Hope Is Not a Strategy
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In this episode, Mike Hansen, a commercial real estate broker with Sotheby's International Realty, shares his unique journey from the fitness industry to specializing in vineyard and winery sales. He discusses the challenges facing the wine industry, the importance of understanding financial metrics, and the role of institutional investors and lifestyle buyers in the market. Mike emphasizes the value of building connections, providing value to the community, and the complexities involved in selling wineries. He also shares insights on using CRM tools and leveraging LinkedIn for networking, concluding with life advice on being present and enjoying life.
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Takeaways
- Mike Hansen transitioned from the fitness industry to real estate.
- An MBA can enhance financial understanding in real estate.
- The wine industry is facing significant challenges.
- Institutional investors are interested in large vineyards.
- Lifestyle buyers are becoming more discerning in their purchases.
- Selling wineries involves complex due diligence.
- Building connections is crucial in the wine industry.
- CRM tools help streamline sales processes.
- LinkedIn is a valuable platform for networking.
- Being present in the moment is essential for well-being.
Chapters
Introduction to Mike Hansen and His Journey 00:00:00
From Fitness to Real Estate: A Unique Path 00:04:02
The Value of an MBA in Real Estate 00:08:41
Understanding the Wine Industry 00:12:11
Current Challenges in the Wine Market 00:15:10
Institutional Investment in Vineyards 00:18:09
The Role of Lifestyle Buyers in Wine 00:22:02
The Complexity of Selling Wineries 00:25:04
Building Connections in the Wine Industry 00:26:56
Financing Family Farms 00:32:30
Using CRM for Sales Success 00:34:43
Leveraging LinkedIn for Networking 00:38:10
Final Thoughts and Life Advice 00:46:11
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Jonathan Mahrt (A):
This is on the Flywheel, a podcast where each week we talk to entrepreneurs and professionals about the practical things they do to build and keep momentum in their personal and professional lives. Hello and welcome to on the Flywheel. My name is Jonathan Martin with Flywheel Consulting, and today I'm excited to have on the podcast Mike Hanson, a commercial real estate broker with Sotheby's International Realty. Thanks for coming on today.
Michael Hansen (B):
No problem. Thank you for having me.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So I always, I'm looking forward to this conversation because I think it's a little bit different. We've had, I've had a real estate, like a traditional real estate person on before, but that was just residential. So I'm excited to. This is like, you work in a very unique space, so I'm excited to kind of chat about that and learn about that. But first I'd love for you to just give us a overview of your career and how you got to where you are today and a little bit about your background.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, yeah, sounds good. Well, I took a very strange path to where I am today. My family is in the wine industry. Both my mom and dad are winemakers. So was born in Napa, kind of bounced up and down throughout the state. Went to high school in San Luis Obispo, started college down in Santa Barbara, was an athlete. So I got my undergrad in kinesiology. Then I became, you know, a personal trainer. And I was working my way up kind of in the health and wellness space. Eventually got to being a vice president level at a pretty prominent health and wellness group, kind of doing the corporate fitness wellness thing. And I was working a lot and that, that dovetailed into managing golf courses and, and really kind of, you know, know doing a large scale operation with them. And I was doing real estate as kind of a side hustle. And at this time I was selling homes and I was doing pretty good at it and I was working a lot, so, you know, for maybe 55, 60 hour weeks at the golf course. And you know, golf courses have restaurants and, you know, events and all that sort of stuff. So just working all the time. And my wife had attempted to get her real estate license and didn't finish the program. And so we had all these real estate books lying around and I was like, you know what I've heard, it's not that hard. I'm just gonna do it. So I got my real estate license, started selling.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So she made the attempt first.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, she didn't get it over the finish line. And so the books were lying there And I was like, hey, man, it costs, like, 250 bucks to get it. So I just. I did it really quick, and. And then I sold a few. My wife and I bought a house and then sold a couple homes for friends, and I was doing fairly well, and the tax advantages are good. And so she was like, why don't you just quit your day job and just do that? So I quit my day job, and I happened to be touring at that time a group that my dad was working with at several different vineyards. They were looking at possible acquisitions. And so I was freshly off the MBA program, and I was like, you know what? I'm going to put together some proformas. I'm going to describe what the investment profile looks on all these ranches so that when we get there, I can hand over these, you know, polished decks and they can look at that sort of stuff. And then I did that, and we happened to go to three different properties. They're all listed by the same guy, and he saw my decks, and he was like, you know what? Like, you should come work with me. And so I ended up working with him for a couple of years, and then that was really great. Learned a lot. Kind of found that this is my, you know, vineyard and winery sales is really my niche, and that's where I like to be. That's what I find interesting. And so that, you know, was kind of set the stage for. For what is now, you know, I transitioned away from the partnership with that guy, and I'm, you know, working by myself at Sotheby's. By myself. But, yeah, so that was, you know, kind of how I got to where I am. Very cool.