Speaker 1There was another deal that I thought was really funny. We were buying a piece of land from this guy. The husband was so excited with the amount of money we're giving him. His wife says, no, we're not selling this. I want my kids to be raised here. So I told him, I was like, hey, man, if I was in your position, this would be a great opportunity for you. This is what I would do. And I said, print out the contract for a couple million bucks. Print it out. Go up to your wife and say, I love you, honey, more than I love this much money. And rip it up in front of her. Hey, what's going on, everybody?
Speaker 2Welcome back to the Land Development Podcast. I am your host, Ryan Glick. I'm excited today to be joined by Brian Van Meter, who is the Land Acquisition Manager at Century Communities and founder of Nashville Land Acquisition Group. Brian, thanks for joining me.
Speaker 1Hey, Brian, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2Yeah, so, you know, you and I had a chance to talk a couple weeks back and dug into a lot of different things. And so I've really been looking forward to the conversation. And, you know, we're obviously going to get into, you know, some real estate talk today, some land acquisition talk and everything. But before we get into the meat of the conversation and get into those details, I want to start with your background. And specifically, you know, you've had a career in the music industry, which I think is a, I feel like that's something that, I've never had before on the show. I haven't had somebody kind of go through the music industry and then get into the land acquisition space. Can you walk us through that experience of how you first got into the music industry?
Speaker 1My parents do music. My dad's a pastor. My mom's a nurse. But they sing really well together. My mom's side of the family are like Grammy award-winning, Dove award-winning songwriters. And back to like my great-grandma, I was like, played music, played piano for silent movies. So, yeah. My mom's side of the family is very musical. And so that was just a natural iteration for me to fall in love with, to see it and also have some sort of talent at it. But just like anything, you have a little bit of desire, you know, proclivity to it, but you still got to work hard at it and practice. It's not just give it to you. But I did that around 16. I wrote my first song. And, um, and then within like a year or so I had a band and we came second in the nation at the Fine Arts Festival in Orlando at the convention center there. And it was, I don't know, 10,000 plus people or something like that. We came second. It was pretty fun.
Speaker 2That's awesome. Yeah.
Speaker 1And so that was it was just one of the things that's important about the music to me was the love of it and the synergy of the people you work with being in a good creative environment. So I've always, as I got older, I realized how important that was. But the next step was I went to college in Florida and then wanted to move to Nashville, do music and around 2003 we're on the radio quite a bit and and just really having fun getting a lot of people together to watch us. So it was successful there when I moved here in 2003 I was on Myspace and so Myspace was a big deal. Everybody laughs when I say Myspace, but it feels like it was just like, like last week, you know, but it was 20 years ago, you know, and a lot's changed since then. But I had four million followers on Myspace and that was really pivotal to me getting in front of Universal Music Group. So I had some connections that got me in front of the CEO there. Then I was moved out to California and the L.A. area, Beverly Hills on La Cienega Boulevard, right by the park, and got to San Francisco. I got to see a lot of famous people and perform in front of famous people like The Who came to my show once and that was cool. So being around famous people is was a good segue to into which the shift into doing land acquisition which my mom's dad owns Cane Builders in Florida and he's 90 now, but his son takes it over. But so I was around that. I didn't really he didn't. See it. You know, I was in my peripheral, but it wasn't something I cared about music. It was it. I still love music, but then I started shifting into this land acquisition thing. My dad really didn't ever take a paycheck from the church, so he'd always owned his own businesses and stuff that was his passion was the church, but he made money doing entrepreneurial stuff like that. So once I got into the land business, it was such a nice little segue and transition because, or made me successful at it was that the energy and the band, the creative energy that you have with people in order to create something together that was good. You had to be around the right people and it was very relationship based, you know, and then also the people that I looked up to in the music industry were my Mount Rushmore people like Jimi Hendrix and Tom Petty or the Beatles or you know, the 90s was a big deal to me. So like Incubus and three, 11 and little one hit wonders songwriter guys like a mash box 20. You know, so I looked up to those guys for inspiration. You know, I looked up to those guys for how to be better myself and then moving in the land development I was drawn to the entrepreneurs, the guys that owned the building companies or developers. They were what I've found out was they were very creative people, so that was their job. They loved it, but they had a background in art somehow was like, sculptor sculpting or sculpting. And I don't know what you call those people, but painters some did music some people wrote poems and stuff, but they had a creative side to them that was very consistent at that high level. So I looked at those guys as like mentors and the Mount Rushmore replacement from the music into what I do now what and what was really key I think you might say at the beginning that it was sort of a rare thing to find a musician, type guy and this role and so I did see that from them because we had a mutual admiration for each other but they were they were happy that I looked up to them you know and so that gave me a seat at the table to learn just like in music you watch these guys and you just you pick up from them what they're doing really quickly and so that's what I did and I think it's important for people to know what last time we talked we talked about Robert Ford. Robert Kawasaki the Rich Dad Poor Dad one of the phrases that he said was we don't pretend to be our heroes anymore and so that's what I did is when I looked at music you know and I looked at those guys I would try to play like them I keep my guitar like how they kept it like Tom Morello he likes having his up high and Dave Matthews he holds his guitar like this and then now I'm in the land development world and I'm watching how how these guys how they sit you know they sit certain ways they talk certain ways. So anything I could steal from them by just being in their presence was was really beneficial