Lastly, I believe the web of involvement extends to many other financial parties as well. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out during an investigation, but I sure hope that the money can be followed for the investors' sake that were damaged here.
I've also been made aware that a company, Tardus Wealth Strategies, who "coaches investors on financial independence in 10 years or less" was heavily promoting the Norada fund to unaccredited investors and was also heavily promoting Ron Fossum. It sounds like there was multiple webinars conducted by Ron Fossum and Marco supported by Tardus to hundreds of investors that also invested heavily in the Norada fund. I believe there are many groups that helped promote the Norada fund without doing any preliminary research on what the investments entailed or the criminal history of the people involved putting together the "investment opportunity." I think this is something bigger than many of us realize, but this is just the beginning of the house of cards. It appears Norada has been sending out unaudited balance sheets to investors asking about their financials that shows over $100M valuation in these seemingly bankrupt businesses they invested in.
Our coaches guide clients through an extensive course on investment due diligence to identify their risk tolerance, ask the right questions, create investment criteria, evaluate performance, identify any red flags and have a plan for what to do if an investment doesn't perform as expected. For more clarity on what we do, check out the Income Snowball video on our website.
Anyone with Tardus on this thread invest with Norada? I know Norada investments were heavily recommended by the Tardus coaches.
If so, you might want to read this:
https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/960/topics/1196567-nora...
https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/70/topics/1198271-bewar...
https://www.biggerpockets.com/forums/960/topics/913717-inves...
Tardus is a financial education company that does NOT recommend specific investments. Neither Tardus nor our coaches accept commissions from vendors. We teach an “investment product agnostic” strategy, focusing on educating investors on performing due diligence, establishing their own risk tolerance, and choosing their own investments. Understanding the risks associated with any investment, being prepared for the worst possible outcome, and having a plan for when an investment doesn't perform as expected is essential. Our primary objective as coaches is to help clients ask the right questions, develop the right criteria, and identify potential red flags.
Lastly, I believe the web of involvement extends to many other financial parties as well. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out during an investigation, but I sure hope that the money can be followed for the investors' sake that were damaged here.
I've also been made aware that a company, Tardus Wealth Strategies, who "coaches investors on financial independence in 10 years or less" was heavily promoting the Norada fund to unaccredited investors and was also heavily promoting Ron Fossum. It sounds like there was multiple webinars conducted by Ron Fossum and Marco supported by Tardus to hundreds of investors that also invested heavily in the Norada fund. I believe there are many groups that helped promote the Norada fund without doing any preliminary research on what the investments entailed or the criminal history of the people involved putting together the "investment opportunity." I think this is something bigger than many of us realize, but this is just the beginning of the house of cards. It appears Norada has been sending out unaudited balance sheets to investors asking about their financials that shows over $100M valuation in these seemingly bankrupt businesses they invested in.
Can you DM me the link or the contacts, please?
Just sent you a message!
If you truly desire to become financially independent you should learn from the experienced, successful posters on this forum instead of “shooting the messenger”. My mother alway said you can’t teach stupid, but what the heck, I’ll give it one more try
I'll use an example with dollars, to make it easier to follow. Here is the Tardus wealth strategy in a nutshell, stripped of the fancy terms and fluff. Take your $5k of saving, and borrow another 5K by placing a home equity line of credit on your house. Then invest the $10k in something that pays more than the interest you're paying on the HELOC. So let's be generous and say you're getting a 9% return on your investment. That's $900 per year in earnings. Let's say you're paying 5% on the HELOC. That's $250 per year in interest expense. So your net earnings ( increase in wealth) is $650. By utilizing leverage you made $650 on an equity investment of $5000, or a return of 13%. IF you had just invested the $5k without the leverage of the HELOC then you would have earned $450. So by utilizing leverage you earned $200 more. Your rate of return was 13% versus the 9% return not utilizing leverage. The only question is if the increased risk of loss is worth the extra return.
The second part of the Tardus strategy is to pay off/down the HELOC by using both the income earned on the investment AND wage/salary income or income from an outside of the subject investment source. So save $362.50 monthly from your salary and use it to add to the interest income from the investment and pay off your HELOC. Then Do it all again. The naive and unsophisticated Tardus participants think “I started with $5,000. Now I have an investment worth $10,000. Wow. I doubled my money! NO, Virginia, there is no Santa Claus. Your investment was NOT $5K. It was $5K PLUS the $362.50 you contributed monthly to pay down the HELOC. So your actual investment was $4350 plus $5000 or $9350, which is exactly the difference between the $10000 your investment is worth and the $650 you earned. Truth is you could have invested just the $5000, added the $362.50 monthly to the investment on a monthly basis. You would have earned 9% on the initial $5K invested, or $450. The $362.50 invested monthly at the same 9% would earn $184.00 interest. So your total investment at the end of the year would be the initial 5K, the 362.50 invested monthly or $4350, and the $184 interest earned on the monthly $362.50. A total of $9534. So by using the Tardus “system” (which anyone can easily implement and which has been discussed for many years on BP), an additional $466 was earned at an increased risk. IMO this is much too little additional return to put your personal residence at risk. But everyone has to make there own decision.
