Clay Hepler: We bought all these properties when interest rates were lower, and we also caught them when rents were way higher. So we got hit with one after the other after the other, and the worst thing was my wife got let go from her job. This was a couple of Thanksgivings ago, the day before Thanksgiving. Giving. I was going out there and I would wholesale like I wholesale a 28 unit, a 35 unit, and I was getting these big checks, but they kept disappearing.
We had to look really seriously at our pro form a. Are we actually cash flowing? And then we're like, oh my gosh. We had a bad property manager, and it just hit us all at once. So I was like, I gotta make I have to make income.
And I had to pay for my wedding that year, that up that next year, and I had to live. And so I was like, I gotta make this happen. I I I did the math. I was like, I couldn't get a job.
Steve Trang: Welcome, and thank you for joining us for today's episode of disruptors where millionaires are made. Today, we have Clay Hepler with Landman Consulting, and Clay flew in from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to share how he went from 30,000 to 3,000,000 in gross profits in three years. Now, guys, I'm on a mission to create a 100 millionaires. The information on the show alone is enough to help you become a millionaire in the next five to seven years. If you'll take consistent action, you will become one.
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You ready? Yeah. Alright. So we've been talking about doing this for about a year now, because I think that's about how long ago I met you Mhmm. If that's accurate.
Right? And when we met, it was at a boardroom.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: Right? And you were already doing some pretty impressive things, and it seems like you've gone and done even more impressive things. But before we get into all that Yeah. Let's talk about what was your life like before you got into real estate?
Clay: So before I got into real estate, I was an aspiring, diplomat. Right? So when I was in college, I went to college. I went to a college specifically for being a diplomat. Right?
You know, learning language. Yeah. Well, I mean, like, it was one of the colleges. It was like, you know, you look at The US Business World Report. It's like, this is a college that sends peep right?
That has good languages, foreign policies Interesting. Stuff like that. So I didn't
Steve: know that was a thing.
Clay: Yeah. I mean, the CIA sends a lot of their operatives for, like, Arabic and, you know, Russian Mhmm. To this school in the summer. Right?
Steve: Okay.
Clay: So I wanted to do that, and I went and was working at the US Embassy in Buenos Aires for, like, a college, kind of internship, working internship in my junior year. And I was like, Steve, this is, like, what I wanted to do. And I realized very quickly that I did not wanna work for the government. Right? So my entire world, like, exploded, and I was at plan for this?
Well, I I the whole point of going to this specific college was like, hey. I really like language. I spoke Spanish and Portuguese at that point, and I really wanted to do something in the United States government, whether it was, like, military or, state department or something like that. That was that was interesting. Right?
So I I was, like, planning even high school my senior year. I'm like, this is what I wanna do. And then, you know, you do the thing that you you you know, never try it. And then you do the thing, you know, like, this is horrible. Right?
Working for the government in the state department, like, I have a five year track that's this is exactly what I could do or I go to the military and it just didn't really resonate with me. And so at the Art
Steve: was like, this is not what I wanted.
Clay: It was more about, hey. You need to put in a certain amount of time to get this output. And as entrepreneurs, we know it's, like, very meritocratic, which is I can put in time and get a crazy output. Right? The same amount of effort or energy that I put into a certain task, depending on the task that I choose or the project or the business that I'm in, I can get crazy outputs.
Right? Leverage. Right? In in in an environment like that, I wasn't able to put together the words to say, I'm not getting a lot of leverage on my time. But I felt like I didn't wanna do that.
Plus, there was, like, the authority aspect to it, which is if I if I have a good idea, it doesn't really matter. I just felt like this. Right? Whether or not this was, like, a 19 year old Clay, 20 year old Clay that was, like, you know, screw this. But I really just felt that.
Right? And so We just knew you didn't belong. Right. Right. Yeah.
It was some variation of that. Yeah.
Steve: And I appreciate that because that was me when I got to actually work in a corporation. Right? Like, I went to school for it to be an engineer. I went to grad school to be an engineer. They became an engineer.
I was like, this is not what I wanted. Right. Right.
Clay: Yeah. So I ended up, I I, dropped out of college for a short period of time. Like, I wanna take a semester off. Right? I was a college athlete too, but I got I had a career ending injury.
And so there was a lot of things that were, like, contributing to me taking some time off and thinking through what's the direction of my life. And I joined my family's chocolate company. My my mother had a chocolate company, and I was like, hey. I'll go and learn sales. And at that point, that was, like, one BiggerPockets and Grant Cardone, and that whole movement was really gaining steam.
Steve: I think before getting into there.
Clay: What sport? Lacrosse. Lacrosse. Yeah.
Steve: Alright. So you're used to, like, a lot of physical pain.
Clay: Lot of physical pain. Yeah. A lot of fun.
Steve: Yeah. Okay. So running into each other at full speed, no problem whatsoever.
Clay: Love it. Loved it. Love it. And I played defense, so I loved I was the guy that was really hitting
Steve: people. People.
Clay: Yeah. That's right. Even better.
Steve: Alright. Okay. So sorry. I just had to ask that question before we got in the truck.
Clay: Yeah. For sure. So the chocolate business was, hey, a family I I I didn't know what I wanted to do. There was I never took an economics class or business class. I was really, like, political science, like, US Latin American trade relations.
That was my degree. Yeah. And I ended up being in that small business environment. And even though it was a family business, I had a lot of autonomy. I was able to do a lot of sales, and I was listening to podcasts because I had a lot of free time.
Because, you know, when you're a young kid, you're just listening to podcasts and and absorbing, and you're like, I'm in the entrepreneurial world. Yeah. I learned about real estate. And so about a year and a half after I went and joined my family's business, I was like, hey. I wanna go and do real estate, and amicably.
I left the family business and joined a a guy that owned a couple 100 units in my local market, the local city that I was in.
Steve: Okay. And so Couple 100 units as in, like, apartments or just a bunch of doors?
Clay: A bunch. So he owned a scattered site portfolio. A what? Scattered site, like, a bunch of like, a six unit here,
Steve: a a
Clay: two unit here, a ton of hundreds of single family homes.
Steve: Okay.
Clay: And so that was like he was in the oil and gas business in the Marshall Shale, which is in for those who don't know, in Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, that's like a big natural gas play that people go. So he was
Steve: in that. Got
Clay: it. And so I went and worked for him. I was like, hey. I wanna I wanna learn the the real estate business. And After
Steve: you've been listening to, like, all the BiggerPockets.
Clay: Exactly. Okay. Exactly. So after I was listening to the BiggerPockets podcast, I went and joined him. Mhmm.
And he was truly a mom and pop. Like, I was really grateful that I learned the business from him, but it was like going to a small business, and I was learning all the things that I was learning. And I was like
Steve: business with a couple 100 doors.
Clay: Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.
But it was really kinda not run that way. You know what I mean? But, I mean, the guy was cash flowing. He was doing well. He's doing well.
And so I actually learned wholesaling and house flipping when I was there. I was taking, yeah, I was taking courses, and he was I was like, hey. We need to get lead flow. He was like, great. Let's get lead flow.
Steve: Oh, so you're learning it not from him. You were learning wholesaling flipping, but not directly from him.
Clay: Right. Not not directly from him. I I learned, like, the property management business, but at that point, he wasn't really acquiring any other units.
Steve: Got it.
Clay: He was like, hey. I bought a bunch of really good properties. It's like the classic old guy. Hey. I bought this house for $10,000.
I can't get any deals today. Right? Mhmm. Because I don't have the lead flow.
Steve: Right.
Clay: And so I learned through, hey. Let's go out and build this business. We actually built a business, and he hired some some more people. He hired a guy that was a really a really good president of a a mortgage company, and so he became the CEO of this company. And so I learned a lot about business and entrepreneurship from this guy, who still actually actually is in CG right now.
Steve: Oh, okay.
Clay: You would probably know him. He's actually this guy that was my previous boss is literally in CG. Mhmm.
Steve: He
Clay: has a wholesaling business in Pittsburgh to this day.
Steve: Got it.
Clay: And he's he's really done well. He's kind of branched off and has his own business in right now. But I was at the beginning when he was building this business, we were I was there in building it with him as his acquisition guy
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: As a market. And then on the side, I started to you know, kept listening to BiggerPockets and then started to buy a a house hack. And then I bought another three unit and then a six unit and started to buy in
Steve: in When was when when did you start buying?
Clay: What year? That would have been about five years ago.
Steve: Okay.
Clay: Yeah. Five years ago. Right. Right, yeah, about four and a half years ago. I used the FHA two or three k loan, you know, did the whole thing.
And right right before COVID, right before COVID really got crazy.
Steve: Probably not everyone knows what an FHA two zero three k loan is.
Clay: So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's a low down payment loan for a first time home buyer that, basically, the government, helps someone put 3.55% down.
Steve: Mhmm. And
Clay: they bought a triplex using that. And the two or three k aspect of it is you can get a construction loan that's basically on top of your mortgage.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: So you can use it to repair a building that maybe needs a new HVAC system or a new furnace or or, kitchen or whatever. Something like that.
Steve: Well, I'm glad you brought it up because, like, not everyone knows about the FHA two, three k. I only know about it because I was a realtor. Right?
Clay: Right.
Steve: So I think for people that are listening, like, you know, if you haven't bought a property if you if you don't have a primary, right, you could go buy your first property with an FHA two, three k. It's not easy. But if you get it, basically, you're you're getting a construction loan to build your primary residence.
