what do i learn after attend $100k seminar

Seven Sins of Real Estate Investment seminar

The year 2016 has been a difficult year. In this year, Australian banks decided to stop offering the biggest welfare to Chinese investors - overseas income loan. In fact, this policy used to be the bread and butter of many brokers, including me. I used to fantasize about getting a better car by working hard this year, but I need to adjust my expectations due to the policy change. We have experienced a sharp performance decline since the policy changed, and I recognized I do not only need to cut back on my expenses and also need to make transformation of my business.

In this transition period filled with confusion and chaos, I invest $ 100,000.00 on a variety of success and real estate investment courses, trying to get some inspiration for a career breakthrough. The following is the list of courses I attended.

1. Nhan Nguyen

2. Dominique Grubisa

3. Cherie Barber

4. Bob Anderson

5. Mark Rolton

6. Jim Castagent

7. Michael Yarney

8. Libby Lombarbo

9. Amber Khanna

10. James Dawsons

11. Bernadette Janson

12. Jane slack Smith

13. Rob Flux


In addition, I have also attended countless free Seminars, read nearly thirty books on real estate and all kinds of hotspot real estate reports. These sseminars have helped me in many aspects, letting me consider the real estate investment in a new upper level. I started to looking for land with a price lower than its value, rather than simply purchasing off-plan properties. By learning various development strategies, I have obtained the ability to clearly discover the potential of a piece of land
Apart from attending these seminars, I have also learned theories from house speculation masters from many other countries, such as the United States, China, New Zealand and South Africa. Through learning the process of urbanization in other countries and summarizing my own practice, I deeply felt that some of the theories in the real estate investment Seminars are misleading：

1. Quitting a full time job
The promotional materials of many courses are the "secret" of many real estate investors. If you want to quit a full time job and have a significant annual income at the same time, you’d better pay for our Seminar.
The poor do not only be hard up for money, but everything. Maybe he is lazier than the rich， unable to control his emotions, lack of useful connection or do not have a plan for the future. The situation cannot be changed once you are aware of what real estate development is and how to renovate a house, unless you sell drugs. Learning is always useful, but there is no good if you just want to quit your job in three months and sit idle and enjoy the fruits of others ‘work.

2. Investing in small cities

Nowadays, all hotspot reports and buyers’ agents are recommending their customers to invest in second-tier cities or regional area . For a long time, agents would hold a big round plate like wizard holding a crystal ball, telling their customers that real estate in Sydney has already been overpriced and is on the top of the circle, and Brisbane and Adelaide are a better choice.

Investors are always advised to avoid big cities and invest in small cities. Experts believe that Sydney property market is always expensive, unjustifiable, and going to crash. I don't want to comment on the actual performance of this subjective real estate cycle theory. What I know clearly is that if people in small cities could broaden their horizon and adjust their psychological price to invest real estate in big cities, they may be millionaires today. On the contrary, if people in Sydney sold their houses to invest in Brisbane and Adelaide, the result would be very clear.
i don't want find the property suits my situation, i want change my situation to buy better properties.


Please remember that the Matthew effect will be more obvious in the process of urbanization. It is a historical law that big cities will be increasingly prosperous. For example, the average house price in Moscow is 65 times higher than that of Russia, and New York's house price is hundreds of times higher than that of Detroit. In 1977, the house price in Wollongong is on an equal level with Ashfield Sydney, but it is now at the bottom.

This is the result of marketing. Most people, who like hotspot, do not have a high income. It is easier for them to believe that house price in small cities will be doubled and poor districts will become rich than to believe that mosman will rise. The public love Cinderella story, but we can barely see this kind of story happen in the real life.

3. Unicorn

If I tell you that you can own a beautiful and unique unicorn as long as you pay ten thousand dollars, will you believe it? In fact, no one will, because unicorns don't exist at all. However, many buyer agents and all kinds of experts claim that they can help customers to find undervalued properties with capital growth potential and positive cash flow. Customers believe this is exactly what they want. If I match these sentences with some other products, you may have a different feeling. For instance, If I tell you this weight loss drug invited by the research institute of America, can be very effective without any diet and exercise. It only takes one dose to show its effect and it does not have any side effect. You only need to pay 5888 dollars for it, what would you think?

