Trusting the CLHbid.com Platform

Welcome And Why Trust Matters

Devon Davidson 0:00

The Farmland Exchange, the official podcast of chlhbid.com. Expert insights on buying and selling farmland in Western Canada. Welcome back to the Farmland Exchange, the official podcast of clbid.com, where we provide you with expert insights into the process of buying and selling farmland here in Western Canada. I'm your host, Devon Davidson, and digital media strategist for CLHBid.com. If you haven't already, please like, rate, and review the podcast on your preferred platform. It really helps us out and uh we would really appreciate that. On today's show, we're going to be talking about the all-important issue of establishing trust with buyers on our platform while still representing the seller. And joining me in that conversation, Alle Carter, legal and member of the executive team from CLHBid.com. Alle, how are you?

Alle Carter 0:50

Good. How are you doing, Devon?

Devon Davidson 0:51

Good. Thanks for being here.

Speaker 0:52

Thanks.

Devon Davidson 0:52

And of course, as always, Roy Carter, CEO of CLHBid.com. Roy, thanks for being back. Thanks, Devon. Thanks for being here. Okay, so where do you guys want to start? Trust on the platform. Um, maybe Roy, do you want to talk about what your goal was in relation to buyers at the outset? Um, knowing knowing that they have the funds and that they have to trust the platform for it to work.

Transparency Over Sealed Tender

Devon Davidson 1:12

Sure.

Roy Carter 1:13

Yeah, and I I would to a large degree we're a function, I guess, of seeing what didn't work. And it was the lack of transparency. I, you know, I've used the example probably too many times. I think I've used it on a prior podcast, but I had uh I was mostly familiar with legal tender to law firms.

Alle Carter 1:30

Right.

Roy Carter 1:31

And uh we uh we never did it, just didn't believe in the process. But I had an older fellow one time from Southern Alberta tell me that uh talking about sealed tender to a law firm, he said, uh, you know, it's like playing darts blindfolded with one dart. And uh that goes to transparency, you know, the lack of transparency, even if there's uh something not untoward going on, there's the perception sometimes, right?

Alle Carter 1:59

Right.

Roy Carter 2:00

So take the blindfold off, give them a bucket of darts, and and let's do this right. Yeah, and uh so that was the deal there. You know, and another thing, uh, there's this misconception sometimes that the buyers are sort of the enemy, or it's seller versus buyer. It's not. I mean, uh, these buyers deserve to be treated right, fair, they deserve transparency, right? And uh in a lot of the other formats, there was a total lack of it, and they were getting played, and uh, I think most farmers don't like players, and often they'd back away. So um, sure we only act for sellers, but to maximize value for a seller, um, you got to engage these buyers and treat them fairly, and they got to be comfortable in the platform before they'll participate.

Devon Davidson 2:51

So, what would you say that CLH does differently to build trust with those bidders or buyers?

Roy Carter 2:57

Yeah, I mean, basically at the outset, Allie, we sat down. It was basically um, I think we were basically the two uh founders that would built it together, looked around the world. Allie then went to law school in Australia. We looked at Australia, New Zealand, uh their systems. Um, you know, some of the basics is uh what are people concerned about or why don't they trust?

Devon Davidson 3:21

Right.

Roy Carter 3:22

Uh so you know, um basic things like proxy. We don't have a proxy. I mean, the house shouldn't know how far you'll go.

Devon Davidson 3:30

Right.

Roy Carter 3:31

And um, yeah, I mean, we would never use it as a law firm, but we don't need to know.

Devon Davidson 3:36

Yeah.

Roy Carter 3:37

So uh yeah, there's basic things like that that people will call and say, well, can't I just put in a proxy? And it's like, no, uh, because there's that's a perception issue.

Devon Davidson 3:47

Right.

Roy Carter 3:48

And you know, you can go down the line there about not disclosing bidders' names. Um, there's no reason for anybody to know those names, yeah, including the seller. Uh, you know, they need to know the end party, but there's no reason to destroy relationships on that.

Devon Davidson 4:04

Yeah.