Clay: That's right. Yeah. That's right. And and so we were able to renovate this this three unit. Didn't go as well as we anticipated.
Real estate never does.
Steve: Was your also your first flip or your first remodel.
Clay: Yeah. That's right. It was a disaster, Steve. But, and we we got through it, and then we kept I kept buying properties, on the side, doing, like, the model. Right?
That was when interest rates were were way lower. And I had I parted ways with this company that I was working for because I said, hey. I can raise some money and, from family and friends and things like that, and I can go out and buy a bunch of apartment buildings. Mhmm. So we bought a ton of smaller apartment buildings.
We bought, like, 65 doors and just all burrs in, like, less than a year. Right? So this is go going from, hey. I have two, three units of six unit in a single family, and then I'm gonna scale up to 65 doors in less than a year.
Steve: Really short period of time.
Clay: It's a very short period of time, and it's the reason why I am in the business that I'm in because I realized I'm really good at acquiring properties, but not really good at managing.
Steve: But you had a property manager as a mentor.
Clay: Right. Right. Right. You you have it. You have it, but, it was it was not, it didn't transfer.
Steve: Okay. So let's talk about what did not do well. What what where were you having challenges managing property?
Clay: So I think the the the core problem was, we were buying properties that were built in 1900. And so there's a lot of CapEx that you don't anticipate, and people don't talk about when you are buying these properties. Like, it's not sexy to talk about, hey. If you have sandstone foundations, like, most likely, those are porous. If it rains a lot, like, water's gonna get in your basement.
Steve: Sandstone? Yeah. So we don't don't have anything. You're right. I've never heard of that before.
Clay: Exactly. Or you have all single pane windows, and they're all wooden windows. And so if you get a lot of rain, they'll rot or termites will get in them. Or, you know, locust posts in your basement, like, literally locust tree posts in your basement. And if it gets super wet down there, the locust posts will get termites in it because it would get super moist, and then you have to jack up your foundation.
And and terracotta sewer lines. Right? Old terracotta sewer lines, if you replace, it's a $35,000, replacement. So I think it was a overlooking the cost, which tenants, toilets, and termites, which is why I'm in the business that I'm in now. And, also, like, managing real estate is, like, very hard.
It is it is truly difficult, and you never manage to most of the time, you don't manage to your pro form a. Mhmm. You manage a lot lower than your pro form a. Right?
Steve: Really?
Clay: Yeah. Right. Right. You're right. So so what happened was we bought all these properties and in a very short period of time.
And then we caught them when interest rates were lower. Mhmm. And we also caught them when rents were way higher. So there was a huge delta between the interest rates that we're refinancing at at the beginning of the year Mhmm. And then as interest rates were ticking up at the end of the year.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And then, also, our rents dropped 25%.
Steve: Right.
Clay: So we got hit with one after the other after the other. And the worst thing was all along this time, my wife was was working full time. She did a really a a good job for us. And we're in Pittsburgh. We're not in, like, LA at that point.
So, we were living off of her income. I was going out there, and I would wholesale. Like, I wholesale a 25 28 unit, a 35 unit. I was getting these big checks, but they kept disappearing because we had these massive terracotta sewer lines. We had these roofs that were old shingle roofs that you have to rip off, and then, you know, you would look underneath them, and there would be another roof underneath them that you'd have to rip off, and then another roof because, like, a roofer would just go up there and give them the cheap treatment
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: And just nail the the tabs onto the previous roof. And so we just kept getting hit with these just massive CapEx items. And then my wife got, fired. She got left go let go from her job. This was a couple of Thanksgivings ago, the day before Thanksgiving.
Steve: Oh, jeez.
Clay: And so we had to look really seriously at our pro form a. Are we actually cash flowing? Right? Because I was wholesaling these bigger buildings that we would get that wouldn't fit our criteria, we couldn't burr, and then my wife had the income. So we're never, like, looking in the business ledger versus the personal ledger.
Right? It was like, hey. We're good on our personal, situation, and I'm just gonna keep scaling this business. Right? Naively.
I really naively thought that. Yeah. And so then we she got fired, and we're like, okay. We gotta look at everything. And at that point, there was a mounting amount of CapEx, and then we're like, oh my gosh.
We had a bad property manager, and it just hit us all at once. And so I was like, I gotta make I have to make income. And so that's life before land, but that was kind of the whole story arc of of how I got into the business.
Steve: So I just wanna touch on the pro form a thing because when I first got into real estate, also naive. Right? Like, because you look at pro formas, it's how people advertise properties.
Clay: Right.
Steve: And, like, everything I saw when I got in and everyone down this route. But when I was everything I saw was, like, it seems like it pencils out better just to be a slumlord.
Clay: Literally.
Steve: Right? It pencils out better. But, man, that is not reality. Right? You wanna be an a class, b plus, because you don't have turnover.
You don't have every time there's a new tenant, you don't have to redo all the carpet and paint. Right? But, you know, so I just wanna hit that because you were saying, like, yeah. You don't really ever manage you don't don't get your performance. You manage as close as you can to it.
Yes. But, man, like, all the performance for slumlord properties because I was looking at it, it's like, man, this is way better. Right. But that is not how the math actually works out.
Clay: Yeah. Well, what what's really, you know, you listen to these podcasts, and you listen to people talking about, hey. I'm I'm running my business in in this way. Mhmm. And you have no context.
And so someone might say, hey. The, you you should get a $100 per door, $200 per door, or you should be looking for this cash on cash return.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: Or if you burr, this is the, a loan to value that you need to be going in so you're protecting yourself. But it's just context. And you you're like, is that in Phoenix, or is that in Pittsburgh? Is that in Nashville, or is that in LA?
Steve: What's the price point?
Clay: Exactly. And so when you when you're learning any business, you you learn through podcast and absorption. But, really, the best way to learn anything is activity, actually going through and doing it. But the problem is if you're an ambitious entrepreneur, you go out there and you say, I'm confident in myself, in my abilities. I'm not really battle tested, and I wasn't really battle tested.
And so we I was able to scale really quickly because I could move fast. I was good at sales. I was good at marketing, and I could push really, really hard. And it had all the context of everyone that was around me. And that was not the context for my specific circumstance.
Yeah. And so the reason why we fell really hard is because I wasn't I wasn't talking to people about their their, apartment buildings in Pittsburgh. I was talking to people about their apartment buildings in Georgia that were 25 years old that, of course, they didn't have to worry about Tarragon or sewer lines Mhmm. Or all these variations. And so that's what inevitably drove drove me into a more active business, that had kind of less complex deal flow, lead flow, and everything.
Steve: Well, you look at, like, the rule of sounds. Right? You're watching YouTube. Right? If you're gonna look learn how to wholesale off of YouTube, 70% after repair value and then minus, like, your fees.
Right? And, and then, minus rehab. Right. Good luck in Arizona. Good luck in Arizona with those numbers.
Like, you're not buying houses. Like, you'll buy some houses. Right? And you'll crush it on those houses. But if you're making offers based off of that in Arizona, like Right.
You're not gonna do a lot of deals. Right? But, like, if you're you're watching YouTube videos and you're learning from this. It's like, well, yeah, that's what you have to do if it's a much older home. But, like, you're saying, like, in Georgia, like, we're 25 years old.
Like, our house is out here. You know, normal house here is 40 years old. You don't need, right, that much margin. Mhmm. Not that much updating to do.
Clay: Right.
Steve: So, yeah, I think context is always important. Like, the other one you always hear is, like, well, what should I pay my sales guys? Like, well, what's common is 10% for acquisition guys, but what's your marketing budget? What's your median price point? What's your average fee?
Right? If you're not doing enough marketing to do at least double digit house in a month, are you gonna feed your guys?
Clay: Right.
Steve: Like, I think it's really important what you're talking about here is context. Yeah. Context is so important.
Clay: Exactly. Exactly.
Steve: Okay. So then you figure out, alright. Something's gotta give.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: Right. Right. Well, so before you tell me what it's gonna get, like so you tell me, like, you know, all these bad things are happening. Did your confidence waiver? Because you're a confident person.
Clay: I think that I had the self awareness to realize that my skill set was not in managing property. I was acquiring properties.
Steve: Mhmm. And I
Clay: also admitted a mistake. So I I have a philosophy of, it's okay to make a mistake if you do not, make the same mistake Yeah. Twice. Mhmm. And and I had investors that were involved in that, and I was really transparent.
Hey. I'm going to make this right. Mhmm. And granted, it wasn't like the the world wasn't burning down. But I had to look at myself and say, it's my responsibility to do this.
So it wasn't about confidence. It was about a responsibility. And I think responsibility and character traits raise above confidence because I think confidence a lot of times is a fleeting thing. You you're attaching your confidence to your your identity, which is like, no. I am my character traits, my personality, this is who I am.
I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna figure this out. And that was my mentality in in land. And, also, it was kinda like you burn the boats. Like, I was on the shore, Steve.
Like, I was there there was no there was no room for not being confident because I had to make money. I literally had to do it. Yeah. And and so that was a great question, but I didn't have any choice. I was thinking about confidence.
You know?
Steve: But I think your confidence is still kind of so you but, like, you didn't think about, like, maybe gonna get another job, mailing it in.
