American Land Seller Podcast
Episode 23: Charting New Frontiers in Land Data with Ben Maddox of Acres.com
Get ready to unearth the intricacies of land data management with Acres.com's Ben Maddox, our esteemed guest this week on American Land Seller. His journey from Heifer International to becoming an accredited land consultant and the vice president of Business Development at Acres.com sets the stage for an enlightening conversation. We unpack the innovative strides Acres.com is making in the realm of mobile land data accessibility, a game-changer for rural professionals. With Ben's unique combination of brokerage experience and data expertise, we navigate the pivotal role of accurate, in-depth sales data in an industry where such information is gold, especially in non-disclosure states.
As we talk with Ben, the veil is lifted on the crucial challenge of creating a comprehensive national database for property data. The task is monumental, but Acres.com's meticulous data compilation and professional alliances are crafting a solution for precise property valuation that benefits brokers, appraisers, and lenders alike. Ben's insights shed light on the importance of integrating listings with valuation tools and the advantages of mobile technology for sales prospecting and appraisal support out in the field.
Finally, tapping into the pulse of technology trends, we delve into how Acres is reshaping the landscape for today's landowners and brokers. Data isn't just a buzzword; it's the cornerstone of trust and success in land transactions. We also highlight the forward-thinking marketing strategies of Land Hub and the benchmark-setting practices of American Legacy Land Company. These are the stories of how cutting-edge tools and local knowledge are not only keeping pace but also carving new paths in the ever-evolving territory of the land business.
www.Acres.com
(479) 935-9526
support@acres.co
Get ready to unearth the intricacies of land data management with Acres.com's Ben Maddox, our esteemed guest this week on American Land Seller. His journey from Heifer International to becoming an accredited land consultant and the vice president of Business Development at Acres.com sets the stage for an enlightening conversation. We unpack the innovative strides Acres.com is making in the realm of mobile land data accessibility, a game-changer for rural professionals. With Ben's unique combination of brokerage experience and data expertise, we navigate the pivotal role of accurate, in-depth sales data in an industry where such information is gold, especially in non-disclosure states.
As we talk with Ben, the veil is lifted on the crucial challenge of creating a comprehensive national database for property data. The task is monumental, but Acres.com's meticulous data compilation and professional alliances are crafting a solution for precise property valuation that benefits brokers, appraisers, and lenders alike. Ben's insights shed light on the importance of integrating listings with valuation tools and the advantages of mobile technology for sales prospecting and appraisal support out in the field.
Finally, tapping into the pulse of technology trends, we delve into how Acres is reshaping the landscape for today's landowners and brokers. Data isn't just a buzzword; it's the cornerstone of trust and success in land transactions. We also highlight the forward-thinking marketing strategies of Land Hub and the benchmark-setting practices of American Legacy Land Company. These are the stories of how cutting-edge tools and local knowledge are not only keeping pace but also carving new paths in the ever-evolving territory of the land business.
www.Acres.com
(479) 935-9526
support@acres.co
This week on the American Land Seller, we meet one of the driving forces behind Acrescom, vice President of Business Development, ben Maddox. Ben is not just a familiar name in the world of agriculture, but a seasoned professional with a wealth of experience as an accredited land consultant, accredited farm manager and a licensed broker in the state of Arkansas. Ben proves to be a wealth of information when it comes to land data as well as land marketing. Prior to joining Acrescom, ben served as an analyst in international agriculture with Heifer International. His projects spanned across multiple continents, focusing on supporting farmer cooperatives and agribusinesses.
Speaker 1:But it doesn't stop there. Ben holds an MBA from the prestigious Sam M Walton College of Business, showcasing his commitment to not only excellence but also learning in his field. His dedication and passion for agriculture doesn't go unnoticed, as he's a proud member of the Realtors Land Institute, as well as the American Society of Farm Managers and Rural Appraisers and the Arkansas Cattlemen's Association. Whether you're a seasoned producer, land broker, curious land enthusiast or just someone who appreciates the importance of sustainable agriculture, you're in for a real treat by joining our conversation with Ben Maddox. So buckle up and get ready for a trek through the vast fields of knowledge of Ben Maddox from Acrescom. As always, we hope you take away something from our podcast.