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So you were. So what inspired you to go get your MBA if you're selling residential real estate? It doesn't seem to me a natural fit to go get an MBA if you're just doing. Doing that. Yeah, well, I mean, I don't want to say just doing that. Right. I don't mean it like that, but it just. That doesn't. That's not something people typically do.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, well, I was kind of stuck a little bit in the. In the fitness and wellness space, in the timeline. I tried to make it kind of coherent, but what happened was I was working at a golf course selling memberships. I had kind of moved away from the fitness side of things, and I was selling memberships, and my wife was like, look, you're. You're not going to. Your trajectory is not going to land that high, right? Because, you know, you have a kinesiology degree and not to disparage anybody that's done that degree, it is hard in the sciences category. But she was like, look, you're going to plateau and so why don't you go and do your mba? And. And I was like, okay, all right. It was. Sonoma State was not over, you know, too expensive to do. And I did want to have a little bit more rigor in terms of my financial understanding in my back pocket. And it did end up opening a of doors for me in terms of both my understanding of, of commercial real estate, but also it helped me progress much more quickly in the, in the fitness and wellness space before I made the jump.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, very, very cool. So who would you. Just for those that might be thinking about getting an MBA now that you've gone through a pro a program and you went to like Sonoma State has, it's a, it's a state school. It has a, it has a good program, but it wouldn't be what someone would consider like an elite MBA program. And so there's lots of, there's lots of programs out that, out there. But so what would you recommend people think about if they're trying to make that decision to go get an mba?
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, I think being committed to, to financial understanding and literacy inside of business is never going to be something that will do you, do you bad. I think understanding how to read a P and L A balance sheet cash flow statement, understanding health metrics of a business, understanding profitability and all of the ratios, you know, profit profitability indexes that are used in, can only help you formulate opinions about, number one, how to make your own investments, number two, how to run a healthy and successful business. And you know, as we move into kind of uncharted territory in terms of the, the national business environment with all the AI and stuff, it's, it's, you know, now more than ever you have to be able to understand inside and out if your business is healthy. And so just to have that, you know, whether you do a structured program, whether or not college is even around in the next 15 years, I don't know. But being committed towards being committed.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
We can't talk about that for a second, but go ahead.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, just to wrap it up. I think being committed to understanding a field and signing up to finish something. You know, my dad used to tell me this. He's like, look, college is about, is about finishing something. It's about proving to an employer that you know how to finish the job. And, you know, getting my mba, there were sure, there were things that kind of felt like filler courses. Uh, but I. I thought that going through that process, it proved something to me that, that I could do that. And, you know, it does 10. It does look better on resumes, and it certainly makes people give you a level of respect to see those words, those, you know, initials behind your name. But, you know, I think really more than anything, it's. It's knowing what knowledge you want to have and then going and getting it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Very nice. Okay. Yeah, No, I think. I think college. I don't want to go down the. Is college worth it? Rabbit hole. Because that's a whole nother rabbit hole that we get really distracted about. But I think college and MBA programs, the biggest people, people. The biggest mistake people have is they don't have a plan for an ROI from that investment of time and money. And so college and an MBA program could be super worth it if you have a plan. It can also be a huge waste if you don't have a plan.
Michael Hansen (B):
Absolutely. 100. I agree. And I. I got lucky because, well, I didn't. It accelerated my growth in the corporate world because I had financial understanding that my peers didn't have. And so, you know, I was able to speak a language to leadership that they were speaking. I was able to immediately say, like, oh, I understand and can read this financial sheet, and because of that, you and I can have a conversation about strategy that you couldn't have with my peers. And so, you know, I think I was lucky in that there was a use case presented to me when I was doing it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Michael Hansen (B):
And so it gave me some direction. But I totally agree that if you're just hoping to get a higher designation to land a better job. Hope is not a strategy.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
There we go. There's the sound bite of the day. Hope is not a strategy. So. So you get into basically the commercial real estate game when it comes to. And. And business. Business in terms of you're selling wineries and you're selling vineyards. Right. And so wineries, you're selling. Not just. That's not just land. That's actual. The business itself as well. Right?
