Land Due Diligence Checklist: How to Avoid Every Costly Mistake in 30 Minutes

Fellas, welcome to Land Geek Nightcap. Tonight. We're talking due diligence. Cheers. Due diligence tonight. And here it is. Like, before you buy any piece of land, you got to listen to this episode because one misstep in your due diligence can cost you guys a lot of money. Maybe some, some waste of your time as well. So. And you don't want to end up with any worthless dirt, Right? So tonight we're going to go over the complete checklist to avoid every costly mistake with your due diligence. And just a reminder, just like every week, for those of you listening to the replay, don't miss out on the fun. Next week we go live every actually, not next week, the following week we go live almost every Tuesday night at 9. 00pm Eastern. So come hang out with us on what it be July 15, I think will be the next one, and interact with us live. We can have a discussion about land investing. You can get your questions answered.

Yeah.

And have a lot of fun. So tonight, fellas, welcome. We're joined as always by Mike the Zen master Zano. Breathe in the mailing. Breathe out the marketing. What's up, Michael?

I was just out back there playing the piano a little bit and figured I'd come in.

Playing the piano a little bit.

I like to like, I like the image of you playing the piano. Yeah, that's a good mental image.

You know, I feel like. Well, if you've ever seen. It's a. Well, I. It's a TV show, it's kind of tongue in cheek called Lucifer. Have you ever seen it? And the guy is a piano player. I don't know if you ever seen that, but it's a pretty good cop show type. Anyway, I digress. Yes.

Pianos.

Well, we look forward to hearing a tune at some point, so.

Yes. Yes.

And then we have with us as well, John. Eight is enough. Burnett, Handsome Rob is here. What's up, buddy?

Not much. Getting ready for a trip tomorrow, which is great. Going to Southern Idaho. So I know it's going to be great. We're going to go to my in laws and then we're going to go camping. Potato, potato. I mean, that's literally all we do in Idaho. My children just play with potatoes all day long. McDonald's out of them. Spuds.

Potatoes to play with. Regarding potatoes, we're eating potatoes. I, I mean, what's your favorite kind of potato gun?

I mean, probably this. I mean, I like yams a lot.

I don't know if that, that's not.

A typical potato, it's not, but they have a low glycemic index. And so they're, they're very popular with me. Look at me, pulling out medical terms in front of the pt.

A sweet potato. Are they the same thing? I'm always confused when I go to the grocery store. Am I looking at the same.

They're slightly different. So they. Yeah, yams actually have a higher glycemic index than sweet potatoes, according to my science.

I mean, you've done your due diligence on potatoes, John?

Yes, I have.

You're saying you're making potatoes. Your jam is the yam.

What was that, Mike?

His jam is the yam.

Yeah, I like it.

My jam is the yam.

Well, cheers you. Cheers to you guys. Good to see you again. So tonight we're talking due diligence, and as always, we want to hear, hear from the community. So everybody throw out some questions out there, if you have any questions about due diligence. But this is a topic that, I think we don't talk about it a lot, but I think it's a topic that, that can overwhelm people sometimes when you, you know, when you get down to some of the details of this stuff. So I don't know about you guys, but I kind of think of due diligence in two different ways. I think of like the. Oh, almost like the legality stuff that comes with the property, and then I think of like property characteristics. So I thought we, I thought we'd kind of talk about that stuff. So, so first off, you know, let's, let's talk about some of the, some of the legality stuff that, that we want to look at when we're, when we're looking into properties. So, John, I'll start with you. Due diligence on a property, let's say you have a successful mailing and you get an accepted offer or somebody comes back with a counter offer and it looks like a property that you might want to purchase. So what are a couple of things you're looking at? What are the couple of first things you're going to look at?

Yeah, so I think from like the legality standpoint, so there are a few things that stand out to me. One is, does this person own the property? Right. And so if they don't own the property, I'm no lawyer, but I don't think they can sell it to me. Right. And so that's the first thing.

Right.

Do they own the property? The second piece is back taxes. Right. If there are taxes Attached to a property, generally, those are going to go to you. Right. If I buy the property, then I inherit all of those back taxes. And so that's something that I want to check and see what the back tax situation is, that the taxes paid up, all that kind of stuff. So those are two big things that I look for. And. And then another thing, like, from a legality standpoint, I don't know if this qualifies or if we're branching into the other category, but, like, can I get to this property? Right. So is it like. I don't really want anything that. I'm digressing over.

You're stepping over.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Forgive me.

Timeout. T. Stop. Property characteristics.

Okay, you.

You had me. You had me at. Do they own the property in back Texas? You had me.

I'm sorry.

We'll get. Yeah, we'll get to that. No, I like that.

So well done so far.

I gotta give you a hard time.

I tried.

I give you a hard time. So. All right, let's go to Mike. Mike, what other logistical things are you looking at when you get an accepted offer in the mail in addition to back taxes and ownership?