Clay: So so the the reason why is because I ran the numbers. So at at this point, I also like, we'd acquired this house in Colorado, which is a, you know, 5,500 square foot Airbnb in Colorado that was doing okay, not amazing. So I made a a couple of mistakes in a row, and and I was like, I need to make a lot of money. Like, I just can't go and get a job. I need to make a lot of money quickly.
And I was like, I'm good at sales, and I know that I can figure this out. I had already done the wholesaling house flipping thing. And so I I want to do something that has some sort of complimentary skill set, which is how I found land. How I got into land was because I was like, hey. This is a niche that is undiscovered.
No one's talking about land, and there's so much opportunity here. And I know if I do the steps that I need to do, I will figure it out because it's very complimentary. And I had to pay for my wedding that year that up that next year, and I had to live. And so I was like, I gotta make this happen. Yeah.
So I I I did the math. It was like, I couldn't get a job.
Steve: And I you're not digging yourself out of a hole
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: With the with the job. No. No. So okay. So then you figured out LAN.
So then what was what was the first, you know, step into LAN?
Clay: So I went and took a course. I took two courses, and both of them were, like, okay. They weren't really that great, but they gave me the energy to go out and do what follow the course, syndicate what I learned in both courses, figure out what I think is the right direction, and just go and do it. Yeah. So that's what I did.
I literally just took the course, plowed through it between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and started to send out direct mail, like, right back.
Steve: Yeah. So just start sending out mail. How long until land became, like, theoretical possible until, like, this is
Clay: So the the worst thing about this is I sent out 15,000 mailers and did not get a single deal.
Steve: That's a little concerning.
Clay: It it's it was concerning. And, fortunately, I had credit cards. Like, I had credit cards, and I also, had a a little bit of cash. Right? And I was like, hey.
I'll put these mailers on credit cards. I'll have really quick feedback loops. I have my $30,000 that I can live. We were house hacking, fortunately. So the house hack allowed us to we have a mortgage payment.
We're making a little bit of money, so we could we had really low expenses. And so we were able to just go all in and invest. And my wife was like, I choose you. You can do it. And that gave me the confidence boost that I needed.
I sent off these mailers to all these Florida info lots, and I just kept sending it. I was like, eight people told me to send mailers. I'm gonna do it. And then I got my first deal, which is an info lot in Santa Rosa County, Florida. And we bought it for, like, 19 and sold it for, like, 35 in a very quick period of time.
And I was like, it works. And then from there, it was like, you know, I just kept I kept pushing.
Steve: Got it.
Clay: So that that's kinda
Steve: So 15,000, nothing happens?
Clay: Nothing happens.
Steve: How long?
Clay: That would've that would've been, like, three weeks, four weeks.
Steve: So you spent a lot of money, sent a lot of mail. Yep. Nothing happens for three weeks. But then something does happen.
Clay: Yes.
Steve: Okay. So then going back to it, like so this works. So now you got all the confidence in the world. We're gonna figure this out.
Clay: Yes.
Steve: Those other properties that you had, it was, like, 65 doors. Do you still have them? Did you give them back?
Clay: We still have some of them. We're selling a lot of them right now.
Steve: A lot of them. Yeah. Okay. So then right here, this is the beginning of paying all the investors back.
Clay: Yeah. So the investors, we were we were still, like, doing okay. We weren't, like, underwater on the deals. We had a little bit of cash flow, but it was getting eaten up by, maintenance fees, turnover, everything. Yeah.
So that that wasn't really about paying the investors back. There's equity still in the portfolio that we still own, and we're just slowly selling them when it's the right time. So it wasn't at that at that point, the land investing was not, paying back the master of the how the, you know, apartment buildings.
Steve: Okay. So you're mailing info lots Yeah. Florida. Yes. Why info lots?
Clay: That's honestly what the course was like. Hey. You know, you mail these info lots, and you get them for 40%, 50% of market value, and then you sell them for a 100% of market value, and they're easy. Because in land investing, a common tactic is using what is called blind offers. So you you pull a bunch of comps in a specific area, and then you will get an average of those comps, and then you'll do a percentage of the market value.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: I know, household sellers do that now with, like, percentage of Zillow value, but we don't have that land. There's no Zillow value land, so you have to actually pull the comps. And so I pulled the comps, and I sent blind offers and range offers through these properties, which is, hey. Your $100,000 property, I can pay 50 k for it. Whatever.
So I sent out all those mails. And that's how that's how I actually did it. Right?
Steve: Got it. Okay. So then once you did one, I mean, do you just scale? Is it is it that easy?
Clay: It's not that easy, but I will say that on the the second and third deal, I got pretty lucky. So the reason why I love land so much is with with an apartment building or house, you you can only sort of get so much out of it. Right? So the ARV of a house in Chandler, Arizona is gonna be, I don't know what it is, a certain number. Right?
And you can't really force that much additional value. You can't really find the highest and best use. Yeah. But with land, you can do something that's an infillot or a 20 acre, and you can cut it up into smaller parcels.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And so we got this parcel. There's one in Orangeburg County, South Carolina. I remember it. It was between it's between Charleston and Columbia, South Carolina, and we we did our first subdivide. So it was like a 20 something acre parcel, and we cut it up into seven, or three seven acres.
And then we got another one that was, like, about a 30 acre parcel, and it caught up in the three tens. And we made, like, a 100 k on the the, 30 acre. And then on the 21 acre, we made, like, 80 k on it. And so it was like, oh, yeah. This works.
And it was just get sending a surveyor out there, working a lot, cutting it up, literally selling it. So you buy it by the bottle, sell it by the shot. And that's still, like, what we do today. It's incredibly lucrative. But, yeah, that's that
Steve: Buy buy the bottle, sell it by the shot. I don't think I've heard that expression before.
Clay: Well, that's what restaurants do. Right? They they get Well, I get it. Right? No.
Steve: It makes total sense when you say it. I just I've never heard that expression before.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: But, no, I was just working in the wrong part of the restaurant. Right. I was only a bartender for, like I bartended, I think, maybe a week or I was like, screw this place.
Clay: Right.
Steve: Yeah. Like, my first job. Right? I I should not like, I wasn't old enough to actually to serve alcohol, but they let me serve alcohol. Yeah.
It didn't last very long. Yeah. So I've not I've not heard that expression. But it makes total sense. Yeah.
Okay. And so then is this the strategy, right, out of the gate then? So because, like, the first one's info loss because that's what the course said. But then your second and third one, you said you got lucky. Right?
And then you bought something that you sub like, are those the ones you're saying you got lucky?
Clay: Yeah. The the the sub it was just like, hey. We we we get this piece of land. Like, with any with any direct marketing, wholesaling, house flipping business. Right?
When you market to something, right, you you might say, hey. My average profit is a certain number. Right? And, you know, how you can scale really quickly is you can pull that lever of you increase your deal flow Mhmm. Or you increase your your average profit per deal.
Right? So if you get a 100 k profit per deal versus a 20 k, it's so much easier to scale the 100 k.
Steve: Yeah. Right?
Clay: And so when I say lucky, it was we targeted the right properties, which were way more, deliberate about what we target now Mhmm. To find these properties that we can make. You know? Just we we actually just closed on one today. It's the same exact thing.
It's 80 acres in Minnesota. I've in the middle of Minnesota. We're buying it for 105,000. We'll sell it for 500 k. Yeah.
Right? And so that's just a standard subdivide. We're gonna, you know, build out little home sites, but it's about targeting the right products.
Steve: When you were saying lucky, it's because you weren't trying to do
Clay: this. Exactly.
Steve: So it's kinda like every once in a while, we're calling people to buy their house for cash. Every once in a while, you learn you land on a commercial property or a storage self storage property. Got it. Okay. So but then you have this experience.
You're like, well, wait a minute. There's a different strategy to apply here.
Clay: That's right. Yeah. So so we kept but we at at that point, there wasn't, like, the sophistication. It was still, you you know, just keep going and going and churning. And so, my wedding was actually that summer as well.
So I was like, I have to pull out money from this to go back into the wedding, but we just kept the flywheel going. So, the reason why I like land is because in houses, I don't know what the response rate is for direct mail. But land is
Steve: Half a percent, I think.
Clay: Yeah. Right.
Steve: What I'm hearing it says.
Clay: Yeah. So land is so much less competitive than that. There's so fewer people in land, and so we are starting to get consistently, hey. Two, three, four, five deals a month just from sending out direct mail. Right?
At that point, it was, like, one out of every 4,000 pieces of direct mail, we were getting a deal, which is, like, crazy.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And so we just kept ramping up the direct mail. And at that point, there's a a lot of velocity in all in these markets. We were in South Carolina. We were in Florida. We were in Georgia.
All these markets that have a lot of velocity. Mhmm. And so we just kept from there, we kept scaling. We started hiring some VAs, and we just kept moving up the chain. And every, you know, quarter, we would get that, you know, subdivide Mhmm.
And built that was the base of this business. And it was you know, the first year, we did about 650 k of gross profit, which is for some people, it's like, hey. That's nothing. But when you start a business like that, you're like, man, this is this is great. You're
Steve: in. Right?
Clay: Right. Exactly. We're in. We're in the business. Yeah.
So it was really it was, really good.
Steve: Okay. So then you say hire some VA. So, basically, at this point, it was mostly yourself? Yeah. And what help did you have?
