I spent a couple of years looking at land in several states while traveling to/from an annual elk hunt NW of Bozeman.  Through that process I spent hours in trucks with various brokers from leading brokerages in Montana and Wyoming as we toured their listings.  In 2013 Mike and I met on the phone and had a couple of great conversations.  We really drilled into what we were looking for in a ranch.  Mike helped reinforce many of our goals, but also added important context that we hadn’t fully considered.  The discussions and subsequent field trips were grounded in what Mike perceived in our best interests, not SLC listings.  After a year of conversations and several trips to visit properties, none of which were SLC listings, a new ranch had just hit the market – a SLC listing.  It was the first we visited and it was the ranch we purchased and have lived at for the past 8 years.