Well, first, I want to concur with John that I think there's two stages here. You always have to concur when there's something said. That's correct. And. Because the first level of due diligence comes during negotiations, really. Right. I mean, what John's saying there is, are you the owner? And is there back taxes? That's part of the, you know, before we even agree to buy the property. That's all part of it because we don't know who we're dealing with. We don't know who we're talking to. We've had people who, oh, my uncle owned the property and he died. I paid the taxes for the past 20 years while the state, the county, they. Thank you, but that doesn't qualify you as a person who can sell the property. So I think it's good to understand that in the beginning, when we have an accepted offer, we want to know who we're talking to. And since we're doing. In the middle of negotiations, we want to know what the back taxes might be, because then we can have a fruitful discussion. Then, if we come to an agreement knowing that they are the owner and knowing what's on the plate for taxes. Now, once we have that accepted agreement prior to finalizing the deal, we could go into the secondary stage, which is what John was seeping into there.

Bam. Bam. You're missing stuff, man. How long you been doing this?

I want to give you something to talk about.

Scott, I'm giving you hard time. I'm just giving you. No, I. I love what you said.

It's me too. He.

I know he's cranky.

I'm a jerk tonight. I'm a jerk tonight.

What do you have? Is it a hoppy beer? What's going on there?

No, this is high west rye whiskey, so.

Ooh, the rye. I know.

Pulling out all the stops. It's great. It's a good, solid middle shell fry whiskey.

Yes, yes.

Very nice. What do you got, Mike? You got red wine.

I want to Pinot. No. War kick sometimes here. It's a nice little sipping wine. You can sip it by the bottle.

Yes, yes, but no, those are the first two.

Oh, go ahead, John. I'm sorry, Scott, go ahead.

Let me share. I have a. I have a Four Roses small batch.

The four small batch.

Right. You bought that in person?

Yeah. Actually, no. This was a birthday gift from a buddy of mine. A buddy I've known since I was seven years old. He actually came to my surprise birthday party.

So now I feel guilty that I didn't get you any. Would be a birthday like now. It's just the way he laid that in there, John, you know, or come to my.

Or come to my surprise birthday party.

Yes. Yes.

Yeah. I mean, the surprise, Scott, was that he wasn't there.

So there you go. That was actually.

Gotcha.

All right, well, we digress. We do that a lot.

Scott, I think that, you know, two major things you have to uncover. I stick to it. Is that you. Are you talking to the person who's a property one taxes. Those are the first two.

No, you're totally right.

Due diligence.

Yeah. And. And the interesting thing is that, you know, we'll ask people, do you know if there are any back taxes? And you. You need to trust and verify because a lot of them say there's no back taxes. And then you get on the county website or you call the county and ask if there's back taxes. And there could be hundreds of dollars of back taxes. So, yeah, you do need to trust and verify with. With the county what the individual is telling you, because every once in a while you run into somebody who they don't. They forgot to pay the last couple of years. They don't know that back taxes. Right. So that definitely comes into play as well. For sure. And then, you know, I think there's just other things as far as, like the. Just kind of the logistical legality stuff goes, Right. Like, are there any other back fees that you might need to consider? Is this property in an HOA or poa? And for everybody on the call, you inherit those as well. Right. Are there any other back fees? If this is in, like, a metropolitan area, sometimes there's sewer fees and water fees that you also inherit. So these are things that you need to look into when you're doing your research on the property. Yes, Michael.

So I think you're going into pre. Pre due diligence now. You're almost into the mailing side of things, because we target. That do not have HOAs. Right. So typically we're going to go to the same area. It's going to have a ton of property, and we would have known prior to. So I feel like we've gone back even a step further, which is very important because the due diligence can actually start in the county research phase.

Right.

And in the mailing data collection phase, it's the pre.

Pred. The free pre. Dd. Oh, man. I love that, Mike. It's the pre. Pre dd. It's very true. You got to do your due diligence before you mail and you'll find that stuff out. I love it. Yeah. Good. Good job, man.

I don't think we need the pre. Pre. Just ppdd. It just sounds.

I think we're. Oh, man. Oh, you know what? I forgot to do something. There's about. There's one or two other things I'm thinking in this category before we get more into the property characteristics. John. I'm gonna pick John. Okay, great. Any ideas?

So as far as. I mean, this isn't something I would check before checking the physical characteristics, but it's an important legal aspect, which is the chain of title. Right. And we touched on that a little bit. Right. So you go on the county website, does the county say that this person owns the property? Right. Yes or no. But then even if they say they do own the property, we still need to do our homework and make sure that everything lines up right. So a chain of title is basically all the documents that are attached to the ownership of the property over a period of time that have been publicly recorded. Right. And so we're checking all of those documents and making sure that lines up.

Right.

And so are the deeds signed. Does. Do the names match? Right. And so we're going through and making sure that there's no substantial issues there and that everything lines up.

Love it, man. Chain of title search Very important. Very important. And yeah, that's awesome. And you know what, John, that you were. You were thinking exactly what I was thinking. So I just want to, you know, tell you that you complete me.

Oh, you have me. And hello.

It's a love story.

It's Mike. Are you jealous right now?

Just a tiny bit.