None. None. So you were pulling the data, sending the mail sending the offers. I'm sorry. Sending blind offers.
Clay: Sending blind offers.
Steve: They're signing it. Yep. Sending it back to you. Yep. Or calling you.
Clay: Or calling me?
Steve: I had
Clay: a live call answering service. Mhmm. So they'd call in live call answering service. Yeah. And they put the notes in the CRM.
I underwrite the deal. I'd call them back. I'd give them an offer. Mhmm. And I just was do I was literally doing everything.
And then I had to hire
Steve: A 650 gross profit Yeah. Solopreneur, pretty lucrative business.
Clay: Right.
Steve: Right. So you said anyone can do it?
Clay: I don't know. Like, I I don't know if anyone can do any business.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: I would say that it takes it's it is a business that is less competitive. If you're gonna get into real estate, it is less competitive than any other niche. We've done when we were at that other that other business that I was working for, we did sell some self storage stuff. We're buying small multifamily properties. We did you know, I did the whole small multifamilies with the BRS.
We're household selling and flipping. It is so much less competitive than these businesses. But I I don't like to say anyone could do it because I I don't know if anyone wants it. Does anyone want it as bad as you want it?
Steve: It's it's fascinating because, like, we've had Jack Bosch on the show. We've had Ray, I think, Jag on the show. Yep. We've had, Daniel and, camera the it's it's hard to see. Hopefully, this is what this episode.
Multiple guys walk. Yeah. Like like, we're we're land guys. Right? Brett Bauer.
Right? Like, we're land guys. And the best thing about land is, like, there's no competition still. Right? Like, Jack was on the show, like, back in 2019 talking about land, and it still seems like there's there's very little competition to land.
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Clay: I what I would say is, it is still a business. Mhmm. And so, there's actually a podcast that recently came came out that was like, hey. You know, a lot of land and people are leaving the land investing space, right, because it is changing. Right?
And it's just an adapter dive. It's just an evolve or dive. So the the the people that were the kind of, legacy course gurus, they have a specific way of teaching land that a lot of the people in the space were teaching.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: Right? Imagine if the majority of the wholesalers today were learning the same tactics that was taught ten years ago. Those wholesalers, no longer can hold on. Right?
Steve: And They're trying to do bandit science today as their sole lead source. Exactly.
Clay: They're trying to do that's a perfect example. And so the reason why I see relative to other asset classes, it's so much less competitive because it is, And that doesn't mean that you're gonna come in. It's gonna be the easiest thing in the
Steve: world. Mhmm.
Clay: I I don't I think that's a false promise, and and and that's trying to sell you something that the reality, it's not like that. Every business is is a difficult business, but I think that the reason why you, you people wanna talk about LandSat is such a great opportunity is because it has this ability for for you to scale Mhmm. So much faster than any other business. In no other business can you learn the same skill set in real estate that you learned from, flipping an info lot in the middle of nowhere, you know, if 50 miles, a 100 miles north of here or entitling a piece of land or doing a subdivide like I was just talking about. Yeah.
For most people, if you do one, two, three subdivides, like I was just talking about the Minnesota subdivide, and you're making 800 k and 90% profit margins because you just sent out the right amount of mail to the right people, they're they're ecstatic. And that is that is still incredibly possible. Right? It's just about how you approach the business. So the opportunity is there, but I think it's just false advertising to say that that, you know, there's no competition.
Because, of course, it's such a lucrative opportunity. There will be people that are coming in and and trying to take advantage of it.
Steve: Well, that makes total sense. So you get your second year. You're at 650. Now you start hiring VAs.
Clay: First year, I started hiring VAs. And but not many. I had, like, three VAs that first year, and they were, like, you know, very low very low paid VAs. Mhmm. But the second year, I started to hire more VAs and started to hire some US based people, and that's when I did the boardroom.
Right? And so I started to kind of scale the business from there.
Steve: Got it. Okay. So then what were your biggest challenges up to this point? Because we're talking about, like, the wins. Right?
But, like, what are the biggest challenges? Because, like, you didn't know how to subdivide right out of the gate, I imagine.
Clay: Yeah. I think the biz the biggest challenge is is just being a good business center. And and, you know, every business is a set of levers that you pull. And in order to be successful, you need to pull the right levers.
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: And in order to be better at pulling the right levers, you as the business center need to know how to prioritize. Mhmm. And so, you know, how we prioritize in our business in in the land, wholesaling, house flipping, kind of two huge funnels that you need to optimize, your acquisitions and your disposition. Right? And and where a lot of people mess up is they're like, one time, they're like, oh, we're acquisitions heavy, and then now we have all these properties that we need to sell.
And so deals are falling through. Our PSA to close rates dropping dramatically because we can't sell anything because we have so much. And then this is the seesaw, and that's why people never get traction in the business. So the most difficult thing was, like, being a good business owner and prioritizing the right things, specifically in our business. A lot of the people, acquisition managers, lead managers, and and admin people or transaction coordinators, See, they they're, like, full utilization utilization at all times.
Right? I think about, like, entrepreneurs, wanna have a 40 ounce imagine you have this 40 ounce glass. Right? It's forty hours in a week. It's completely full to the brim in most of the household selling and land flipping business.
Yeah. And people just wanna keep putting water on top of it. Let's do this special project. Let's do this special project. And and I see when when I work with people individually or in general, the reason why they can't actually build a sustainable business is because their entire team is at full utilization, and then they're trying to do this thing, add this thing, do this thing all at one time.
Right. Instead of saying, I've I, as a CEO, am an allocator of my resources, my time, my capital, and my resources in terms of my people. Right? And they wanna allocate those across a multiple different things to solve multiple different problems at at once. So my biggest challenge is taking a breath, figuring out what is the actual biggest, most important thing that we actually need to solve in order to move our business forward.
And a lot of times, it's a very painful experience because as a business owner, you wanna solve everything at the same time. You're like, oh, this is important, and this is important. This is a priority. In the reality, there is only one priority at any one time that you really need to to allocate your resources to because you have such limited resources in this business.
Steve: That makes a lot of sense. Right. Right? I mean, we got, Gary Keller wrote the book, The One Thing.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: Right? We got, Darren Hardy, you know, insane productivity. There's, Alex and Mosey talks about, you know, the lady in the red dress, which is a distraction. Yes. Everything you're saying makes total sense.
But how do you do that?
Clay: Yeah. It it comes down to a clarity of of your goal, like, knowing your goal. Right? So what is what is the actual goal of our business? Right?
So, you know, if I wanna make 3,000,000 to $4,000,000 next year, $5,000,000, I have to pull levers in my business to do that. Now anyone I I like to think, like, in in some crazy alternative universe, I can do that. And so if I have belief in myself that I can do that, then I need to know what are the actual actions, the levers that I need to pull in order to get there. You could come up with 20 or 30 different things, but the you have to rank order those. That's the problem.
That's where most people mess up because they're like, I wanna do one. I wanna do seven. I wanna do eight. I wanna do 13. It's like, you really only can do one actual thing that will lead to the highest likelihood of you doing this.
I'll give you a perfect example. In our business, our PSA to close rate went from, like, 65 to 13. And it was like What? What is going on? Right?
So at the beginning of this year, it went down like crazy. And what I realized is I had a VA that was incredibly, incredibly talented in our acquisitions. She was a lead manager, but she had run, an she was a closer before, and she had run operations for an entire another wholesale business. She was really, really smart, like, super accomplished, very high energy, owner's mindset, principal mindset. I'm like, okay.
I'm gonna have you actually come over here and build my dispositions department. So I'm telling a VA that is not paid like myself, to come over and actually build a department within my business.
Steve: But she was doing such a good job.
Clay: Exactly.
Steve: You took her from what she was doing really
Clay: good. Exactly.
Steve: I took
Clay: her exactly. Because I was like, hey. You know, your past usually dictates your future. And so if you have success in this specific initiative, right, you're doing so well. You're so detail oriented.
You're hand you're already handling the operations of our acquisitions team. You're holding our acquisition managers, accountable. Let's just, like, help let's promote you essentially, and let's have you run this department. Right? Because I was like, this is the most important lever that I can pull.
I can bring her over here, and then she could actually run this dispositions department. Because at that point, the goal was we need to increase our PSA to close rate. But what was beyond that, it was also re reduce our cash conversion cycle, which I grouped in and said, those are, complimentary things. And for the the listener, cash conversion cycle is the time it takes from under contract to close, under contract on the buy side to close on the sell side. And the faster you can compress that, the faster you can scale your business.
Steve: Right.
Clay: So my thesis was the most important thing was bring her over and having her actually run that department. But I gave her the initiatives like an executive would give. Like, you're basically someone that has experience that knows how to run a disposition department, but that wasn't her. And so I expected her to act like a disposition manager who had years of experience and also act like a disposition associate and act like a disposition admin all in one thing. And that was my bet.
And that was a horrible bet. Right? That was a mistake. And that was just showing, hey. This one thing was what I focused on.
What I should have done was it's my responsibility as a CEO to actually sit in the seat and build this entire thing out and then install people underneath me. But I made the wrong decision Yeah. Right as a as a CEO. And, yeah, that's so that's would be an example. Does that help elucidate it kind of?
Steve: Or That's a good example. But, like, I mean, going down the the the part about, like, prioritization. Right? Yeah. So because that's what it comes down to is prioritization.