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, a lot of times it is. And even if you were to just look at a winery facility, winery facilities, you need to understand at least some level of the business to be able to see the function of a setup of a winery. Right. Because, you know, from, like, where do they truck in to, where do they do their pressing to, how does it route into tanks, where is their cooperage, what's the temperature Control like you have to have kind of a cursory understanding of the flow of the business in order to know if a winery is set up well or not in terms of just how it's laid out. And then yes, it does often come with a business kind of m. And a component with it because more often than not I'm working hand in hand with an owner who is either going to exit the business as well, and sometimes I will facilitate, facilitate that transaction. Maybe they're going to hold on to the business, but this is a strategic repositioning in terms of how they're capitalized. But yeah, I mean, it is far more integrated into the long term plan of business strategy than, you know, like a house or I would say it, it's kind of even more technical than something like an apartment complex.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Oh, I mean that, that absolutely makes sense to me because you're, you're acqu. Acquiring a production facility as opposed to just being a landlord. I mean, once again, not just, just, but yeah, if you're trying to make, yeah. You're not just trying to collect income from people. You're, you're having to like go and you're trying to have, buy a facility or a business that is actively producing a product. And there's a lot of operational considerations for that.
Michael Hansen (B):
And, and you know, I'm also lucky to farm 14 acres of Chardonnay. Lucky in this environment. Is anybody lucky to farm grapes? But I, I have that background and understanding also of, you know, the original product, the, the agricultural product that kind of starts the show. So, you know, being able to not only help people that are in the industry, but I also participate. Gives me a good lens.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, no, that's, I think that's super helpful to be, have gotten, gotten your hands dirty at least a little bit in the doing of the business and makes you more relatable, allows you to relate better to the people you're trying to help and sell to. So the wine industry going through a lot right now. Give us a big picture like state of the industry, particularly. I don't know if it's different. You know, we're here in, in Sonoma Napa. But if it's different here than other parts of the country or the world, what are you seeing out there right now?
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, well, there have been a lot of symposiums held about the state of the industry and I, I have attended several of them and there are many people who will give a more depth, more in depth kind of breakdown of where we're at.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I, I, my That's okay. We're just, we're. Big picture here.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. Big picture is wine industry is struggling as a result of kind of a decrease in consumption. There's been this premiumization that has carried through the last couple of decades where anybody who has been selling wine has just continually been taking their pricing up in order to justify compressed margins and increased labor costs, increased input costs. And so you've seen this premiumization that's, that's just pushed its way all the way up. And, and it's at a breaking point. I mean, a lot of people can't afford to buy premium wine. The middle class of, of wineries is really struggling. You see these two kind of more stable parts of the, of the bell curve are the outside, the very low price, the very high price. Those are the people who are surviving. The middle class of wineries is having a very, a very tough go because you just can't find a margin there. And what that's done is it's made wine. It's made wine kind of shift in, in how it's used. And it doesn't really appeal to the masses and it doesn't really appeal to younger people because they haven't yet gotten to the ability to have a status buy of. I'm gonna go buy a 75 bottle of cab for tonight's dinner or whatever at a restaurant. That 75 bottle is now $150. So it's. We're in this place of reset. And what that's going to do to land values and facility values is what we're already seeing. Everything is going to kind of, you know, unfortunately compress, but it's part of a cycle. This cycle has happened before, it will certainly happen again. And it just happens to coincide with also a very large wealth transfer and a period of time where there's a lot of economic uncertainty. And so, and so, like, what do you, what do you call them stuff you buy when you don't need it?
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Because you phrase it that way, I get the, I don't know, not frivolous spending, but yeah, I understand what you.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, extra income. Right. Disposable, discretionary purchase.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Discretionary.
Michael Hansen (B):
That's what we're looking for. Yeah. So discretionary purchases are being scrutinized by, by the everyday consumer. And so, yeah, it's, it's a tough period in time for wine. There's going to be winners and losers and, you know, the, the overall industry is going to compress until it finds balance. And it's the same, same thing that Happens in many other industries, but it's just happening now.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah. So what's that mean for your business then? Does that mean lots of people are trying to get out and trying to sell, but then there's no buyers? What's, what's the landscape look like for someone who's trying to facilitate transactions?