Roy Carter 4:05

So yeah, there it's uh a lot of um uh elements in our platform go to trying to build up that trust. And uh a big part of it too is the track record. Now we're going into our 10th year, and basically don't breach that trust. Um, you know, we've never placed a bid, never had a bid placed at the office. Yeah, we get calls, you know. Uh normally the buyers are really tacky, and you know, they'll they'll be on their combine, their X9, and they're buying. But the odd one is like, I'm not sure how to do this. Can I come in? And it's like, no, you know, yeah, go over to your granddaughter's place or go find good Wi-Fi. So we got some pretty strict rules, and we adhere to them, and the whole team adheres to them. And uh, I think that goes a long way to building that trust over 10 years.

Devon Davidson 4:57

Well, and to that point, I I think Corey's told me the story before where um a buyer wanted to get on the site, wasn't even registered, it was five minutes before the sale, and she had to actually walk them through that process because we're we're not gonna handle it on their behalf, it has to be done from their own end. So totally yeah, yeah. Uh, how does CLH attempt to solve the issue of ongoing potential conflict in a law office

Avoiding Law Office Conflicts

Devon Davidson 5:18

when multiple clients might be tendering?

Roy Carter 5:21

Yeah, I mean, good question there. Um law firms are you know supposed to have and can have what we call Chinese walls, where you know you don't need to know what another partner's doing. And uh, but again, it's perception. Uh, you know, in small, it's most of the farm tendering in law firms is is rural Manitou, Carmen, you know, Rosetown, uh, that type of deal. So they drive by the law firm and they see Joe's pickup there, right? They know the tenders are tomorrow. And the one guy's sister-in-law works there is a paralegal, and uh it's it's more perception than anything, uh, but it's not good. Right. And so how do we remove this? You know, and I was talking to one Manitoba lawyer uh about it, and he said, you know, he'll do a tender, and uh, he's acting for the seller, and um, six of the seven tenders that come in are their own clients, and there's this perception that they're gonna shop it to the best client, meaning the client with the most land. Right. And uh again, it's more of a perception, but how do you clean that up? Because um perception too is is everything, right? And you gotta give these these people comfort. So, from that point of view, it's like we move that. Go, you don't need on our system, you don't need to hire a lawyer to submit a tender. Right. Leave your pickup at home. It doesn't need to be parked in front of that law office in Carmen. Yeah, and uh bid from home. Yeah, and um I think uh one of our first sales near million, um, you know, the high bidder at the end of it, um, basically one of the his big comments to us, and it was in our first year, was you know, my son and I were able to bid from our office shop, and uh we weren't in front of an auction crowd and everybody wasn't screaming and yelling.

Devon Davidson 7:20

Yeah.

Roy Carter 7:20

And we had two minutes to decide whether we wanted to click or not.

Devon Davidson 7:23

Yeah.

Roy Carter 7:24

And it's our business and we can do it from home type deal.

Devon Davidson 7:28

Yeah.

Roy Carter 7:28

Yeah.

Devon Davidson 7:28

Uh, you know, just given that there's so many issues with tender, we've talked about it lots on different podcasts, whether it's collusion or bid shopping or anything, anything like that. There's a number of issues. Do you ever see a scenario uh where that just goes away? Like, or will just tender always be an option just because it's it's convenient for some people or because it still exists? Like, I just don't understand why with so many issues it it continues to go on.

Roy Carter 7:50

Yeah, I mean, we are tender. We've taken that, we've taken tender, you know, it's price discovery, but it uh single tender in an envelope doesn't work. Uh closed doors, all of those reasons. Yeah, so um we definitely see less of it, I think. Um definitely in, you know, going into our 10th year, there's areas where there was a lot of tender where you've seen it kind of dissipate, where they realize escalating tender with everything locked down, no names go out, full transparency is a better way to go. Right. Uh but uh yeah, I'm sure uh we're we're never gonna take over the total market share, but uh yeah.

Devon Davidson 8:34

Well, th thanks for making that clarification because it's an important distinction to make. We it is still tender, it's just not a closed envelope. Yeah, yeah. Um how do you deal with with sellers that propose to bid back on a sale?

Stopping Seller Bid Backs

Roy Carter 8:45

Uh yeah, um under our retainer agreement or sales agreement, we're we have them under contract where they can't, right?