to me growing as a person because all I had to do was copy them you know and and following their footsteps and secondly is I've never had any of those gentlemen mainly gentlemen not like that you know they they loved it they loved that honor and it's I've learned a lot of consistent things through. All these people that I looked up to that they all had these traits you know success leaves traits you know and I could talk about this I mean we got 45 minutes I could I could I could fill this thing up but when I go sit with them at dinner the one thing they they always try to pay for it but they got to beat me to the check so I've learned to beat them I always drop my card off to the hostess and I'm like don't let them pay and they hate that you know they want to pay so that's a trait whenever they finish eating they always clean. I don't know if you can see me but they always organize their desk when they're talking everything's lined up so they're OCD you know everything's got to be just right and I'm watching this you know and I'm taking that away and I'm adding it to my repertoire one of the things the guy Chris Pascarella he does he owns his own company but he used to work for Southern Land they build a big neighborhood out here but when he would pray he would just bow out his head and then keep eating you know and so. And so those little those little traits like that I I would see it I loved it you know and I took took from that one of the sad things though was being in those rooms with those people and being the being like I probably shouldn't even be in this room with these guys I don't deserve to be around these guys and this is really important and hopefully people can relate to this and and grow into this and realize it's a good thing but. One thing I noticed is when I'm in those rooms with those people they're so successful they're so talented they're so great and you feel like you're not that guy and you're not you know you're not that guy you're at the bottom and so I realized that ego having a big ego about yourself would keep you want to surround yourself with people that you're better than you know so you could feel good about yourself but you never learn you never grow and so it is very. humbling and feels humiliating. you know, in your heart when you're around those people. But you know that if you're around those people, you're going to grow. You know, people say this all the time, you know, who you surround yourself with. If you hang around five, you know, successful people, you'll be the sixth. And on the opposite side is you hang out with people that are doing bad things, you're going to be, just by association, you're going to go down with them too, you know. So it's really important to be around there, but you learn a lot of personality things. You learn a lot of like coming of age type things, you know. But it is really tough being around big time people because you just feel, you know, unworthy, you know. And so what I leaned on here, this is the blueprint. What I leaned on was what do I have? I think to myself, what can I bring? And so I would bring my personality, how I treat people, how I talk to them. You know, I learned the Dale Carnegie, you know, how to win friends, influence people. I don't have nothing to bring to the table except myself. So I'd be nice to be around, funny, high energy, listening. One of the biggest things in Europe, you've taken this thing to the next level, Ryan, which is a podcast. But when I sit around these people, I'm in their face. I'm like, tell me, tell me about yourself. You know, I'm asking questions because I generally want to know, you know, I'm asking questions because I generally want to know, how do you change your guitar? How did you write that song? When you did this, like, what were the parts? You know, how did you come up with that? You know, so exciting. And in this world, I'm excited to learn from them. And so that was just a pure, natural, wonderful iteration. And if you kind of take a step back, if people are listening and they're trying to get to the end result, you know, you got to focus on the process, you know. And for me, I didn't necessarily have to focus on the process. I just loved it. So I always tell people, you start with your heart. What do you like? What is inside of you? What do you want? And when you find that, then I always tell people, if I ever go to a meeting or something or maybe a nice restaurant, they have a guitar on the wall, which is very common in Nashville. Nobody ever has to tell me, hey, Brian, you want to pick that up and play it? They always, it's like, try to stop me. You know? Right. It's like, I love it. I'm going to do it. And you're going to have to pull me back. You know, I'm debating whether if I want to give all this good information out. But one of the things, my mentor, my first mentor, he's on the Mount Rushmore because he was the first guy that helped me. His name was Kevin Martin. And I'll send this to him. Hopefully, he'll appreciate it. I've learned that the guys that I look up to hate compliments. They hate it. That's one consistent thing, too. They don't want to hear that. But I don't care. I still tell them. I still tell them what they've done for me. But he always said, there's two types of people. There's a racehorse and there's a jackass. The jackass is the one you got to kick to move along. You know? Pick up that guitar. Play it. And there's the racehorse. Would you stop playing? It's one in the morning. You know? I'm up there. So he said, be a racehorse. Make them pull you back. You don't want to be the person they got to kick to do things. And so that was one of the big things for me is I loved it. I didn't need a pep talk. And it's gotten me into places. One of the feelings that you get when you do this, one of the risks or the symptoms is you always feel like you're going to get in trouble. You always feel like you're doing something you shouldn't do because no one told you to do it. You know? And so you're putting yourself in the position where you're making phone calls, knocking on doors, you know? And that may be a personality trait of mine that maybe other people don't have. And that's okay. Because. In a band, you have a drummer, you have a bass player, you have a guitar player, you know, you have all these guys that are masters at their craft. You only have to be good at your instrument. You know? Do what comes naturally to you. Do what you love. Can I play the guitar? Can I play the drums? Yes. But I'm a master at this. I'm going to be really good at this. So if you have a personality like mine that works that way, maybe you don't. Maybe you're more analytical. You know? Maybe that we need. You know? That all together makes a great team. But you do have some people that don't work well with others. You know? So that's something we all got to work on. Is learning synergy. And there's a quote that says, if your dream only requires you, it's too small of a dream. So having a bigger dream is going to require a team.