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, your intuition is, is kind of correct. I think the interesting part about the wine industry is that it is also a, an asset class that tends to be considered stable for institutional investors. Once there's a certain size, it kind of gets into this commodity range where, you know, large scale investors like insurance groups and pension backed funds and these sort of things, they hold, they hold natural capital. Right. They hold agricultural land and you know, thus are invested in the product, the product that comes off of that land. And so, you know, there's been kind of a stand by the side and wait pattern going on and they can't, I don't think they can wait much longer. I mean, what I've really been talking with a lot of people about and I've actually gotten a few calls from institutional investors saying they're ready to deploy capital. So you have this cycle of, you know, buyers and sellers. Yes, the mid and small size stuff, there's a lot of sellers and not a lot of buyers for that. But the more institutional call it, I don't know, 80 plus acre style vineyards, those are, you know, interesting in terms of having attention on them right now from, from a large scale.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so. But how many of those vineyards right now have a home for their fruit? Like so are people buying, buying property, these institutional investors buying property and there's no home for the fruit and they're just hoping that there's going to be a home someday or whatever.
Michael Hansen (B):
You're on it. So what's happening now is institutional buyers are having pretty strict requirements for what they're willing to buy. At the end of the day they're saying, hey, I want a pretty good vineyard in these prime Avas. Anything that's not in those prime AVAs.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And what's AVA stand for?
Michael Hansen (B):
American Viticultural Area. So I want either Napa Valley or in Sonoma. I want the Russian River Valley and Green Valley, even better. But I won't look at anything outside of those areas. And so I need a premium location that's going to make sure I have a stable land asset. And then I want either a great purchase agreement or I want a long term leaseback on that so I can guarantee my revenue and my rate of return on the price on the asset and whoever has those contracts has to have a big balance sheet. So I know they can pay me. And that's.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
They're very risk averse.
Michael Hansen (B):
They're very risk averse. And you know, the, the good part is with some of these groups, groups, they don't have to, they don't have to hit a high spread. They don't got to be in the 11, 12, 13 range. Some of them want, you know, 8 to 11%. But I've had conversations where some of these groups, if their model is more long term, they can be down in the 6, 7% range. So it doesn't necessarily have to be a cash cow, but it has to be big, it has to be stable. And the purse, the, the group at the end of the line backing it up better be healthy.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, no, that's. And so when you say leaseback, that is someone that is leasing the land to man and planting their own fruit typically. Or vines on.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. So a sale leaseback is, it's exactly what it is. The owner will sell it, the new buyer will lease it directly back.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
You're leasing it back to them. Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
And typically it'll be like a triple net lease or sometimes it'll be a great purchase agreement and the new owner will hire a farming company to do it. Sometimes the, the groups can be, can have specific rules that they're like, if it's a reit, then they have to have a lessee on there. But if it's, you know, like an insurance group, they might choose to operate it themselves and prefer to have a great purchase agreement. There are different ways that banks look at holdings. Like a long term lease may show up on your debt schedule versus if you are, if you have a great purchase agreement. So it can change your leverage position.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Man, what an interesting, what an interesting world. So my, you know, the anecdotes that I've heard because I've, I know some people that have done like serve the wine industry from an accounting perspective is that there's basically. Tell me if this is correct. There's. Well, I hear institutional investors, right. There's the huge companies like a Gallo or something and then there's. There's a lot of independence and then, and then there's a bunch of people that like really wealthy people and it's like a, like a hobby for them and these things.
Michael Hansen (B):
Don't call it the lifestyle buyer. Yeah, the lifestyle buyer. And that category has largely been silent in the last three years.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
I mean I sold a ranch in Forestville at the end of last year, the Juicy ranch that, that happened to be bought by a lifestyle investor, but it was like the first lifestyle investor that I heard of. And the only reason he bought that place because it had Airbnb, it had stable long term rental, and it had the vineyard that was under contract with a really high quality producer. Like, it kind of checked all of the boxes to be risk mitigated. And so, you know, that said, I think the lifestyle buyer makes up an important market driver in terms of, you know, the idea and the romanticism of wine is not going to go away. The, the idea of kind of the Italian wine villa like that, that, you know, gentleman's vineyard, it's not, I don't think that's gonna disappear because the second you go and visit a winery, you look around, you go, dang, this place is beautiful. That's true. And everybody wants to live in a beautiful place. And I think eventually it'll shake back around that we start to see some more investment from lifestyle buyers. They just are getting smarter. Yeah, they're just now underwriting more like a bank will. They're looking at it and they're going, hey, this doesn't cash flow. Why would I buy this? You know, and, and, or they're saying, I don't know that much about wine. I don't know what to do if there's no contract on this place. Like, I need to have a contract because I don't know anything about farming. Yeah, right. And I just want to live somewhere beautiful. So, you know, that has to happen for them too. Gotta be a contract.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, no, that makes, that makes a lot of sense because I think what I'd heard in the past was people that just had no idea what the, they were doing and they were just throwing money at it, though. I don't know if they were always living on the property or not. Lots of times I think they just wanted, you know, to be able to put their name or have their own brand of wine and say, you know, and serve it at parties and say, yeah, this is for my, this is for my vineyard. You know, it is a cool thing.