I got the cards back. It's the.

You complete segment. And I got the first one. I got the first one of this season.

Yeah, you really did. And we just so we know we're talking about a love story movie there.

Yes.

Everybody knows.

That you completed segment is back, Mike. So just. Just so you're aware. I know you're happy about that. All right. I can only think of like one other thing, Mike. Let's see if you can complete me. Maybe now this was a little bit more difficult though.

Is this the tree?

There's actually two other things that would probably fall in this category.

Pre. Pre or pre.

Post. It's. It's just regular dd. Regular dd. And so kind of goes with. Kind of goes with the back taxes things. Things.

We're talking after we've determined that yes, they are the owner that we know the back taxes. We've got to solid agreement on a price and now we're going dig. Dig deeper into the due diligence. Is that what you're saying?

Yeah, but what. What else can come with.

With he's picking the card up. You can only use the card once per. Once per.

You're not gonna complete me then, so.

No, no. I mean it's just like you can't reuse that. You complete me twice in one episode.

Only one person can complete you.

Yeah, I know. It's true. It's very true. And John, John. Yeah, I. This was a hard one, Mike. It's a hard one. But.

But diligence. There's a whole bunch of things I could talk about. So that's why that I was kind of trying to clarify if we're talking prior to, you know, we have an agreement.

We.

But go ahead. I'd love to hear what you. What you think you.

You. This is kind of fun actually quizzing you. No, that's not it. Mike.

Started. I gave no answer.

Okay.

No answer was incorrect.

Okay. Dan, you know what? Daniel Bryan. Daniel Bryan, you complete me. Thank you, Daniel Bryan.

I lost my position to Daniel Bryan.

Yeah.

All right.

Leaves on the property right now. There's tax liens. There can sometimes be IRS liens. Do you guys have you ever seen those? Like we talk about every now.

Oh, irs, mortgage, Liens. I think once I may have had what they call a mechanics lien. It's like when someone did some work on the property. But I think those are more in line with properties that will be more infill lots or closer to development or developed areas. Basically, somebody has done some work on a property or some way to improve it and didn't get paid. So they put a lien against the property and that can move with the property. So you don't want to take ownership of that.

Yeah. Love it, Love it. What about you, John?

So we know that's. That's not typical in. No, the desert land that we focus on, you know, and sometimes we have people out there, these desert squares, like it's an evil couple of words put together. But these are the properties that discount and we sell very quickly. And they don't have liens in the property. So, you know, I guess. Don't get me started on this whole desert squares.

You know what, Mike? It's just squares. It's just. It's just. There's desert squares, there's tree squares, there's swamp squares, there's mountain squares, info squares.

I mean, some people just.

I mean.

And so they should.

Minor rectangles. If I'm perfectly. Okay rectangle guy, I very rarely buy a square.

Yeah, but actually, John, squares are rectangles, so.

Oh, that's.

Wow.

Elongated squares.

All squares are rectangles. But no, rectangles are squares.

Wait, no, that's not right. Some rectangles are squares. Right? No, wait, but if all squares are. This is. We're about to get into an existential debate here.

Can anybody concur with.

Yeah, thank you, Daniel. I remember my high school geometry. Anyway, okay, we digress again, but no, thanks guys for the good points.

All ZD is pasta, but not all pasta is ziti.

No, no. Pasta is eating, according to Scott.

I'm just saying, John, I know my rectangles and squares. Okay, I'm probably wrong. Probably wrong.

All right.

I think we covered the. What do we call. Do we call that the legality character? The. The legal. Due diligence. I think that's what we call it.

Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, does like zoning count? Like, what can you do on the property?

I mean. Yeah, I think that kind of. That maybe bridges the gap between the legal and the property characteristics.

I don't want to get in trouble again.

I still think that could fall into the pre. Predium because you're going to one area that has thousands of properties, similar size, shape and use the whole Thing is, we're canceling out all the potential things that could go wrong right out of the gate. And then we mail to these properties and all that's left, truly, you could say that's all that's left to uncover. If you do the first part right, is who owns the property, Are there any liens and any back taxes? Because you would have uncovered everything prior to. So this is really bleeds both ways if you think about it.

You're right, Mike. But I do like. I do like the pre dd. Sorry, pre. Pre dd. Yeah, the. The. The legal. The legal. The legal DD and then the character. The property care characteristics. The what?

The standardized DD or the standard dd.

Yeah, yeah.

If. If anybody is taking notes, please show us your outlines after the show.

Yeah.

The most important thing is that everything we're talking about needs to be uncovered before you buy the property. Whether you do it in this order or that order. Everything we're talking about is something that should be revealed, should be understood, should be uncovered, should be discussed, should be talked about, should be in front of you before you buy the property. Now, I matter how, if it's a pre. If it's illegal, or if it's a date, it just has to be done. All of them have to be D O N E done.

And we're out of here. We're done.

If I was. If I ever had a. A mic drop, and I think that might have been a mic drop. Can I get a microphone?

Yeah, yeah, there you go.

That's like. I better make a mic drop card.

I like it.