So how do you then prioritize? Right? Because you can say I won't I'm I'm only allowed to do one thing at a time. Yeah. I've got my list of, like, 18.
Yeah. I'm only allowed to do one at a time. Yeah. And this might be a super simple question for people, but focus is a struggle we all have. I have that problem still today.
Right? So then how do you prioritize?
Clay: Yeah. So so what we use internally is a framework, called ICE, impact confidence ease. So you have maybe 50 different priorities, right, for us. And, the impact, you rate them all based on impact, confidence, and ease. What's the impact that this is gonna make?
What's my confident confidence that I can actually execute this thing? And how easy would it be for me to execute this? Right? What's the confidence score of, like, what is the ease and also, my confidence in this actually being the right decision. And we and you rank order them.
And the mark of a good entrepreneur is the ability to pick the right one based on that framework.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: You can use that framework or or a different framework. But the most important thing is when you do that, when you say I'm gonna do this, right, you rank order them, then you say, I'm gonna pull this lever. I'm gonna focus on this lever, and then I'm gonna create internal feedback loops so that I actually learn from this. Yeah. Because I learned from the dispo admin, person.
That's the person that came in that, she was a really high performing, lead manager, and I said, you can do this. And so what I realized is there's different team members have different functions
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: Within your your your team. And you a lot of times as, like, early budding entrepreneurs, specifically in wholesaling, house flipping, in in land investing, we promote people above their ability. And so what I learned from that is the feedback loop was, when you do when you give someone a promotion, specifically in our business in which, every one of these positions matters because profitability is so tied in a small business context to the outputs of each individual that you give them a trial run. So a two week, three week trial run of adding this. You know, this is what Google does.
Right? Google says, hey. You have your 10% moonshots that you spend 10% of your time on or 30% of your time. So then you bring this person. This is what we do internally, and we allocate 10% of their time or 30% of their time into some additional initiative that we would be promoting them into to see how they handle it.
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: And that's the feedback loop. And then it's like, okay. I learn as a CEO. I become a better decision maker. But the reality is if we boil down your question, you're like, how do we prioritize?
You just guess. It's your ability to prioritize is directly proportionate to your your excellence as an entrepreneur.
Steve: So I think there's two different things I'm hearing here. Right? Right. And I think it's fantastic. Because we don't really spend all time talking about this stuff.
It's important. So one, thinking time. You actually have to sit and think. Right? You actually have to, like, evaluate which one is gonna be the most impactful, which one is gonna have, the confidence, and then what was it?
Ease? Was that the other one? Yeah. Ease. Right?
So the confidence and impact, confidence and ease requires thinking. Right? So I think that's the part we like, we just jump into it, but, like, we have to actually sit back and think. Another thing I wrote down here, was allocation of resources. So, again, that's something we talk about a lot on the show.
But when we were doing a lot of talks, when we're doing certainty talks, right, with Paul Sparks, it was like, we only have a finite set of resources. We act like we have infinite resources, which is what we're talking about the cup. Right? You got 40 ounces, 40 ounce glass. Yeah.
Keep keep let's just pour more in there. Right. Right? So we act like we have infinite resources. Right.
But our bank account, and our stress levels clearly indicate we do not have infinite
Clay: resources. Right.
Steve: Right? So we have to allocate resources effectively. And what you're saying, like, the mark of a good business owner, good entrepreneur, is their effectiveness in allocating resources.
Clay: That's right.
Steve: So and that's how you're able to go from, like, 30 to to to three in just three years. 30 k gross margins to 3,000,000 gross margins
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: In three years.
Clay: Yeah. Makes a
Steve: lot of sense. Yeah. You're actually thinking.
Clay: Yeah. Right. You have to you have to it and this goes like, if we kind of go beyond, the just, hey, in a micro scale is me as an entrepreneur. Mhmm. This is how I'm allocating my my own resources.
Then we kinda look beyond. It's like, what's the leverage of your time within your business, which is why I'm so bullish on land. Yeah. Because, you can go after a land deal that is a 20 k profit deal, 200 k profit deal,
Steve: 2,000,000
Clay: deal, and it's the same exact skill set. And so, you know, there's this famous quote by Warren Buffett. He talks about his one of his colleagues at Columbia Business School. And he says, you know, I was I built Berkshire Hathaway, and this guy went into the steel business. And, you know, I was so much more successful than not because I was smarter than them, but because I chose the right vehicle.
Right? That's kinda like you're choosing choosing the AI vehicle right now. Right? And and then and and when it comes to real estate, the reason why I think land is just an incredible asset class is because your ability to create leverage through rezoning, through finding the highest and best use, through going from flipping, properties in the middle of the desert to I'm gonna develop this self storage facility and create millions and millions, yakking million dollars of value. Mhmm.
It's not like you're going to reinvent the wheel. There's a very clear, steady playbook of exactly how to do this. Mhmm. And that's that's, like, the macro level of I need to allocate my resources. And instead of thinking about flipping another house or how do I add five more houses Mhmm.
To my bottom line this month, it's like, how do I have one more opportunity in land that's gonna get me, you know, the Yeah. The two the $2,000,000, $3,000,000 pop?
Steve: There was someone in boardroom who was speaking, and he figured this out. He's like, I now know what my niche is. Right? And it would involve land, involve self storage. Right?
But, basically, it's like, yeah. All I have to do is find every piece of land if it's this box, and then I can turn it into a self storage facility that all I have to do is entitle it Yep.
Clay: And
Steve: then sell to someone else to build it. He's like, every time I do these, I make between 700 and 50 and $900,000. Yeah. All I have to do is find all the lands that fit this box. Man, that's so much easier.
Clay: Right. And and you don't and the crazy thing is, right, you don't have to deal with the, hey. I'm gonna, like, reposition this NOI, and it's a five to seven year turn like, period, and I have to raise all this capital for this thing. A lot of times, Steve, it's just controlling the land. Yeah.
And so you're just getting you're you're you're learning the skill set as I need to find the off market land. I need to get it under contract using good sales tactics, and I need to understand how to sell it to the right person. But you're not a lot of times, not even taking title, so you don't have to raise this crazy amount of money Right. To create this value like these guys, the apartment building guys or the self storage guys do, and they have to deal with all these tenants and problems over time.
Steve: Possibilities, obligations.
Clay: Right. I don't wanna deal with that. Right? And so it's it's it's the it's the kind of the beginning of real estate and the end. It's the end game.
Everyone wants to be a developer, and it's the beginning of everything starts on a piece of land.
Steve: Yeah. That's fascinating. So I'm glad you got that clarity. As we're going through this conversation, I can see why you're one of the hardest people I had as far as selling to. Right?
Because I met you at boardroom.
Clay: Yeah. Right.
Steve: I was like, hey. You know? Like, Michael Smith pulls along. I was like, hey. Like, this guy needs sales training.
Talk to him. I talked to you.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: And I was at the end, I was like, he's not sold. Right? And you're like, get all these other questions. I could see you're more cerebral. I was gonna let so I was like, okay.
This is more require a little more work. Right? I had to sell you how you want it to be sold. And so eventually we got there.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: But But through this conversation, I can see why. Like, you're looking at all these things. There's a lot of considerations. I'm allocating resources. This doesn't make sense.
Versus, like, typically, as an entrepreneur, I put myself in this category. Hey. If I buy this, I'm gonna get this, this, and this. Alright. I'm sold.
Clay: Right.
Steve: That's me.
Clay: Right.
Steve: That's not you. Right. So I can see why it was so hard to to to get you on board. But you did come on board.
Clay: I did.
Steve: So let's talk about that, you know, real just real quick. Yeah. What were the benefits you saw in working with us as far as the sales training goes?
Clay: I would say the there is a very clear set of rules that you need to follow. And when it comes to sales training, you have different scripts of rules. Right? Yeah. And you could deal with the most basic level sales trainer, and you're playing it at one level.
But one level up for me, if I get one subdivide, that's a 500 k profit deal. Yeah. It's a no brainer. And so the reason why I I ended up working with you, number one, is you're really great. You're very good at sales, period.
Steve: Thank you.
Clay: Right? And so if you were so good, right, your organization had to be reflective of that. That's how that's what I felt like. And, also, you had a good reputation with other people in in different mastermind groups that that we run-in. And so it was an it it was how you showed up and then your reputation with other people and the other people that you've worked with.
And then just I've talked to these people, and they're like, oh, man. This is this is just the best level sales training. And I was like, well, if I invest this amount of money into this and I get one deal out of it or it builds the the framework of my business, it is a no brainer. And so I made the choice, and, obviously, I was very, very satisfied with working with you. It really it really built the foundation for our business and how we're currently operating in terms of our sales, going talking to people that own smaller tracks to much larger tracks.
Steve: Yeah. I don't remember there was a specific scenario we're going through. We were on a fence with a guy in your team. Like, should I keep him, not keep him?
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: What should I do? Yeah. And I think that was that was probably not a pivotal moment, but, like, an important moment
Clay: Yes. Yeah.
Steve: In your journey.
Clay: Yeah.
Steve: Do you wanna talk about, like, how that helped? Is that does that is that relevant to the conversation at all?
Clay: Yeah. I think that, for what we were talking about with allocating resources
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: A lot of times, you you know, we were saying, hey. Like, the feedback loop is super important.