By the way, I read through Tardus website, and a couple of VERY INTERESTING items popped out. Other than the two principals, an executive assistant and two managers, everyone one else associated with Tardus is either a”wealth coach” or a “client success coach”. These are NOT employees according to the website, they’re independent contractors who receive 1099 at the end of the year. But what’s MOST INTERESTING is
We are currently seeking confident and ambitious sales professionals to join our first-class team as we continue to expand throughout the country. This role is a fully remote independent contractor position (1099 role) with flexible hours and unlimited income potential including high monthly commissions and monthly residual pay.
We are looking for influential and approachable financial coaches to support our clients and help them succeed with our system. This role is a fully remote independent contractor position (1099 role) with flexible hours and unlimited income potential including high monthly commissions and monthly residual pay
The above is copied directly from the Tardus website. Both the “wealth coach and the “financial coach” are compensated by “high monthly COMMISSIONS’. It is a well established belief in the financial industry that there is an inherent conflict of interest when financial advisors are compensated on sales commission. You as the consumer of financial services will NOT be getting unbiased advice from anyone associated with Tardus no matter what the title or position. You will be receiving a sales pitch. BECAUSE THIS IS HOW THESE PEOPLE EARN A LIVING, BY SELLING THE TARDUS PRODUCT.
Look, if you need to pay someone $5K to tell you to save money and invest it instead of spending it on throw away toys, then so be it. Just be aware that (1) you can easily do whatever it is Tardus is selling much cheaper elsewhere (2) Tardus special investments for members only are mundane investments available at the same terms to anyone with a computer and internet connection and (3) the strategy of borrowing from a HELOC to juice returns carries with it a much greater risk than is apparently disclosed.
While I had intended to not engage on this thread anymore due to the level of unprofessionalism, I do need to correct some misinformation being spread here on behalf of the Tardus team, for those doing their own due diligence.
Tardus financial coaches do not get paid a commission for any financial product or service. Neither does Tardus as a company. This is done intentionally in order to remain unbiased and be focused on what is best for the client.
Tardus has no investment products to sell you and receives no compensation for any investment you choose. Tardus even refuses to take referral fees from vendors we partner with.
- Tardus sales professionals (Wealth Coaches) are paid based on selling the coaching program. That's how any salesperson is paid. They put together and present a plan to a potential new member, and then the potential member decides if they like the plan, at which point they would sign up and buy the annual coaching subscription.
- Then, a member is transitioned to a financial coach who helps them implement said plan. The financial coaches (Client Success Coaches) are the ones who a client meets with on a monthly basis. They are on a commission structure, but it has nothing to do with selling anything. They are paid a commission based on the meetings they have with their clients. Basically, they are paid for their time. Just like any job.
Feel free to discuss this with any of our coaches, I'm sure they would be happy to share. In the coaching world, being paid as an independent contractor/1099 is considered the norm. There are also tons of financial and tax benefits to being paid as a 1099 that the team gets to implement as well.
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The explanation of the Income Snowball strategy above is incomplete and inaccurate. I encourage anyone trying to learn how it works, to check out the educational videos on our website that explain it better. Something to note is it is not easy to be awarded a patent. Your concept must be verified, proven and unique.
In addition to the Tardus members who have responded on this thread, if you're interested in hearing from a real Tardus client who has been through the program, feel free to send us an email and we can connect you with people who have used the program. Bigger pockets doesn't allow me to post contact info here but you can find it on the Tardus website.
Lastly, to those of you who are considering Tardus (or any other coaching or investment program) - there are many reasons you might have ended up on this page. The truth is, a lot of people are lacking a financial education. If you can easily achieve financial independence on your own, that is great and maybe you don't need a coach!
If you need help developing skills, changing your mindset around money, educating yourself on evaluating and choosing investments, or learning how to create passive income, it's okay if you can't figure it out on your own. Or maybe you're already on the road to financial independence and are just looking for new, faster ways to get there, for a proven plan to follow, or for accountability and a community of like-minded people. Either way, don't let people on the internet make you feel bad if you don't already know it all. Keep doing your research and keep learning, and keep chasing your goals, whether it's with Tardus or not.