People do not like making choices because they want it all. It is impossible. As the old Chinese saying said:” One cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs”. Once a saleman tried to sale me an off-plan at Meadowbank and he started to brag all these theories from nowhere. He told me this property has the best location, close to water, train station, city, Parramatta, Macquarie Park and a few employment centre.


I told him the theoretical cornerstone of investment is not the location, but firstly the nation’s monetary policy and currency inflation; secondly, demand and supply. If supply exceeds demand, it will have a significant impact on the value of the property. I asked him:” Don’t you know the future supply in Meadowbank?”

In the real estate investment, you cannot choose the exact lots that are close to all locations. Maybe it is close to bus, but not close to train; maybe it is convenient for buses, but far away from train stations. Suppose the rent is the same, which one do you think the tenant would choose? The place close to their work (e.g. within 10km from CBD), or the place close to everywhere, but actually far from CBD (e.g. 20km away from CBD)? Cattail growth, under value, development potential, positive cashflow—if you can manage two from these four categories in real practice, you are already an expert.

4. Positive Cash Flow


After 5 years, interest only period ends, the monthly repayment become $28,000 and surplus declined to $7,000. This is only under the circumstances that the rent does not decline, interest, management fee and maintenance cost do not increase. And you need to pray for an increase of the property price, because most properties with 7% rental return are in rural area and can hardly find a buyer. by the way 7% return, the price is likely to going down.


5. Make Profits in Every Market

For many experts, ‘buy and hold’ could be the worst solution, because you have to pray for an increase in value. If you can purchase a property with a relative low price, then do some renovation or development, your property would worth more in spite of the stable market. If the market flattens out, renovation or reconstruction would still be a good idea. But if the market goes down, then no matter what you do to your property, the value of your property would still go down. Once the market goes down, people would lose confidence in real estate investment. No matter how good the number used to be, you may not sell your property in such kind of market.

6. Apply Local Strategies to the Whole Country

Many property guru from Brisbane would suggest that small investments are so profitable. For a while, I had been wondering why all these lecturers are from Brisbane but not Sydney or Melbourne? I found the reason later on. In Sydney where everything is so expensive, if you want to split one area into two and sell them separately (Including the driveway area), you need at least 1000 ㎡ land. And in most circumstances, you even need to demolish the current buildings, and the cost is so high and you can barely get any profit from the whole project.


But in Brisbane, it’s another story. To split the area you only need around 800㎡. If it is in higher density planning areas, then you need even less than that. Plus, a lot of residence are based on wooden stakes in Brisbane, you can move the whole house to somewhere near the corner of your area, then you can even save the building.

An inch of land worth an inch of gold in cosmopolitan cities like Sydney or Melbourne. And to split the land, investors need 1000 ㎡; In Brisbane, you can easily find a land which is only 10km away from CBD and you only need 800 ㎡. I believe this is the very reason why such developers are all from Brisbane.

In addition, the more mature the commercial community is, the clearer the division of labor would be. Only the most powerful ones could survive. In Sydney, all small investment developers are already builders or have such background.

7.The Mentor’s Crutch

In the end of many real estate investment courses, they would tell you that all you have learnt is just a start. If you want to learn more, you need to pay some ten thousand dollars for an advance course, where the lecturer would guide you step by step and you can copy their success. Trust me, to learn step by step and copy is not the shortcut to success, it is the misleading path.

1.There is no success that could be copied in this world, all success is unique. Have you ever heard that some CEO copied others’ success step by step, instead of struggling on his own? When we were learning how to walk, if we fell, our parents would never say “using the crutches”. Because it is impossible and will only make us more dependent on these crutches.

2.
Such “advance courses” would cost $15,000-$30,000, such amount would be more than enough for you to sit down and talk with professional lawyers, accountants and architects for more than 100 hours. That is where you can learn some practical stuff.

I was often asked by young unit student “Do accountants earn a lot?” “Do financial planners have a bright prospect?” “Why real estate agencies always seem to be so rich?”.


I would like to use my answers to these questions as the ending of this article.