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: But you can get feedback loops from other people, and they can shorten your ability to make the right decision. Right? Because we are paid in a proportion to our ability, right, to allocate resources. And the biggest resource that we have in our business is the people. Mhmm.
Right? And so we just kinda walk through that, and I that was very, very helpful. And we'll we'll I'm sure we'll talk about another person that that I have after this after this, meeting as well or this interview as well. But I I just thought it was it was really pivotal for giving me the clarity of the excellence of standards that someone at your level, right, and and the other people that are part of your organization, the other companies that are part of your organization. That was really helpful to me.
Steve: Yep. And then you made a comment before the show started Yeah. That, you're using basically AI all day every day now.
Clay: Yes.
Steve: AI has become more prevalent. Right. It's a lot more rampant today than than it was three months ago, six months ago, definitely more than a year ago. How are you using AI today?
Clay: I I view it as a really good thought partner, an analytical partner.
Steve: And so Which even helps more because you like to think.
Clay: Exactly. Exactly. Right. But, it is pretty much in every, aspect of our business. Like, everyone uses AI to write emails now.
Right? Yeah. Write content. We use it to write content. We use script content.
We use it to approach sales conversations. We use it to get market statistics if we're bringing a, a land parcels to market, understanding the velocity of the market. We use I I use it as a as a thought partner asking questions, about certain things to to create curriculums for, like, hey. If I have a challenge coming up or, if I wanna, partner with someone on a deal, some considerations that I need to make. And so it it it's become this this adhesive kind of to me.
Yeah. And I and I think and and use it in everyday life.
Steve: But you're talking about, like, how you require everyone in organization and, like, basically, like, you used to use whisper only these days.
Clay: Yeah. Yeah. We so, we don't I don't really type emails anymore. I just use AI to, like, type my emails for me.
Steve: You're just dictating. This is like
Clay: I dictate for everything. I dictate for everything.
Steve: So it's just kinda like back in the day, you had your secretary. Right?
Clay: Right.
Steve: Dear so and so, stop. Yeah. Right? Whatever. Right.
You're just saying, hey, GBT. Send me an e send an email to so and so. This is what the message needs to convey, and it just says all of that. Yes. That's one example.
But, like, you don't use a keyboard at all anymore?
Clay: Very rarely. Very rarely. It's it's pretty much with everything that I do. You can work so much faster and so much more efficiently with using AI to dictate everything. CRM notes, boom.
Slack, boom. Send it of this voice and send it to someone on my team, Done. That's why I mean, I use it for literally everything.
Steve: It's not
Clay: my wife. I would never I would never send her a voice.
Steve: So you strike me as a driver personality. Right? So have you ever been accused of sending, like, excessively short, rude emails? Oh.
Clay: On a daily basis. Right?
Steve: Yeah. So it's probably really helpful for you.
Clay: It's incredibly helpful. It's incredibly helpful. It's actually caused me to be more reflective.
Steve: Really? How so? It it's
Clay: I I've I use it in a way that's not like, tell me how to do this. I use it in a way that's asking me questions to help me figure this out.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And I think that's the right way to do it because you don't Absolutely. You don't learn through just saying, tell me how to do this. And so I've noticed because I interact with it in that way, it becomes this, like, personal coach
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: Versus a fix mister fix it for everything. And that's caused me to I can I I almost loop in my head before I send something? Mhmm. I've noticed, like, oh, I've become, like, a better boss. I'm not, like, such such a jerk.
Right?
Steve: Yeah. Because I've I had an assistant. She's no longer with us. But, like, I remember she was complaining to my colleagues. Like, why is Steve so mean in his emails?
Right? But they're like, he's just telling you what you need to do.
Clay: Yeah. Right?
Steve: But I am that short and direct, and, like, your feelings are irrelevant to this conversation.
Clay: Right. Right. Outcome outcome oriented outcome oriented. But whether or not it's wrapped in a a a flower bunch of flowers or not.
Steve: But I can see now, man. Like, emails I sent in the past have gotten me in trouble.
Clay: Yes. Same. Same.
Steve: Yeah. Would be a lot better today. And I like how, like, going back to the reflective part about the thinking part. Because, again, like, the one of the books I recommend to, like, what book should I read? And, like, the first one always, I'll say, like, if you haven't read The Road Less Stupid, like, that's the one.
Right? And the cool thing well, GPT, AI, or depending on what you use. I use Grok personally. But depending on which one you use, it's gonna do one or two things. Is it gonna do what it's done for you, which is helped you be a better thinker, having someone to sound your ideas off of?
But more people are going into, like, this brainless
Clay: Yes.
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Clay: I I believe that is a cultural question, not a, like, enforcement. Because it like, I can
Steve: Before they even work for you.
Clay: Right. I can give them the I can give them the mandate of you need to do this this way, but it really it's more I believe that the the creating a lasting impact comes down more to the culture. Yeah. And so if I'm using it in this way and and demonstrating this is how you should use it Mhmm. I believe that that's more conducive to the brainless.
But, like, I really have no control over that. Mhmm. But the fact is, like, AI is so smart that it's gonna make the employee smarter than what they would be normally. So
Steve: Yeah. I mean, that's the biggest fear, though. It's like, when when did it become, like, so reliant on AI. So I think it's a concern not just, like, in my business, but in my business site.
Clay: Yeah. You know, it's interesting. I I think it's like this you know, you can play at these different lever these levels with AI, and your ability to actually leverage it, and leverage yourself, there's, like, magnitude, Steve. I mean, I know you're using magnitudes of of additional capacity. Mhmm.
But if someone's everyone's playing on this level, it's like, oh, you can write a good email cute. But, like, what do you real like, are using it to visualize your data? Like, you can just download all your CSVs and then chat with it for a little bit, and then you have clarity on, like, what's actually going on in your business. And it's so much easier than hiring a $250,000 a year data analyst. But it's just like, are you gonna use?
Are you gonna spend that money, or are you gonna get good at using AI to actually
Steve: I see so many people using AI. And it's good that they're using it, like, to create, like, these cute memes or whatever. Right? Like, it's good that they're using it because at least they're dabbling it, and they're, like, getting comfortable with it. But, like, man, like, that is not what it's for.
The the things that we've been create able to create with AI is just nuts. Right? Like, the I'm not quite vibe coding everything, but, man, I was I'll give Grok, like, 98% of the credit, like, everything we built. Right? Like, I've had to use my engineering skills here and there.
I I probably put on my engineering hat more than a dozen times by now.
Clay: Okay. But, man, like, 98%
Steve: of it was, like, rock. Like, here's what I want to have done. Yeah. It does most of it. And every once in a while, it just gets stuck, and then, like, I actually have to read the code and understand it.
It. Right. But mostly, it's been doing all the work. Like, everything we built, between GPT, like, Ian working directly with GPT, me working with Grok. Like, we built it all this with us just interacting.
Clay: Yeah. Hi. What a good a good, like, frame is, like, ten eighty ten. So you put the 10% of the inputs to to have the desirable outputs, and AI is gonna come in with the 80. And then you come in and you fix it and tweak it.
Steve: Right. And
Clay: that's that's what matters with, like, the taste of the AI. Mhmm. And that's how I, like, talked to my content team, like, ten eighty ten. And I talked to everyone, ten eighty ten. Like, you you need to tweak it so that it's there's human there.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: Because you see the social posts of, like, someone, it's like, you know, the emojis, like like, emojis and these, like, perfectly, like, entered paragraphs and you're
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: That's AI. That's AI. There has to be some soul on it.
Steve: There has to be some soul on it. Absolutely. And then you're doing, a challenge. Yeah. What what's this challenge?
Clay: Well, it's, if you want to build the type of business that we are talking about, not air air related, but land flipping in in land investment in general, if you want a foundation, a foundational map, that's what the challenge is. So it's a four week challenge. It's launching I don't know when this is gonna launch, but it's launching towards October, October 21. And it's literally you come in and I we have we had private clients. I do still do some private client coaching.
But, we're gonna give you everything that we've done, Steve, with our private coaching in a series of four weeks. We're gonna literally give you everything, because I know I don't make money from selling courses. So my goal is you come in, you get the most amount of value, and maybe in the future, we work together, we do a deal together, whatever. But I'm literally giving this away. And if you complete all the homework of the challenge, it's completely free.
We give you a credit back, 100% credit. So it's $297. But if you complete all the homework, you literally get $297 back in the credit. So it's completely free to to do this challenge, and we'll help you build, the foundation for a 7 figure land flipping business.
Steve: Wow. That's an incredible offer. You pay for it, and you get your money back. You just do what?
Clay: The homework.
Steve: You do the homework that, hopefully, you've committed to doing when you sign up. Otherwise, why would you sign up? Right. So
Clay: And the homework is designed to literally give you the framework of what you need to be successful. Yeah. So you so every it's four weeks of exactly the step by step process that we take our clients through over a six month period. Obviously, it's distilled down to make sure it's super applicable. Mhmm.
But if you complete all the homework that we talk about in the course every single week, you get, all your all your money back.
Steve: Yeah. Super simple. I I love that. And then, like, the things you're gonna be learning. So, like, you've closed deals in 35 states.
A lot in a very short period of time.
Clay: It's a lot. How did you use it? How are you Tax returns. Tax returns are are brutal. They're brutal.
How did I do it? Well, you know, the land the land flipping business is a lot of it is is virtual, so you go kinda everywhere.