Here’s what I know after 40 years as a successful real estate and mortgage investor, syndicator and wealth accumulator
1. I’m not at all impressed by the ‘positive’ experiences of people who have been investing for all of 6 months through one - tenth of an economic cycle
2. The educational system in the U S is extremely lacking in the field of business/economics if someone can write a book as simple as RDPD and have millions of people say that the simple concept of if you save money and invest it in appreciating/income producing assets you’ll be better off than if you spend it on unneeded toys has radically changed their life’s because they never knew of or heard of that concept before. Educators, education administrators and politicians should be ashamed.
3. Same thing for the so called “infinity banking”. Borrow money at 3%, lend it out or invest it at 6%, pay back the 3% loan and do it again. Save some of your salary and use it do pay down the loan. Btw, wrap it all into an overstuffed single premium whole life policy and through the insurance industry’s lobbying of congress your income will incur taxes deferred to far in the future, and if you’re lucky enough to die before 71 you may never have to pay taxes on the income. Possibly a good move, IF you don’t blow the investment or IF the investment doesn’t blow up. If it does you have zero asset/income, a much larger debt secured by your personal residence, at just the time you probably also lose your job due to economic conditions, and all those nice folks teaching you about sno ball, infinity, you’re your own bank, etc., will be long gone. They’ll appear again selling a different ‘financial concept/system/advice a few years later, with many having changed their names and residencies.
4. No investment is risk less. The higher the return the greater the risk. The peer to peer lending platforms as well as the real estate crowdfunding platforms are not having their investments chosen by Warren Buffet, or for that matter any money/investment manager employed by the big pension funds, endowments or ultra wealthy individuals that RDPD is always alluding to. These platforms are run by techies with no investing experience. For the financial side they hire third year financial analysts (3 years removed from college) because they cost one quarter of what a qualified employee would cost. I know because I consulted for one of the largest real estate crowdfunding platforms. They has NO idea how to underwrite a commercial mortgage loan. No one on staff who had ever analyzed a commercial mortgage loan. Yet their website stated that they crowdfunded AND VETTED commercial mortgage loans.
5. Here’s the biggest risk. The government closes the whole life tax deferral allowability. Think it can’t happen? That’s what the tax shelter investors thought in 1987. Not only were tax shelters stripped of their tax deferral capabilities, but they were stripped of it RETROACTIVE, allowing the IRS to recalculate tax shelter investors income going back 7 years. With penalties and interest. No telling what a desperate, bankrupt government will do. The government used to be able to just print money to pay its bills. Now with the resulting inflation it would cause people would move to crypto currencies. At some point the gov bond market drys up, the gov becomes desperate for cash, and anyone with deferred taxes looks like a fatten cow ready for slaughter. Just a little additional risk that probably wasn’t mentioned when they were explaining “infinity banking”.
Is there any way to give 100 votes for a post? Because this post is deserving of it. Every once in awhile here on BiggerPockets a product like this makes an appearance and gets pumped up very aggressively, and the unfortunate thing is that it makes an impression on folks that are new to investing or may not have much of a financial background.
Any seasoned lender will tell you that one of the most basic tenets of lending is that your loan must be secured or collateralized in some fashion. I can't think of anything riskier than taking a HELOC out of your primary home and using that to make super aggressive loans that are unsecured.
if you want to make aggressive loans and arbitrage that against the higher yielding loans, at least make loans that are collateralized. Why not invest in a BDC like ARCC, TCPC or GBDC? You're essentially doing the same type of strategy except you're not putting your precious primary home at risk. Nor are you making loans that are unsecured and uncollateralized. Plus these companies are subject to a lot of regulatory scrutiny (SEC, SOX).
This Tardus strategy truly makes me cringe. For those of you who haven't been doing this for a while, let me tell you that there were similar companies with similar strategies prior to the GFC, advising people to take helocs on their primary so they can arbitrage that into higher yielding investments. Where are they now? LoL, they were all wiped out of course. What do you think the odds are that a strategy like this will survive the next economic reset?
Almost any strategy will do well during up time of unprecedented economic expansion. The true test is when things aren't going well and the investment is put under stress. This is why seasoned investors run a "stress test" when evaluating their investments. How bad do things have to get for them to still break even and how bad does it have to be for them to lose money. With the house of cards-like strategy with Tardus, it won't take much for it to come crumbling down.
Tardus has been in business for 20 years, with an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau and has withstood the 2001, 2008-09 and 2020 recessions. The strategy was created over 6 years of research and development with arduous vetting from math professors, investment professionals and the US government in the process of receiving the patent. We work with many well-known financial and real estate vendors who have also vetted and trust our program.
I believe some of you are missing the point. All Tardus is, is an education and coaching company. Our coaches meet with members on a monthly basis to help them learn to evaluate investments, do their own due diligence, and manage their own money. The Income Snowball is a strategy, that is now software, that just projects how long it will take you to create X amount of passive income if you invest on a certain schedule, also laid out by the software.