Speaker 2:Welcome to the American Land Seller Podcast with your host, kobe Richardson. Kobe is an accredited land consultant and multi-state land broker with American Legacy Land Company. Join us each week as we explore all things land. We bring you fresh insights and expert guests on sales, marketing, regulations, economics and so much more. Visit wwwamericanlandsellercom and find us on one of your favorite podcast platforms.
Speaker 3:Okay, kobe and our special guests, let's get started.
Speaker 1:Hey everybody, welcome back to the American Land Seller Podcast. Super exciting day. We've got a guest from Acres, ben Maddox, a brand spanking new ALC just recently. He still has the new ALC smell and everything. Guys, ben, how are we doing today?
Speaker 3:Man, I'm doing well. It's a beautiful day in Fayetteville, Arkansas, and I'm happy to be here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I just recently got my broker's license in Arkansas Congratulations. Yeah, so that's, my son lives down there and we're excited to. Our company is excited to be a part of the future we have in Arkansas. I can tell it's going to be great.
Speaker 3:We're there next time you're down here right.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. My son's from Bryant, which is southwest of Little Rock, I think, just a little bit kind of a suburb there, yeah. So yeah, he's a firefighter EMT down there, amazing, yeah. So, ben, I'm excited to have you on here today. This is kind of an incredible tool that you guys have, not only for me as a real estate broker, but for landowners, for investors, like tons of different people can get some stuff out of it. Let's just talk about how did this get started, what is Acres from the elevator speech type of deal, and then, just how did this get started? Where did you see a?
Speaker 3:need here? Yeah, sure, so it's most basic Acres which you can find at. Acrescom is a land research diligence marketing platform, so what that means is, if you work in, if you're a rural land professional so broker, appraiser, lender and you're trying to learn more about a particular property could be farmland, ranchland, timberland our product gives you parcel details, transaction information, bank financing data really all in one place, right, and so, importantly, we do that both on desktop when you're at your office, but also on a mobile app, right, so you can take this out in the field. It works when you're in offline mode. So that's really important to us is that this is not just something you sit behind a desk and use, but you got to get out there and actually use these things in the field.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's kind of cool. I've been using it a little bit and you can be out with your client, kind of looking at a list and something, and be kind of answering. Sometimes I'm answering questions for them because of the data that's on there. So it's a really neat tool for me. At least I found it to be valuable.
Speaker 3:That's good to hear, and you kind of alluded to the question of why did we build it where it came from, and, like a lot of good products, that came from a bad problem, right. So we were sitting there I was working with a group of folks and we were trying to purchase farmland more efficiently, right, and so we were sort of going through all the motions and utilizing some products that existed already, and none of them really did exactly what we were looking for, right. There were a couple good point solutions that maybe did one or two things really well, but either they didn't have national coverage, or it wasn't mobile-friendly, or sometimes the data just wasn't as accurate as we had hoped, and so ultimately, we ended up realizing that there was a need for something like this that really combined all those things. That was naturally nationally relevant, and the rest is history from there. We realized everyone else had this problem too, and we began building the product pretty quickly after that.
Speaker 1:And you guys, are you still? You're still in real estate, then correct.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. So. I have my Arkansas real estate license, I'm a broker and then also an accredited farm manager and, as you mentioned, a new ALC, so I'm still pretty active in the real estate business. But obviously, working with acres is more of a data business, right? So we're working with clients that are interested in accessing different types of data through our application, and so where to hats? Still working the real estate side, but also working on the data side.