Picture of me and you drop mic.

And you just drop it.

Or a picture of me dropping Mike would be more fun.

I like it.

Yeah, I thought I was gonna get that one. I. I really thought I was gonna get a laugh from Mike on that one, but.

Oh, you got a giggle. Giggle.

Okay.

I'm sit. Yeah.

Wow. Okay, I see how this is. Move on. Let's move on to the property characteristics. Or should we stop and answer some questions? Yes.

What should we do?

Okay, let's.

Let's even listening. That's the first step.

Let's say hi to some folks. Daniel Bryan is here and interactive as always. We appreciate you being here, Daniel. Don Thrasher's here. He's a frequent custom frequent flyer as well.

Done.

Daniel McCallum's here. He's a frequent flyer. Good to see you guys. So let's see here. Daniel has a comment. Due diligence paid. He does. Due diligence and it paid off. Recently he backed out of an infill lot after finding out the developer went bankrupt and wasn't going to finish the road and utilities didn't reach the lot. So you saved yourself a big headache and a lot of money there, Daniel. So good job with that. Due diligence for sure. Here's a good question, Michael. How far, how far back do we check the chain of title?

Now, that's going to have a variety of answers, and that does bleed into, like, some. So I would say if I have someone that's owned the property for the last 30 years, you know, then feel very comfortable buying that property, you know, but if I've seen some recent transactions over the past decade, then I'm going to want to dig further. Many times we do find people have owned these properties for a very long time. And by the way, that's why some of them don't even know if they own back taxes. They could be older people that just don't pay attention. It's not like they're lying. They just truly don't know, you know, if they do or they don't. They may have owned these for whatever reason. It might have been years and years ago for an investment or for some sort of use, and then they've held on to it. So, you know, I would go back as far as I can, you know, easily acquire. And if I can't get something, you know, that's. If I do see something that's been owned for a long period of time, decades, I'm going to feel very comfortable. If I see something that's had a lot of transfers in the last decade, I'm going to want to just look deeper into that to make sure that, you know, because every time there's a transfer, there's potential for mistake. It could be. It could be something as simple as I bought the property as Michael Zano or Michael R. Zaino, then sold it as Michael Zano, and they might say, oh, you didn't have the R. And then, you know, this is little things. Every time there's a transaction, something could potentially go wrong. So the more transactions, the more closely I'm going to look. But if someone's had it for decades, I feel very comfortable.

What about you, John? How comfortable do you feel?

Yeah, I mean, I think I would concur with Mike. I would say that decades is where it comes down to. So, like 25, 30 years. I mean, I'm no lawyer, but that's kind of the level of comfort I have. And we've talked about this before about having people in your corner that you can reach out to for advice. I've got title companies that just have been very generous with me, and I give them brownies, you know, every so often for all of their kindness to me. But they will, you know, I'll reach out to them and say, hey, here's what I'm seeing in the chain of title. If I were to buy through you guys, would you see any issues with issuing insurance on something like this? Right. And if they're like, oh, yeah, that's fine, then generally, I'm. I'm okay. So.

Love it. Love it. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Thank you, fellas. All right, I think we can move on to the next. The next little segment here of prop. Let's talk property characteristics.

All right?

And. Well, why don't we throw it out to the community for those thousands that are watching? What. What kind of property characteristics do you think we're looking at here? So we've had a nice conversation with the seller. We know that they're the owner. We've checked into back taxes, liens, that type of thing. We've checked into back POA fees. If you're buying in a POA. Some people don't like to buy in POAs. And. Yeah, what property characteristics are we looking at here? And if people don't answer in the next little while, I'll ask John and Mike.

No, we just pretend that they answered. That's what we do. Okay. Joe from Facebook. Great answer.

John from Wisconsin. Great answer. You nailed it.

John from the. Is it the potato state? What's Idaho?

Is it the potato state? I think we're gem state now, which is a lot more exciting than potatoes.

You say gem Gem like jam or jam?

Jam.

Not yam, Mike, not yam.

Yeah, yeah. Not yams. No, yam. Jam.

There have been a lot of gemstones discovered recently in Idaho.

I mean, I don't know. It's just the gem state. Did you know I saw a great horned owl today in the. Sorry.

During the day.

During the day. It was crazy.

What is happening?

How big.

I know. I mean, bigger than a bread box. It's probably. I mean, the winning span was huge. Like, it was like. I don't know. You can't see my hands right now, but it's about this big, so.

Yay big. All right, nice. Well, I don't think I've ever seen a great horn. Well, I probably have. In a zoo.

Yeah. This wasn't. This was in the real world, Scott.

Natural habitat.

I need to try it. Sometimes the real World, Yeah, Good to try that. All right, we got some people making comments here. Leo Twala, road access, definitely road access, utilities, slope, perk, test, et cetera. So I think we, we hit a few there. John, let's come to you first. What are some of the property characteristics you're looking at when you're considering purchasing a property?

