Who can I trust?

Crikey,

Not a nice craigs list post at all.

It does amaze me how people will do business with folks without checking them out in detail.

Just as an FYI

One of my main source's of business is from one of the larger SElf Directed IRA companies in the US… super funds to OZZIES.

This gentlemen got tired of his clients calling about so and so turn key guy that screwed them on some house,, or some other investments that went pear shaped. So he decided he would put a cadre of providers together so he could give good referrals.

he decided on 2 turn key guys

One Note guy 

One factoring company

he went on a hunt throughout the US and contacted 200 plus folks… boiled that down to 20 and did deep due diligence on each.

There was a turn key guy in Chicago that was great but he had all sorts of liens and lawsuits of no pay on bills.
etc etc.

Others had bankruptcies crappy credit etc etc.

He ended up with 4 companies.

2 turn key guys.

TWH for his Note with equity product.

and one factoring company in Florida  ( which they just went around him and stole clients so he dropped them)

And this company has 3000 plus clients in super funds with almost 400 million in the accounts of which 10% is liquid at anytime.

they buy 10 plus notes from us a month and then we have our own efforts that create another 10 or so…. We have done 4 so far this week.

So at the end of the day the good guys do win. but boy its frustrating watching these low lifes manouver on the internet.. promise the moon and deliver mud pie.

JLH

TZ, skin in the game refers to the company putting their money where their mouth is. Owning the property they are selling. That have a vested long term interest in the assets performance because, the company took the risk, bought it foreclosed, renovated it and believed they could on sell it at a fair price.

If you rely solely on a licensed agent… well I've met some absolute muppets who have licences. Its not hard to get a licence. Its harder to build a credible reputation, putting your money where your mouth is and going above and beyond what is required of normal service.

To answer some of your above questions:
Ask the agent who actually owns the property how many properties this agent you are dealing with owns. How long have they been in the game? What is the long term service if you purchase through this company.

Google the address of the property and you may find it available on many websites (we wholesale to a bunch of aussie brokers, some who sell 10k above our net cost to our retail investors.)

Question the agent on the area. Get a gauge on how well do they know the city they are actually selling in.

How do they know if it is a large or small firm? Ask the turnkey company how much money they have invested in the market at any one time. How many foreclosed properties are they doing up at the moment? Speak to several companies and ask them how many deals have they done in the past few years. Do they provide market updates and other free of charge services that keeps you in the know and aware of how the fundamentals are tracking in your specific market, this is crucial especially during times of negative sentiment <moderator: delete language>

Again, just determine experience levels of each firm with these types of questions and use it to filter through your preferences.

Hope this helps

As far as Bigger Pockets are concerned, the matter was brought to their attention, and they've taken quick action to remedy their part in the shonk's activity – not really compensation for the injured party, but I hope ilovehouses can at least find some comfort in the fact that, from now on, at least, their ability to continue shonking others through a major channel like BP.com would be greatly reduced – (and, think what you will of the content, BP's internet reputation and resulting investing-related traffic "among the masses" is vast – so it's in all of our interest that it stays as clean as possible, in similar fashion to this platform).

Here are some extracts from Joshua Dorkin's, BP's founder and manager's, response – I'm sure if any of you contact him directly you'll be as impressed as I am with the guy's candidness and professionalism, considering the size and nature of the beast he's steering –

"…We've closed the account pending more information from this Mr. Patchin…The last thing we want to see is people getting scammed and do take such things very seriously…our goal is really to try and elevate the industry. We throw off dozens of users every day who try to use our platform to do bad things (mostly spam, but certainly some scammers), and work tirelessly to the benefit of our members…It would be very easy to sell out our users to the gurus and scammers who pay top dollar, but we take a different path…"

Hope this helps, at least a bit. Best of luck getting your money back, and with future investments – hope this doesn't put you off the entire global real-estate investing industry, as there really are good operators and good deals out there, we just need to all look past our personal pockets at times, and work together to "keep the bastards honest", so to speak, for everyone's benefit.

http://www.biggerpockets.com/conversations/64208

Our chat on BP.

that link is a direct link from the chat.  don't know how else i could do it.  sent the paperwork you sent me to my lawyer, just waiting to hear back from him.  Need to check the taxes also so you don't lose it in the tax sale this august.

A bit of an update on John Patchin.  I managed to post comments on the Rewholesaleking youtube videos before he blocked me.  So at least Ive got him on the back foot.  Is there an equivalent of an Office of Fair Trading over there?

The problem with reporting some business to BBB is that ALL the members of the BBB are PAYING subscriptions to that service. As BBB is getting money from this guys, it will do NOTHING to touch its customers in a negative way. I've read and heard a lot of stories about BBB and in the best case scenario they'll have the case reviewed and that's pretty much all… Nothing will happen.

Jay,
 You are partially right; search online and you'll see LOTS of complaints AGAINST BBB addressed to the way they handle things.
When you say that 99% of out of US investors don't know about the existence of BBB, you are right; the same with the field BBB is concerned about.

In FL for example the equivalent of Australia’s “Fair Trading” offices is the Division of Consumer Services http://www.800helpfla.com/ I think they have a similar division in most other states too. They take complaints and mediate on your behalf. Not sure if they have “teeth” though – the time I considered utilizing their services they indicated that they can’t “make” the other party respond, it is more an optional program.

The ball is in motion, it will be near impossible for John to do anything when we get done with him.  My associates and I don't take kindly to people making our city look bad.