Speaker 3:But I think that's also what makes it work right, because our whole team has that background right. So I like to think about there's two types of expertise when you do what we do. There's subject matter expertise and there's product expertise, and so subject matter expertise is what you and I do every day, right, we're in the land business and you have to understand that business to build a product like this. At the same time, I don't know really anything about coding or app development or software engineering, but we have a lot of people who do, and that's where the product expertise comes into place. We've got about 30 different engineers working here in Fayetteville, arkansas, working on our product every day, and so I think you have to combine that in the field knowledge with the technical expertise of how do you build a great app, because that's not my background, but we have some fantastic people here who are experts at it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's absolutely true, but the fact that you're one of us and you're on the staff like making sure that they're giving them the direct feedback on as a land broker as to this is kind of something we don't need. This is stuff that we do need, do you get? I think that another, going back to the Realtors Land Institute has probably helped you guys out a lot, because I think at one time in the land broker business it was very closed. We're not going to share anything and so, but I think RLI has really started and the guys that have been doing that for 30 years or whatever, or 40 years I can't remember how long it's been around but I've really kind of broke those laws down and made it so that you can create a product that helps me. Essentially, now that I've got my license down there, I could be your competition. Talk just a little bit about have you had any pushback from anybody on because you're in the business, or has it mostly been positive?
Speaker 3:Well, I'll start with. It's mostly positive, but I think you raise a really interesting point that we care a lot about, which is this idea of Growing the industry at large so.
Speaker 3:I'm fairly convinced you've probably seen this to me the amount of people interested in being a farmland owner has increased dramatically in the last 1015 years. Right, just taken off it. It's only increasing every day, and there's a lot of reasons for that. Whether they're looking at as a diversified investment opportunity, whether looking as a lifestyle opportunities is a lot of things that are, I think, behind that trend. But what I pretty firmly believe is that we're still early in that curve, right, like the amount of people who are interested in this is just going to compound and grow over time. And when you take that long term outlook, I think that helps you realize that something that may seem like competition today is really just a drop in an ocean and there's a lot more opportunity out there and plenty of business for everyone to be successful, right. And so I think taking those sort of short term events with a long term mindset of where this industry is growing, and is growing rapidly, really sort of removes any sense of intense competition on any given front.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely I agree with that. I also think that with technology, that's kind of shifting the mindset of the industry across even the residential world and everything. As far as that, it's not so much we're against each other as much as we are against like just being irrelevant. Right, and so you have in the MLS documents, you know the book and all that stuff and having all the information, like the days of old, it's all fingertips, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think you kind of tied in one of the other things that was on my mind to discuss today. Like obviously we're all used to the old physical Platmap book on the dash of the truck as you drive around. We're long past those days in many respects. You know we've had digital Platmaps for a decade or longer at this point, and while that feels like progress, when you look at these other types of real estate so let's take residential will, take commercial real estate that comes so much further in technological adoption, and it's not just do you have the latest tool, it's do you have data and information to explain to your client why this is the right property, why they should buy this property and why this price is the right price for that property.
Speaker 3:And I think the lack of that progress in, let's just call it, rural land so it could be farm or timberland, ranch land lack of progress in that particular space is really what we're trying to address. So I think we have an outlook on things where, if you increase transparency and you bring more data to the marketplace, you create a greater efficiency in the market and that creates liquidity. Right, so we are all in the business of land. Greater liquidity, greater market efficiency frankly drives more business at the end of the day. So I think as you, as you bring that data to the rural property market, you're going to start to see more efficiency, like you see in commercial and single family real estate. I mean today we have maybe 1 to 2% annual asset turnover in farmland and in a good year single family turns over at 5 to 6%, and so you're talking about major changes in the amount of business within the larger land market that could be unlocked just through greater market efficiency.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I again, I absolutely agree with you. I think I, you know, I think the detriment to those that are still not willing to share or really against. You know, like I, I'm multi state, so if you go Nebraska, I mean it's pretty easy to find a data right, that's just, it's very easy. But if you get into like South Dakota, kansas, wyoming, you know, missouri, they don't have the same availability for data out there when, again, I think your point is very smart in the sense of how you know, like if I only am using my comps or stuff that I sold and I'm not paying attention to where the trends are at, unless it's a auction sale or something you know like I probably may be doing a disservice to my client by undervaluing their property and not you know. So if you are, if everybody is kind of the latest and greatest and all that stuff's available, then we can go out, we can look and we can do a better job for all of our clients. I mean, that's kind of my thought.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and you know there's three. There's three scenarios that that come to mind, like these are real life things that have happened in my career that represent how difficult this is, even in the best case scenario. So I'll be. I'll be brief.