Speaker 2Well, I want you. You said a lot there. And I got a lot of things I wrote down as you were talking that I want to dig into just a little bit before we get into the rest of the show. Before we get into maybe some more specific land acquisition conversation. But one of the things I've heard you talk about both on our last conversation and then also here already today, you talked about your Mount Rushmore. And I think that that's. Can you explain what that even is and why you think it's important for people to do something different in their own life and in their own career of creating this Mount Rushmore of people?
Speaker 1Yeah. Well, Jim Rohn was introduced to me by Kevin Mark. And his son is Matt Martin. And he's the one that gave me the opportunity. They put me in front of Jim Rohn, which has passed away now. But I have some of his personal artwork in my house now because of it. But what is Mount Rushmore? The way that I would answer that is from Jim Rohn, which he says, he would, he always say this in his talks is that he said, I could tell you what the next five years of your life is going to be like. It's going to be like the. Last five years of your life, unless you keyword change. And so he says, it's decision time, you know, to make that decision. So in order to change, we have to bring in new, new information, new habits. And so where do we find those? Well, we find those from Mount Rushmore people. So you go look at people that are doing it. And so when I have my Mount Rushmore, it's people I've identified with discernment, which I think is very key to develop understanding who you're going to. To idolize in a sense, or who's going to be your heroes. I call them Mount Rushmore. It's a more palatable thing for people to, to, to take. But it's a select few of people that I look at and say, these folks have altered my life to change so that I'm not going to be the same person over and over. So I'm going to adopt new habits. One of the habits that's happening right now is I'm writing notes, you know, like you're doing. I mean, I picked that up from you. I thought it'd be great. It's a great idea too, because I know my past, who I am. I don't remember things good. I can't follow up unless I write it down. So you start seeing these little habits of how to change and how to grow. And man, it is so absolutely phenomenal. And it 100% works every time that if you do these things, you will get these results.
Speaker 2Well, I think, yeah, I'm sitting here throughout all these conversations. I've always got, I do it on little sticky notes. And so when I'm done, when I'm done with each of these, I've got. I mean, I don't know, a bunch of sticky notes on my desk that I then take and do something with. But yeah, they help me. They help me in these conversations, especially, you know, follow up to certain things that, you know, trigger a thought in my mind that I want to go back to. Because otherwise, if I don't do that, I lose track of it. It's so easy to lose track of, you know, things like that. So I definitely understand that. Another thing you had mentioned too earlier was being in a room with people who are really successful at the thing that you're doing. So in this, at this maybe point in your career, you're going to be able to do a lot of things it's in the land development game, right? Or you're in the room with some people are very successful in the land development industry. And you have this sense or this feeling of imposter syndrome where, you know, it's like, man, they've been so successful in everything that they've done. I'm here. Maybe I don't even belong in this room. How have you in those situations? I guarantee there's some people listening in who are either intimidated to reach out to some of these people that are really successful or they've been in those rooms. With successful people, but they're just really quiet and I, it's probably okay to be quiet, but like, how do you, how, how do you go about, you know, behaving or acting when you're in that room with these really successful people to be able to learn from them, but also to, you know, just to get the most out of that experience and to give back also to the others in the room.