So I'm going to go back to my answer from minutes and minutes ago of access, right? So I want to make sure that there is legal and physical access to the property. So I'm looking for is there a platted road to the property? And then I want to make sure that that road has actually been developed. Like not, not, you know, is there the little line on Google Maps, but when you turn that off, Right. Do you actually see a dirt road there to the property? So for me, that's something that's, that's important. I want to make sure my properties have access. Other things are like Jeremy was saying, slope. Right. Does it look like this? Right. And so if it does, this is a little bit harder to sell than this. Right. And so I want to make sure that there is ideally some usable portion of the property. Right. And I'll be honest, I will still buy this. Right. But I will buy this as recreational property. Right. So if I see that that's something that I want to go back to the person. Sorry, for audio only listeners, I am saying, is it a cliff or is it flat?

Right, There you go. Oh, you only. Yeah, only.

I mean, I know they're very confused.

Gosh, now you got me thinking. I got to talk to this whole other audience I never thought of before.

I think a lot of people do listen to us while they're driving, so they won't see any of the mannerisms we're making and they won't see my.

Beautiful piano, but they're imagining it. Mike. It's great.

John, thank you. That's all very good stuff. But I have a question for you. Yes. If the property has legal access, if there's, let's say there's a paper road, but you can't make out on Google Maps that there's any dirt tracks to get to the property and that it might be a little bit of an adventure to get to the property, are you still buying that thing?

I mean, generally I. My rule of thumb is that I would potentially buy a property like that. I just need to get it at the right price. And it's always just around price point. Right. Because property all has value. I'm just thinking about How. How quickly can I turn it and at what price? Right. And so if I get a property like that, I'll buy property with challenging access, but I have to get it at a good cost.

Agreed, Mike.

That brought up a whole separate point for later that we'll refer back to. But for me, it comes down to three things. A U. D. Access, use, and desirability. Oh, I think it all falls there, right? Is there access? Can you use it? And if so, is it desirable? Is it gonna. Is it going to sell to our customer base? Is there something about this property that's attractive, that they're going to want to, you know, buy it for whatever reason? And then to do that, you have to go back to your avatars, your buckets of buyers. Like, you know what, you know, some buyers will like that. And I'm. Now I'm moving my hand for the audio listeners in a slope. Some people will like to climb up in that environment. Right. They're rock collectors, so they might want to sit on a little. Little outcropping and watch the stars. So, I mean, there. There's less desirability, but there's still.

I mean, dude, you're just on point tonight with the pre. Pre DD and the AUD I. I can only imagine what's coming next.

Oh, man. Scott. I'm starting to make lists of things where I'm like, Scott would say this, and then I write it down. Oh, it usually rhymes. Today's was. I was talking to Lance Castleman. Lance. Shout out to Lance. We were talking about building a list and. And how the first time is the worst time. And I wrote that one down.

That's great. The first time's the worst time.

The first time is the worst time. It's only uphill from there, so. But we digress. Yeah, it's.

We always digress on this show. It's all good.

It's all about. That's what makes it.

We somehow end up at the destination. Right. We're kind of. If the starting destination's here, we're just kind of a little bit here and there and everywhere. And we get here at some point.

It's like snakes and ladders. Yes.

Or like taking your dog for a walk. You never can just walk from here to there. They have to stop and sniff the flowers and walk over here, over there.

Yeah.

It's just. But you know what? If you. If you just enjoy it, it's actually a more fun, more better one.

I have a friend. I have a. I have a friend who goes on Walks with his kids here in town, and he calls it a land snorkel, where they'll just, like, go around and they'll just, like, stop and, like, look at stuff. Right? And, like, because you do that, like, when you go snorkeling, right, you're going really slow. You're just taking in everything and then.

So it is enjoyable. I love it. I'm gonna go land snorkeling tomorrow. I love that.

I know.

That's awesome. I like it. Very cool.

There we go.

You have cool friends, John.

I do have cool friends, yeah. I mean, you guys count, I guess. You're my. What is that? Bvfs my best virtual friends.

I was hoping he was gonna say that. I'm really happy he did.

I know, right? Exciting stuff, but it's all. What's also very exciting is we're all going to be seeing each other very soon. Not very. Not very far away. First weekend in November, we're going to Austin, Texas.

We are.

We're not the only ones going. No.

There's at least three other people.

The Land Geek community is going to Austin, Texas.

It's gonna be amazing.

That'll be awesome.

In November.

I love our Land Geek group of our team members, and. And I love Austin. So the two together are going to be great.

Yeah, it'll be great. Yeah.

It's gonna be good stuff. And for those that are interested, I'll see if I can find a website here in a minute. Or I'm sure it's probably landgeek.com Dirtrich summit or something like that. Or if you Google Dirt Rich Summit, John's doing it right now. That was my little way. That was my little way of just prompting him to do it, because I just knew he would. Yeah.

If you. If you google. If you google Dirt Ridge Summit, then it should come right up. So.