Steve: I get it. But, like, most people are, like, three states, six states.
Clay: We just we we, you know, we did a lot of outbound stuff. And so when you do a lot of outbound stuff, you can carve your data pretty quickly. You know what I mean? Yeah. So we've done, deals in, you know, Alaska, Washington, Idaho.
And And another thing, a lot of people bring me opportunities because we know how to execute these, developments and subdivides and and flips. And so people submit deals to me all the time to get, JV funding, and we help actually with helping them sell the deals. And so, you know, 35 states, admittedly, is not just me. We've we've done deals in in about, like, 25 ish states, and the rest of them has all been from other people bringing us opportunities and us partnering on.
Steve: So what does that mean to partner with you?
Clay: So people will bring us deals, and then we'll come in as a funding partner and fund a 100% of it. We'll fund all the survey costs. We'll fund all the per test costs, literally everything.
Steve: Really?
Clay: Then we split the profits. And we also help them sell it on the back end. So we have a massive dispo engine in our in our business.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And so we'll help post on social media, or we'll list an in house and help sell it on the back end.
Steve: Yeah. So they bring in a deal to you. You'll fund it, take it to the finish line, and you gotta split the profits.
Clay: Exactly. Seems
Steve: like a very simple offer.
Clay: Try to keep it simple.
Steve: Yeah. That's that that's incredible. And that's like I mean, you you're basically doing a land. What is, like, the traditional wholesale model? Right?
It's like, hey. Find a bird dogger. I bring you a deal, and we'll split it $50.50. Right? It's like, hey.
Go drive all the houses. You know, do the, drive for dollars before deal machine was around. Right? Just do the driving for dollars. And then, you know, some other deals, and then we'll split it.
Or, well, first, it was, like, $500 to you. But, eventually, it was, like, let's split it $50.50. So you basically took the same concept.
Clay: And put it in the land. And the thing with the reason why it's it's so valuable is because unlike houses, I can call any guy and walk down the street in Phoenix and find a hard money lender. Right? The the
Steve: the Phoenix, you can It's so easy. You
Clay: could throw you could throw a penny. You're a hard money lender. Land's totally different. Yeah. Right?
Most people don't have expertise in all these states. They don't understand how to manage all these specific laws in these counties. There's thousands of counties in The United States. We've done deals in a lot of counties, hundreds of counties, and we also have the expertise with doing so many deals in some of these larger brokerage. We can reduce commissions because of that.
But the most important thing is you can't just get a hard money lender. No one's gonna wanna land on a on a piece of land that's
Steve: No.
Clay: An hour, two hours outside of a major metro area. So we bring all the expertise to the table and then fund it, and we split the profits.
Steve: Yeah. That's incredible. How many people are on your team?
Clay: As of well, it depends on our conversation after the I'm just kidding. No. It's it's about 25 people.
Steve: 25 people now? Yeah. Okay. It wasn't that big before. Yeah.
We're working together a lot. Okay. Wow. You've changed. You've grown a lot.
Clay: Yeah. I you know, there's there's a there's, a a a pretty decent amount of VAs on the team. Yeah. So there's some outbound people on the team. So I would say for our core our core core team, I would say 15.
Steve: 15.
Clay: And then the then the the extra 10 is kind of the add, you know, outbound and stuff like that.
Steve: Got it. Okay. And then, I got a couple notes here. One constraint operating system, cadence, high performing teams. What, have we have we touched on?
Clay: Yeah. We talked about the the one constraint is, like, especially in this business, in order to be successful, you cannot focus on acquisitions and dispositions at the same time. And when you fix a problem, keep it fixed.
Steve: What does that mean?
Clay: So if you have a problem, for example, in I don't know. Say you're having problems with your response rates, right, in in direct mail. And first of all, there are so many levels to solving the problem, but let's just say you're at the basic level. You're just not even tracking your KPIs. We gotta start tracking our KPIs to understand, what do do our KPIs mean?
Are we AB testing things? And then what what a lot of people will do is they'll solve the problem, and then they'll, like, be like, okay. Someone else is gonna solve this problem in the future, and they don't go to accountability in a in with the solving problem. So it, like, lives I go and solve this problem on this island, and it's isolated from anyone else in the organization. And then all of a sudden, it works for, like, three or four months, and then all of a sudden, it doesn't work anymore.
Steve: Or we just took our eyes off of it.
Clay: Exactly. Exactly. And so you can take your eyes off of problems, but you have to have accountability in your organization. And so you wanna solve a problem forever.
Steve: Right.
Clay: Now, of course, your inter your response rates might drop for some reason or another, but you wanna solve it so that your your system can help continue to solve the problem, or a person can go in there and continue to solve the problem instead of you having to come in and dip your hands in again as the CEO. Yeah. And that's a lot of, wholesalers or land flippers have that problem because they're like, I'm gonna solve it. It's gonna just be me. I'm not gonna teach anyone else how to do this.
I'm not gonna communicate with anyone how to do this. It's gonna live in a vacuum. No one's gonna understand how to do KPIs. And I might teach this one VA who I'm paying $4 an hour who has no back backup owners. So if this person, if they end up getting sick or go to the hot what they leave, we fire them, whatever, all of a sudden, they gotta bring someone on and teach this person the whole thing again, and it requires another twenty hours of my time as a CEO or more.
Steve: Yeah. Fun stuff. It feels like you've, lived through that a few
Clay: times. Too many times. Too many times.
Steve: Alright. So, then, I guess, oh, we haven't talked about it. So, guys, you know, I'm I'm hoping you guys are getting a ton and ton of value here. So, please, you know, just post in the comments. Again, we're reading the comments.
I appreciate what you guys are putting in there down below. So comment your biggest takeaway. You know, I'm reading every single one of these. And then, you know, share with you guys share with us what you like to see more of, see less of. You know, the like, a lot of this selfishly is for me, but still, like, this is also for you guys.
Or we we have people come on, talk about their journey so that you can, you know, replicate it or take pieces of it that you like, add to your business. That's how I like to learn. Like, learn a little bit from every guest, add bits and pieces to my business. So, guys, please make sure you do comment below. And then for you right now, looking at your business, you know, how does your land business look different, you know, today?
Or how does your business look different today between now and when you'd, like, saw, like, you know, the writing was on the wall with all those properties that you own after your wife lost her job.
Clay: Yeah. What's the core difference?
Steve: Like, how's like, how different is your life?
Clay: It's completely different. It it's it's you know, we're not concerned about making our mortgage payment.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: You know, that's that's the the visceral thing. And we're we're able to I'm able to come out here to Phoenix
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: And and talk with you and not be worry not worry about it. Just just do it. Just make the trip. And we're able to go and travel. We're gonna be in Europe for four or five weeks next next year.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: You know, we we're we're able to travel a lot more. We're able to kind of enjoy. I have a a young son, a 16 old son. I'm able to spend time with him. But I I'm also a really high driver, so I I work a lot.
You know? Yeah. So but it the financial thing is really the comfort level is is which is so much so much better.
Steve: Well, the nice thing about land is you don't have to deal with contractors either. So, like, as you're in Europe, you're not worried about semi photos. How's this flip going?
Clay: Right. Right. You can you that's the the benefit of this business. You don't have to worry about, keeping all these contractors, which contractors, man. Keeping them all accountable.
Use you have to keep your team accountable, but you can have systems to do that. Right? Or people other people, like an organization. You got a COO, so he can manage a lot of that as well. Yeah.
So
Steve: Alright. And then, what would you do if money was no object at all?
Clay: I like I really like what I do. I like playing this game. And if money was no object, I would probably keep playing the game. Yeah. I just keep playing I would keep doing what I'm doing currently because I really like the challenge of this business.
The growth that it takes from where we were just a couple years ago to now starting to get into development, entitlement, large subdivides. That's really, really fun. Mhmm. So, I I love it. I so I I really wouldn't I honestly wouldn't change anything about
Steve: Really fun game. Yeah. I'm with you on that. What is your epic life goal? Well,
Clay: I would say that a really big goal for me is to be an example for my son and my future children as an amazing husband and father, an example for for them, and and raise them up to be good contributing citizens to this great country. Yeah. That's a huge driver for me. I I and and then just play keep playing this game. Just keep playing at the highest level that I'm inspired to be around people that are playing the game at a higher level.
I'm inspired to keep pushing. And so I don't have clarity on exactly where I'm going, but I have clarity on on shaping the landscape of The United States.
Steve: Yeah. I love that. So very big goals. Yeah. Very impactful.
How do you want to well, I guess, what would what would you say is your your your biggest struggle today?
Clay: I would say the biggest struggle is people. It who I am as a as a leader and as a boss and then having my my team members. It's people. Mhmm. That is the biggest problem.
Steve: What are you doing to fix it?
Clay: Hiring better people. Hiring better hiring better people. Really, reflecting, taking the thinking time to become a better leader of of people, caring more about people, and and absorbing as much information to be a better leader. Yeah. That would that's what I'm doing.
But a a lot of his hiring. Just hired made this big hire, ex Green Beret for our c a COO, you know, MBA from really prestigious school and, you know, really, really impressive guys. So I think he's gonna take the business
Steve: to the next level. So Gonna challenge you.
Clay: I'm excited about that. I'm excited.
Steve: You might be able to kick your butt.
Clay: I'll learn a couple of things. I love it.
Steve: Yeah. What's your superpower?