Speaker 1I mean, that's such a, that's such a deep question as I think in my mind about it, because I've had these conversations. I've had these conversations with people who have been in that room for a long time. And I love, I love it a lot, but I, I feel kind of, and when I'm talking about this and meeting these great people and sick, you know, successful people, actors and musicians and stuff, I don't tend to have a big problem there, but I was just thinking about when I was a kid, my dad was my coach and we played basketball. We were came six in the nation and AAU, which was pretty good. My dad was the coach of the team, but I remember when I was a little boy, I probably in middle school or so, I got put on a team and this team was like number one and in the little division we were in. And I remember showing up and they were already in the uniform and already practicing. And I remember being really scared, you know, because how good they were. I was like, these guys are great. And I remember clutching my dad, like, I don't want to be here. Like, I feel like I'm, I don't live up to that, you know? And I remember that was tough being a kid. And so I, I'm. Maybe sympathize empathize with that thought, because I know it's a big deal, but it just, I don't know what maybe be the difference here, but for me, it was like, I have a goal, I have a dream, a vision, and I'm very grateful, and I want to be around these people, so I have that desire, but I do remember, I can, I want to, if people are listening, they do have that, it's easy to just be like, ah, just forget it, but, you know, if I look back, I'm like, if logically, if I know, like, I'm going to be around these people, I'm going to be better, it's going to be hard, because they're so good, the key is probably, is your passion and your desire that you're going to get it, that you're going to work at this, and you really want to do it, you know, when you start the heart, it's like, this is what I want to do, I want to be great, and then having mentors for me is, like, the key to me getting there, so, I mean, I don't really know, because the iteration for me was, I didn't really think about that too much, one of the things that happens a lot with people is, like, the smarter you are, the more intelligent you are about something, the more, I've heard this before, the more reasons you have in your mind, that the more, the more things you can think of that could go wrong, so you're thinking so much, and, uh, and I think I have a, a leg up on everybody, because I am the dumb guy that doesn't think a lot, you know, and so I, I have this, uh, you know, I'm, I don't know, I could say a lot about that kind of stuff, but the guy on Futurama, you know, the main character guy, he was just so dumb, you know, they, they sent him to that brain planet, you know, because the brains couldn't see any brain activity in him, you know, so he, he was able to wiggle through and not, undetected, but, you know, it's just not, you don't think too much about it, you know, in the movie Sandlot, You know, in the movie Sandlot, you know, when they were like, you know, you don't think too much about it, you know, in the movie Sandlot, when he hits the ball and he didn't catch it or something, he's like, he kept saying, you know, I thought this would happen. I thought, he's like, well, if you weren't thinking, you wouldn't have thought that, you know. So it's more about like, you know, this is what I want to do. This is what I love to do. I'm going to get better at it with reps and being around the right people. But, you know, doing too much thinking about it is really probably a negative thing because you probably, I could be wrong, but you're probably so self-absorbed. And one of the other quotes that I love is, don't think less of yourself, think of yourself less. So the other second quote that kind of tags along with that is really important is Jim Rohn says, the fastest way to get what you want is to help others get what they want. So now we're talking about existentialism, we're talking about living life with people and then going back to music it was always just about having fun it was always about being around your friends and being an environment where you can create and think positive and optimistically on outcomes I think that's really key and so you're not really thinking a lot you know as far as logically you're just in an environment where those things can come out but if you're constantly thinking about yourself, then you really haven't matured to the next level. And I was listening to Jim Rohn this morning. He was talking about that as well. The stage of a baby where they're totally reliant on somebody. It's all about them. That's a baby. You know, they can't even hold their head up. Are we on video? Can people see this?
Speaker 2Oh, you were on video. They're seeing it.
Speaker 1They can't even hold their head up. They can't burp. They can't do anything without somebody else and so we got to grow out of that and then you get to this point where you become you know self-reliable so you're going after taking care of yourself then as you get older your parents get older now it's you can rely on me you know those are the stages Jim Rohn talked about so we have to grow out of that and get into a more mature stage where we're about other people's business and um if you do that uh this is the way I think about it but when you go in you're making a phone call, you're cold calling somebody, you're going to knock on somebody's door, if your intentions is to help them, what is the problem? If your intentions is to go and to help them, why would they be mad at you? Well, I don't have a degree. I'm not tall, good looking like Ryan. I don't have a personality. Okay. Think about it like this. If somebody, and this happened yesterday, if somebody's driving a car and they flip their car over and they're upside down a ditch. You run over there to go help them. Did they stop and ask you, what degree do you have? Wait, hold on. How tall are you? 6'2"? What does your parents do for a living? How much money you got in your account? Did they ask that? No, you're showing up to help them. There's no requirements here except that you showed up. So you got 80%. You got a passing grade. I'll take an 80 on a test any day. That's a good grade, I think. And you just showed up. So that's where you got your mindset's got to be, if you're thinking more about yourself, and I showed it to that basketball team, I'm thinking about me. They're good, I'm not. I go up and say, hey guys, y'all are amazing. Oh my gosh, how do you do that? Let me watch you shoot. Let me watch and learn how you do. That's a tough place to be. But live a life where you're not growing. Go do it the other way. See how that works. That's probably why people are depressed and people are trying to learn, you know, grabbing these podcasts. And, and the other thing I'll say is we need to be, if more people were like this, we probably wouldn't have a big world of problems. You know, everybody's helping each other out.