All right, nice. Danny McAllen is going to be there. He's excited to go. And, Daniel, I'm excited to meet you and your wife there, for sure. Yeah, that'll be awesome. So, yeah. What other characteristics? So let's see, Mike, you. I think you pretty much covered everything. I think the only other thing I would add is, like, I am like, John, you talked about this last week. I think it was last week. Like, I'm looking for power lines or we're looking for power lines On Google Maps, you get really good at finding the power lines. Right. And if your power lines are nearby, I think it increases the value of your property.

Value add, not a requirement, right?

Oh, for sure. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry, I didn't mean to blow up.

I just don't want to confuse the movies. There's no telephone pole.

No, we sell. 95% of the land we sell doesn't have power. Doesn't have power lines. Right. People have a hard time wrapping their head about. Around that. I had a hard time wrapping my head around that initially. But nowadays, I mean, there's all sorts of ways to. To enjoy life out there without power lines. Yeah.

Oh, Daniel. Daniel Bryan's got a good one. FEMA flood zones.

So, yeah, flood zones, I think are good to look at. Yeah. Yep.

But you know, a lot of like. So like, you know, I buy property in a lot of like there's one county I work in and it's like, there's very little when you're dealing with, you know, the desert rectangles.

Right.

Then, you know, a lot of. There are certain counties where there's just. It's very rare to find flood zones. Some places in Arizona, if you see like a wash running through a property, it might flood stuff like that. You need a. And a wash generally, like kind of like a ravine you see running through a property that kind of spreads and stuff. And. But yeah, that is something to take into consideration.

It's got me thinking, Scott, remember Princess Bride?

Yes.

So we're talking about the rous or rectangles of unusual size.

Rectangles of unusual size. That's when you get like an 80 acre.

What do they call those, what was it?

The R O U S S or is it.

Yeah, the rats of unusual size. Is that what?

Rodents.

Rodents.

Rodents, that's what it is. Yeah.

Classic movie, huh?

I am Eagle Montero or whatever it is.

Right, yeah. Prepared to die. I'm looking for this six finger man.

You can do that in the Halloween. You just have to shave a portion off and you could pull.

Yeah, I could.

I don't know. I need a. I need like bigger hair. He's got like the. I don't know. All right, Don.

Don, that's a great. That's a great comment. Don. Had an inquiry today if the parcel had a tree big enough for shade. Lol. Yeah, we get. We get haters. We get land snobs all the time, right. We'll market a property. It. It's a desert rectangle, which is not.

A square purchase comes a free tree and then just send one his way.

Yeah, yeah, there you go. I like it.

Send them a packet of seeds, buy.

A property, plant a tree. You got this. We sell those properties, right. Like People love land and a lot of people love land that doesn't have trees even.

It's no different than sending out awful letters and getting people to respond to you. They're upset. Why would I ever sell my property for this price? And then all of a sudden someone calls up, it's like, how do I get my money?

Yep.

Different than someone saying, hey, there's no tree, there's no this. And then the next someone calls up, I love it. That's exactly what I want. Right. So it's not for everybody, but it's certainly for somebody.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Awesome. I think the only other thing I can think of, property characteristics wise is, you know, I think it's good to know when you're working an area for a really long time, what, like where are the nearest amenities or where are the nearest, like state parks or reservoirs or Donalds McDonald's Walmart. Right. 45 minutes to the nearest Walmart. That's an important thing for people to know. 45 minutes to the nearest hospital. Right. What are you gonna say, Mike?

Chick fil A? Oh, my nearest. I wonder what my neatest pinot nearest Pinot Noir is. Like, where can I get that bottle of wine?

Right?

You're supposed to bring those with you, Mike.

True, true. And yeah, so I, I think we pretty much covered like property characteristics, the most important being road access or access usability, as Mike said. So I think we, I think we covered that well. So go through that stuff and you're going to be confident buying these properties. And you know, I think, I think if things meet these qualifications, there's not much we're. We're not going to buy at a discount, right?

Yeah. I mean, I always think about it like I typically look for three things in a property, right. So I look for, I mean, it's not as fancy as Aud, but I look for access. Right. I look for buildability. Right. And then I look for, man, what is the third thing? Recreation.

Right.

Abr.

I don't know.

There you go.

You could rearrange those somehow, like create like. So it could be the ABCs if you just take the recreation and create a C word.

Oh yeah, I like it. Like camping. Camping. The ABCs. ABC success, buildability and camping. Look at that.

You can camp on a property. You got, you got a, a good property.

Yeah. So. But yeah, I mean, like in my mind those are the three things I'm looking for. And one of those three things might be missing or not as strong and I could still buy it.

Right.

But When I got all three of those in place, then it's something that's a lot easier for me to sell.

Right?

So.

Good point, you know.

Very good point.

They don't have them. What can be the balancer is the price.

Right.

You know, the less it has of those qualities, you'll still. Excuse me. Still buy it. But if the price comes down, which was something I was thinking of earlier, we used to talk about this a lot when we were talking about, hey, there's a wash on it, or there's a. There's a slope. Use it in the negotiation to get a crushing deal, and then use it in the marketing to amplify it as an attribute. Oh, you can see the whole countryside from atop your cliff, you know, oh, you have a seasonal pond to watch.

