This week on the Land Academy Show, Karl Lathus, Land Academy Ambassador, shares how he started flipping land by joining Land Academy and Career Path and how he’s managed to achieve such great success in the business.

With the help of Land Academy, Karl and wife, Samantha really dedicated themselves to starting their land business the right way and their discipline and consistency in sending mailers is paying off.

Transcript:

Jack Butala:I am Jack Butala. This is a Land Academy show. Today, I'm here with Karl Lathus. You may know him as the Land Academy ambassador. He and his wife Samantha have been with us now, geez, since Career Path, for I guess over two years. He happened to be in town. His wife's in town, too. In fact, Jill's recording with her as we speak. Probably going to air on different Wednesdays. We'll see how it goes. I guess we've been talking about all kinds of other stuff except work, what I'm intrigued with is how'd you guys make this work for you? Or, was it just a natural thing? Everybody wants to know what the secret is.

Karl Lathus:I mean, there's a lot that goes into that. I mean, I say discipline has a lot to do with it. Samantha and I are very disciplined when it comes to this business. This is a great business. Jack has set this up for us. We've learned from his teachings and through Land Academy, through Career Path. We did all that. Most importantly is we've taken those things that we've learned, and we've actually applied them. We've been disciplined with them. We consistently send out mail when we say we're going to send out mail. We consistently answer our phone when we're going to answer our phone. We do what we say we're going to do. We've learned all the subtle nuances that make this business profitable and doable and easy, and we focus on those. We don't get distracted, very often, from those. So, I think our discipline towards this craft, towards investing in land, and towards building this business has really been pivotal for us.

Jack Butala:I mean, you came to this with entrepreneurial experience and corporate experience on your belt already. Right?

Karl Lathus:Yeah. Absolutely. I own a construction company. I started that when I was 25 years old, and we built that business. I've said it a million times, but when I started that business, I couldn't afford extension cords. We couldn't afford to make a singular mistake. We built that business from the ground up, and it's been great. After that, we moved into real estate, buying and selling houses, flips, you name it, the nightmares.

Jack Butala:How'd that go?

Karl Lathus:Yeah. Well, I'm not doing flips anymore. I'll tell you that. We made money. There's money to be made there. I know you guys have made money doing it too, but I don't see you guys doing very many flips, either.

Jack Butala:I choose life.

Karl Lathus:Yeah. Right. We built a rental portfolio that we're proud of. We still do own and operate. When we really did come across this land and how this business works, it resonated with us, the data aspect of things. Samantha is just, as you know, just wonderful at that.

Jack Butala:Yeah.

Karl Lathus:I have so much faith in the way she aggregates our data and the way that she sends out our mailers. I have so much faith in that process that it really helps me do what I have to do because I do a lot of what Jill does. I answer the phones, and I use that. I'm that part of the business. It's nice to have faith in my partner who is really getting out the mail so consistently, and I have faith in what she says we could pay for the property. I know that that's somewhere where we need to be.

Jack Butala:I don't think it's any surprise to anybody that we have a ton of married couples like Karl and Sam, and obviously Jill and I, in our group. Well, I did this for a really long time, for decades without Jill. It was a whole different... Do you run your construction company by yourself, entirely,