Alle Carter 8:52

Yeah, and no party can bid on their behalf either.

Roy Carter 8:55

You're right, indirectly. So, you know, we make them sign an agreement with us that it won't happen. We also, you know, watch the registered bidders for names, obviously, if it come up. And again, I would say 98% want to sell their farm, want to treat people fairly. Um, you know, it's the one or two percent maybe you gotta watch. Yeah. Uh, and um, you know, we we've had that request. Uh, you know, and um sometimes uh sometimes it's the biggest guys that want you to bend the rules because maybe they are used to used to doing that.

Devon Davidson 9:36

Yeah.

Roy Carter 9:37

Um you know, and uh in one case it was one of the bigger guys. It's like, yeah, okay, here's what we're used to doing, just let us bid. And if we get stuck, uh we'll pay you half your commission, right? So if you know, if the roulette wheel stops on us, uh we'll give you half and let us back out. And it's like, no, uh, it's totally not happening, right? Yeah, so you got to deal with them up front on that, and you gotta be also follow-through, I would say, right? We had one instance uh where the the a fellow was registered to bid and he had the same last name as the owner. Okay, same area. And it was like, this is too close, right? So we we called ahead of time and it was like, What are you guys doing here? And I was like, Ah, no, no, it's good. He wants it for his own, right? Yeah, and it was like, okay. So away we went with the sale. Sale's over, and the next day, it turns out the guy with the same last name as a brother, and he called and said didn't want it, call the second guy. Yeah, and it's like uh not happening, right? You know, and basically, I hope you got lots of time and money because you're getting sued, right? Yeah, and uh so it was like, well, I decided I didn't want it. And it was like, no, we're not calling the second guy. And uh, we referred it to a law firm and and he closed, right? So you also gotta give you know, you can't back away from those situations where uh you let those people jerk people around, right?

Devon Davidson 11:08

Yeah, you probably how many how many times have you seen a scenario like that where they want to back out and and I oh I wasn't interested, or I, you know, like because we have legal recourse, right, to deal with that.

Roy Carter 11:17

Yeah, I would say Alle, I think it's the only time where it sure appeared, well, I would say he was bidding, he was bidding back uh for the brother and got caught. Uh, you know, we have the other one where you know, after the sale, the wife slaps him or whatever, and you lost your mind, right? Right. And uh how come you went so far or the banker asks him? Uh so uh, you know, and in those cases, it's like, no, that wasn't a fun deal. Yeah, uh, we act for the seller, and uh, you're gonna honor your commitment, right? Yeah, and uh so yeah, we just don't give people a free pass from that point of view. You know, that it's quite different. We've set it up differently. So, going back to your initial question, what did you build differently? Uh, you know, uh some of the big auction houses in the world, you can take something there, you can take your combine there, and and a guy buys it, and if he doesn't pay, you get a call to come and pick your combine up. Yeah, you know, they don't go pursue that buyer. Yeah, in some cases, they hardly know who that buyer was. It was somebody put a hand up.

Devon Davidson 12:24

Yeah.

Roy Carter 12:24

Uh we're quite different in that we've gone to a different level being a law firm. We've built in um uh that if they register, we have privy a contract, not just the seller.

Deposits Disclosures And Legal Recourse

Devon Davidson 12:36

Right.

Roy Carter 12:36

So CLH bid as a law firm can sue that party as well. Unlike an auction house where they just say, come and pick it up. We have recourse as well as a seller, right? Right.

Alle Carter 12:47

So we also require a lot more. I would say, you know, um we require 20% down within 24 hours. So a lot of times you'll see these real estate offers coming across my desk on the law side, and it's a $500,000 quarter and the deposit is five grand, and it's that's easier to walk away from in my mind, but we require the 20% down 24 hours. That offer is signed within 24 hours. Um, and kind of going to the buyers trusting us, we post all those offers to purchase on the site prior to bidding. Yeah, our whole legal team drills down on surface lease revenue. Um, if there's anything you know laying in the weeds that might come up after the fact, we disclose all of that uh if we know about it. And sometimes we've even not taken a sale because it looks like there might be something coming up later, right?

Roy Carter 13:42

Yeah, totally.

Alle Carter 13:43

Yeah.