The concepts the Income Snowball uses - from cash flow investing, to using leverage, to investing in real estate or peer-to-peer - are nothing new. They're just normal investments that have been around forever. This is just a way of doing it that doesn't take 50 years.
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‘Peer to Peer lending (on Prosper) - Invested $10,000 initially - receive $320/month for 3 years. $320 x 12 months = $3,849/$10,000 initial investment = 38% CoC Return
The Legacy Income Model (this is a product a financial planning firm created specifically for Tardus clients) - Invested $10,000 initially - receive $310/month for 3 years. $310 X 12 months = $3,720 in a year. $3,720/$10,000 initial investment = 37% CoC Return”
So I’m confused by the above. Are you stating that you have made, or have heard of an investment on Prosper of $10,000 that pays interest only payments of $320 per month for 36 months and then your principal of $10,000 is returned; or is the $320 monthly payment INCLUSIVE of principal and interest and the loan amortized over three years? If it’s the former I find it hard to believe anything but the absolutely most risky loans if that would pay 38% annual interest; if it’s the latter then you DO NOT get your $10,000 principal back at the end of the loan term, it is returned monthly as part of the amortized monthly payment. I this case your annualized return is 9.43%, not 38%.
No, not interest only. These are amortized payments that include a return of principal each month. The 38% cash on cash return is including the principal. (investments structured with principal & interest payments is part of what fuels the snowball at the beginning)
If you're looking for a standard return rate, yes you're usually looking at between 8-10% return on Prosper
(Tardus is not affiliated with Prosper in any way and does not recommend specific investments)
I'm writing this in hopes that maybe Tardus leadership adjusts this.... I've been reading about Tardus clients and even the CEO saying that the interest rate you get on your LOC doesn't matter but I believe that it does matter, only when the interest rate gets too high.
I received the password protected videos I was instructed to watch after booking my consultation. Without saying too much, the video uses a 24% interest rate on LOC. That is too high and after "reverse engineering" the calculations. I will not make all my money back that was contributed. I will be short by a couple hundred dollars.
I believe the interest rate needs to be at a reasonable percentage. But 24% utilized in that video example is not good.
Hi Daniel, I know what video you're referring to. This is a tool that some of our coaches use, showing an overly extreme example to prove how the Income Snowball still works, regardless of the interest rate. This example was a 24% interest rate on your line of credit and a 3% return on your investment and showed that at the end you've invested $9,000 of your own money, and received about $10,300 back from the investment (a $1,300 profit)
In the video, he shows all of his math along the way so without seeing your "reverse engineering" I'm unsure how you didn't come to the same conclusion.
Not to mention, as you saw in the video, you pay off the line of credit in 6 months and then get to reuse the same money again, using less of your own money this time for a higher return and applying a compounding effect.
I'm writing this in hopes that maybe Tardus leadership adjusts this.... I've been reading about Tardus clients and even the CEO saying that the interest rate you get on your LOC doesn't matter but I believe that it does matter, only when the interest rate gets too high.
I received the password protected videos I was instructed to watch after booking my consultation. Without saying too much, the video uses a 24% interest rate on LOC. That is too high and after "reverse engineering" the calculations. I will not make all my money back that was contributed. I will be short by a couple hundred dollars.
I believe the interest rate needs to be at a reasonable percentage. But 24% utilized in that video example is not good.
And that's best case scenario. You're operating under the assumption that none of your P2P borrowers default or are late on their payments. BTW, how are these loans secured?
Certainly not the best case scenario. This is more like a worst-case scenario. Not a single one of the 1,000 currently active Tardus members are paying a 24% interest rate, or only receiving a 3% return. A more average representation would be 10% interest rate and earning 8%. This was a highly exaggerated example for illustration purposes.
Again, the Income Snowball is investment agnostic and Tardus has no affiliation with the investment product or platform the individual investors chooses to use. Members do not have to use peer-to-peer lending if they don't want to. And if they do decide to use it, of course, there is the risk of default. Every investment comes with risk and that's where the coaching comes in - to help you set your own investment criteria and choose a risk you're comfortable with.
Not entirely, if your saving 1 grand a month for a downpayment on property; your first property will be in three years and then you will have to save for another 3 years to buy a second property, so on and so forth.
With the income snowball your first property will be in three years, however you will be able to buy your second property in just 4-5 months after your first rental and 3rd property 4-5 months after the second rental, so on and so forth. In other words, you’ll be able to scale your rental portfolio much more rapidly using income snowball which would not be possible if you were “saving” for each downpayment. Your able to do this because of all the monthly passive income you will have coming in from the short term amortized investments. If you watch Tanisha podcast on RTR, she shows how this is possible with the income snowball calculator.
Not to mention over the course of those 3 years (or however long) your $1,000 a month hasn't just been sitting in a savings account losing value - it's been buying assets for you that create income, while still helping you accomplish your long term goal of buying real estate.