Michael Hansen (B):
I make a little chardonnay off of our, off of our ranch. And it is really cool to share your own product with people, but absolutely. Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah. I'm not, I'm not hating on that. Hey, if I had the money, sure, I'll, I would probably do that too, you know. So what's different about. You've kind of touched it already, but what's different about selling in, in this kind of in the wine space as opposed to other selling that you've done in the past or maybe compared to like traditional real estate or traditional commercial real estate.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, well, I would say versus residential. You know, the due diligence is just so much more rigorous. You know, you're actually doing financial underwriting from a long term perspective and you're looking at cash flows, you're looking at the market stability, you're diving into all these different reports, whether it be the grape crush report and you're knowing how much your district averages are or you're benchmarking against that and, and you know, putting out some level of loss compared to what the averages are, which is what, what a lot of groups are doing now. But it's like just orders of magnitude more challenging. Like you're looking at soil reports, you're looking at water availability, you're possibly doing water development, you're looking at what the regulations are. I mean if you're going to plant a vineyard you got to go through the ECP process. You have to make sure that you're fish friendly and you know, and now with the consumers maybe you're looking at being organic or regenerative or any of these other kind of more not fads but consumer preference styles of farming and so it's just a lot more complicated.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Well, yeah, fair enough.
Michael Hansen (B):
Every farm is a business and you know that with your guys ranch but, but even just one monocrop grape field is a business with inputs and outputs. And so you're, you're a part of an ecosystem and, and, and trying to paint a picture of what the future of your business is going to look like from a current day snapshot. It's tough and so there's a lot of work that goes into it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So what do you think? I'd love to get into just a little bit of what you're doing to be successful at your job. So particularly on the sales side, how are you making connections and then you know, how are those connections leading to deals?
Michael Hansen (B):
Well that's one thing that I am, I'm very grateful for my background on because I come from sales, you know, at, when I was selling golf memberships and then I was the VP at that health company, you know, I was making 50 calls a day minimum. You know, and I got the reps inside of a CRM. Not to, not to speak down but I think a lot of people in the real estate industry don't necessarily come from like high volume of calls backgrounds. And so I really have that mentality when it comes to pursuing leads, I use a CRM. I have scheduled tasks and follow ups. I, I, you know, I'm all about,
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I, I'm all about the CRM life. Absolutely.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. So, so, so I, I just actually have a little bit more, I think, diligence in the way my business is structured. And then I'm, I'm just, I'm trying to connect people. A lot of times it's just a mentality of providing value first. It's part of the reason why I'm here. You know, if I can share any value with you, if I can, you know, put any of your information out in front of people that might connect with you and use your services, then that's great.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And absolutely.
Michael Hansen (B):
You know, a big part of my, of my journey here is to provide as much support to my community and the community that has allowed me to have a great life. Like the wine community gave me everything. If I look back, you know, my dad had a really stable and good career because of the wine community, same with my mom. And I was able to live in beautiful places. And so, you know, being able to give back and, and then also I have this like, other motivation which is, you know, being a part of the farming community in Sonoma county. There are a lot of families that are facing hard times just with the cost of doing business in agriculture and being able to not necessarily just transact their properties, but to give them any advice that I can for keeping their properties is something that I really enjoy doing and, and part of my learning inside of the wine industry because there's a ton of people that farm grapes in Sonoma county and are struggling. And a lot of these people were older families that, you know, have, have helped to build this community and are now falling on hard times and potentially having to sell their properties. And I will sell it for them if they have to, but if I can provide some other route that allows them to keep their family property, then that's even better.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so you're actually working against your own self interest in that case?
Michael Hansen (B):
In many cases, yes. But I, I'm lucky enough that my, my self interests are, are kind of, you know, it's not that important. Like I, I service large institutional buyers and sellers and so a lot of times that's not the family farm and so that keeps the lights on. And so I'm not like, one of the things about me is I'm not super pressured to make a sale, and I'm very grateful for that. But what it allows Me to do is, is provide as much service and as much value upfront as I can before, you know, and if things get to a sale, I'll do it. But, like, if I can help a family keep their ranch, that's even better.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, no, I totally relate to that. I mean, that's a big part of actually why one of my motivations for starting my business was, you know, I did a lot of this in terms of like, fractional CTO work for my family's business, finding ways to better use technology. But what it really came down to. Comes down to is like, I want to see family businesses and succeed. Like, there's a lot of opportunity there. They're, you know, they've been in the community. They're the, they're the, you know, part of the hub and the engine that makes the community run. They're the ones that sponsor the baseball teams. You know, I come from that family business and so I just want to help them be more successful and maybe I can also help them have a little bit more work life balance. And so I, I think that's a super rewarding and thing to do because, you know, the, the giant corporations at the end of the day are not what is keeping your community alive.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, Here's a great example. I went to lunch today with a couple of guys. I'm a member of the Farm Bureau. You guys are too. And so is Fly with. Nice. Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
All right.