Speaker 3:The first is this one county had some sales records. They were willing to share those sales records with me as a citizen and I said great, send them on over, I'd love to look at these transaction records. And we received a physical CD Rom mail. I don't have a computer that has a CD Rom reader anymore. We had to go out and buy one just to read the thing.
Speaker 3:The second is I still get things faxed, or people tried to fax them to me. Right, like, here's a set of comparable sales for this transaction that I'm happy to share with you. That's a best case scenario, but yeah, it's getting faxed over. And then, finally, if you ever Gosh, if you ever make it down to the delta and you start doing work over there, there's still a lot of places you got to go in person to retrieve physical records and they haven't been digitized yet. And so I just think, through all these examples where the record exist, I could go get the property information to help me with my valuation. You know, to give someone like a BPO. But gosh, I've got to have a CD, rom reader, fax machine and I got to drive 200 miles to go to the county court house. Like these are all things that just shouldn't exist in 2024 if we're trying to grow this industry and bring more people into it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I cannot agree with you more. That is, I think, that the technology and just the lack of investment for a lot of government agencies and brothers and sisters of ours in the industry yeah, if you've got some time, but I think we're going to take a quick break and then we'll come back and keep on going, if that works.
Speaker 3:Hey, that sounds great.
Speaker 1:All right, perfect, we will be right back. The American Land Seller podcast is brought to you in part by Land Hub dot com. Join us today and experience the expertise of Land Hub's land marketing professionals, whether you're buying or selling. Let us show you the way in the ever evolving world of land transactions. Visit land hub dot com and discover what the future of land marketing looks like. Land Hub dot com, where your land journey begins. All right, we're back here with Ben Maddox from Acres, and then you can find those guys at acres dot com. I think I forgot to do that in the last intro, but I'm sorry. I'm no worries, you think I marketed for a living and then when I get your great product on here, I don't tell people how to get there. But so I guess my curiosity is we talked a lot about like, what void your product filled and stuff like that. But really, what problem does Acres solve? Like Is this, and you know, along with that, what are your specifically? What are your users technically? You know typically.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll start with the second question first. So our typical users range from real estate brokers to lenders to appraisers and really it's anybody with an interest in real properties of real property transactions and so. But we want to do is build a national database of property data, transactions, mortgage information and, while some of these things already exist in other individual programs or other platforms, really want to bring it all into one spot and Again build a national version of that and put a real emphasis on data quality. So I'm sure you have probably seen this before, but you're pouring through county tax assessor records, either at the county tax assessor or on some other platform. You may have noticed there's some issues. Number one it could be that they fat finger at something when they're internet in. I've seen an unbelievable amount of transactions that they miss attributed Multiple parcel transaction to single parcel and they'll say, hey, this farm, so for a hundred thousand dollars an acre, and you and I know that's simply not true. They just miss applied across one parcel.
Speaker 3:The second issue we see is obviously not disclosure states, right?
Speaker 3:So there's not a lot of data in the others some twenty odd partial, non partial disclosure and on disclosure state.
Speaker 3:So You're kinda out of luck if you're in Mississippi, parts of our, in some Missouri, kansas we went through that early in the conversation and then, finally, a lot of sales data you find from the county is obviously they're gonna have maybe your buyer and seller price and a date, but Not really have much in the way of a hair, their fixtures and improvements in this thing, or how is the property irrigated, how old is the center pivot. So Is all this contextual information that when you're reviewing a transaction, if you're not aware that well, hey, the pivot belong to the tenant and then transfer the transaction like you could completely flub it up if you're working with your customer and you're saying, well, this is the comparable price for properties in your area, when you actually don't know the whole history of that transaction. So what we're trying to do is Bring a greater depth of transaction data, sales data, for those folks who are you keenly interested in tracking what's going on in landmarks around the United States.
Speaker 1:That's. That's kind of a daunting task. I would say.
