n this episode of the Paper Trail Podcast, we speak with Chalea Grant of Mountain West Ranches, a family-owned land investment and note company on the West Coast, and a sponsor of the Paper Trail Note Conference. Chalea shares how his family has been building trust with investors since 1990, using seller financing and a fully in-house process to ensure quality, transparency, and strong returns.

From navigating investor concerns and scams to providing recourse guarantees on land notes, Chalea reveals what makes Mountain West Ranches a standout in the land investment space. Investors will learn why having everything in-house, maintaining detailed documentation, and prioritizing long-term relationships leads to a reliable, stress-free investment experience.

Resources & Contact:

• Website: mwranches.com/land-note
• Email: chale@mwranches.com

Join Chalea and other industry leaders at the Paper Trail Note Conference, September 18–20, in Chandler, AZ. Register Here

Welcome everybody to another episode of the Paper Trail podcast.

Today I have Chalet Grant with Mountain West Ranches who is a land investment company out on the west coast and also a sponsor at the Paper Trail conference.

How are you today?

I'm doing really good.

Super excited to talk with you and tell you a little bit about what we do.

So yeah, I'm excited.

Thank you for having me.

So I'm type person who just likes to roll up our sleeves and dive right into it.

So why don't you tell us a little bit about Mountain West Ranches, what you do and how you got involved in this avenue of business.

Yeah, so I've been working, it's a family owned business.

That's biggest piece probably that we like to tell people and it's just a small business, but I've been working for the company since I was 15 years.

So I've been hearing my dad, he's the owner of the company, I've been hearing him talk about this since I was born.

So very, very passionate about our company and what we do.

The way it started, it was my grandpa, he went out to the tax sale, bought some lots for super cheap.

He went in and you know, made sure there was a road to get into the lot, graded out a nice little pad, you know, to fit an RV and just started selling lots that way.

And then a few years later, you know, demand got so crazy that we saw a need for seller financing because obviously banks don't really finance rural land.

So.

So we started, you know, seller financing.

And then obviously from there we needed a little bit of money to, you know, grow our business.

We needed some operating capital.

So my dad was like, hey, well, why don't we start selling a few of these loans?

So we put some ads in the local newspaper and that's where we found our first group of investors that have been with us for 20 plus years now.

We are so incredibly blessed to have really amazing, just good people that invest with us.

They're just all a pleasure to work with.

Like I mentioned previously, it's just really good mutually beneficial relationships.

So yeah, I've been doing this for almost 15 years now, working with our investors, helping them to pick out, you know, the notes that they, that they want to purchase.

And yeah, we have just to dive into our whole program.

We have a really great loan servicing team that's in house they do an excellent job.

There's five people in there, they work full time taking really good care of our loans.

And yeah, we just, we do everything in house.

That's our, another big thing about us is that everything's in house.

Our road crew is in house.

The only thing we don't have in house is, is a title company.

But we actually do close some of these loans in house if they don't want title, title insurance.

So.

So it's interesting that you talk about in house which you've mentioned a few times and I don't think people truly understand the benefits sometimes of doing certain things in house.

And you mentioned you have five people on the servicing team in house and you know some of the other things you do.

And for us we're a company that we also raise money and we buy a lot of non performing loans and we have asset management and our investor relations in house.

And a lot of people like oh that's just extra overhead.

But the differentiator as a business of being able to a control it.

But also if somebody has a question, which always happens, they pick up the phone call.

If you call a third party servicer which we use and you know it's, you have good ones and some that now sometimes it takes a little bit.

But if it's somebody who's in house, you always seem to get an answer much quicker.

Sure.

Yeah.

And that's very, very important to our investors.

You know, I mean when they came on with us 15, 20 years ago, you know, a lot of them have been scammed.

They've been scammed because I mean Utah, where we are is the number one scam capital in the nation.

So a lot of them had been scammed.

So we took a lot of time with them.

Just really, you know, just taking our time with them and no, no pressure type of thing.

And I think the reason why it worked is because like I said, we're a family own and like you said, we take care of them, we don't.

I mean some of our investors will use escrow specialists but in fact they've found that we do such a better job that they don't.

I mean none of our investors even take their loans over there anymore because it's just, yeah, when you have everything in house, you're just really able to control the quality of everything.

And when you care about your company the way that we do and you care about your investors the way that we do, like that's just, I think that's, that's probably the biggest reason why we're successful is because we, we take good care of our investors and we take really good care of our borrowers too.

That's.

You know, I will say I've been listening to your podcast and that's one of the things that I feel like we have in common is we're just.

Everybody that you've interviewed is just.