Roy Carter 13:43

Good example. Uh yeah, I mean, you're only as good as your reputation. And I mean, after 10 years, yeah, you can still destroy it in one sale.

Devon Davidson 13:52

Yeah.

Roy Carter 13:53

So there's times when, you know, a buyer will say, or a seller rather will say, Well, did I forget to tell you about that or whatever, right? And uh, you know, it's got to be posted. There's uh we drill down, and not only do we get it from them, we have our own pair legals that drill down on uh on everything, including, you know, SLR, including option agreements on solar, you know, uh wind agreements on leases where it might be related to electricity charges, yeah. Where sometimes, you know, sometimes the seller's not dishonest, they just forget. And uh they thought it was this and it's really this. So we actually that's a a benefit to the seller too, where we make sure what's represented is accurate.

Devon Davidson 14:41

Have you ever had scenarios where a sale happened, it's finalized, but then a buyer was surprised by something? Was there any sort has that ever come up where you know that maybe they bought something they didn't think they were?

Roy Carter 14:52

Yeah, um, not often. Um yeah, it's happened uh a couple times where there was, you know, and then uh in the one instance, uh it was a dispute over a shop. Um he bought in the fall, and the owner said, Oh yeah, oh yeah, I told the tenant from last year he could use that shop.

Devon Davidson 15:15

Right.

Roy Carter 15:15

And it's like, man, that had to be disclosed, right? This guy was buying the shop. So um, yeah, we don't uh that it's not good for us, right? Um, so it's important to us too. Again, I would say 98% of our sellers are are awesome, and uh they realize the importance of giving accurate information to the buyer. For sure.

Devon Davidson 15:36

But I guess I brought that up because it it's important to know that CLH is there to sort of help mediate that situation, right? Like it's not like you're washing your hands of it and saying go go go pay for your land like we're done here.

Roy Carter 15:47

I think Oh no, we gotta we own it. We gotta, we were we're the agent or the lawyers for the seller, but um, if there's if if there's bad data out there, we gotta deal with the buyer on it and um and try and make it right.

Devon Davidson 16:02

Uh going back to you know certain auction houses and things like that, um it's important to note that CLH is totally custom

Custom Tech And Data Security

Devon Davidson 16:10

built, purpose built for selling farmland. So how important is that? Like we don't disclose bidders, um, but how important is it having our own technology that we've built purpose for this task? You want to go on that one?

Alle Carter 16:22

Yeah, I think a lot of websites, and to be honest, I didn't know this until I kind of took over the one of the IT rules uh for CLH bid, but they use these plugins and they don't actually own any of the back end of their websites. And it's kind of confusing. I don't totally understand plugins because we don't use it, but our website is completely custom to us. We have our own IT uh team in-house that monitors each sale at the back end, and so there's no risk of anything getting leaked because a third party doesn't own it. Yeah. Um, and so you know, you know, when you register on our site, it's all locked down. Um, and that really goes to not disclosing bidders' names or anything, and we can assure individuals of that, which I think is huge.

Devon Davidson 17:09

I think it's so important too, because with third-party plugins, if you don't have a good development team, things like updates can get missed. So when you do have that sale and all of a sudden, holy crap, the site crashes because of a third-party plugin, that's not gonna happen with CLH bid. We've had we have an in-house development team that looks after that stuff all the time.

Roy Carter 17:26

Yeah, um, totally, Devon. But I think part of it too is um the level that we answer to at the Law Society is you know, we can't let the you know the uh furnace technician in the file room to go through files, right? Right. And uh our data has to be somehow controlled within the office. Yeah, and that's one of the reasons we have our own programs or our own IT, that it's not outsourced and not out there on the net, right?

Devon Davidson 17:55

Absolutely, yeah.

Roy Carter 17:56

Yeah. Which we see lots of these days.

Devon Davidson 17:58

Yeah. Uh at CLH, you offer solicitor client confidentiality being a law firm. Um, why is that so important when selling law uh farmland?