Speaker 3:I'm glad you said that, though, because it is some it is some of the least sexy work on earth. Right, we are going in and there is no everyone wants a to solve all their problems. Right, they want some computer algorithm to figure it out for him, and we Aggressively take the opposite stance. Right you? This is hard work, requires a lot of manual sifting, correction, data entry, and there isn't some computer program that's gonna give us the magical value for piece of farmland. So we're going in there and retrieving records the old fashioned way, building relationships with appraisers, lenders, brokers that help provide some of that data to us, and there is no easy way to do it. But that's what makes it a good business, right, I mean, I think, classic. If it was easy, everyone would do it, and that certainly applies here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, like, yeah, it's definitely not sexy work. I can guarantee that I. I'm not your data entry guy, so I'm the reason why there's fat finger. So you're welcome, appreciate, appreciate, being there for you guys. So so, with all that said, you're, you're doing all this work, you're compiling data, you're putting it into one really effective tool. Who's, who's your? Who we market in this to?
Speaker 3:I mean, is it just to me or Certainly certainly real estate brokers right, and one of the things we haven't really touched on is, you know, in our platform where I talked about sales data, we talked about some bank data we have in there, we also have listings right. So we do have a pretty big partnership with the land broker co-op team. They actually syndicate a number of listings on our platform via API relationship with them. We're thrilled to work with them and host those listings, but we also host listings from individual brokerages who may create their own direct API with us. So we we host real estate listings.
Speaker 3:Are platform is a great way. When you have the listing right there in your valuation tool, you click on the listing Draw radius around your listing and get a desktop valuation in a couple of minutes. So it's a nice way to integrate both the marketing side of things and the valuation side. And that's really where we kind of lead into the other customer segments, which would be world appraisers as well as ag lenders. So whether you're in the farm credit system, small community bank or one of these newer alternative lending Offerings where we've got all of those in our system today and ultimately they're using it either as a sales and prospecting application or as a appraisal support tool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's, that's incredibly handy. But now I have been a huge fan. I've used, I've been a member of a land broker co-op for Number of years. So I again I think those guys are are cutting edge. I think again that's another. You know tasks that they've taken on some of the bigger land. You know like the land hosting sites and things like that. It's it's, it's good to see somebody that's catering towards us. You know like his land brokers so, and it's also good to know that you know like those, those Listings are going to your, your site as well.
Speaker 3:So yeah, absolutely. I mean, I talk about difficult and unsexy work. I mean getting listings syndicated at a national level. It's not easy either, right, and so I think the more of those bridges we can connect between people who are doing a little bit similar and then trying to put it all in one place, that's part of the value that we want to add.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's well again. I just it's making it easier for people to to find properties and to to again find a fair value. I mean, that's that's what marketing is all about is trying to make it as easy as we can for our clients to To find what they're looking for. So that's awesome.
Speaker 3:Kobe, I was going to ask you and we're talking about speed and efficiency and technology how long do you typically spend when you're putting together like a BPO what's? What's your time to put all that together? Kind of depends, I guess it kind of depends on what state I'm working in In Nebraska.
Speaker 1:it doesn't take a whole heck of a lot of time because, again, we have everything's pretty much online. I can go find, you know like, we have GIS data, we have your product also. I have another couple products that I use, realistically, though, in Kansas Wyoming for sure, missouri is extremely time consuming and a lot of times I do have to find, like a partner in crime somewhere nearby to have them run down and see if we can't find some. You know some actual data at the courthouse. But yeah, it's, it takes a lot of time, you know, because you don't want to, it's. You know how it is as an agent, we got to price something to sell, but we also don't want to leave any money out there, so you got to be as close as you can.
Speaker 3:That's a big part of it. Right is having the confidence to make a decision on something right. It's just like all right, I have some data. Is that enough for me to move forward with confidence that I've done the best job for my client, either on the buyer, the sell side?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's actually been times where I've been a while but where the market's been so wild that I've walked in and been like here's what I think. And they're like well, I want to go, you know, $1200, an acre more, and I'm like, well, see it, I'm willing to try.
