Real estate gurus and expensive seminars
May 26th, 2005 | by mbhunter |The June 2005 issue of Money features real estate — a topic on many minds for sure. An article called “No-Money-Down Mania” by Joan Caplin and Scott Medintz surveys the renewed interest in seminars that offer techniques to make money in real estate with little or no money down.
Real estate “gurus,” self-proclaimed or otherwise, command up to thousands of dollars for a weekend seminar, and leaves some questioning whether they could actually put into practice what they were taught, leaves others whether they got their money’s worth for the seminar, and leaves still others with a lot of confidence that might serve them well, or might not.
A few months ago I picked up a link to John T. Reed’s website — this is quite a site. He sells his own real-estate materials directly from this site, and has direct, often blunt, researched commentary on the majority of the gurus mentioned in the Money article, as well as a few dozen others. I have several books by Robert Allen and Robert Kiyosaki (two gurus discussed both in the Money article and on Reed’s website). I have not attended any seminars by either, and don’t plan on attending mainly because of Reed’s analysis. However, Allen’s newer books, the Multiple Streams of Income books, have non-real-estate wealth building strategies that seem to be reasonable, and Kiyosaki’s books I thought were good not because of the specific real estate advice (which John Reed turns into Swiss cheese over many, many screens) but because it pointed out that there are other ways to make money besides going to a 9-5 job. There are over-generalizations, even errors, in the material, sure. But, it’s also unlikely that somebody would walk into a real estate negotiation armed only with a copy of Nothing Down, any more than a surgeon walks into the operating room armed only with an anatomy book and a scalpel.
If you are considering giving real estate investment a try, I encourage you to check out John Reed’s site before signing up for a real estate seminar, and perhaps look into the real estate experts he does recommend — there aren’t many. You could end up saving thousands of dollars and a lot of time. Lots of people are pursuing real estate investment now, and education — especially about its educators — is critical.