They're all just really down to earth people, right?

Like, no egos.

Like, we're just, you know, we're just people just doing our job every day.

Because I feel like in this world you will speak with some people that do have a bit of an ego.

You know, everybody's different.

But I've realized, I've just noticed that the people that, you know that are coming to the conference, they're people like us.

We're just down to earth people, very personable, you know, just want to take care of you, no pressure type of thing.

So.

So yeah, yeah, it's.

I tried to get people who do what they say they're gonna do, and there's so many people out there that just are using social media, you know, and trying to get an influence on there.

And it was interesting.

I was watching the documentary about that unfortunate.

Where, you know, the young couple, basically where I think he, like, you know, ended up killing her and drove back to Florida and so forth, where they're trying to be influencers.

And there was a quote on there that hit me though, that somebody said is the people who are either the loudest or happiest on social media are typically those that have the most skeletons in the closet.

And.

And it's like in real estate, it's kind of almost like so true from what I see is.

And again, I'm sitting here as a person who, yeah, I have a podcast and so forth.

You know, I don't consider myself any type of influencer in any way, shape or form, but it's like, I try and tell stories, but there's so many people out there just trying to take advantage of people and don't actually even do what they say they're gonna do, and they pretend they do.

I want people who actually deliver on what they do.

And that's why it's, you know, great getting to connect with you in that sense.

I want to rewind a little bit because you mentioned something and for our audience, because land investing, people sometimes think is easy.

Oh, it's a piece of land, and so forth.

But you mentioned a lot of people get scammed, especially in Utah.

What are some of the ways people can get scammed in this type of investing.

With notes.

I mean, I don't, to be honest, I don't.

That's, you know, when, when I first spoke with you, I was very adamant on, you know, I don't, I don't give advice.

That's not what I'm in the business of.

I don't give advice.

So I don't, you know, I couldn't really, to be honest with you, I can't really speak on what kind of scams are out there.

I think for us, the biggest thing is I, I will say that we get that a lot.

People will say, oh, you're too good to be true.

Right.

Like they.

We're a scam.

Yep.

So with us, it's just all about.

It's just all about documentation.

Everything is disclosed.

You know, I tell people, I'll send you.

I'll send you whatever you need to see so that you don't, you know, so that you feel comfortable so that, you know, we're real people.

I mean, a lot of people will even have them come out to our office to meet us in person.

Okay.

Because, you know, it's just so much better to just see in person that, oh, these are real people.

They're really doing what they say they're doing.

Because, yeah, I, I honestly don't know what kind of scams there.

There's a lot of different types of scams these days.

I mean, oh, all the kind of scams that are out there, it's, it's truly wild.

And some of our, some of our people are older, they're retired, you know, so I feel like that's, that's a group of people that are, are being taken advantage of.

So, so with us, it's just like you said, do what you say you're going to do.

And that's why we're, that's why I'm successful at what I do is because when I say I'm going to do something for my investor, I do it, and I do it in a timely manner.

I don't, you know, because if they're wondering, we don't ever want our investors wondering.

We don't want them during, hey, what's going on with this payment that I haven't received?

I mean, I don't even want them wondering for one hour.

It's, it's an immediate reply, an immediate get on the phone with you.

So, yeah, that's, that's kind of what we do to, you know, make our investors feel comfortable and just Let them know, hey, I know it might seem like it's too good to be true, but we're.

We're real people.

We're not a scam.

And, you know, we just take.

Take our time with people as, as long as they need.

So.

Yeah, one thing I noticed that you're very detailed on your website is in the descriptions of your property.

You talk about like, water rights or the zoning and, you know, is it ready for, like, cabins, does that access, Is it ready for enjoyment or not ready for enjoyment?

Where I have seen people, and I've seen this in Texas where people at tax sales would go out and buy, you know, basically land that just is landlocked underwater.

Like, can't do anything with it.

That's 30 miles from any, any utility and you can't do anything for it.

They'll buy it at tax sale and then jack up the price because they'll offer 0% seller financing and basically tell people, oh, here's a big beautiful lot and buildable when it really isn't.

So that is one thing I have seen people do.

And some people get a really bad reputation on.

And one thing I noticed you are really descriptive on your website, not only from a aspect of what you put in there, but you also put everything in English and Spanish as well.

So it's, you know, bilingual, so everyone can understand.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Right.

But that's.

Yeah, that's definitely something we've learned through trial and error.

It's just, it's.

You.

How.

I mean, I don't know how people expect to be successful long term if they're not being upfront and honest with people.

Right.

Like, it's just.

That doesn't make any sense to me.

I mean, we want to be.

