Selling Farm Land: Why CLHbid.com, What Was Broken & Early Days
The Farmland Exchange, the official podcast of CLHBidcom Expert insights on buying and selling farmland in Western Canada. Welcome to the Farmland Exchange, the official podcast of CLHBidcom, where we bring you expert insights on selling and buying farmland in Western Canada. I'm Devon Davidson, your host. I'm the digital media strategist at clhbidcom and on today's episode, we're going to talk about why clhbidcom was started, what was broken in terms of selling farmland across Western Canada, as well as tell you some stories, some interesting stories across early days at clhbidcom. Make sure you follow us on your podcast platform of choice. This will be available wherever you listen to your podcast Spotify, apple Podcasts and the like. Today, joining me on the show CEO and founder Roy Carter and Alle Carter, both members of the executive team. Guys, maybe just give everybody a bit of an introduction about yourselves who you are, what you do, where you're from and something interesting that people may not know about you you go ahead.
Alle Carter:Okay, I'm Alle Carter, so I have been with CLHBID since the start. I grew up in the Peace Country, Grande Prairie. We're actually filming this today on our family farm. My great-grandfather homesteaded it in 1911, and I took it over three years ago now. Nice, something interesting about myself. I guess that I have my class one. In between work, I like farming and then delivering some of the sealage-bid vans around.
Devon Davidson:Nice, that's fantastic, roy.
Roy Carter:Yeah, thanks for the comments about the ancestral farm. It's kind of Devon likes the Oilers and how they start those games. And so, yeah, our grandfather rode horseback here in 1910 with his horse and a pack horse, nice, and so we got pretty lucky, I would say Alle, 114 years later.
Devon Davidson:Yeah.
Roy Carter:He had to ford rivers where grown men are, um, in fear, sometimes now crossing with a riverboat. So, um, um, yeah, we're pretty lucky. Um. As far as my background, I haven't got far in life. I grew up, uh, within a few feet of this tack room in a little house, uh, a family of seven Went to law school, came back, lost my dad in my 20s and farmed with my mother here.
Devon Davidson:My first question, you guys, is what was your main motivation or inspiration behind starting CLASPITcom?
Roy Carter:The main inspiration. And, Alle, I think you were an undergraduate or just out of high school, inspiration. And, Alle, I think you were an undergraduate or just out of high school. The main inspiration. Uh, it had, you know, over years, one of the benefits of getting old you sort of know what doesn't work or learn. The toolbox gets pretty big, for sure. And but there was kind of a catalyst.
Roy Carter:You know, over 10 years ago I had a call from clients who I knew asking if they could bring in another couple to see me. They had a problem on a tender and you know, the day probably changed the rest of my life. Met with them, I still remember where they sat in my office and they proceeded to tell me about the oil patch had stopped, they'd had some graders and they were farmers, but basically financial difficulty. They needed to sell some land. Retained a lawyer and asked difficulty. They needed to sell some land. Retained a lawyer and asked them about different methods to sell. Since that I saw the file. The Law Society got involved. But the lady who I didn't know at the time now invites me to her birthday party. Basically, she had a notebook, a three-ring notebook, of everything that transpired and showed me the ad the lawyer said tender was the way to go put an ad in a local paper and it had in the ad that there was what we call a roafer right of first refusal.
Devon Davidson:Right.
Roy Carter:And they were then called by the law firm after the tenders came in and they had a really beautiful land. I knew the area and they were told there was only two tenders came in and they had a really beautiful land. I knew the area and they were told there was only two tenders. And we know now, if you advertise land for sale, right, Alle, with a rofer, generally a lot of people don't even get interested. They know they can be trumped, right. In any event, they told me the story that they thought they'd been had or bid shopped and listen to the story and it's kind of the old story about, you know, the doctor killed mom, right, and it's maybe not true, but you kind of listen to it and I listened to it. But, man, there was some stuff that rang a bit true, right, and we as lawyers are allowed to call a party once before they lawyer up. And it turned out the party that was high, they were told, was their tenant, and so I asked for the number and I gave him a call. The two couples were in my office and he picked up and I just we have to disclose as lawyers who we are and told him who I was and was calling about land and he said have you got more for sale? And I said no, I'm just calling about I hear you bought some nice land. And he said yeah, and I said have you bought inputs for it yet? And he was kind of talking over me. And yeah, I got inputs. I'll be out there in about three weeks.
Roy Carter:And just guessing, I asked him the question. You know. I said I hear you didn't even tender and his answer was no, and I just about fell off my chair and I said really? And he said yeah, no, I was just told by the lawyers what the high tender was. And so I said well, you should probably take your tender or your inputs back. And he said why? And I said, well, you're, you should probably take your inputs back. And he said why? And I said well, you're going to need money for a lawyer and your lawyer buddies are going to need money for a lawyer. So that was the end of that call. It turned out the Law Society became involved. But the big catalyst is my client had a heart attack over it, medivac to Edmonton and you know, in the days that followed up it's like it's got to be easier. Right, the stress can't be on these owners over that.
Devon Davidson:Yeah.
Roy Carter:There was two tenders only. They were super low, it turned out later we sold the property for, you know, a lot more than the highest tender. Yeah and so, anyway, I guess that was the main catalyst after years of seeing what didn't work. Sorry about the kind of the long answer there.
Devon Davidson:No, that's a great story and, honestly, this is the platform for these types of conversations. I think one thing we find lots and now you can probably talk about it more is at trade shows we get questions about who we are and how we're different, and we don't really have the opportunity to do that on social media, to talk about how we're different. So I mean, this is just sort of a spinoff question, but maybe you can talk about that a little bit is who we are and how we are different.
Alle Carter:Yeah, yeah, I always ask how long do you have? You know, because it's not a one size fits all, you know, for every farm and we know that Something we're really proud of is that, you know, the majority of the members on our team are all farmers. We understand it. We know what a big decision it is to sell your farm and so when we set out to create Sale, each Bid, we really looked at, you know, all the existing avenues that were out there and we really wanted to address all those shortcomings in one platform that was specialized in selling farmland. So that's all we do, you know we don't know how to do everything for sure, but we do know the space of selling farms and we try to do that you know very well. So I would say, you know there was listing with a realtor, was a typical one and I think we're going to kind of talk about these later a little bit more in depth.