There you go.

But I'm joking. But I'm serious, too. There's things you can look at that it's really depending on who's using it for what. That can be either bad or good. And you can use it to negotiate the price, but then flip it in your advertising.

I had a property once and I bought it, man. I think it was like, I ended up buying it for like 6 or 700 bucks because the whole thing was like a giant. Like, it was. You look at some of the GIS images, and it was just literally underwater. So it flooded. Like, it really flooded. And so I just told the person, I was like, look, I'm gonna resell this. And this is only recreational, right? And so I've got to be able to sell this thing at a steep, steep discount. And so I ended up buying it. He ended up being okay with that. And then somebody bought it for me for $4,000 because they wanted a spot for a music festival, like, and they just bought it cash, you know. And so you just, you know, you find. And. And we were up front, like, this isn't a property you're going to build a house on. But they weren't looking for that. They wanted a discount property that they could have a bunch of people over to.

So it had some dry areas, but then some wet areas all the time.

Well, no, it basically it flooded, so. But it was not all the time. Right. And so it was. It would be dry for large chunks of the year, but then with, like, with seasonal, you know, seasonal snow melt, then it would.

It would flood both worlds. You had the surf and turf.

Yeah, surf and turf. I like it.

Oh, man.

What do you want? Oh, I love that.

I'm going to use that.

It's the surf and turf property. You get the best of both worlds. Visit it one time a year.

You can swim in it.

Just can't.

I like it. Yeah? Yeah.

Awesome. Oh, man.

One, John, It's a benefit.

Two properties in one.

I like it.

Whoa.

How did you do the balloon thing?

What?

No, I did my. Whoa.

How'd you do that?

Oh, my goodness.

How do you do that?

I just put fingers up two things. Surf and turf.

Water frontage, John. There you go. Water frontage. I'm seriously getting a picture of me dropping Mike. That's what's happening. I don't think it is a Mac thing, Daniel, because I'm on a Mac and I don't have this.

I'm on a Mac too.

Daniel.

Not a Mac thing.

Oh, yeah, it's my thing.

Oh, it's a mic thing. Not a mag thing. Yeah, that's like a Scott thing. That's something Scott would say. Yeah.

Well, I've learned a lot from Scott over the years. Oh, I can't wait to play him in Scrabble. That's one thing we haven't done yet.

Dude, I kick.

I know. I think you're probably very competitive and I'm very non competitive, so it probably.

Would be, oh, well, then it'd be fine. I'd get my way and you'd be fine with it. Be all good.

Unless I happen to get his luck and you would be really upset.

Oh, man. Hey, so. So, Mike, I do have something exciting for you. I, I, I, I touched on it earlier, but we got some segments back. All right. I got my cards, I got my cats, got the cards back.

You got the same.

John, back in the day when we did Nightcap, we had some segments and I had cards, and I do want to do one tonight because there's something important going on in the Facebook group. So one of the segments used to be it was the Facebook quote or question of the week, but I'm going to call this the Facebook update of the week. Okay. So I don't know if you guys saw this week, but we're doing something a little different with the Facebook group now. I, I think all posts are being approved, which is cool because with 17, 000 people in the group, every once in a while you get spam and it kind of throws the, you know, it kind of takes the energy in the room or whatever. So all posts are going to be approved, which is, which is pretty cool. But I, but I have, but I have to say, I also have firsthand knowledge of the fact that I think in the very near future we're going to have a separate page for like a land geek marketplace, which is going to be pretty cool because if we have a land geek group for engagement where people can post questions about land, get help with. With land deals, and then we have another group for like marketplace deals where people are able to buy wholesale, sell wholesale, buy land or sell. Sell land. Arm. That's gonna be pretty cool. So that is coming. Coming soon.

Very cool.

Fun stuff, right?

How do you have all this inside information, huh?

I don't know. I mean, you have any of this?

They only tell things to Scott.

No, not true.

He's the land. The land confidant. That's my new nickname.

You're like the Land Godfather, right?

Yeah, something like that. Look at that. You were just offered lunch, Mike.

Ooh, wow.

Daniel Bryan's in Massachusetts.

Big state. What part are you in? North, south, east, west, northeast?

I mean, Massachusetts. Pretty small. Probably meet him halfway.

That's not Texas, but it's not Rhode Island.

Oh, man. Well, fellas, this was fun. I don't know if there are any other comments, questions. Anybody have any questions about due diligence. Kind of a. A nice little refresher tonight on the due diligence. I think. I think we covered things pretty well.

I thought it went very well. I thought it was fun, engaging, and I was entertained.

Hopefully informative.

I was also entertained.

Are you not entertained?

I was entertained. What does he mean by that, John? I wasn't like, it's a famous movie.

Quote from what movie?

Oh, you're the movie Gladiator.

Are you not entertained? Gladiator? Yeah. What year?

What year?

2000.

2000, John. Good job, man.

Six or eight.

He was like 2000 and he wasn't even finished. And then you like, you got it.

I know.

He was 2,000 years ago.

For real?

What, Mike?

What's that?

