

Let freedom ring. All right, good night, everybody. Have a good night.