Clay: I think my superpower is my ability to sit back and and look at the scene, look at the the chess pieces on on the table, and understand the how to move the rent chest pieces.
Steve: Yeah. Can you associate like, do you think you were always that way, or is there something that
Clay: You know, it's interesting. When I was younger, I would I I'm I was very cautious. I wasn't really to be fair, I wasn't really cautious in when I when I originally got into real estate. I was very cautious when I was younger, and I I would sit back, You know, my brother would go out and run out and jump into the lake in in the middle of the night or, you know, we I grew up on a farm, and he would jump in and, you know, we had these pigs or these horned horses sheep, and he would jump into pens with them. And I would always, like, observe things.
So kind of sitting back and and observing how everything how dynamics social dynamics and and how everything kind of work together. So I always had those characteristics. Mhmm. I was a cerebral person in my in my life. So yeah.
That was it.
Steve: I feel in some ways, like, we have that in common, that crazy risk taking, but also, like, very curious about how things work. Like, if I do this, this happens. If we do that, that happens. Yes. I, I had a friend who at one point is, like, said, you know, Steve, you're the most calculating person I know.
And I was like, it's not my fault. I'm just better at pattern recognition than you. Right. Right? Like, I'm very curious.
Like, I know how things go. I I know if you do this, like, these things are gonna happen. Right. I mean, do you feel like you do you feel the same way? Like, you can kinda predict the future just because, like, I've seen this movie before.
I know how things work.
Clay: I would agree with that. I think you're you're a lot older than me. You have a lot more
Steve: a lot older than you.
Clay: Okay. You're just a you're just a couple years. Just a couple years. Just a couple years. And, you know, you've you've seen, you've seen more cause and effect relationships.
Yeah. And so I would say that I am getting there, but it happens a lot because of the failures and the faults and the problem. Right?
Steve: Made more mistakes. Right. Right.
Clay: And so, yeah, I I think I'm I'm I understand it, and I'm getting better understanding it. But Yeah. I have a lot to learn.
Steve: Yeah. But I think that curiosity, I think we definitely have that in common. Like, hey. If if I do this, what happens if you're good and bad? I've made some really bad decisions, but it's like, hey.
If I push this button, what happens over here?
Clay: Right. Yeah. And and and the the best thing, Steve, is when you meet someone else like that and you can just kind of sit there and think and and and really work through those problems, that's what's amazing about business. You know, you interact with people, other business owners that are thinking like you're very strategically, and you work through problems together. And you say, oh, that's a really interesting way of approaching this thing.
One thing that I try to do in my business is, try to take things that are successful in other businesses Mhmm. And try to bring it into land investing because it's a transactional business. So I'm I'm I'm I'm always thinking, how do I create how do I take this transactional business and make it less transactional? What can I do in in this business? Whether it's, like, creating a value chain or exposing our or increasing our offer with, sellers, figuring out some other ways to create value in a transaction so it's not just one transaction.
That's super interesting to me. Yeah. So
Steve: I like it. And then, final question is, it's not a final question. Two more questions. Which failure did you learn the most from?
Clay: I would say the the rental real estate failure. Yeah. And because I realized my that I I was even though I can be calculated, I also can be impulsive. Right? You resonate with that?
Steve: Yeah. Right. Absolutely.
Clay: So so I was like, oh, I can do this. And I didn't collect enough information, and I moved really, really fast too fast, which I think is a mistake of youth, not a mistake of, like, miscalculating the situation, even though I did. But that I learned I learned a lot a lot through that.
Steve: What was the lesson?
Clay: So the lesson was being more calculated and understanding, like, margin of safety and risks associated with certain things. Don't get over leveraged.
Steve: Yeah. That's that's a very simple saying. Right? It's not what you don't know that kills you. It's what you don't know that you don't know.
You found that. It didn't kill you, but hurt. It stung a bit.
Clay: Yeah. And the the other thing is, like, other peep like, I think I was influenced by other people. I was in a mentorship group at that point, a coaching group, and other people were doing all these, like, massive syndication deals. And I was like, I don't wanna syndicate, but I wanna kind of move quickly. And I was just so impacted by other people.
And that's the opportunity, the shiny object that we, as entrepreneurs, are always, like we're always just pulled in these directions. Oh, I have to do this. I have to go bigger. I have to right? It's like play your own game because the the best people, the people, the entrepreneurs that we aspire to be, the the highest performers, they play their own game.
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: And so I learned that lesson. Play your own game. Know what game you're playing. When someone says I'm doing so well in this thing, good good for you. I'm gonna play my own game.
Steve: Yeah. That's big. Absolutely. That was one of the things that took me a long time to understand. I was like, yeah.
They're excelling. They're winning at their game, but that's not my game. Right. Yeah. Yeah.
Was it I'm trying to think there's a a lesson I got from, Nick Peterson. It was when I was like, you know, you can't oh, you can't, win a game. You can't win a race. That's not your race. Right?
You can only win your race. You can only win your race. You're trying to win someone else's you're trying to win someone else's race. It's not the I'm butchering the quote, but it's something that always resonated with me. So
Clay: It's hard to figure out what the the problem is. It's hard to figure out what the race is.
Steve: Yeah.
Clay: Especially when you you're younger.
Steve: Mhmm.
Clay: Right? You're you're younger, you know, or you you're young in the entrepreneurial game. How do you know the right race to run? Yeah. And then that just comes back to what I was saying earlier, which is, like, know your goal.
Understand the goal. Like, what is the goal? And then just commit to it. Say, hey. You know, if I'm my goal is you know, our goal next year is 7.5.
Okay. So if we're doing 7.5, like, can I really be doing this? Not really. Probably not. I have to focus all my energy on to know your goal.
Steve: Yeah. I think the absolutely right. I think what it was, you can't win a rest you can't win a race you never really wanted to run.
Clay: Okay. That's good. Yeah.
Steve: Because if you're trying to win someone else, like, you never really really wanted to run that race.
Clay: Right.
Steve: How can you win that race? Right? Because, like, you're gonna do it. You're like, oh, this sucks. Right.
Right. Right.
Clay: It's like, I don't wanna run. Like, I hate running.
Steve: Well, it's you with your government job and me and my engineering job.
Clay: Right.
Steve: Right? I was like, this is what I thought I wanted, and the guy is like, this is not what I want.
Clay: Right. Right. Right. Right. Right.
Right.
Steve: What book have you gifted more than any other?
Clay: 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership.
Steve: Haven't heard that one.
Clay: It's amazing.
Steve: Tell me about it.
Clay: I think it's the single greatest book on leadership.
Steve: It's pretty that's a pretty big claim. Yeah. I'm gonna have I'm gonna check it out.
Clay: You should. It is
Steve: for you on this.
Clay: I think it I'm gonna rate our
Steve: friendship on this.
Clay: Rate it. Rate it. Call me up, Steve. I'll take it. It is it is incredible.
It is incredible. It's I think it's a little, it's not really niche, but it's very, popular in the Silicon Valley community.
Steve: Okay.
Clay: So all these big tech, titans Mhmm. They all they all work on the 15 commitments of conscious leadership. Alright. It's extraordinary.
Steve: Alright. I'll get that from you later. Alright. So
Clay: I'm not gonna say thinking grow rich.
Steve: I know. I know. So Go ahead. Alright. So I wanna see what's the last I wanna leave all the listeners with.
Guys, if you guys got value from this episode, again, make sure to subscribe. That way we can have, more people come on, have success. The old cliche, but it's still true. Right? Horizon title is all boats.
I'm on a mission to create millionaires. The more people are watching, the more people we can impact, the more we can create entrepreneurs, reach capitalism. Please help us accomplish our goals by subscribing. Last thoughts I wanna leave all the listeners with.
Clay: Yeah. Our our vision at Hepler Land Holdings and Landman Hepler Land Holdings is a business, Landman Consulting is is turning, you know, theory theory into action and kind of going back to this this era of the strenuous life. Right? The the Teddy Roosevelt's strenuous life going back, turning, land to labor, like, laboring over the land and really creating wealth and building wealth through it. There are so many opportunities in land investing, in in real estate investing in general.
There's so many opportunities, but people are distracted. People are so distracted, and I was distracted. And I know land is the thing for me. And so, the reason why I've been able to have success is is not because I'm particularly I'm, like, the most special person on the on the face of the earth. It's because I really picked the lane.
I knew the goal, and it went all in. And then I learned everything, all the things about knowing your goal and then allocate allocation of people. That goes down all the way down to the business level. But if you're just going in every other different direction and not actually picking a path, this is so cliche, but it we have this opportunity in in America at this time that who knows how long much longer it's gonna be. Right?
Who knows? It could be five years. It could be ten years. I don't know. But we have this amazing opportunity in land and business ownership in general.
Take advantage of it. Right? You can you can reap what you sow, and that's that's why it's inspiring to me every single day.
Steve: Oh, that's that's passionate. I love that. If someone wants to connect with you, what's the best way for them to connect with you?
Clay: Yeah. So, social media, I'm sure we'll put my social Mhmm. In the show notes. So Instagram, you can DM me on Instagram. I'm I'm pretty active on Instagram.
Steve: Awesome. Perfect. Well, thank you so much. Appreciate it. Yeah.
Appreciate you guys for watching. See you guys next time. Shout out to Steve train. Jump on the Steve train. Disrupt us.
