Helen Tarrant or James Dawson Commercial Property course

Hi guys, I am new to the group and keen to know if any of the two; Helen Tarrant or James Dawson provides better knowledge and experience for a newbie in commercial property investment?

 

Neither? You'd probably learn more just reading this forum instead.

 

Helen tarrant is all over Facebook. She basically just promotes buying little shops.
Not exactly rocket science - borrow money at 3% and find something with a yield of 7%.

There is a lot more to it such as long-term rental demand, rental incentives...

 

No chance!

Pay a commercial buyers agency rather than a course and save yourself the time whilst greatly lower the chance of stuffing it all up. Also there's syndication opportunities.

 

Many of my clients are also James Dawson students. I can tell you they have good knowledge of Commercial investing therefore I would recommend James Dawson’s course. It’s a good course for anyone looking to get a basic knowledge in commercial property.

I haven’t really heard many people going through Helens course to be honest. Looking online I find her style of investing is a little more geared to the entry level of commercial investors. For example she does seem to concentrate a lot on small retail shops that obviously would not really be the Covid proof investments you want. James’s investments seem to be slightly on the high-value side but more diverse in nature

 

Quite possibly but a good understanding of lease clauses, negotiation, agent interaction, effective marketing strategy analysis, cashflow analysis etc comes from experience or dealing with experienced players (mentors).

 

This is true and add to that how to estimate the value of a property and estimate the likely rent for a vacant property. That said, you don't need to do a course to find all that out. There are plenty of resources if you know the right people.

 

But it always makes a compelling reason to spend $$$$$.

I know several virtually illiterate investors in the CIP arena, all of them extremely cash poor , none own residential, are all knowledge rich & not seen the inside of a classroom or lecture theatre.

I must be doing something wrong.

 

For those who may want to see what commercial agents must do for their CPD points annually in order to renew their real estate licence.

Consider this module: Commercial CPD | Real Estate Training Solutions (RETS) at a fraction of the cost of the other courses. There are others out there as well.

Some good information in there for newbies (and those in the profession as well).

 

Great value. Looking into doing the course out of interest. Recently bought into 2 commerical ventures with minimal knowledge under my belt.

 

James Dawson and Helen Tarrant are wonderful. They provide a great deal of free information to get you started. I have two commercial properties that are doing wonderfully. I tried Scott O'Neill buying agency service as did a number of others I know and I am sorry I cannot recommend him. He overpromises and underdelivers. He really is only interested in getting rich and and takes care of the big deals. The small deals he sidelines and sends atrocious properties with pressure sales. I'd use Helen or other buying agent or buy direct.

 

Nothing like jumping in head first to learn.

 

Sometimes you gotta jump in head first (just be sure to drag in with you some very competent folks)

 

I'm not hesitant to say, most of the money I've made is through leveraging the competence and expertise of others.

My best skills are getting people to work together for a desired outcome.

 

Surround yourself with people who know their stuff - it fills in the gaps in your knowledge and you aren't all knowing, all seeing & all responsible.

 

I've sent you a PM to check if there's more to the story you can't share publicly but to bring some balance here my partner and I just settled on an industrial purchase with Scott and the Rethink team and on the opposite I would definitely recommend him. Between the knowledge he shared, the discount on the purchase price we obtained and even down to helping get the best deal from rental managers and depreciation reports I think we made up for the BA fee twice over! Now of course we're only fresh new landlords so the performance of the asset in the long term remains to be seen but we're quietly confident.

 

Your profile looks like Scott O'Neill's alias...

 

Not at all, you can check my posting history I’m sorry you had a bad experience though, it’s always stressful putting your faith in a BA. We just got such a good deal I couldn’t help but reply!

 

I would agree with the experience you had with Rethink Investing. We were at the 450-700k price point. Unfortunately was not all that is portrayed in the podcasts and articles. He is a marketing natural, and absolutely do not doubt he knows his stuff, but will he/they do all they say...? In our experience, we did not receive this and was a very different BA experience / approach to others we (and others) have used. A real shame as love the story and would have loved to partner long term, but I too can not recommend Scott O'Neill or Rethink. Common statements like "from all our [Rethink] clients, only a handful have had rental issues due to Covid"... I would love for a host to ask 'how do you know this [given they don't manage the properties post sale]...Did you ask each of your clients...?'.

 

Agree...when something is too good to be true sometimes it is. His numbers do not stack up. Again another post in the weekend newspaper of how he and his wife purchased so much property in such a short time. He basically leveraged off the marketing and BA income to purchase more properties. There is a lack of genuine sincerity in his marketing and element of arrogance that James Dawson and Helen Tarrant do not have.
Lots of gaps in his information. There are good deals out there in commercial property but just be aware that it isn't as easy as he makes out.