Alle Carter:You know public auction tender at a law firm and I guess for anyone maybe that doesn't know what tender is kind of in that previous story, sure, you know, typically the lawyer will put maybe an ad in a paper or something and say you know, tenders are open until such a date. That means that, you know, everyone has the opportunity to give an amount that they would pay for that land. They bring it typically to the lawyer's office. Is that right? You know, we always refuse to do it, so I've actually never seen one.
Alle Carter:But you just put, you know, your high bid in an envelope and it's open behind closed doors. You're not there, there's no transparency, and so we really, you know, wanted to create a system that that buyers also trusted, because our system wouldn't work unless they trusted it, and something that was transparent. Uh, as you know, roy said, takes the stress off the sellers. Um, and a lot of people and we'll talk about this again later but don't don't trust tender for the lack of transparency and they always don't want to leave money on the table, you know no one does, and you don't know what that lands with.
Alle Carter:You don't know your high number, and if you were told you know you could have maybe had that land for an extra thousand dollars, would you have probably bid an extra thousand? I would say so. So there's just no true price discovery, and so we tried to address all of those shortcomings.
Roy Carter:I think a good example in close proximity here my mom who was left alone on the farm here at 59 and then spent another 20 years in the house, her good friend Vera, three miles away. Her land went up for tender and on the home half there was three legals because she had a subdivision. It ended up three owners. It was closed bid tender. Obviously some of them would have moved to take a half as a part as opposed to farming a quarter right yeah so we, you know issues like that just don't work.
Roy Carter:I had an older guy when I say older, probably about my age, but down at Granham, alberta, tell me one time. He said, you know, submitting a closed bid tender to a lawyer. He said that's like playing darts, blindfolded with one dart and there's just so much to it. You have no idea if you hit the center or not, because you don't know what they tell you is 100% the truth in building uh clh bid.
Roy Carter:We spent a couple years 10, 11 years ago and I went to a mittenite farm. They were growing organic oats and would sell it down into lower mainland and really progressive, and they had a boardroom, unbelievable, like super progressive farm right. And we wanted input from buyers too. On, if we're going to build something, we need to engage them. We only act for the seller? Yeah, but part of that is you got to look after the buyer and you know their comment was we think we've been high a lot of times on a tender, but we don't get it because our wives wear a bonnet in their hair and we don't drink whiskey at the curling rink yeah, and we don't drink whiskey at the curling rink. And build us a system where, if we're high, we get a notice right away where there's no chance to bid shop.
Roy Carter:Right and so that was part of what we built.
Devon Davidson:Okay, so maybe in that same vein, roy or Ali, what were some of the other key issues you found in selling farmland, you know, across the market in general, like what else was happening that wasn't really fulfilling the need and doing justice for both sellers and buyers?
Roy Carter:I would say lack of price discovery. It's not a movable object. They say land is the only commodity, once purchased, cannot be moved, and because of that arbitrage in the market doesn't work. It's not like buying a combine in Winnipeg and one at clarice home you'll, eventually it'll just be freight. That'll be the difference, because the market will work. People will buy and sell and bring that market together, right. But of course such isn't the case with land and I think the lack of understanding on that um list doesn't work because of that, um, you know, list works where you have houses in town that are generic, right, and yeah, you can't move houses in town, but you can move streets. So the market works, gotcha.
Roy Carter:But because there's so many external factors that affect land value, it's too hard to come up with a list. So we would see we didn't think list worked. It's a wild guess with farmland and it really comes from can you appraise farmland very accurately? No, you know, we've seen. We had a sale here a couple years ago, a court-ordered sale, and the order court order King's Bench was that it had to be sold by a realtor. It was listed for $500,000 for six months without an offer, and then the lawyers came to us and said well, can you sell us? And we said you have to go back and get the order changed. We're not realtors, we're CLHBid. They got it changed and we started the bidding at $450,000 and it sold for a million. So that gives you an example of how list doesn't work. People don't trust that, and so where I'm going there is price discovery. We didn't see it working right.
Alle Carter:Yeah, you know we've also taken land that has been listed for a couple years even, and sold it for more than that list price. And after we actually called the high bidder and said I bet you wish you would have bought it at the list price and he said no, because on your system I know that it was worth that. I know someone is bidding 10,000 right behind me and I didn't overpay. Actually they just don't trust that that price because they wonder how much air is in it and for the farmer selling you're really capping yourself at what you'd ever get. You know you put that list price on it and everyone waits for the sign to rot off the fence post and for that price, just to start coming down for sure.
Alle Carter:Why would you ever?
Devon Davidson:you know you put a cap on that yeah, well, that seems like a good segue into the next question, which was you know what makes clh bid, uh, different from those more traditional methods of selling? So we've got private tender, uh, we've got public auction, we've got private sale and we've got professional realtors. So maybe talk a bit about each of those, how we're different and the benefits for the seller. I know we've got private sale and we've got professional realtors, so maybe talk a bit about each of those, how we're different and the benefits for the seller. I know we've touched on some of them already, but maybe dive into each one a little in more depth.
Alle Carter:But which one do you want to start?
Devon Davidson:with Raleigh Private tender, sale, auction or realtor.
Alle Carter:I guess we could continue maybe with the realtor, because we were kind of on that segue. So right off the bat, we are not realtors or auctioneers.
Alle Carter:You know we always ask that question at trade shows. Do you know about SaleHB? Oh, yeah, I see your vans around. Who are we? Oh, you must be an auctioneer or a realtor. We're not. So we are a law firm. Roy and I are lawyers and you know we have an exemption to trade in real estate and we have an exemption to trade in real estate, so we don't have to be realtors. And even if you go to a public auction, they still have to team up with a realtor and then a law firm. So that is how we are different, right off the bat, that way, and then kind of as we explained, with list price, there is just no price discovery.
Alle Carter:And also packaging. I think that is a huge one. We've seen where there's an assemblage of 40 quarters in saskatchewan and they try listing it just 40 quarters together for 20 million. Right, well, for every person that has 20 million dollars, you have 50. Who have, you know, 500 grand? Who will want to just buy one quarter? Yeah, so the way you package farmland really matters, and I think that just goes to our ag backgrounds. We understand it. We understand how it's farmed. You know, if this is farmed as a half, there's only access into it as a half. It has to be sold as this. But then one of my favorite stories that you always tell actually is kind of a segue, I think, into public auction. You know where you did for a lot of years take your clients to public auction because when they would come to you and ask how do I sell, kind of the only price discovery at that time was public auction. Right, and maybe you want to tell your story about that. Sure.