We want to be around forever.

We're actually expanding to new locations.

So I mean, if we want to do that, we have to disclose everything.

We have to be upfront with people.

We have to take good care of them and treat them like they matter, not like they're just, you know, a dollar sign coming into our bank account, you know, so.

So you mentioned, you mentioned you're looking to expand, you know, new locations, different states, you know, can, can you talk about that or is it still kind of under wraps?

It's still under wraps, but we're.

We're able to talk about it.

And it's not.

It's nothing like set in stone.

We're working on it.

We want to.

The first place we want to expand to is southern Utah, northern, Northern Arizona, just probably because it's closest.

And that will be the easiest way for us to kind of, you know, we've really, we call it a well oiled machine is what we currently have going on.

I mean, sure, there's flaws here and there, nothing's ever perfect and we're always working to improve those flaws.

But yeah, we have a really well oiled machine.

So we're just really excited to be able to take that operation, those systems and procedures and try it somewhere else and see if it's, see if it's successful.

So.

So yeah, I'm excited about that.

Yeah.

Walk me through the experience of, you know, as an, if somebody was an investor with you kind of, what, what's their, what's it look like for their process?

Because with everything in house, I'm assuming it must be pretty streamlined.

Yeah, it's pretty, it's pretty easy.

I mean the first thing you do is just get with me and I'm the one that has the, the list of notes that are available.

Our notes, the, the rates range anywhere from 8 to 13% and then our discounts go up to 10.

Our discounts are just based on our need to sell notes based on, you know, what position our business is in.

Sometimes we're buying a huge piece of property.

That's a big thing we do is buy huge lots and subdivide them and create submissions.

So when we're doing that, sometimes we need to sell a couple more notes, you know, to cover those costs type of thing.

So, so yeah, they get with me, they pick out some notes that they want to buy.

We close through the title company so that they do get title insurance and a lender's policy.

That's, that's huge because it's, you know, I mean you want to make sure the title is clear.

You want to, it's just due diligence.

And then a big thing that we do that makes us different.

Our quote unquote purple cow, if you want to call it that is.

Heard that.

Your purple cow.

Wow, hold on.

Write that one down.

I learned that in marketing school.

That's one of, one of my favorite things.

Just your thing that makes you stand out, you know, thing that makes you different than everybody else.

Because obviously there's people selling notes even, even notes on rural land all over the, all over the nation.

So.

But we, we offer a recourse guarantee agreement with our loans to our investors.

So that that document comes in with the title company's documents and that just says if the loan defaults, we're going to replace it with a similar one from our portfolio.

Because we always have about 200 in our portfolio, you know, so that's a big thing.

Just because it, it guarantees your income stream.

Basically you don't have to, you don't have to deal with anything.

And it goes through the title company when you swap out the loan, when you replace it, it goes through the title company.

So it's, it's all official, it's all.

And yeah, we even have an online system for them to view everything.

So once it's closed and recorded through the title company, they can log in and see all their notes and the status of it.

And it's just nice because they're not ever wondering, you know, like I said, you don't want to ever have an investor wondering what's going on with their money.

So it's just an extra piece for them to have some peace of mind and see what's going on.

So that's kind of the process.

It's super easy.

And then from there we service the loans and we have a really good team.

I keep in close contact with all of them.

So I'll know our agreement and the recourse says that we swap it out at 90 days.

So I kind of keep my eye on the ones that are getting close to 90 days.

And once it gets to that point, I, I work with the investor to find them a replacement loan.

And it's.

Yeah, it's a pretty seamless, easy process.

That's why I like to say, you know, if you're just looking for like something easy and you don't want to have to do a lot of work, this is, I mean, it's perfect.

Our investors that we currently work with, they just, they just stack paper, they just buy more and buy more.

Yep.

And like you mentioned, you know, some of the differentiators I view is one is a, you're buying land, but you also can buy large scale which can subdivide it, which is huge advantage.

Because I know there's people out there that don't even know that their land can be subdivided or families passed down and you can buy it and then figure out, and you know, based on having done this for 35 plus years, you've done a lot of work in the counties you worked in.

So you know everybody who's in those offices and you know, their kids, a lot of them yeah, exactly.

My dad.

Yeah.

So, you know, for those who are not in real estate, and I come from a real estate development background as well and construction background.

You know, people may not want to admit this, but having a relationship of knowing somebody in the office that you've worked with compared to being somebody from out of town or out of state.

If I went to go into Utah and buy a piece of property and buy it the same day as MW Ranches and doing a subdivision, I could basically bet and be pretty confident that you would have it through their system and half the time easily.