Speaker 2Yeah. And I think, you know, you said something there that reminded me just even of starting this podcast, it's coming up on, you know, from when this releases, I mean, it's just going to be about a month away and it'll be three years since starting the podcast. And I think in the early days of this, I had a problem with imposter syndrome because I'm not a developer, but I'm interviewing people in the land development industry. I'm an aspirational developer, but I hadn't done any of those projects. And it's like, who is this guy getting on here talking to everybody? But I looked at it as an opportunity to learn. I looked at it as an opportunity to ask some of the same questions I know other people have who may also be aspirational or who may just want to hear from their peers across the country who are doing similar projects and everything but i think one of the things that you had said that stuck with me is when you overthink i like to call it predicting the future right you constantly are trying to predict the future the outcome of what could happen and when you do that and it's you're predicting the future of a negative outcome that leads to stress i mean it's just naturally going to lead to stress. If you're thinking about this negative thing that could happen, it may not, but it could, then you're going to be thinking about that and it's just going to eat away at you and everything. And that is something that, you know, I struggled with, with this as well, just thinking about, you know, what if nobody listens? What if this happens? What if that happens? And it's like, why are you worried about that right now? It's not, it's not the same as planning for contingency in a project where you do need to look ahead and think about some possible ways a project go this is just like regular life where things aren't likely to happen but you still think about it and agonize over it well
Speaker 1talk about a little bit more about what you just said because i think i don't need i want to hear that too you're talking about future tripping versus like trying to avoid um possible scenarios where things could go wrong what's the difference to you
Speaker 2on those two well i think of i mean if you're doing your proper i mean you have to you have to properly plan for certain things. There's different areas of your life where I think you do need to look at the future and say, what if, you know, what's my plan B in this particular situation because I don't want to put myself or my family or whatever it may be in a bad spot, right? So you're going to plan for that and you do need to think about the things that may not go exactly as you want them. But I'm thinking more so when it comes to agonizing or just overanalyzing things, you know, outcomes of just things in your personal life of, you know, what if I go to this meeting or what if I make this phone call and this person says no, it's like, okay, well, what if they say yes? I mean, it's like you, if you just always go to that negative side, you're always going to be super stressed out about it. I feel like.
Speaker 1Yeah. Yeah. That's tough. Uh, cause I do get a lot of people. They just, they want to just listen to me make a call or go with me as I, as I go knock on doors and stuff like that. Yeah, that's a tough thing. The way that I do it is having the relationships where you can call other groups, other people that are doing what you're doing. I think having these networking events, those types of things, like the land acquisition group, dudes in development, ladies in land, some of the point of that is we always ask each other, like, what are you seeing? Like, what's going on? How did you overcome that? We're mining information and we're working together, you know. And that's a normal thing in life to do as well. But the biggest thing for me is in a process of, I wrote down notes here, which is a Nick Saban quote. He's like, we focus on the process, not the outcome. I don't know why we have to say that. It should be common. But most people, I can hear that they don't know what they're doing if they think only about the outcome. If they're only thinking about how much, what's that pot of gold in the rainbow? It's not that. You're missing the fun. You're missing the process. You're missing life now. You're constantly looking at the end results. You're not enjoying the moment. So you're missing out on what's most important, which is time, which I could debate that. I think love is over time, but time is over money. But the steps. that you do. So it's everything you, everything you do, it has steps A, B, C, D, E. You can't focus on step F, G, all the way to Z when you're here now. It's okay to have that peripheral look ahead, you know, that you, but if you don't do step one, you're not going to two. You're not going out to three. We don't do two. And so you got to walk it out. And so we don't know what's going to happen. We don't know, but we're going to walk it out appropriately and do all the correct steps. Uh, if you have an issue with making calls or if you have issues like that, I mean, that's just, you know, just trying to get around the right people or find out, you know, what you love to do and what, what your heart is. And I mean, I don't know how to speak on that. I love it. You know, I personally do love it. And so it's not a problem for me, but I'm really not good at a lot of things. I'm good at one or two things. So when it comes to that, that's my instrument. That's the thing I love. If I need something else, if I need a podcast, I'm calling Ryan. You know, I don't know how to do that. You see the, my background, look at your background, you know, you're good at it. So I would come to you. So if I don't know it, then that's where those Mount Rushmore calls and those people. Uh, and also you're growing and you're changing. I think that's something that we all want to do. We always want to be a little bit better and grow. Um, Jim Rohn was talking today about the humans are the only species that doesn't all live up to their full potential. He's like, he's like, how big does a tree grow? He's like as big as it can, you never hear of a tree growing halfway. He's like, what, at what point are we going to, we're going to say, Hey, I don't want to do this. You know, I don't want to grow anymore.