Roy Carter:Yeah, I, you know, I got out of law school at 23. And a client of mine, Don Pearson, and his wife June, walked into my office my first summer and they were some of the biggest, them and Borak, which became the biggest owner of Twin Otters worldwide. Ken Borak Both of those boys are from 40 miles, I hear 50 miles Adventurous, went to the North Slope and I got lucky, having Don as a client in June, and Don accumulated a lot of land and he came to me he'd lost two sons, so unfortunate came to me, you know, probably 15 years ago and said I want to sell my 28 quarters. I believed in price discovery, you know. He said well, what about if I do it locally? His comment was he was afraid of selling to what he called the black hats, right, the autorites, and uh, which is, you know, an issue for some and other people love them as neighbors and they couldn't find better neighbors, right, in his case, I don't think he really. He didn't live next to any colony, he just didn't understand it. But he was, he liked his neighbors and he'd get back to the community. He'd planted all the trees and height for free. Just a real class guy. So I said you know I'll take you to auction. And he said, no, I'm going to try and do it myself. And I was like no, you're going to have everybody upset because you're too good natured. So it turned out Dave Ritchie, who started Ritchie Brothers, was a good friend of his. They were about the same age and so we engaged and I'd taken a fair amount of clients to Richie Brothers. We engaged Dave and Dave actually said he'd fly up in his private jet and sit with Don. So the way we went on Theater B in Grande Prairie at RB and sale went rock star and went you know for well above what he expected.
Roy Carter:But you learn from a sale like that. You know I could see collusion, I could see neighbors talking, neighbors up there, who's on, who's off that type of deal. But when the sale was over, a guy walked up to me and, uh, you know don's number was x and he walked up and said, um, I'll give you a million more than the sum of what you just got. And I knew he wasn't kidding, I knew the guy and I said well, you know I can't do that. It's auction. Again, auction's different than tender. When it's auctioned it's over. In a tender situation I could have, maybe, but anyway, I said you know I can't do that. But I said why didn't you bid? And he said I can't start with, I'm not going to start what I can't finish. I'm not going to end up with 14 or what they call one rubber boot. Yeah, and he said it's too risky to get run because then I have to unload and, uh, you know, I drove out of theater b or I drove out of richie brothers that day and I thought, you know, we just left a million bucks in there, right, because we didn't have the right system, right? Yeah, and again, one of the benefits of getting old and seeing what doesn't work, right for sure.
Roy Carter:And that really is the start of our 'En Bloc', where we have two rounds to engage that second round, you know, and in that area, as part of building it, we looked around the world. A lot of countries were ahead of us New Zealand, australia in price discovery. There's one in the States called Iowa Auction where we looked at that, where they would bid out. Like Alle said, the key is you've got to bid out these individual quarters at first, and it's only fair to engage the smaller farmer too. Right, and what they'll do there is they'll bid out quarters and then, if it stops, say at $20 million, they restart. Don't make the big guys play the first round. And then they start at like $20 million plus $1 over where it stopped, right and the small guys in Iowa or in the Midwest down there see it as wasting their time. They're just price setters. So we took information like that and said, okay, that doesn't work from input down there, let's tweak it. And again we'd go back to buyers and say is this going to work for you? Interesting?
Devon Davidson:so yeah maybe just for our listeners explain 'En Bloc' just how that process works a little bit more in terms of sea lice bidcom I don't know if you want to talk about that or roy sure, yeah.
Alle Carter:So kind of you, kind of you're right the the Iowa auction method didn't work because the the smaller farmers said you know, I'm not even going to bother to go get financing, cause I'm just a price setter.
Alle Carter:So the the larger farmers were able to kind of just steal it.
Alle Carter:So when we developed 'En Bloc' we said okay, so the the larger farmer, who will pay a premium for the assemblage and who in the previous story, you know, was going to pay a million dollars for that assemblage over what they had, right, and so the larger farmer has to participate in that first round is the big difference. So each sale varies and each sale, you know, is tailored for what makes sense. But for example, if you have a sale of 10 quarters, someone would have to have bid on all parcels in the first round and maybe been high on three of the parcels to then be eligible to participate in that on-block round. So it does all get bid out in the first round and then there's eligibility requirements to participate in that on-block round, which could continue getting bid out and there's typically an on-block premium. So for example, in that one it might be, you know, depending on the land, a premium of $500,000.
Alle Carter:So then that on-block round, the bidding starts at $500,000, over and above the high bids in the first round, gotcha, yeah. So we really try to, you know, also cater to the smaller farmers. We're not out here to just cater to the, you know, the big guys per se, the colonies or anyone. We're really trying to make it fair for everyone and sometimes that's a misconception, so I just wanted to make that clear.
Devon Davidson:Right.
Roy Carter:It exists for that purpose to give everyone fair opportunity, right, yeah, if you're coming 20 miles or 10 miles, you don't want to be caught with half. That's right 'En Bloc' guarantees. You get all or none and buyers like it. And if they like it, that means more money for our seller. The more avenues that we can put out there that buyers engage, the better our client is. You know, have we have some people, uh, in the industry of selling land that said, you know, we'll say clh bid has this stupid french name right, and nobody can understand it. Believe me, buyers understand it and uh. But our answer to that is well, it's just another road. If you want to be high on all 28, you, it's still there. We didn't take the old highway out, right. But it might be really risky to try and be high on 28, right, right, yeah, uh well, you touched on it earlier.
Devon Davidson:Uh, rofers, right, right or first refusal and um, and tenant bias. That seems to be something that we encounter a lot with sales. You know they sellers say, well, I want to sell to my neighbor because he's been a good tenant or whatever, and so how do you approach that at seahorsebidcom? Like if someone comes to you and says I have a tenant and they have right of first refusal, what's your advice to them? Usually, like how does that process work?
Roy Carter:So we won't sell land with a rofer on it. You know it just kills the price. You know, we had a sale near Vermillion in our first or second year I guess, and the fellow had passed away and he'd told his wife to contact us. She lived in Sherwood Park then and the tenant had came to see her before the funeral and said you know, I want a roafer. And she said you know, he's been good, which is common, right? These owners have a good relationship with most of their tenants. And she said you know, ed said to call you, can I give him a roafer and tenants. And she said you know, ed said to call you, can I give him a rofer? And we said no, he doesn't need one. With clh bid, he can just bid and he's just a hair above everybody else and if you give him the trump card you're going to lose everybody, right, right. And we said we think on three quarters we estimated total gas. But we said we think it'll cost you half a million bucks. And it was like, well, I, you know, she had no idea, right, and people will go and seek advice and say, well, a roofer cost me any money. And it's like, no, it just means I got to pay what somebody else was. But that's not true, because nobody shows up at the party.