Michael Hansen (B):
And so I'm sitting there with one of the, one of the board members and we're talking about, you know, struggles that he's having with his family property. And I had this idea of like, oh, my gosh, we need to put together some financial education for young farmers and ranchers. And we need to teach these people how to buy the ranches that are for sale. Right. Let's figure out how we can get our community to buy the properties that our community is selling. Right. Versus just selling out to, you know, a large corporation that's, that's, you know, gobbling up land, acres. Let's figure out if there's a way to be creative and to have the next generation actually be able to afford to buy a ranch and to make it work. Right. And so on the buy side, a lot of my, A lot of my kind of good feelings for the community come out on the buy side because I help people to make a strategy of how they actually can't afford to get the asset that can make the dream versus, you know, just getting out from under something that's hurting Them.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So how. Just so speaking of that, like, how are people in that situation actually financing those kinds of deals? So not the big institutional investors, but you know, if a family farm is trying to acquire more property.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, well, it's a good question. There. There's multiple ways to do it. You know, your typical thing would be you'd go to a farm credit lender, American Ag Credit or, you know, Ag west or somebody like that, and you would apply for a loan and you would put down a down payment and they would cover a percentage of it and you'd pay it off over time. Typical mortgage type situation. The loan to value is not going to be as advantageous. Generally you have to come up with a larger down payment somewhere in the 30% range.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
But as compared to buying a residential home.
Michael Hansen (B):
Right. Which you can do for 5% or whatever, there's some gray area if you were going to buy a primary residence that happened to have farmland attached to
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
it
Michael Hansen (B):
that you could potentially get a residential loan for. But I think there's some other ways too. I mean, if you bank, if you have a. If you have the ability to do a portfolio loan with like, if you bank with redwood or somebody like that and you have a certain number of dollars flowing through your accounts, you may be extended a line of credit for an acquisition. You may, look, if you're buying a winery, then you might be able to go through kind of a commercial brokerage situation. Generally those, you know, banking relationships and lender relationships might help to ease a deal in terms of like interest rates and down payment requirements. But there are options. And I think, you know, part of, part of what I want to do now is just kind of teach people how the banking side works in partnership with, you know, actual lenders. I'm not like a super expert. I'm pretty familiar, but I'm not. At the end of the day, I don't originate loans. So, you know. But I think getting that education to the next generation is going to be a big win.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Absolutely. I mean, absolutely. The more. I mean, I think that is where I see the difference between farm families that stick around a long time and the ones that, let's say, I don't want to say flame out, but end up having to sell their properties. A lot of times it is financial savvy.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Is what allow them to continue to survive. Because when you're in agriculture, it's not like if there will be hard times, it's just a matter of like when there'll be hard times. Like it happens to Everyone.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Because you're almost. You're dealing with a commodity.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And so you can't count on commodity prices to always be strong.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, 100%.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So to go back to the sales for a second, I'm curious. This is the more technical question, but I'm always interested about what CRM you're actually using.
Michael Hansen (B):
So I use pipedrive.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, yeah. It has a, it's pretty customizable and it has a nice interface for real estate. And specifically because it's, it's both a CRM and a project management software. So you can have your database over here and you can just have, you know, work off of individual lead profiles or you can have, you can have the deal flow window and so you can see where deals are at in terms of status. So you can have both like your database of individuals and you have all of your deals and where they're at inside of the. The deal flow. And you can customize the, you know what the, the different stages and stuff are.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, yeah. Okay. And you've been pretty. How long you've been using it?
Michael Hansen (B):
2 and a half years.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Been pretty happy with it.
Michael Hansen (B):
I like it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Michael Hansen (B):
I looked at Monday.com, i looked at, like, there's some ones that the Real Realtor association like gives you a discount on and stuff. And I looked at those two, but I didn't like them as much.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
No, I mean, pipedrive is one of the ones that like, looks nice, is easy to use, and definitely in that, like in that space for sure.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. And they, they have. For my large blasts, I use constant contact.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
And so they have a good integration. Yeah. An integration with constant contact.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you're, you're providing regular updates or weekly updates. How often are you emailing people?