And it's not because they're playing favorites, it's because they know you that you know their system.

You know what they look for, what they don't look for.

There's so many advantages to working with somebody in that sense.

So.

Yeah, yeah.

Same thing with a title company.

You know, I tell people just use our title company because they're right there literally are like two blocks down from the county building.

So it's always just a little bit more cost effective and faster to use them because they're just right there.

They do it all the time.

They know what they're doing.

Whereas we, when we go to a different title company, they're kind of like, you know what, you just have to tell them everything.

You have to spend more time with them and then it's usually going to cost you more money because they have to do more work.

So.

So yeah, so we had somebody recently, we had someone recently who adamant they wanted to use their own title company.

And we're like, if you use ours, it'll be much smoother.

Nope, I'm using my own.

I don't trust yours.

And we were supposed to close this loan on like a Monday and literally we didn't get.

And come Wednesday comes around prior and like this deal's not closing on Monday because you have.

We have no title commitment or nothing from title back yet and we can't finish underwriting the loan.

Yeah.

And like Friday at like 5:30pm they send get the title commitment.

They're like, hey, want to confirm we can still close Monday.

And I'm like, no.

I'm like, it's like, it's impossible.

I'm like, we told you we're going to need a few days.

And like this is why it took their title company about three weeks for to, you know, do everything.

I'm like, we know what we're doing.

We would have had this done in a week and just would have been over with.

But you know, you're either thinking that you're saving money and so forth.

I'm like, you're really not.

And actually their title company was more expensive than the one we use.

So.

Yeah, yeah, like you said, it goes back to trust.

Some people just have a really hard time trusting people.

So I feel like you have to, you know, you have to respect that as much as you can and work with that as much as you possibly can.

But I feel like, yeah, it's, it ends up being their loss in the end because they didn't, you know, they didn't trust you and just do what you, you know, what you knew was going to be faster and a little bit cheaper.

But, you know, at the end of the day, when you're working with an investor, it's like you have to walk a fine line of, you know, taking good care of them and making them feel like, like I said, like you're not a scam and because, yeah, trust is, Trust is a huge piece.

Yes, yeah, yeah, trust.

And goes back to what, you know, we were talking about earlier, just, you know, being a person of your word, being in the business for 35 years, building investor trust.

And as you mentioned, a lot of those repeat investors, you know, we've been around for, in this business, you know, you know, three plus years with our current fund and we have a very high reinvestment rate because, you know, we just, you know, we tell people, you know, what's going on, we try and keep them informed and, you know, we try and be as transparent as possible on things and, you know, just, you know, just, you know, try and be upfront with people and what's going on.

And I think that goes really a long way.

If people have questions, they can reach out and talk to us.

We don't, you know, not respond to them.

So it's, that's important.

There's a lot of that in this world.

There's a lot of, you know, you can't get through to somebody.

There's a lot of, you know, there's, like we were saying, there's a lot of scams.

There's a lot of people who say they're going to do something and then they don't do it.

So when you are that person that does what you say you're going to do and you're that person that you're real, you're not a scam.

Like, it, like you said, it goes a long way because there's nothing, unfortunately, a lot of that in this world right now.

No, it is.

And the reality, too, is, you know, there are deals that go bad, you know, and this reality is if you're in real estate and your family business of 35 years doing this, there's deals that probably didn't go as well as you thought.

And that's the reality of it.

You know, I remember I was at a conference and this, you know, there's.

They had, like, little groups around an area where different sponsors got the talk and so forth.

And they basically went from.

Like, you were in a group that went from one to the other.

This one guy talking, and he's like, yeah, we're a $5 billion fund that is, you know, basically does private lending.

And we have never had to foreclose on.

Never had, like, foreclosed on on a loan or something.

And I'm just like, there is.

And they've been around for, I don't know, 10 plus, whatever years.

I'm like, that is impossible.

I'm like, there.

I'm like, unless you sold it for a loss, but there is no chance that, you know, you've done thousands of loans.

And I've never.

I'm like, it's, you know, pretty much statistically impossible to have that happen.

And, you know, a person was touting it and stuff.

And, you know, I see people going, you know, and I'm like sitting here thinking, like, okay, I wish I had my meter, because I could pull out, because the thing would be going off the charts.

That's the other problem in today's world is a lot of people don't have a meter.

They don't, you know, they see a shiny thing and they're so impressed by it.

But you have to really be able to see through the shine because everything that glitters is not gold.

So.

Oh.

So there was.

Somebody sent me an article yesterday about an investor in Southern California, was running basically a mortgage note fund that got charged wire fraud, and basically 62 million.