Roy Carter:But on that sale we had numerous calls from that Vermillion area saying is there a roafer on that land or not? And if there is, we're backing away and we would have to email. And then it was like this is really weird. And then we found out later after the sale that the tenant actually was spreading the rumor they had a roafer to basically kill the price, right. So you know, they come about hundreds of years ago for good reason, before communication. Right, you know, I'm looking after your asset or whatever in england. Don't sell it out from under me. Give me a chance, yeah, uh. But and now, there's absolutely no reason for a roafer if it's a public sale. So you know, you know our advice to landowners if you're doing a lease and the tenant wants a roafer, give it to him, but exempt out that. If it's a public sale, he doesn't need it. He's got the right or she's got the right to bid right Right.
Roy Carter:Otherwise it can drastically affect you right.
Devon Davidson:And if they come to you with a tenant, with a roafer, you just advise them to basically hold out until the end of the term of the lease.
Roy Carter:Exactly, Devon. You know some are good, some tenants, you know, when I say good, they would probably have a different view. Some will just say, hey, I don't have a problem, mabel, I know you want your money. You've lost your husband. I'm okay with the sale, I can bid, so that's my rofer. Other ones will take a hard line and it's like no, I'm going to, that rofer's staying and you're going to end up waiting to monetize your land, right? So some will, yeah, sometimes offer them a bit of money or something to get rid of it. It all varies upon how hard and fast the tenant is on keeping it.
Alle Carter:Yeah, and I think that kind of goes into private sale really nicely, where we say that. You know, we really try to take the stress off the seller, as we mentioned earlier. And it's hard to when you're farming in an area you're farming next to. You know land around me hasn't moved much. You know it's been the same family since my great-grandfather was here. You have, you know, long relations with those families. Sometimes you're farming next to a nephew, Sometimes your nephew is farming your land or you have a really great tenant and in our case you can tell all of those people you've been a great tenant, You're a great nephew. I hope you get it.
Alle Carter:You can bid on sale day and you're not picking between people, You're not choosing relations, You're not trying to figure out okay, he's offered me this much, how much more are you going to offer me? Everyone at the end of the day doesn't like that and they all kind of back off if they feel like they're getting played a little bit. And so with our system everyone does have a fair opportunity. But you're not the one trying to choose who to sell it to, because in the end you're not going to make anyone happy. We sold land down by Claire's home and the seller thought that the Hutterites would probably buy it, but knew that if he sold directly to them, all the neighbors in the area would be mad, so put it on our site. And they did end up buying it. And he said you know, all the neighbors kept talking to me because they know that they could have bid. They had the opportunity, they were bidding, they just, you know, didn't keep going totally getting back to the house deal.
Roy Carter:You know, often it's the widow, um, on the farm. And you know, as a kid growing up I used to watch my dad. You know um mix carbine in a sprayer tank with his arm right. And the amount of farmers around here that went before their wives is scary right.
Roy Carter:Yeah, and so I don't know if that was part of it, but definitely as a kid I saw stuff that you know we don't see nowadays so often. It was a case that we saw, you know, 82-yearabel at the kitchen table and the tenant has been plowing her out, he has been cultivating her garden, he has been good to her. Yeah, and it's like you know, mabel, your, your lands were 300, 000 a quarter right, and she had, and they're not adversarial, you know, they're beautiful people, right? Yeah, and I think farmers by nature are not adversarial, so they had no way to say no. And uh, you know, they certainly weren't going to go sell it out from under the tenant, and often deals were done under jiras, in my mind, where you know that was part of the reason for clh bit as well, you know. Basically, give mabel a chance to say, hey, you've been awesome to me, you've been good, I hope you get it, but I don't know what it's worth. Yeah, you bet One of our. It was actually booked to be our first sale and it was a cousin to the fellow, the couple that come into my office that had the tender shop by the lawyer, and so then she heard about us through her cousin and said sell my quarter.
Roy Carter:And a beautiful lady, naomi Eumann. She had a jewelry store in a small town and she got it right away and I still remember the day she got Wi-Fi in her car and tried to go see it, but she was just really cool. Anyway, she said sell my quarter. And it was like, really Like, are you in that community? And it was like, yeah, all these neighbors come in and all the guys and they, oh, naomi, I love your jewelry and all this. And she said they go to Costco and buy it and I'm sponsoring their kids in the hockey teams, yeah, and she said let's figure out what it's worth. And you know it was. It was fun that day.
Roy Carter:We, we didn't. She didn't end up being our first client. We did sell her in our first year, but we take her away from those buyers. We went and sat with her and she said Betty, my friend has a Dunvegan Inn, let's go and we'll have a few drinks and watch the sale, right, yeah? And you know she was late 70s or something then. And just with a few seconds to go there was a bid and she texted her son and said, oh, we sold it for 400. And I was told by an evaluation it was 240 and uh, you know, and it was like it's not done yet, right. And the bidding started. The next day, the the buyer went walking downtown fairview on the street and a guy come across the street you know, in the old towns 300 foot wide streets and came across and said you know what are you doing? Wrecking land prices in the area. What's going on? And the guy that bought it said to him why don't you go find the guy that was number two bidder? He's the problem right? And it's like, oh, okay.
Roy Carter:But, anyway, we've really, I think, leveled the playing field and allowed those people to say you know, I don't want to wreck our relationship, You've been good, but just bid yeah.
Devon Davidson:Yeah Well, the next question I had here like farmland values have been growing in past years, I think the FCC report was at 12% nationwide last year. Um, but one function of CLH bid is is maximizing value for farmland. Right, that's one of our functions for our sellers. So how do you balance that maximizing value with transparency and fairness for buyers, like there's kind of that push and pull right. How do you balance that?
Alle Carter:Right off. You know. So on our site it does appear like an auction on sale day. It is online on our website and it's open for an hour and bidding will continue beyond that hour if there's bids in the last two minutes. But being a law firm, when they bid they also bid the offer to purchase. So we allow a lot more control for the seller. But kind of where I'm going here is we can also come up with some pretty unique solutions for buyers as well. You know we have a sale coming up where we had an interested party come to us and say would your client offer a vendor, take back you?