Michael Hansen (B):
You know, I tend to try not to. I'm a phone call guy. Okay. And I. Because the wine industry is really small, I, I tend to set up a lot of phone calls and lunches and stuff. I, I really only do blasts if there's like some change with a listing that I've had. Sometimes I'll use like the Realtor provided ones and sometimes I'll do my own network one.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, so you're not really like doing a newsletter of any kind, saying, like, here's the updates on the industries once a month, once every couple weeks or something like that?
Michael Hansen (B):
No, I am in the process of building a new website. You heard it here first.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Breaking news.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. And so on that website. Website, I will actually have a consistently updated blog platform.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
I, you know, if I, if I do, I do some small stuff on my Instagram where I give little updates and pings in video format. I tend to think video format is a little more engaging.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I mean there's a lot of stats about the fact that. That's true. Yeah. The newsletters, Newsletters have become, you know, are now are like they had kind of fallen off for a while, but over the last, you know. Well, it's been a while now pretty popular in terms of. They have pretty high rates, pretty decent engagement as well.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. You know, from, from the sales side, it's like, you know, touch people as many times you can, keep your name in their head.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Right.
Michael Hansen (B):
So from, from that perspective, I probably will start doing a, an optin blog newsletter thing. But if I send a blog, gonna have a video embedded in it.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah, sure. Yeah. Yeah. No, no. I mean, not totally. Fine. Why not? Well, and I see I want to give you credit too because your LinkedIn game, I feel like is pretty strong and you're posting interesting stuff on there. As someone who follows you on LinkedIn. So are you. Tell me about that. I mean lots of people are trying to sell through LinkedIn. It's obviously very popular for that. So are you having success using LinkedIn?
Michael Hansen (B):
You know, I gotta say, LinkedIn is probably where I generate the majority of my conversations.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So how do, what is your strategy? Because I, that is a nut I have not yet cracked and yeah, it's on the list.
Michael Hansen (B):
My, my strategy has been to just try and provide value in terms of things that I'm thinking about, things that I know, like if I have, you know, if I start to know about, like what types of deals investment firms are looking for or whatever, I try and share that. I also try to just give practical advice for people if they're, you know, thinking about selling their vineyard or whatever, they need to start preparing their pre diligence now. This sort of thing I try and share, you know, what's really interesting about the wine world is the deal side. The financial side is really segregated away from, from most of the lower levels, like, you know, winemaker down. Most people in the wine industry are not privy to the financial information or how well the business is doing and that there are many reasons for that. But so I actually share a lot of information for them because they might not understand certain aspects of what, what, you know, how the financial scenario might be going. And then the, the tack that I'm taking now is just kind of trying to be a little bit more fresh I think a lot of the M A and transactional space in the wine industry is really a little bit stale. Nobody really shares very engaging information. Nobody's all that fun to listen to. And so I'm trying to create something that's both informational and entertaining at the same time. And maybe a little edgy here and there, you know, because I think people. People enjoy when you actually have an opinion about something.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I'm. Social media would say that's correct. I. I agree with that. The. Even though everyone wants, especially in California, wants to be so politically correct, I think from an engagement perspective, it's much more interesting to see someone that has an unusual or strong opinion about something. And as long as you know, for me personally, like, as long as you have a reason behind it, then I'm like, okay, I don't agree. But yeah, I can see where you're coming from.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah. The.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
So are you mostly then just trying to post interesting content and then people reach out to you naturally that way?
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
You're not doing too much of, like, direct outreach through LinkedIn?
Michael Hansen (B):
Oh, well, hey, everybody that I connect to, I introduce myself to.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
Every single person.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
But you're doing. Are you meeting them first in person and then connecting with them on LinkedIn?
Michael Hansen (B):
No, no, no, no. I do a lot. I do a lot of. Yeah. Cold connects all the time. Yeah. If you're related to my industry and I can. And I can conceive of any way to provide you value, then I will connect with you and I will share. I. When they connect with me or they accept my connection request or whatever, I share with them how I think I can provide them value, and then if they want to, they can reach back out to me. Yeah, I do that with everybody.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
That's a. I think that's a great tip because I have not.