Speaker 2So on that note, so we've talked about quite a few things here related to just kind of just growth in general. And when you think about a lot of these different things we've talked about, what do you think then makes somebody successful in land acquisition versus not successful in land acquisition? Does it play into a lot of the, the growth side of things and networking and being around the right people and everything? Or what do you think the differentiator is between someone who is successful in that role versus not successful?
Speaker 1So land acquisition and what I do, I work for century communities. You can see the purple behind us. They're the 10th largest builder. I have about $600 million worth of deals under contracts. I've closed over a billion dollars in deals myself. What makes a good deal is partly the relationships are going to be, massive. If anything, they're probably the most, the most important thing. Maybe the only thing that matters most, but having good discernment on where areas are going to be successful and not some of the guys that are the guys that are the most successful have been putting themselves in positions back in the nineties and eighties, even we're further behind, but mainly, you know, 20 years, 30 years ago kind of thing. But in order to be successful, the relationships are important because you're going to have a lot of folks that are in different levels of the deal. So you'll have people that have entitled deals or one I'm working on right now is finished lots. And so finding a finished lot deal is very, very, very valuable. And that's from our relationship. I mean, you hear me talk, I'm not a genius, but you have the right relationships with people and you be yourself. That's how you can find a good deal, a good opportunity. Cause you have somebody that is obviously very good, very talented, very successful. And now you come alongside of them. But if you're going to have to raw land for residential stuff, even commercial, you're just looking at where, where do people want to be? What areas make good sense? I mean, you're looking at topography and utilities and things like that. But I guess, I don't really know specifically the question just based off of what I do on finding land. What makes a good deal successful for a single purchase? Like what I do, uh, would be if I'm taking an unimproved land is, you know, how big is it? How much does it cost? You know, the underwriting mechanics of things, you know, I don't know. Does that answer your question? I feel like I might be kind of wandering around.
Speaker 2Well, I think it does. I think it's, it does. And you said something there too, that kind of stuck out to me as well from the standpoint of, you know, you had mentioned that a lot of the people who are, you know, successful in this industry, there's a lot of people who've for a long time, right? They had looked ahead and they knew that, you know, this piece of land, the city was going to grow into the spots. They bought it 20 years ago or 30 years ago or whatever. And, you know, it's like the, it's like the saying of the best time to plant a tree is what, 20 years ago, but the second best time is today. And so, and so I think mentioning that is important because I think a lot of people today overanalyze everything. And so they, they analyze things so much that they never truly take action. And this isn't necessarily the, you know, the people who have been doing this for a while that are listening in right now, they, they find what they, what their next project is going to be. They go acquire the land and they do the project, but you've got people who are maybe doing some of these things for the first time. And I think it's important that they, you know, they may be thinking, they may need to think ahead a little bit further of where things are going to be going. And maybe that project for that piece of land is not going to happen right now, but maybe it will happen in the future if that makes sense in their situation. So anyway, that kind of stuck out to me when you were talking about that.