Alle Carter:know, personal mortgage and we said you know we'll take it to her Absolutely, and she agreed. So they're actually carrying 80% of the purchase price over five years and that's huge for the buyers For sure. So we will work that only maximizes value for our client. Whether they get it in the end, maybe, maybe not, but they will keep bidding and continue increasing that value for our seller. So we do really try to come up with solutions to engage all parties, with FCC still providing 100% financing based on existing equity too. That's also very promising for buyers.
Roy Carter:Yeah, I think exactly where you're going. I think the key is you've got to we respect buyers. They have the money, but you've got to give them confidence of values there. We never sell stuff for over fair market value. You know it sells for fair market value. So they don't have to overpay. They're just a hair more than somebody else but they get total comfort in when they're outbid. But part of that is integrity too. After eight years we've never bought one acre of land. Uh, you know, we don't have proxies where the house knows what somebody's going to go to, etc. Um, and a big deal too is that I think they trust a law firm and we don't disclose any names. So that's a big deal for people not to lose relationships, whether it be, you know, friends, cousins, neighbors or whatever. They don't mind if they own it, but they don't want their name out if they're second right. And they do know historically. You know other avenues. Uh, you know, we'll see.
Roy Carter:Now there's a thing called progressive tender, which has really been around forever. But some realtors are seeing what we're doing and then kind of coming into the tender space a bit. It's really bid shopping, which in some cases is illegal. But really what they do is they get rounds and you know sometimes they'll rent a hotel room and they'll let people bid around and then some go home and then some stay, but by the end of it and there was just one, you know, in northern Alberta recently a law firm did Everybody knew who was on at the end and people really don't like that and some people don't even participate. It's like, you know, I don't mind buying land but I don't want to lose relationships and you know they't mind buying land but I I don't want to lose relationships and you know they're tight communities right for sure they are.
Devon Davidson:Yeah, ali, you just mentioned it, but each sale is unique and part of our process is that sellers have more control over the process, so maybe just touch on how that works in practice. I mean, what, what type of control? What things can they do custom for their sale?
Alle Carter:absolutely so. So I would say everything is customized. So you know right from the first phone call we kind of figure out why are you selling. You know what does your land look like, what is your goal If you want to stay. You know we understand it's a huge decision to move off the farm in a lot of cases. So, for example, we've had couples before that say you know, I really just want to stay in my house for a couple more years, so we've subdivided their house off and then maybe that is also an option to the high bidder of the home quarter. Really, you know anything we can customize that way. And then the offer to purchase you know everything's in there. So often we have where we sell. You know they say well, when can I sell my, my lease agreements? Not up until you know when the crops off, so we can actually sell in the summer. And then the possession in that offer to purchase is subject to the tenant getting the crop off Also something that you know we'll have an episode on, as well as the whole. You know, maximizing after-tax dollars. That's huge and very unique to everyone's circumstances whether they've already used a lot of their capital gains, how the land is held.
Alle Carter:We do really understand that space and we really love to tell a story. It kind of goes into the marketing a little bit, but each farm has a story and so we really immerse ourselves and try to tell that story. So we have, you know, we do the typical drone videography, the still, you know photography, and then we have a script writer come in and really bring that farm to life. You know we like to sit at the table and listen to what used to go on around here and what their favorite parts about it are. You know, often they'll say that little piece over there is, it would be great for a young family to build a house.
Alle Carter:We'll tell that story and then we have a, you know, voice actor that reads over that script and we pair it all together. And we've had, you know, quite a few people who don't even need to go look at the land nowadays and they sometimes even call us after the high bidder and say you know, was there a house on that ranch I just bought? And I have to laugh sometimes. But you know, buying land has changed quite a bit. So really nothing is out of the question for customization on our platform. I would say.
Roy Carter:I would say a big deal is set exit date. You can do all the tax planning you want, but if you don't have a set exit date, it's thrown in the garbage for sure. Uh, you know, if you go to list it then and and Trudeau's changing the plans, you know this year, um, I was driving one day from Saskatoon and it should have been like a nice weather. People had been seating, but it was a snowstorm and I think we I think I was talking to you that day Devon like the end of April, yeah, but it was wicked roads, yeah, and you know this.
Roy Carter:I was just a client, had called from Southern Alberta and said can you get us to the curb? Before Trudeau's change? I think it was June 26th or whatever the inclusion rate, right? Yep, and you can't do that with a listing, right? No? And so he said but that's really short, uh, so how do we, how do you get us to the curb? Save like tremendous amount in tax, but allow these people to bid right. And it's like yeah, we can do it, we'll have the sale before, we'll close it before. Super tight fuse then, because you need about 30 days to close for sure so we're really talking the sale in a four-week period yeah
Roy Carter:and uh, but we'll do a vendor take back and basically allow the buyer then to pay in full in the fall. But be on side with CRA, right, and the sale was fabulous, some of the highest, we're told by FCC highest dry land sale ever in Western Canada, two and a half million a quarter for non-irrigated. So it's those kinds of things that you can control. We think our seller client owns the land. They should be able to call the shots. Where with a realtor, the shots are called by a purchaser, they, they make the offer, right, you know, and it's it's kind of backwards, right. So we take the control. It allows us, you know, with share deals as well. There's a fair amount of land in farm corporations, right, and so that's a whole different animal allows us to do the share deal on a on a set date to deal with that issue.
Devon Davidson:So yeah, okay, um, for executives or executors and beneficiaries when they're dealing with estate sales because that's something we deal with quite often I know we've talked about it lots where it's the kids of whoever is actually selling the land, what's the real advantage for them in using clhbidcom?
Alle Carter:Yeah, yeah. So executors have a duty to, you know, maximize the estate for the beneficiaries, essentially, and so they have a lot of pressure to figure out what's this land worth? How am I going to sell it? How am I going to make sure that all the beneficiaries are happy with it at the end of the day? And don't come back on me and say, you know, you sold it below fair market value or something, and so often there's you know, we've seen estates with 18 beneficiaries that you can get quite big ones.