Roy Carter 18:08

Um I think the uh selling farmland is is way different than uh urban real estate um or commercial real estate. Um but generally for urban real estate, the seller of a house and the buyer don't know each other. They, you know, in Saskatoon or Edmonton are uh very, very it would be unlikely if they ever knew each other. Right. So there's no transfer of information. But in the case of farmland, um, I would say 80 to 90 percent of the time, at least the buyer and seller know each other.

Devon Davidson 18:42

Right.

Roy Carter 18:43

They might curl together, you know, they might hunt together. Uh so it becomes a lot more uh critical that the information doesn't move from that seller to these uh friends, relatives, uh

Confidentiality In Small Communities

Roy Carter 18:56

people in the area. And it can easily move because it's because they're in close proximity.

Devon Davidson 19:02

Right.

Roy Carter 19:02

So from that point of view, we offer sellers solicitor client privilege. It goes nowhere, they're they're comfortable talking to us, and they know sort of right away there's not calls that Joe's got his land for sale, you know, somebody's sick in the family or whatever, and make them an offer of this or whatever. I mean, that does not happen, right? Yeah, uh, so um I think it's it it uh is critical given the proximity and um the buyers and sellers knowing each other that you have that privilege.

Devon Davidson 19:32

Okay. Uh we'll continue with seller requests here. So one thing we said we don't do seller bid backs, we won't do third parties, no proxy bids. But has a seller ever come to you and said, I want you to block um buyer XYZ?

Roy Carter 19:46

Yeah. Um, you know, we we usually try and talk, it's it's not that common, but it it definitely happens. Have we passed on sales because of it?

Refusing To Block Specific Buyers

Roy Carter 19:58

Totally.

Devon Davidson 19:58

Right.

Roy Carter 19:59

Um, and uh, you know, uh we've got one fellow that'll call. I maybe he hasn't called for six months, maybe he sold the farm, but it's quite nice farm, but he doesn't want the Hutterites to buy it. And it's like, okay, uh go sell it to somebody else and let them sell to the Hutterites, right?

Devon Davidson 20:16

Right, yeah.

Roy Carter 20:16

Uh and it's like we're not blocking anybody, right? You know, and um uh we had another one a while ago where the guy didn't like a neighbor that had borrowed some heavy arrows from him, and it's like uh I don't mind selling to the Hutterites or anybody else, but I'm not selling to this guy because he brought him back and they were a mess, right? Yeah, and it's like yeah, we're not blocking anybody, right? Sorry, it's we got to be true to our word. There's got to be transparency and fairness, right? Yeah, and uh and you you know you can block people all day long, but you there's a uh concept in law called restraint on alienation where you cannot put a restrictive covenant on your land to say it can never be sold to you know a certain sect or whatever, right? You're not allowed to to do that. That's part of the common law. So we we always say, well, yeah, you can block them all you want, but he could be out there in two years farming it, right? Yeah, for sure. And uh in the one I'm talking about where he didn't want to sell to the neighbor, um, yeah, we didn't get the sale and the guy sold it. And uh, you know, they're in some this was nice land, a nice sale. But you you know, if you if you set out to build a system that's fair and transparent, yeah, that means every time it's got to be fair and transparent.

Devon Davidson 21:35

Yeah, CLH is playing

Tender Scams Collusion Done Deals

Devon Davidson 21:36

the long game, it's not about one sale or another choice, it's yeah, about building trust long term. Have you ever had a tendering that um has a bot deal in advance?

Roy Carter 21:45

Uh we of course don't uh haven't, but you know, definitely heard of them uh and heard of them from you know, there's all kinds, there's one um definitely that I heard of um from one of The parties that you know basically they drop off an envelope of cash at a law firm and uh with a letter to be invited to the tender opening and pay a premium and get the cherry pick. And uh I was shocked to hear about it, but yeah, I asked him how many law firm boardrooms he'd seen, and there was quite a few. Um there's a chance that maybe I wasn't getting the straight goods, but I think I was uh in another case, uh again, it shouldn't happen, but sometimes there's this deal about well, and I I got a ton of respect for you know uh a lot of different nationalities that made Western Canada and uh including the Hutterites, what they do. Uh you know, in this case, uh um this farmer didn't want to it to be perceived as selling to the Hutterites, but he did.

Devon Davidson 22:53

Right.

Roy Carter 22:54

So it was a done deal, and then what they did is they did a tender, and so the tender was all a facade.