Speaker 1Yeah. So one of the background conversations was that when I started doing land acquisition, the way that I started doing this, I don't know if I told you this, but I went to go work for this builder and they gave me this job. I was over the HOA and then I was also their field measure. So it's like a entry level job. I'd go out to the sites and measure what the trades had done and kind of audit them. And then I'd go out to their neighbor, our neighborhoods, and I noticed that the neighborhood wasn't up to par. The grass was growing. It was, the buyers were unhappy with the houses and stuff. So I started making a name for myself by going out there and fixing a lot of those things. Then my boss, or one of the developers came up to me and said, took me out to lunch. And he said, Brian, would you finish my development for me? I lost my partner and I need someone to finish this for me. And I was like, I have no idea how to do this. I'm like, I still don't really. And I was like, what all do we have to do? I grabbed my pen and paper. He's like, all right, we have to put top coat down. We got to fix the curbs. We got to fix the street lights. We need to put a fence up. We got to put a pool up. And I luckily knew all the trades, you know, by being a field measure. I knew I had them on speed dial, you know? And so I said, okay, I'll do it. He said, I'll give you half the budget if you could do that. And then so it was 400 grand. And so I went up to my boss and I was like, hey, this guy wants to pay me this money to do this. And, uh, he didn't care. He's like, sure, go do it. But he's like, you like doing this type of thing? I said, yeah. He said, um, he said, all right, you're the new lane acquisition guy. And, uh, I said, okay. So two and one day I'm getting promoted to stuff. I have no idea how to do. So I don't want to hear people talking about, I don't know how to do it. You got this dumb, dumb coming in, just thrown in the deep end of the pool. You can figure it out. I guarantee you're going to be way more successful than me. So I remember sitting in the office with our land development guy. He said, Brian, go to, how do I do this job? He's like, go to, uh, the development tracker on the, on the, the city's website. And so I pulled it up. That's all he told me. That was how to be a land acquisition. You don't need 45 minute podcast. Just go jump on the land acquisition developer, uh, development tracker. So I go in there. I just started calling people. Wait, can you hold up your little notepad, your little yellow sticky pad? I had one of those Ryan on the side of, on my wall at my desk. And I would write a little, I would do this every time somebody hung up on me, I would call and say, Hey, Mr. Developer guy. Uh, this is Brian with hello. I rock it down. Hang on. Now those guys calling me. I wrote down, I got hung up on all the time. So I just was thrown in the deep end of the pool and I was so excited. You know, I was just like, I thought it was, I wish I would have kept that piece of paper because I would frame it, you know, because I was so scared. I didn't know what I was doing, but I was just so pumped up about doing it. But getting on the development tracker, looking for finding what deals are already in the process. You can learn a lot of the right people. You can start learning about engineering. Uh, you can learn about approvals and the cost of approvals. Everything's right there. If we're overthinking it so much, I think that's a good thing to try to gather up as much information, but it's just really like riding a bike. You're just going out, you're just doing it. You know, you're going to fall a couple of times, mess up. You never stop. You know, that will always happen. You know, you'll always have those issues, but, but you're in a, you're on the team, you know, you're in the band. So you're, you're in a safe place to do that. But that's how, that was my iteration of learning how to do this was get, just got thrown in the deep end, but it was just this passion. I was just relationship, you know, I just was out there working hard. You can't argue with hard work.
Speaker 2Well, and you have to say, you have to be willing to say yes, knowing that you may not know everything and you're going to be able to figure it out too, which you obviously did in that situation. So that's a, that's definitely cool to hear that story in general. Do you have over the years, and I don't know how much you can talk about with it, but do you have over the years, a deal that has been your favorite or one that stands out the most in your mind?
Speaker 1Yeah. I mean, yeah, there's probably a bunch, but I mean, the one that I think the ones that stand out the most were the ones that took the longest that were that other people couldn't make it work. And there's one in, in our, in the county around us here that had been It was an existing phase of an already finished neighborhood. So the original group couldn't do it. The sellers couldn't sell it. I made a relationship with them, and I stuck in there with them. We closed on it this year. And so I was been in there for almost two decades, just sitting there. But it was the patience, the continuing to be the person I am now, and the bad and the good. So that's a really big point that you didn't ask, but I think it's really important to note, is that whenever you go, whenever you focus on the process, the thing that made that deal specifically so good for me was that I was challenged to be the person you see now, even when I didn't win, even when I didn't get it. And so I think I learned the value of that was more valuable than when everything goes right. I actually think that I prefer the things that go wrong because it gives me an opportunity to show myself and you and anybody else I'm involved with that this is who I really am. When things don't go my way, I'm still this guy. I didn't change. I'm still this guy. And that's what ended up getting the deal for me, and it worked out. The husband was so excited with the amount of money we're giving him, and he signs the LOI right away. I think your listeners will love this if they're still listening after this 40 minutes. But they probably are watching because they're like, this guy's crazy. Let's see why this is. But he signs it, but then we go to the contract part. I'm not moving. She got very emotional about it. And there started to be a