“Money making skills are some simple techniques, which most people don’t know or despise. The reason why people don’t know these skills is because their prejudice, and their bias and ignorance of such simple techniques is because that they don’t know how to use them.” For example, buy and hold properties in Sydney.

 

Sounds like you wasted your money.

 

no really, i learn a lot as well, plus my income is very solid

 

Wow! I admire your resilience and patience in sitting through $100k worth of seminars. I do not have the temperament to be able to do that. I found your post really insightful.

This is my favourite part:

I like this because I have travelled my own path in property investing and am finding my own groove to do something not many would do but what works for me.

 

An interesting read. Thanks for sharing your experiences and interpretations. Immersion is certainly a good way to start seeing through all the BS.

 

Are you sure about this?

 

Hi @thomas8888,

Real-estate is also an experiential / practical activity as well as a theoretical one. It's like a lot of university courses where you learn certain theoretical skills and then you need to put them into practice in your work career. For example, a lot of filmmaking courses can tell you how to make a film but to really learn you need to actually make a film. Often you need to take 'baby steps' in the learning experience to develop the skill sets. For example, doing or managing your first renovation, organising to replace a kitchen, doing a bit of painting yourself, investigating subdivision sites, doing a splitter / subdivision, etc. Hence, spending the money on courses without doing some practical activity may not have been the best use of your financial resources. One of the courses above, I've actually done and then applied what I learned before moving onto the next step.

Also with so many courses, it may become confusing and then maybe you start to have doubts about what is learned. No doubt the course presenters have a business and it is a way for them to derive income as well. The idea of doing a course is to minimize your own risk to hopefully learn from others who may have done things before and have made mistakes. So from what you have learned, just focus on say one thing and do that, and then continue to develop your skills - you will never profit from property courses only from the property itself, (unless you are giving a course that is!)

As far as your item 6 goes. As the Brisbane LGA covers a wide area and the development rules are generally consistent, as well as standardization of lot sizes and the types of houses available, this has made Brisbane probably an more easily accessible subdivision market than many other property markets in Australia. Other cities in Australia are made up of many LGA areas and have planning rules at state and local levels. However, the principles of understanding the planning and development process, finding a good town planner, understanding what can / cannot be done and the steps of doing a subdivision are similar - only the specific details in each LGA are different.

At the end of the day making money via property can be done, but it's not so easy, it does require a lot of hardwork, the courses may help to minimize risk but you actually have to do it to learn about it.

 

What property prices looked like 40 years ago: Sydney's changing real estate landscape

read yourself

 

And that didnt cost you thousands.

 

Did you learn that the courses didn't actually teach you much?

 

i agree with you, i done renovations and currently doing development, but there is wrong theories no one try to challenge

 

it not issue, if you have good salary

affordability is personal thing

 

1.



11 archie street nambour qld 4560



He claim the property can be rent out for $800, it clear show this property 11 Archie Street

Nambour Qld 4560 has been rent out for $350 per week. In last few years this property has no growth and previous owner struggle sell as development site.

11 Archie Street, Nambour, Qld 4560 - View Sold History & Research Property Values - realestate.com.au

 

Tbh most of your insights gained could have been attained from 3-5 books . Imo you're focusing in too many directions with all those courses . It's like your trying to find the magic potion and keep searching endlessly .

You need to go back and simplify things. You have way more material than you'll ever need to be successful . You gotta examine now why you haven't been able to use it to get results .

Just my opinion .

 

it's better than search for forum

The best course so far is

Cherie Barber -----never regret

Rob Flux----never regret

Nhan Nguyen -----never regret（ even I saw lot of negative comments）

 

Michale Yarney book is ok, beside his book, i personally don't think there any other good book


i do get result, i will share later on

 

Ok I read it. Mentions The gongs real estate price in 77 but not now

 

I agree with @Leo2413. whatever your goals are, I'd be picking a strategy or two and using that to help me reach it. You dont need to spend $100K for that.

 

what i am try say the Wollongong is price is same as ashfield in 1977, what happen now? there is no destiny for small city, urban city is foundation of real estate investment, not regional town.

 

$100k is a nice hefty 20% deposit and stamp duty on a property which would have grown in value. $100k is an awful lot to spend on seminars.

 

And you needed to pay someone to tell you that?