Alle Carter:And how do you keep everyone happy? How do you pick? You know, know, everyone has a relationship with a realtor. Someone wants to use their friend. What's this list price? Who do we sell it to? Maybe some of the beneficiaries in some cases are farming and you know, might want to buy the land, and so how do we make it fair for everyone? And so on our site, as we've alluded to before, you can, everyone has a chance, and then at the end of the day you can't say that that wasn't fair market value. You know, with the amount of marketing we put into it, everyone had the opportunity to participate. You know it's fair for all. So it really does also relieve that burden from the executors.
Devon Davidson:All right, we're going to switch gears a little bit here, guys. We're going to move into early days of CLHBidcom, maybe get into some stories and some fun stuff like that. So the first question was just looking back at early days, what challenges did you face getting that platform off the ground? How long from concept to product was it and what challenges did you face?
Roy Carter:Maybe I'll go there first.
Roy Carter:It was basically the two of us. Alle was riding at a high level, then jumping, show jumping with a team out of Vancouver and ever since that incident with the tender shop it was like somebody should build something here to fix this. And I still recall a call from Pilot Mound from a lawyer saying and I'd sent him I I still recall a call from pilot mound from a lawyer saying and I'd sent him a tender for a client and he called me and said you know, my guy doesn't like the guy that's high, uh, will you guy move a bit? But he doesn't have to match it and it was like man, that's crazy dirty this game, right, right. And uh, it was just, and you would get clients in that would say will you tender ten dollars over the highest, and it's just like sleazy stuff. But you saw it, it was going on all the time, right, and so anyway, it was like you almost sort of don't. I hardly told my wife because I had to spend money, but I started meeting IT people but basically it was because of Ali's connection. I knew a guy that was into marketing in Vancouver and then he knew IT people and so away we went and it was basically a Russian that had emigrated. That was the IT guy, programmer, and it was kind of a shoestring budget.
Roy Carter:But I'd listen to these kids around the riding at Thunderbird show stables in Vancouver and they'd be trading stuff on the internet and me kind of old school but I was listening and it was like then they would get close to closing and it would go like to a Tim Hortons to meet this person, yeah, and do the transaction, right, and it was like, man, I gotta somehow that it's got to be online the answer to this problem, right, sure, so that's kind of where we started and then then, you know, built from there. But the little old lady with the jewelry store was supposed to be the first client a year out. So we had lots of time until a guy by the name of Tommy Roycroft and Carol just the beauty of a guy come into my office December 22, 2016. And he had his cowboy hat on, really-respected, uh, thoroughbred trainer, him and his sons, anyway come in and, uh, they had one son with him and he was sitting there and it was like want to sell my ranch, right? It was like, okay, um, and I was listening to him and it was like man, oh man, this is exactly our space, what I'm working on, right and uh. So I said like in the next year or two, and he said no, by april.
Roy Carter:So it was like tommy and uh. So and he had like uh, nine or ten quarters, uh, butting to the smoky. But it was a beautiful layout and but I knew the problem, one of the problems with auction couldn't take him to auction because the guy that takes the home quarter then can steal everything else, right, so everybody else goes to their truck, he takes the power of the water, uh, so, and we always say take the heart and leave the carcass. And we knew that was a big problem with auction on choice. So I knew I couldn't take tommy to auction, even though I'd taken farmers with raw land.
Roy Carter:This was not a case, right, and I'm just, um, you know, sitting there listening to it and it's like, oh my lord. And and so I I disclosed to him, you know, I said I'm I'm working on the answer to this deal. Can you wait? And he was like, no, I want to move. We got more horses coming, and so I explained my, what I was going to. I was going to go to an online tender system to clean it all up, um, all transparency and all the stuff.
Roy Carter:But I said it won't be ready and, uh, I won't use the exact words, but he, he basically said you know, get it blank blank ready yeah, and I I said uh, are you telling me you'll give me your whole ranch on april 5th, and this is december 22nd? And uh, yeah, he stood up and shook my hand and said you got it wow so I went home, told my wife that we're not going on holidays, so basically had Christmas and flew to Vancouver and we had a set date and didn't even know the name of CLH bid but started dealing with programmers and and sort of went from there.
Alle Carter:Was it the night before the sale. He gave you a call and said are you going to put some signs out here, roy? It's like, oh, we didn't think about that.
Roy Carter:Yeah, so I mean it was. It wasn't easy, Luckily, you know, just a few days he was the 22nd New Year's Eve my wife and I went to a New Year's Eve party at Mad Hatter's and a good friend of ours that I knew was like top drawer is videography and that was Mike Reeve, who was a big part of our team.
Alle Carter:Yep Producer Mike yeah.
Roy Carter:And Mike was there and Mike Crystal, his wife, just got married, married but was terminally ill with cancer. I hadn't seen Mike and I knew he had class guy, just parked everything for a year and you know, mike had lost weight and disheveled and he was all in. But I talked to him a bit that night, you know, and I said, you know, I got this idea and I know you're the guy for it, but I won't bug you. And he kind of gave me his word. You know, roy, a day or two or something, I'll do it right. And so he said he had some different ideas and we knew if we were going to do it. We wanted to market different, and then things kind of got a bit crazy.
Roy Carter:Then Tommy the rancher, of course, had some people that heard, maybe, what he was going to do, and one was kind of a shirttail relative and made him an offer to avoid us, right. And so anyway, tommy, I still remember the night In January it was dark and I got the call and it was like Roy, yeah, and it's like I got this offer for this amount, right. And it's like, wow, tommy, you better take it right. And I'm good, tommy, you know. And he said, no, roy. He said I wouldn't have this offer if it wasn't for you. And it's like that's a real person, right. And it was like I don't know if we can get it for you, tommy. And it's like, no, I'm good, I'm all in, wow, and uh, yeah, not many people.
Roy Carter:So, uh, mike or eve and I, uh, we at that time we didn't drone, we mike organized a helicopter, yeah, and we got up in the helicopter and, uh, I got a text from the relative saying we'd be safer on the ground. Uh and uh. But mike did basically the start of the CLH bid, visual side, where voice actor, great video work, and I mean people were shocked by it. Going to to Alle point, yeah, it was busy. I went to watch her ride down to California and the her coaches thought I was mad at him, but I had to just go back to the house and type because the website had to be built by this date, right? So, um, yeah, it was. Uh.