Speaker 3:I mean, that's that's absolutely been the market the last couple of years. Now, depending on where you're looking at you know, we kind of have a we've an interesting lens because we can see things going on nationally, based on the fact that our customers are all over the United States and so, as always, land markets in the US right now are behaving super locally right. What I mean by that is Each little market is going to be different, not just states, but counties and townships within counties. Everything's a little bit local still and there are some softening parts right. I mean, I still think the land market overall is very healthy. We don't see price declines, but the rate of growth is not what it was even just a year ago, and so it's kind of interesting. I think most projections say things are going to keep on the current path and hold steady. But it's definitely back to your point, and certainly when you're in that rising market, sellers can be pretty aggressive.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, yep, and I mean it's, you know, when you're in the land business like houses I think, because my wife is a residential agent and it's kind of is what it is you know you've got to go get some key indicators. You can. You know there's a lot of data out there most of the time for them. But in our world it's, you know, like I'm going to list property in, you know, east of Pueblo, colorado, here this weekend, and you know like it's 50, some acres of essentially Colorado desert is what I call it, you know, but it's near a couple of lakes, it's you know it's got 55 acres. It's got a water spout on it.
Speaker 1:You know that they can't do anymore. And so you know like some of that you know it's like you said, is the pivot. You know, does the pivot belong to the actual property owner? Does it belong to the guy that's leasing it? You know like there's all kinds of moving parts to it. So I think what you're doing and then trying to get more and more data, you know is every day getting more helpful for our industry.
Speaker 3:Well, I'll tell you one other thing I've been really interested to look at in our data set. So you know, there's the front end we'll just call it like the consumer interface that you see when you use the application. But there's also the back end on our data set where we can kind of play with things in more like a data sandbox. And what we're seeing in some markets mainly California for now, but a little bit in the Midwest is a widening spread between you know what buyers and sellers expect something to trade at right. So you'll see the list price and you'll see the clearing price where it's sold and gaps can a little bit bigger Properties are still selling, they're still interested in farming we talked about that earlier, but I do think everyone is still kind of in that mindset of things will grow at the same rate that they were growing previously, and I don't know what's going to give buyers or sellers, but they're talking a different language right now.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think a lot of like. What's really, I think, interesting is I've been going to like the National Land Conference. We're going to go here in a few weeks, but I think what's very interesting is it used to be like the Delaware Land Trust stuff, the REITs, all those things were all geared towards like high rises office space, you know, multifamily housing, that kind of stuff, and over the last couple of years we've seen that go into ag lands. So you know like what does that? You know now we have investors that are, you know, like, ah, we'll, you know, 7 to 12% return on your investment. Where used to be that they were a little bit more aggressive than that. Yeah, you're right.
Speaker 3:The 1031s, the DSTs, the Opportunity Zones you know that's a big theme. Anything with the sort of the PACS Advantage type investment is pretty popular in farmland right now. So we're certainly seeing a lot of that. I see it, you know, just in my day to day and so I think that's a trend to watch. We'll probably hear plenty of it at the National Land Conference this year. I remember last year a pretty good session on it, so I look forward to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, let's, if you don't mind. Let's take a break. We got one more segment after this if you got time, and then yeah, so we will be right back. The American Land Seller podcast is brought to you in part by American Legacy Land Company. At American Legacy, our seasoned agents set us apart, providing unmatched service with a personal touch that goes beyond expectations. With a wealth of market knowledge and a diverse portfolio including farms, ranches, development lands and recreational properties, we forge lasting connections with clients through honesty, integrity and transparency. Visit us at AmericanLegacyLandCocom and find the land that defines your lease. Alright, we're back here with Ben Maddox from Acres. That is Acrescom incredible tool for anybody that's in the land business out there. I definitely recommend you try it. I bet you, if they reached out to Ben or his team, that he might even have a way to let you try it out for a couple days for free or something.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you bet. Obviously, we'll have all my information in the show notes, I'm sure. But just Ben at Acrescom, pretty simple, reach out to me. I'd love to talk.