Devon Davidson 23:01

Interesting.

Roy Carter 23:01

Uh so here these people go get financing, yeah, and they tender, and then because there's no transparency, they're just told at the end the hotterates are high. But it was a total done deal in advance, right? Yeah.

Alle Carter 23:13

I'm seeing a lot of those recently, especially uh sometimes with these progressive tenders that realtors are trying to do, which I think we're gonna touch on in a bit.

Devon Davidson 23:22

But that was my next question, Alle. So yeah, finish your point, then let's jump into that.

Alle Carter 23:26

Perfect. So it's yeah, a lot of times even the tenant might have a right of first refusal on the land that's not disclosed. And this kind of goes to what we discussed earlier, but that just the lack of disclosure to the buyers, that in no way benefits your client because no one trusts it. And so no one will bother to go get financing on sale day because they're really just a price setter. They're not gonna waste their time when there's no chance of getting the land. But I've seen many times where they don't even know that. And then at the end, oh, it goes to the renter for you know, maybe what the highest tender was, maybe not. Yeah. Um, and it just completely erodes the system where I know of good friends now that will never submit another tender because that's just their experience with it, and they assume that's how it's gonna go. And it's really quite sad. Uh, and so that's why we genuinely tried to clean up the system. And I think we've briefly touched on it, but we'll never let sellers pick and choose also at the end of the sale who who gets it. You know, immediately following the sale, that high bidder gets an automatic email in their inbox within minutes. And we set that up purposely so that they know there's no, you know, making calls after the sale to to our seller saying, you know, this guy was high, but do you actually want so and so to get it? Yeah. Um, and I think that's huge. There's proof right away.

Roy Carter 24:48

Yeah.

Alle Carter 24:49

Yeah.

Roy Carter 24:49

I mean, we've talked about it before. One of the reasons we actually started, you know, built it 10, 11 years ago was over a tender in a law firm where the party that was high didn't ever find out they were high because it was bid shopped by the law firm.

Devon Davidson 25:02

That's right.

Roy Carter 25:03

And, you know, that's a thing that it's just not right. Or, you know, we've talked about it too, these tenders where somebody will tender, you know, I tender a thousand dollars over the highest tender. I mean, they that should be thrown into garbage. Uh, but uh that's the kind of stuff that goes on behind closed doors, right?

Devon Davidson 25:20

Yeah.

Roy Carter 25:21

Um yeah.

Devon Davidson 25:22

Yeah, so for our listeners, Roy was referring to a story he talked about in in the first episode of the podcast that we did. So definitely reference that when it was a good episode.

Progressive Tender As Bid Shopping

Devon Davidson 25:30

Um, so Allie, you mentioned it progressive tender. So let's jump into that. Maybe for anyone that's not familiar with progressive tendering, um, Roy or Allen, I don't know who wants to take it, but uh just explain how it works and how it compares to CLH.

Roy Carter 25:42

Maybe I just had a call on this yesterday. Maybe I'll give it a whirl. Uh just timely, I had a call yesterday from the lady, and the name came and rang a bell. And I was like, I think I've talked to you before. And she said, Yeah, uh, a couple years ago. So I pulled it up and we could I could pull it up on my computer. It was about two and a half years ago. And uh she said, Yeah, I talked to you about selling my land, and uh and I still got it. And I said, Oh, really? And she said, Uh, yeah, it hasn't been very good. And I said, What's the story? And she said, Well, yeah, after I talked to you, I held it for six months and then decided to sell it. But this guy told me to try this tender by realtors, right? And uh, it was cheaper. So I said, Okay, how'd that go? And she said, Well, not very good. And I said, So what's the deal? And uh she said, Well, first of all, the realtor told me to get an appraisal that I paid for, and then she said that he proceeded to do this, what they call progressive tender, which is a fancy word for bid shopping, and really getting people to negotiate with themselves, right? Lack of transparency, and again, farmers don't like players, but it's just playing all day long. Yeah. And uh so I said, So what happened? And she said, Well, at the end of it, she said, it was really weird that the high bid was the exact amount of the tender or the appraisal rather, exact amount of the appraisal that I paid for. She said, I think my appraisal got out, eh? And uh I said, Do you think? And uh so she said, Yeah, I wasn't happy. And I said, So who had the high bid? And she said, Oh, the guy that told me to use the realtor.