It's 25 years ago.

Yeah.

Did you watch the new one? Is it worth watching?

It's worth watching.

Really?

Yeah. It's not. I mean, it's a little far fetched in some point at some points, but. But it's worth watching. It was entertaining. I enjoyed it. So he's near Boston. He's near Boston, Mike. Boston.

All right, well, Daniel, hit me up.

Do you guys want some. Some land jokes really quick here?

Oh, yeah. Let's do a joke of the night. I gotta make another.

He forgot to do the thing at the beginning and he's hopefully gonna do the thing at the end to let people know we're Live.

Remember that thing I didn't forget?

Yeah, you just weren't paying attention.

Yeah, I don't think I heard it. Really.

Oh, man.

You were busy looking at your piano.

It is a nice piano.

Busy playing the keys over there. Busy tickling the ivory. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway. Okay, John.

Oh, all right.

Wait, wait. Maybe we should call this the dirty joke segment. Oh, I like that.

Actually, that's the first book of the night.

I mean, that qualifies. We can just be done now.

That's great, right?

So I asked. I asked Chad GPT to come up with some land investing jokes. And so here. Here is the joke. How many land geekers does it take to change a light bulb. So bad. It says none. None. They just send out 300 blind offers, 25 cents on the dollar, and wait for the light bulb owner to accept.

I like that. I was gonna.

That's a good one. That's a good one. Thanks for the dirt e joke.

You're welcome.

It's a dirty joke segment. I like that, though. Dirty joke segment. I don't know. I don't know if.

Mike, I don't think you should have it.

I don't mark it like that, but. Dash E. Yeah, Yeah, I like it. Mark. We miss Mark. Like, is he ever coming back? I don't know. I don't know.

Did he ever actually exist?

Always Mark AI.

Yeah, there's. There's Mark AI. But we love you, Mark, if you're watching and we miss you. And wherever you're traveling today, be safe. Which is overseas somewhere. Italy, I think, only, you know.

Awesome inside scoop guy.

What? I know no more. I know no more than you, my friend.

You know Mark's whereabouts? I don't know anything.

I talked to him. I talked to Mark a couple days ago and he showed me where he was. And it was like this crazy mountain, like, right outside of his hotel. It was crazy. So I showed him the parking lot that I was standing in. It was great.

Is it like the Italian Alps or something?

I don't know.

I.

It was. Wherever it was, it was 10 hours ahead of Idaho. So far away.

Yeah, let's let people figure it out. I love it.

Yeah.

Somewhere on that meridian line.

Oh, I love it. All right, guys. Well, hey, next week we have the week off. We're taking a holiday and we'll be back on July 15th. And I think on July 15th, we are featuring the Zamplo guys. I think the Zampo guys are coming on, so we're going to chat with them about their. This about the service they provide for providing owner owner data. Property data. So that'd be cool. So tune in July 15th and I will mention now even to. To cover all bases, that we are live and we would appreciate you guys showing up on July 15th at 9:00pm Eastern.

Yeah.

So we can engage with you and answer all of your questions.

Put it on your calendar.

Put on your calendar. Come and ask us some questions. Ask Mike Zano a really hard question on July 15th.

Yeah.

See what he come up with. And Mike, I'm really looking forward to your. To your recital.

Yes.

Oh, and how did we get through this entire podcast without saying anything about your shirt?

What about it?

A little hoity toity for nightcap. Yeah. There was no memo about the collared.

Shirt, so I put it on.

Oh, of course she did. Yeah. Laura, where are my clothes?

It's usually how I go, Lara, no socks. Wear the socks.

Oh, man alive.

My daughter's like, which one?

The other day I was, I was with. I was holding my, my 2 year old at, at church and I had this button down shirt. I call it my in case of drowning shirt. Like, it's like snap on buttons. You know, you can just grab it and like rip it open and anyways, I was in the middle of church and my two year old just grabs it and then just pulls it. I'm just standing there completely. With a completely exposed torso. It was a very. And then I kind of hunched over and buttoned as quickly as I possibly could. It was great. So there's precious moments with John, our new segment.

Precious moments. Yeah, John, you gotta wear an undershirt to church. That's just protocol.

I know. That is protocol.

Oh, man. And Mike, you need to wear an undershirt next week with your collared shirt. That's this little.

I don't like these shirts.

All right, all right, guys, thank you for. Thank you for the fun call and we will chat with you all in a couple weeks. Happy, happy fourth of July. And you know what? Happy Canada day. Cheers.

Yeah.

To all of our Canada, Canada investors. Yep.

Let freedom ring.

Which we have people doing this from Canada.

Other parts of the world in Canada.

Buy and sell u S land and people in Australia and people in Germany and people in England buy and sell u S land. So you can do this from wherever, which is pretty cool.

That's the whole idea.

It's the whole idea. Wait, did you just say idea like. I say it because you used to say it like idea.

I don't know. You're rubbing off on me. There.

I am rubbing off on you, man. All right, all right. Thanks, everybody. Have a good night. We'll talk soon.

Bye.

Bye.