Speaker 1:Just a regular Ben too, just the B-E-N. Nothing fancy about, like not 12-Ns or anything like that, just the regular Ben. You know, we were just talking about this during the break. The USDA census came out with all kinds of great nuggets of information. Thank God we have the government to help us with everything we need, but kind of trending in the same direction it has been. Is that kind of what you get from it, ben?
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, we were laughing during the break because the census announced yet once again that farmers are getting older, there are fewer farms and farms are getting bigger. So I mean, I think obviously a lot of folks in the audience are going to be real estate brokers or just generally in the land business and you got to kind of wonder what that means for the future of the industry. I'm still super optimistic about, obviously, agriculture in general, but then also the business of brokerage. I wouldn't be in it if I was not optimistic about it. But I do think there's going to be some unique challenges as we do have fewer farms. I still think transactions will increase and you've seen that in whether it's in the USBA or I've seen some state university studies that say there's a lot of farmland is going to change hands in the next 10 to 15 years.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the landowner is more and more every year, gets older and older and every year gets more absentee and more absentee. And so I had David Whitaker I don't know if you know David or not, from Iowa he's a character but I had him on the podcast a couple of weeks ago and he was talking about how you have to go from the spectrum of the 90 year old that doesn't believe you're relevant unless you're in the Midwest farm journal or the Midwest messenger or something like that All the way down to some 18 year old that inherited his farm from his grandpa or something that goes and says how he finds his land broker is hey, siri, find me a land broker.
Speaker 3:You nailed that the need to cater to customers who are going to be digitally native, as they say. So if somebody is inheriting a property today, they're probably under the age of 40 and that person, as he exactly said, they're going to go to Google or Siri and say I need to find a land broker. They get sort of. All of us need to pay attention to how we utilize technology in our businesses to make sure that we don't miss that trend. Right, it's coming.
Speaker 1:Oh it's here, I think it's, I mean it's. But yeah, like and it's funny too, because there's lots of people I mean on absentee stuff, stuff, that college educated professionals, when you print out a report from Acres and it has crop data from five years and all the soil, you know the soil types, and all that kind of stuff, those people geek out on that. I mean that's no joke, like that's, and that's a lot of your, a lot of the people that I deal with. They are, they want the data because they they they make their decisions more so based on not necessarily trusting the data. They don't necessarily trusting me, but they trust that. Hey, I see where you're going, I see where you got this, you know. So you have to prove your work, so to speak, you know right, look, our business is a relationship business.
Speaker 3:It will always be that way, I'm convinced. It is also a business that requires an immense amount of local expertise. Right, like you and I would probably be terrible at selling a farm in California I don't know. I don't think we would be able to do that successfully and so you still need that local expertise, you need relationships, but your point is really good one, which is that you can have all of that and still lose an opportunity because you didn't bring data to back up your years of experience and wisdom. Right, I mean, that's great, but there has to be a trust. But verify element, and you verify with data.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, that's, that is absolutely. That's the truth. I mean, you have to Again. You can go meet with the farmer that has been on the land for 50 years and they may tell you that your dad is flawed or something like that in a way, because they know things that we don't know. But but more and more and more as you take these reports out to them, the more they are like well, that's, that's what happened.
Speaker 1:You know, we did have drought that year and this is why you know our bushels were down or whatever. So, yeah, so how do, if I want to get get on? I mean, one of the things that I think we talked about this at the break to you is is how inexpensive this platform is compared to some of the others that are in your competition space. I don't know like you can go through all the there's probably eight different ones that do sort of some different things, but I mean, by far, you guys are on the lower end, on the lower end for what you get. How, how is it you can keep the cost so low when you're you know you, when you have to do all this data mining and all this stuff.
Speaker 3:Yeah, good question. So I'll just kind of start with what we offer, right? So we have everything from a completely free version of the product on your mobile phone and your desktop computer all the way up to some paid versions, and what I'd say is we have a product out there for, you know, just the everyday user. Maybe somebody needs like parcel maps and not a whole lot more. That's pretty cheap. And then we have obviously a product for land professionals, right? So we kind of bucket it into are you the retail consumer, are you a land professional? And you kind of self sort for which one of those levels of subscription that you need, and there's different amounts of data, obviously, in each one of those.