Roy Carter:And Tommy did call me a couple days before the sale and said, hey, roy, there's trucks out. It was spring early. And he said there's trucks out all over here in the mud and there's no signs, they can't find the land. And it's like, oh man, yeah, we forgot signs. So I emailed um, I have a hobby in photography went in photoshop, did up a sign that is our sign today. Uh, true story. And I emailed it to sos graphics and uh, tommy said you know, if you just get them that sign, uh, I'll go pick them up. And uh, him and dale Stark went and picked up the signs and they put them on some poplar trees around their fence posts. And, yeah, I had a white background with the same arrow and CLH this land for sale, and all we did is reverse colors.
Alle Carter:But yeah, anyway, we've learned a lot. Now our signs have cement bases. They're pickered with a semi truck, you know that was something else that we tried to do a bit differently, but uh, it's been fun well.
Devon Davidson:So that kind of leads into a couple other questions I had. So the, the, the platform itself. For the first question is it's, it's completely proprietary, correct, like it's. This isn't. Uh. Wordpress with a plug-in like this is built custom from the ground up yeah, absolutely we have.
Alle Carter:Uh, you and I have meetings with the programmers once, I think, every other week. There's a lot of things that go into it. There's a lot of people out there that just use plug-ins and it's just so much harder to control and to customize. All of ours is 100% custom. The two-minute refresh on the clock that took a lot of work 'En Bloc' Universal close to make sure all parcels stay live so that if parcel one's going for too much you can go down to parcel three and if it's going too high go back to two, and you know just ways of maximizing value that we can really, really customize. You know we've had some ranches recently that have wanted options for their. They've had a really nice angus herd have an option for my cows.
Alle Carter:Great, we will customize that. We will work on it. Um, nothing is, I would say, too big to say no to yeah, and part of that is we answer to the law society.
Roy Carter:Um, you know, we sort of have a different boss and um, which is a fairly high level. So if you have third-party plugins and you know where's your information Right, you know, and, and where the bidder, when we tell bidders their names will never be disclosed. We need to have everybody in house. You know, right now we have two full-time programmers and again, you know it's a, it's a team. They one farms himself and into the sheep business, but he was programming for a company that was doing work worldwide, right, and yeah, we've got an amazing team, but it's all in-house.
Alle Carter:Yeah, and we're very selective about who we bring in on our team. You know we really like dealing with real people and you know we don't just hire salesmen to go out and try to get some farms. You know, if we hire ranchers farmers if you're selling a grain farm, you will get someone who knows grain farming. If you're selling a ranch, you will get a rancher. We really do care about the people and we want to offer the best services that we can for them.
Devon Davidson:Yeah, totally. You're not going to find a better team anywhere in any business. I can for sure say that. No, absolutely, it's a special team. I'm happy to be a part of it. No question, how much has the platform changed from day one to today?
Alle Carter:Yeah, I think in some ways quite a bit, in some not so much. I know, for that first sale, the Rycroft one, I was actually sitting in Sociology 101 or something. It was three days long. I remember for the first two days there was no bids. Mom was texting me thinking she should cancel the celebratory food she'd ordered. It was like is anything going to happen? And then everyone waits for the last 10 minutes always. So it's like let's shorten this up, let's not waste three days of people's time. You know they're, uh, sometimes seeding, harvesting. They don't need to be on their phone for that. So we now do it for an hour and the clock will keep extending. We've always had that.
Alle Carter:Um, the looks of the site have changed quite a bit. We didn't have universal clothes at the start. I know, uh, I think it was christmas time, we uh were with the family and, uh, we're watching a bull sale and it was like this is pretty cool, they all stay live. So you know your bull that you thought you were gonna buy is going too high, so you go back up to the other one, uh, and so we figured you know we need to have that. But yeah, the bones, like the videography and everything have really since the start we took that pretty seriously to do well.
Roy Carter:I would say the layers. You know every sale. You learn. You know the layers of tax. You know foreign ownership, all of that. I mean the team there has just got deeper and deeper. You know and it's you know realtors. We can do what realtors do. We can do 100% what they do. They can't do what we do.
Devon Davidson:Right.
Roy Carter:It's, you know, and the analogy I'm not sure a good one, but maybe it's. You know, if you need your eyes, if you need glasses and need your eyes checked, you can go to Walmart to the optometrist. Then they're good. But, you know, if you got a problem with your eyes, you go to an ophthalmologist, right, and I guess that's what we see ourselves as. We're not one dimensional. You know, we'd like sometimes to engage two, three years ahead of time from a tax point of view, right, and then we go right to the close.
Roy Carter:This is not a, you know, a listing deal where the sign blows over in the ditch. We're start to finish, right, yeah, and there's one phone number to call if there's any issues, right for sure. So it's. It's quite different from that point of view. You've got a sale now where you know there's know what you don't know, um, and there's right, there's a rule with cra that, uh, this daughter that's selling some land, if she listed it and put it on the market before three years are up, she's offside. It's not the sale date, you know, and who would think? Think of that, right.
Devon Davidson:Yeah.
Roy Carter:So, you know, they approach us and it's like, yeah, no, we basically can't talk. You got to park, stay on side, get on side, and then we can talk about marketing, right, yeah, so it's, it's that's a, you know, a three-year deal, um, but that's fine, but that's uh, that's a space, we, um, we live and uh, so we believe there's a lot of added value in all of the other layers, right?
Alle Carter:yeah, that's to make sure she got her capital gains exemption, right? Yeah you're talking about.
Devon Davidson:Yeah, totally right yeah, uh, just going back to that first sale, the very first first deal, like what was the end result? It went well. Did you get to eat your celebratory food? Did that all go okay?
Roy Carter:Yeah, alana, Alle mom, my wife, you know. She said like, should we book someplace, kind of like your Oilers, if they order the champagne for the seventh, the game, don't do that, don't do that. And uh. So I said don't do that, you know, let's do food and then you can just what it will give it away or something. If it doesn't go, get it. I would say we got lucky that day, um, you know, and um, but sometimes you make your own luck too, I guess. But we, we got lucky. It went really well. Um, the food arrived, the bidding started with about 15 minutes to go and we set new prices that day. So it was a game changer. We beat the number that Tommy was offered in January that I was afraid I couldn't beat. Tommy got to the racetrack and won a unbelievable number of races.
Roy Carter:It was on a Wednesday. We went out and had a bit of a shaker that night with his family and I was having coffee the next morning with alana and it was like man, we were so busy the last four months you didn't have time to be scared, right, and Alle got a saying from her writing on her tack deal that says obstacles are those things in life, you see, when you take your eyes off your goal. And that was it. It was Thursday morning, having coffee with Alana, and it was like I jumped a crevice and I could hear rocks falling behind me. It was like holy shit, you know what could have happened. And it's like you just have another sip of coffee and it didn't happen.