relationship problem now. And so I got frustrated because he was, he was leading me along saying, yes, we're going to do this. I'm so excited. Then he calls and says, man, I know I signed the LOI, but we just, she doesn't want me to do it. And so I got mad. And, but then I remembered like, I'm going to be the same person on the front end as I am on the back end. That's who you really are is when you tested and when you're squeezed. So I told him, I was like, hey man, if I, if I was in your position, this would be a great opportunity for you. I told him, I said, I told him at night and I, I said, take, print out the contract for a couple million bucks, print it out, go up to your wife, say, I love you. This is what I told her. I said, I love you, honey, more than I love this much money and rip it up in front of her. And I said, call me tomorrow and tell me how great the sex was, you know? And, and he calls me back next day. He said, I did that. She, she said, oh, are you crazy? She made him print it out. He signs it, sends it back to me. So it solved it. So the point is, is that to focus on the process, don't worry about the outcome. If you're constantly worrying about the outcome, if you're constantly worrying about what's going to go wrong, then you probably just need to get an hourly position somewhere, stock and shelves, you know, just be in a safe little corner. We'll bring you three meals a day. Nothing ever about it ever going to happen to you. But you go, go out and look for those opportunities and to show people who you really are. Because when you start doing that kind of stuff, you drop their defense down because you're, you don't have any control. Control over it. This is an illusion. You know, you don't have control over that. To continue to just be an influence, be a good person to people, be involved in people's lives. That is, that's the relationships. You know, that's how we treat our friends. That's how we treat. That's our normal way of behaving towards people. When you start getting uncomfortable, it's because you're doing something that you don't, you're doing something new in that situation. But you know how to do it somewhere in your life. You just haven't applied it here. You know, and so the type of, the type of information we're talking about now, it's not new. It's just new in this field. You're learning a new instrument. You're learning a new skill set, but you know how to do it. You just got to apply it here. And, uh, but if you're constantly focusing on the wrong thing, uh, you're going to mess up, you know? And, but you're also going to learn too.
Speaker 2Well, let's go ahead and shift into the last segment, which is a lightning round. And the first question that's going to come to you here is a little bit of a repeat because it feels like we just talked about this, but I'll, I'm going to ask it anyway, and we're going to see what you think. So first question for you, what's one thing you think people spend way too much time worrying about?
Speaker 1What people think of them.
Speaker 2Worrying about other people's thoughts of themselves, basically. Yes. All right. Second one. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?
Speaker 1The best piece of advice to me. That's deep, um, do unto others as you would have done unto you.
Speaker 2All right. Third one. What's one book that has. Made a big impact on your life.
Speaker 1I think the laws of attraction, thinking, grow rich, how to win friends and influence people. The main one is the Bible, especially the old Testament, Proverbs and Psalms. A lot of the things that we learn as we do everything we're talking about was talked about 2000 years ago.
Speaker 2All right. Fourth one. What's one thing you wish you knew when you were younger?
Speaker 1The one thing I wish was being more aware, being more aware of others and not so self-focused. Uh, that would be the big, big one for me.
Speaker 2All right. Last one. What's one skill you think everyone should develop?
Speaker 1I want to say like how to cook, but, uh, one skill is, uh, uh, an instrument. I think learning the instrument would be good.
Speaker 2What's the easiest instrument to learn?
Speaker 1Probably the drums or the piano. I'd imagine cause dogs, cats can bang on those things.
Speaker 2That's, that's true. That's true. We have that happen in this house, so I get it. All right. Well, cool. I think that brings us to a close here. What's the best. What's the best way for people listening in to connect with you and, you know, learn more about your group? MySpace. Yeah. I mean, go add
Speaker 1me on MySpace, uh, my Spotify account or my iTunes account. No, uh, I like LinkedIn is really good. You know, follow me on LinkedIn if you want. And if people got any questions or, um, if they're doing any deals and they just want a little kind of guidance or something, uh, for a low rate of $49.95 a month, you know, I would, no, I mean, I would be happy to help there for free.
Speaker 2Awesome. All right, guys. Well, if you look down in the description for this episode, you'll see a link there to the show notes page and on the show notes page will be that link or all those links that were just mentioned, um, as well as how to sign up for that $49.99 subscription of land acquisition help. Uh, no, but yeah, I, I really appreciate it, Brian, you hopping on here and, uh, and just talking through, I mean, we could have made this episode probably really long. I had, I had to cut short everything we were talking about because I want to keep it to the point where people will actually, uh, stick around and listen and stuff. So maybe we'll have to do this again. Sometime and continue the conversation.
Speaker 1Well, man, right. I'm honored to be here. You're, you're a sharp dude. And the, the, the podcast is incredible, man. Kudos to you, buddy.
Speaker 2Well, I appreciate that.
Speaker 1Thanks for sticking in there for three years.
Speaker 2Yeah. Still going, still going. No plans on stopping. Good. All right, guys, that's all for this episode. If you're not already subscribed, please click that button. And if you would take the time to leave us a rating and review on Apple or just a rating on Spotify, I'd really appreciate it. It goes a long way in getting more people. In front of this show. Otherwise, with that said, we will talk to you all next week. Bye.
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