Speaker 3:But I would say there's there's two things we believe in when it comes to how we price and offer our product to people. The first is you just get access to the lower 48 states. You shouldn't have to buy a bunch of additional states, just use the product, right. So we believe pretty firmly in that and it makes sense, right? Like you just mentioned, you got your brokerage license in Arkansas. We get these sort of one off projects.
Speaker 3:Maybe you have a client that has farmland in some other state and you know take want to go take a look at it. I don't want to have to buy additional states or data just to go do that one project. So that's the first thing. The second thing is we don't have any upgrades inside of the application to pay for it, right? So would you pay for? It is just what you pay for it, and we're not trying to constantly get you to sign on for one additional service where the cost ultimately becomes a lot more than you originally thought. It would be so simple pricing around national access and not a whole lot of upgrades inside the app that's our approach. So if you're a retail consumer and you just need some great plat maps, we got that. If you need some, like high end sales data, we also have that for the land professionals.
Speaker 1:That's very cool. Yeah, I know, I know, like the some of some of your competition I'm not gonna say any names, but like I've had him say, well, this is what it is for the state, I'm like, oh so where are you getting your data? You know, like I can't find any data anywhere. How are you getting it? Well, like it reminds me if you'd like to put that in for us. You know we'll give you a 10% off or something like. Right, yeah, that's you know. Let me put that in for you. That's where you have errors already.
Speaker 1:People I pay to do that for me. But so how do I get a hold of you, ben, and I know you have a pretty good team over there. Yeah, we're on.
Speaker 3:Obviously, we shared our web domain earlier, just acres calm and then obviously we're gonna be on the Apple and Android store. If you want to check that out, you can contact me. Just again been at acres calm and then our general info is info at acres calm. So we've got a ton of folks here We'd love to talk to you. We sure enjoy being on the show today. Kobe, hope to make it back sometime and when you're in Arkansas you got to come visit us.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, I'm gonna my, like I said my son's. I got to go right by you to go see him, so I'll definitely let you know. We can have lunch or something someday and but yeah, no, I don't expect that I'll be doing a ton of listing and selling in Arkansas, but our company's growing and so I think they even though I'm not very good at entering data, I am pretty good at taking tests. They let me be the the broker down there for now until we can find the right person. So what about the real estate side of things? As same way to get a hold of you, is there a different, different?
Speaker 3:route. That's the best way to get a hold of me for that, and then I can sort of field any questions depending on what folks need. Personally, I'm only licensed in Arkansas, so if you need something in Nebraska you're gonna have to contact Kobe here.
Speaker 1:That's right. Just, I have nine states, so yeah, it's okay. You got your ALC, now You're not gonna have anything to do for a while, so you can. So you can work on the yeah, maybe what I would go with Oklahoma before Missouri, though I think we're good to know. Yeah, missouri is a pain.
Speaker 3:I Think it knows?
Speaker 1:Yeah, but all right, anything else, as we're saying goodbye today. What else is on your mind? Anything good? No, dad jokes right.
Speaker 3:That's a great piece of wisdom to a part upon you as I left Kobe, but I think we covered it all we did beat it down pretty good, man.
Speaker 1:I don't know what else there is, so, but look forward to seeing you here and what? Next? Right next week or something, I'm gonna be on my way to Louisville, kentucky, for the national land conference, and so I look forward to maybe meet you there and and visit a little bit more. I will see you there, all right? Well, that's it for today, and we will see you all down the road.
Speaker 2:As we wrap up another episode of the American Land Seller podcast. Thank you for joining us. Visit wwwamericanlandsellercom and find us on one of your favorite podcast platforms. If you would be so kind and you enjoyed today's insights, please like, subscribe, rate, follow and review us on whatever app you are listening or watching on. Connect with us on social media for updates until next week. Kobe wishes you success in your land endeavors. God bless you and have a great week.
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