Allegedly $62 million disappeared out of, like, nine, whatever.

And, you know, the person was offering, like, 15% plus annual returns to investors.

There was another one that recent was in news because they're offering 40% returns to their investors.

And we had one of our investors reach out and say they ask this question on a webinar.

Well, I can invest in this company and get 40, 10% per quarter.

You're like, 10% per year.

Why would I invest with you?

And I, you know, my comment was, I don't know any company on the planet that has sustained a 40% annualized return to its investors.

If it did, they'd be owned by Blackstone and Blackstone would be their only investor.

And also, I have no idea what that risk profile is, but it must be humongous.

And turns out, you know, it was basically a Ponzi scheme.

And you know what it turns out to be.

Yeah.

And basically a lot of these other quote unquote note funds that you see that are offering 15, 18, 20% returns now every three months now.

I see, you know, whether it's that or self storage or anything, it pops up that it's like, oh, this person basically, you know, use the money for their own house or this, and, you know, they lived a great life.

But yeah, it's.

That shiny object is, you know, there's.

When everyone is in like a.

Like you said, you're like 8 to 13%.

You know, when everyone's in that, you know, that range of things, it's like, okay, that makes sense.

But when you see people at like 16, 18, 20%, it's like, what's going on?

What are you doing?

Yes.

The math is not mathing.

That's exactly right.

Yeah.

When.

When you look at.

It's like, you know, you have overhead, you have like, where's that?

How.

Yeah, so.

Yeah, yeah.

And that's why, you know, that's why I think our investors love our program.

And it's, you know, they're all more conservative people.

Right.

Like, they're not.

They're not looking to get a 50 return in three years.

Because I do talk to people like that.

Like, they're looking for crazy returns and a short amount of time.

And I'm like, I'm not.

I'm not going to waste your time.

That's just not what we have.

So good luck to you finding that.

But that's not what we have.

You know, we have a really solid program.

It works.

It's proven to work.

These returns are proven to work.

You know, it is what it is.

If you want to take that risk on the.

On the 50% return in three years, then go ahead.

But like you said, it's usually a scam, unfortunately.

So.

Yeah.

And like you said, been around long enough where you've got the track record, and when people.

And it's a very different mindset.

People that invest in this type of product, they're looking for the income play.

They're not looking for the 50%.

They just want something that, you know, is diversified and adds to that portfolio.

And if you can get that, you know, 8, 10, 12, 13% from one person and it's consistent.

It's like, okay, I will continue to feed them.

And because they're trusted now, they may diversify and try one or the other and stuff, but from the most part, you know, they're not going to leave.

You know, they typically will grow, but, you know, most will also diversify whatnot.

But, you know, the moment you get an investor and you treat them well and, you know, if you can hit the returns, you say, you know, typically they will not leave.

Yes, that's exactly right.

In fact, they.

They refer their family members, their brothers, their sisters, their kids.

I mean, that's a lot of investors.

Their whole family invests with us because they just see such a good return from it and it's such a solid operation that, yeah, they just, they want everyone to get in on it.

So.

Yeah.

So as we wrap up this episode, last two questions I wanted to ask is, with your investors, is there typically, like a minimum investment amount that they need to have?

So, you know, with what we do.

That's what I was going to say.

It's interesting with what we do because we completely avoid the securities Exchange Commission because, you know, you're just buying a note.

You don't even sell partial notes right now.

You have to buy the full note.

Right.

So our lowest loan right now is around $45,000.

Our highest loan right now is about $230,000.

With that being said, you can obviously buy a package of them.

I usually have about 10 available at all times.

Our average loan balance is about 75,000.

That's our average right now.

And then, yeah, when you buy a package, we'll obviously increase that discount for buying a package.

And the loans, you know, amortize interest only.

Balloon how they payments?

No balloon payments.

Just.

Yeah, they're just conventional.

Conventional homes.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Cool.

And if people were interested, want more information about what you do, I know they can go to mwranches.com and should they, you know, reach out to you or is there an email or.

Actually, it's actually mwranches.comland-no, because MW will just take you to our.

Our land business.

But that's always really good to see too.

I send our investors there too.

Yeah.

My email address is just my first name, ch a l e a@m w ranches.com so that's the best way.

But if you go to that website, there's even a button on there and it'll like, just call my phone directly from there.

Same thing with email.

It'll send an email directly from there.

So super easy.

Yeah.

And I'm on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn.

Yeah, great.

Well, thanks for coming on today.

It's been a pleasure, and I look forward to seeing you very shortly.

Yep.

We'll see you next week.

Thanks so much.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Enjoy the rest of your day.

Take care.

Bye.