Michael Hansen (B):
I hate being solid. Okay. I hate being solicited by people who just give me their pitch and the first message, it is absolutely so annoying. So what I do is I say, hello, thank you for connecting. Here's how I think I can help you. If you want that, let me know. Yeah, not here's my course. You could Download it for $9.99.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
No, that's the worst. That's the worst. But I really like that. I mean, I think, you know, it's in some way, like, it's like, simple to talk about, but harder to execute on what I see in the theme of. Of people that I've had on that are doing. They're doing sales, they're doing Things selling like you have to sell is. And even me, I'm like, I have to sell to get new clients. Right? Not quite as, not quite the same as you. But when it comes down to, it's like it's just about providing value and thinking of it as a long term relationship that you're building instead of, I'm just trying to just pitch people, you know. Yeah, it's, it's if, you know, for BNI people it's farming, not hunting, you know.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And I find that the more I talk to people that are really successful about selling that aren't giving off a used car salesman vibe, that's what it comes down to. It's like a consistent theme.
Michael Hansen (B):
And, and I, I really feel that in having niched myself down into this vineyard and winery space, the clarity of how I can provide value is really easy to understand. Earlier today I had a conversation with a POS developer and I just immediately hooked them up with somebody that, another tech group that I know that does inventory tracking. And I was like, dude, if you integrate your business with them, you're going to be able to have a net income number per sku. And that is what a lot of wineries struggle with. And it's like, dude, yours plus theirs, boom, perfect. You go, I'll, I'll set the email up. And so a lot of the work that I do is just making those connections and I don't know if anything is going to come from it. I tell my wife this all the time. I don't know where the next transaction is going to come from.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Right.
Michael Hansen (B):
So all I need to do is just treat everybody good, try and help them out if I can.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
It's going to come back perfect, I think. So we're, we're about to the end of our time. So I want to do the two questions I ask everyone at the end of them. The are kind of a little bit more, I mean not exactly left field, but one is the what, what book do you recommend or gift most to people if you're a reader? Not everyone's a reader. Well, I, I, and I don't mean that derogatory. It's just that not everyone's.
Michael Hansen (B):
And less and less and less and less.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I really like, I only scroll.
Michael Hansen (B):
I really, I know, right? I. Oh man. Okay, quick story. Sure.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Michael Hansen (B):
In college I had, when I was, was first at Santa Barbara City College, I went to my first English class and the guy was like, so who here read over the phone and this girl raised her hand and Went, does reading on my phone like Instagram count? It's like, no, no, it doesn't. But the book that I tend to give away the most would be the Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay.
Michael Hansen (B):
He's a prolific international, at one time international chess grandmaster champion. He also was a push hands martial arts international champion. And his book is phenomenal in terms of learning how to learn. And yeah, it's a really fantastic read.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
I think that's a great recommendation. I think, think, you know, people forget about the value of lifelong learning. It's what keeps you young, it's what keeps you engaged. And so you aren't just sitting. You know, the danger is that you are just becoming, I guess, a consumer and you're not. And without any, without the. Now I'm blanking on the word, but without curation too. It's just like the algorithm just shoving information.
Michael Hansen (B):
Also, you know, second, shout out, out, shout out to Mark Manson, the subtle art of not giving a.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Okay, yeah.
Michael Hansen (B):
Phenomenal book. You know, we are so caught up in our heads and learning how to separate you from the story in your mind is just a huge. It's, it's a huge advantage in not being controlled by your thoughts and being a little bit more free to operate on a daily. And Mark Manson is a really. He's a phenomenally succinct writer. And so. Okay, that's another really good book.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Another good book. And we link all the books in the description that people recommend so people can check it out.
Michael Hansen (B):
Cool.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
And then the last question is, if you had to put like one piece of life advice for people on a. Or piece of nugget of wisdom for people on a. Like a billboard over the freeway. What would you, what would you want people to see? They're driving to and from work every day. Not necessarily has to be in that context.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, I got you. I. I would say try and enjoy your life, you know.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Yeah.
Michael Hansen (B):
We spend way too much time worrying about stuff and, you know, be, be in the present moment and you know, another book, the Power of Now. Right. Just be in. Be in your moment. Be where you are. Yeah. And it will free you from the anxiety traps and the worry traps of both past and future. And I would just say, like, be where you are.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Love it. Love it. Well, thank you, Mike, for coming on. It was a great conversation. I want to give you a chance, chance to shout for you, to shout out where people can find you online or whatever you want to pump. I don't know how soon your website's going to be live, but.
Michael Hansen (B):
Yeah, well, I. I've got the domain, so it'll stay there. You can go to Mike Sells vineyards dot com.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
Love it.
Michael Hansen (B):
You could also follow me on Instagram at Hanson Land. And always feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn.
Jonathan Mahrt (A):
All right, great. Thank you very much. And once again, I'm Jonathan Marr with Flywheel Consulting. You can find me at flywheelconsulting co. And that's another episode in the can. Thanks for coming on.
Michael Hansen (B):
Sweet it.