Roy Carter:Right, yeah, so had a lot of things come right and but it was, you know, starting it right too, with Mike Reeve and his videography, and we still have the same voice, guy, guy, yeah and uh, you know, obviously our marketing was local. I think we had one radio station uh, well, you know that that's all changed. But the core basics were, you know, don't disclose names true price discovery. It was.
Devon Davidson:It was there at day one, I would say yeah, what's been the feedback across western canada from from clients and other buyers in terms of the platform? But you know, what have they had to say? I'm hoping?
Alle Carter:mostly good, but maybe there's some some some feedback there too you know, we were just at the red deer farm show and I think we had quite a few buyers come up to us and say I love bidding on your site For the you know facts that we've mentioned. We don't disclose them. He said you know I've been, I know I've been bidding against my neighbor, but he won't know that. You know I can still go have coffee with him, that type of thing. And then, yeah, from our sellers I would say they're happy, they like it.
Roy Carter:Yeah, definitely, sellers like us more than buyers. There's some sellers or buyers rather that wished we weren't around, right, they'd prefer to go to the old folks home or the kitchen table or whatever. Sure, uh, you know, so we do. We get the odd rudy email about destroying farm, the farm community and all that. Uh, yeah, no doubt about that, you know. I think generally, though, definitely sellers, it's the big deal is stress-free, maximize value, you know, and we now have.
Roy Carter:We have a one law firm in manitoba that's reached out and said you know, this old school tender, doesn't? You know, even though they do it as part of their business, it doesn't work and they know that you know. They were telling us here a while ago. We had a Zoom call with them, la, and we've done some work where they'll refer clients to us now. But they said they had a tender and they tendered for a client, put the tender out. They had 11 tenders come in. Half of them were their own clients and one got it.
Roy Carter:And what they said is we had one happy person and everybody else thinks we either bid, shopped, shopped it to our best client. They're all upset, right. So, um, from that point of view, we just had a call yesterday with a big farm advisory um business that uh had heard about us and uh, so I would say generally receptive, for sure. Definitely there is some buyers that aren't a fan of ours but they do like that. They know they don't overpay and I believe they trust us Right. So they just think maybe they could get it cheaper if we weren't around.
Alle Carter:And what I always say is you know, it works great being at the kitchen table if you're the one at the kitchen table. You know how many times are you not, though, and how many times do you wish you would have had a chance at it, and so we're just giving everyone a chance at it, for sure.
Alle Carter:Something else I want to say, too, is we are so not out here to destroy the family farm. That's something that, you know, we all hold very dear to our heart. We're sitting in our family farm because I don't want to sell it. So, um, we get that if you have kids that can keep farming by all means. That is everyone's dream. But there's some people who don't have that, and so we are here to help. You know those folks.
Devon Davidson:A hundred percent. Uh, what's one success story for each of you that stands out the most after eight going into nine years of CLHBidcom.
Roy Carter:Well, you think I'll maybe you know, for me it wouldn't be one, you know, and it's not numbers, it's not our biggest sale. We can change people's lives and we have. For me, probably the special deal is the widow where you know, maybe she's got two or three quarters but you know, you can maybe double what she would have sold for the the one at vermillion. I was saying she was offered one for we got her two, four and with some tax planning she would doubled her money. And she was a pretty young widow. Her life's changed and we, we went and watched the sale with her and uh, she poured wine and uh, it was like this is why we did this. There's nobody bugging her today. They're killing each other, bidding and she's having a wine, right, yeah, and she just doubled her money. So those events are game game changers. To have an idea to actually assist people you know in in those situations.
Alle Carter:Yeah, yeah, I would say mine are very similar. Those ones are always dear to our hearts. One popped into my mind, though Bridget and I actually went and met them not too far from here, so kind of in the Peace Country, and I had sheep at the time, and so I was with their sheep hanging out and you know, they had no idea what their land was worth. They lived in a pretty small modular home and they kind of just wanted to get a get ahead of it a little bit. You know, things were kind of on the on the downturn and, like I said, they didn't know what it was worth. So we started bidding, and I think it doubled the start bid that day or something. And anyway she texted me. We weren't together, but I got a video of them watching it and crying and cheering, and it's just, we care about, you know, the people, and so seeing those really makes my heart warm.
Devon Davidson:That's awesome. I love that. Uh, last question here for someone that's considering selling, but they're not sure about the best method or platform for them. What would your advice be to them in determining if clhbitcom is a fit or or maybe maybe not?
Roy Carter:I would say give us a call. You know, that's one thing. We're not a fit for everybody. Uh, you know, if you've got too many improvements and you got a home quarter, we won't take it. Uh, we're not walmart, uh, it's got a we. One thing we've made as a team is a promise never to over promise and under deliver. So give us a call. We don't mind spending time looking at your assemblage and talk to you. We don't take over advisors and either. Our tax people work with yours. So there's no fee for basically discussions, zoom calls, meetings in person, and we'll be honest with yours. So, uh, there's no fee, um, for basically discussions, zoom calls, meetings in person, and, uh, we'll be honest with you. Definitely we don't take everything that, uh, everybody that calls us.
Alle Carter:Yeah, we just want to have a conversation. I think all we ever ask is just to have a chance to sit down and talk. Um, and yeah, we'll be very honest if it doesn't fit our platform, but we just want to have that and see if it does.
Devon Davidson:And go from there. Yeah, okay. Well, unless there's any parting words from either one of you, I think that's going to do it for our inaugural episode here.
Roy Carter:Thanks, Evan.
Devon Davidson:Thank you very much, yeah, thanks guys, a lot of fun having you here For our listeners. If you enjoyed what you heard here today, please. If you enjoyed what you heard here today, please consider leaving a five-star review on your platform of choice. It helps us get found on the algorithms and it helps other listeners to find us for information that may be applicable to them. Make sure you give us a follow on social media as well. We're on Twitter or X, we're on YouTube, we're on Facebook, we're basically everywhere you want to find us, so give us a follow. And then, of course, this wouldn't be a podcast with a little bit of shameless promotion. So if you are interested in selling farmland, please reach out to us. All of our contact information is available on our website at clhbidcom. Thanks for tuning in. I hope this was a positive exchange for you.
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