Devon Davidson 27:22

Oh, geez.

Roy Carter 27:23

And it was like, okay, so have you got stuff figured out? And she said, Yeah, the light's starting to go on. And uh, you know, I started thinking she's gonna say it took me a long time, but I'm catching on fast. Yeah, and uh so uh, you know, she she so basically it was like, uh, do you guys want to sell my land? And it was like, yeah, let's talk, right? But that was a call I had yesterday on her experience. You know, they they'll go on sometimes for a month or two, right? Where they keep calling around. And in her case, clearly there was collusion uh because the names get out. And then at the end of it, uh, she told me yesterday, um, yeah, I know I'll either use you guys or I guess another option. She said, I've got the list of all the people. I guess I could start calling them. And I said, Well, okay, yeah, well, you could give that a try, too, right? See how far that's gonna go after these guys have already been played one or one time. Right, yeah. Uh, so yeah, I mean, it uh that really came about by real estate offices after seeing what CLH bid did.

Devon Davidson 28:24

Yeah.

Roy Carter 28:25

And they didn't totally understand what we do. And uh, so they started this progressive tender bid shopping process that uh, you know, farmers just uh it's uh they don't like the lack of transparency, they don't like getting played against each other, that type of deal. Nor should they.

Devon Davidson 28:43

Yeah. Uh oh, just and speaking of appraisals, so again for our listeners,

No Office Bidding And Final Wrap

Devon Davidson 28:48

go back and check. Uh I think it's episode eight's inherent difficulties in appraising farmland. That was another good episode to listen to. Uh Roy, I think you mentioned already, but one question we did really want to talk about quickly was you know, CLH has been in operation for nearly a decade. Um have you ever taken have you ever placed a bid on the site? And that's something that we've had people at trade shows ask us. I think it's a common question that comes up. Um, but just you know, for complete transparency and clarity, uh, you know, I just want to get your answer on again. No.

Roy Carter 29:19

Uh yeah, nobody from the team. We all play at the same level. Uh, it just will never happen, right? There's uh, you know, and you only play that game so long. I mean, we've seen auction companies shut down uh, you know, over bidding back and different things. Yeah, you're gonna get caught at that game. Yeah, and it it we don't not bid because we're afraid. Um, we don't bid because we're ethical, and we built a system to respect buyers and give them transparency. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Alle Carter 29:51

Yeah, it goes so far as we won't even place a phone bid for someone. Like if they call Corey, I've seen it many times where oh, I can't get on right now. And no, it's that doesn't fly. Yeah, you need to be in your own uh office at your accountant's office, have them place the bid, but we're not doing that.

Roy Carter 30:09

And we'll get calls during the sale.

Alle Carter 30:11

Oh, yeah.

Roy Carter 30:12

And it's like uh, you know, is Ben Hofer on or is Jake on? And it's like, whatever, go away, right? Yeah, uh, but um I don't know they're but they try it because a lot of people do it.

Alle Carter 30:24

Would you say that's it?

Roy Carter 30:25

That's the easy thing.

Alle Carter 30:26

Yeah, I guess bid one more time, he is on. That's easy.

Devon Davidson 30:29

Yeah, you know, totally, yeah.

Alle Carter 30:31

Yeah, okay.

Devon Davidson 30:33

Well, I I think that's all we've got for today's episode, guys. Any any parting words, any other topics you wanted to touch on? No, uh, okay. Thank you. Okay, well, thanks again for being here, guys. Thanks very much. Uh, and to our listeners, thank you for tuning in for another edition of the Farmland Exchange. Hopefully, you found some value in today's episode. Um, if you haven't, as I said at the top of the show, please like, rate, or review our show on your podcast platform of choice. Um, if you have any questions for us or topics you'd like us to discuss, or if you're interested in selling farmland, you have some specific questions for us, send us an email at info at clhbid.com or give us a call, 866-263-7480. We'd love to talk farmland with you. That's it for now. Thanks for tuning in. I hope this was a positive exchange for you.