A Land Deal I couldn’t walk away from.

[Brent Bowers]

Just by spreading the word about what you do will eventually bring you Real Estate Deals. My Dad and I were talking the other day and he told me about his adjoining land owner wanting to sell his 14.33 acres in Okeechobee Florida that has electric, water, and 2 buildings on it. One of the buildings is a 2 bed 1 bath camp house and the other is a 2400 square foot barn with a studio that brings in $350 a month rent. I hesitated for a few days before calling for fear of getting rejected by this man because he has known me since I was a kid and I used to work for him while in Middle school. He offered me a price of $75,000 and he would hold the mortgage. I called an appraiser in town and he told me raw land is selling for $8,000 an acre. That is instant equity of almost $40,000. After weeks of negotiating we came to a conclusion that I will give him $30,000 down and he will hold the remaining $45,000 note at 0% interest, payment of $400 per month. This will pay off in 9.4 years. He will be doing a lease back from me until his death and he has willed the note to his God Son. He also gave me a great deal on his 9 cows and I have already flipped them to a buyer and made over $1100 just by making a few phone calls. My plan with this property is to grow Horse hay and raise bees to make income as well as turn the barn into a duplex. Then eventually one day bring my family to live out here so that we can enjoy the land and be very close to my parents.

Something that really helped me negotiate this deal was finding a good Realtor to go and write up the contract as well as have a title company do title search and draw up all documents to properly record the note. Another thing I did in order to test the waters was put an ad on craigslist before I owned the property to see if others would be interested in case I wanted to do a double closing. I got several calls from people wanting to offer much more than what I had it under contract for.