All Forum Posts by: Sylvester Hardison

I put mentorships into 3 catagories

1. Multifamily - yes because 100 units and more usually require syndication, there is a lot to learn and joining a group gives you access to people with money who have that mindset. You need to be an accredited investor interested in multifamily.

2. "Group think" mentorship where you join a group and are on large group "meetings" where the basics are taught, it's mostly motivational and the standard push is to bring leads to the "mentor" who uses people as a "bird dog". You have to be self starting, aggressive to get you questions answered and really take personal action.

3. One on one training, which I decided on, where you are brought from brand new to an investor buying and holding properties. You are challenged to better yourself, it is geared toward the individual and you actually buy properties. This is the best for people that are starting out that want to become proficient investors covering CA TX and AZ. I can recommend who I used and according to Bigger Pocket's rules the request has to be initiated by the person seeking the information and sent through DM. 

@Sylvester Hardison, I am going to echo other's thoughts, but it also depends on what your current education level is and where you feel your weaknesses are.

Within the multifamily space, for instance, there are a lot of groups out there.  Some are more marketing focused, some are more analytical, a lot seem to be "it is all mindset".  If you are looking for someone to teach you syndication, a common thread is to start a thought leadership platform: podcast, post on LinkedIn, post on BP, create YouTube content.

I would say, if you have almost no understanding of what Cap rates are, the basics of underwriting and excel modeling, how to find brokers, etc a mentor can help accelerate your learning.  

But, like many, I am always a bit skeptical of gurus/mentors.  Why?  Well, I would want to learn from people that are doing what I want to do.  But, if they are THAT successful in the field they know the most about, how do they have time to teach it and why would they waste their valuable time building an army of competition?  Generally speaking, most gurus/mentors fall into two categories: 

First, people that are legitimately trying to make it in the industry.  Maybe they have done a deal or two or four, but are not making enough from the deals to support themselves, so need to sell their knowledge.

Second, people who really are no longer active in real estate.  If they are hosting quarterly conferences to bring in new clients and running ads constantly for their educational course, they have likely learned that the education world is far more lucrative then they were able to be in real estate.  And these people, I don't want to learn from.

Bonus third: you have people that are truly active in the business who are using mentorships to "teach people" how to raise money, and magically, those people are provided the opportunity to raise money for that gurus deal.  So, effectively, you pay money to learn how to make the guru more money (also known as the multi-level marketing of the real estate world).

The biggest issues with paid mentoring and coaching are:

1.  Often the "student" doesn't do his/her due diligence PRIOR to choosing a mentor / coach, resulting in a loss of money and little to show for it. The student requests no proof of the mentor's success in the industry but instead gets easily sold on the rainbows and pixie dust. And they almost never ask for a copy of the contract in advance, and when the student receives it, they don't understand what they're signing. 

2.  The mentor is all hat and no cattle, meaning they're experts at marketing themselves but don't really have the requisite knowledge and experience to guide someone. 

3.  The mentor farms out training to low paid wannabe investors who have even less experience, but again, they're great marketers. 

4.  The student expects results but does little to no marketing, does little to no online research to fully understand strategies, potential pitfalls, contract and contract law, title, etc...they just wait to get rich. 

David Greene has talked about this quite often. Too many people sign up for a coach thinking it will make their growth easy. The opposite is true.

Is it a good idea to hire a basketball coach so you can be a better player? Absolutely! Is it easy? Absolutely not! If they are a good coach, they will have you drilling fundamentals every day, watching everything you eat, studying the rules and strategies, lifting weights, and more. You will get better, but it will involve a lot of time and energy to get there.

Investing is the same. There are great coaches, and there are really bad ones. If you find a good one, you'll pay with your time, energy, and money. 99% of all investors would be better off reading some books, networking, and growing at their own pace. Coaches are for people like Brandon Turner that want to put all their resources into rapid growth to build an empire.

My opinion on this subject is admittedly biased, as I started investing without anyone’s help (not counting the buyer’s agent,) and am professionally suspicious of real estate gurus selling “education,” to begin with. But I started at a different time in the market cycle, and attribute my success to date to luck and caution, mostly to luck. I do not envy anyone starting out at this time. (I now know that I was too cautious, especially in the beginning. But that’s only through the benefit of hindsight.)

I wasn’t aware of Zillow or BP, or even whether YouTube may have already had some good content. If useful podcasts were around, I also wasn’t aware of them. I hadn’t even read “Rich Dad.” I advertised my first vacancy on Craigslist, which is also where I may have (memory on this is rusty) found my second property, ~two months after buying my first.

It took me a few years after starting to invest locally (as a landlord) to meet someone who had been doing that for longer and in multiple markets. We had dinner, where I got all the info to feel comfortable to start investing in other markets. The cost of this ~two-hour mentorship was the price of a nice sushi meal (which the unexpected mentor offered to split.) Within the next week, I had a plan to expand out of state. Again, market conditions were (still) different - good deals were oh so easy to get.

In the following year, I finally learned about BP, and decided to become a real “real estate investor,” which (I thought) “required” me to expand beyond just doing buy-and-hold. I got so cocky that I decided to do a flip - I was only a landlord up to that point, but now in multiple states, and still self-managing some of those far away units. But at least I brought in a partner for the flip who had done those locally, in CA, and was also a financial/accounting professional - experience and skills I lacked. We invested in Indianapolis, using a (recommended) licensed broker for the whole project, who ended up being full of hot air - which we only learned too late…. We lost money. But I got better educated for that money, not to mention humbled.

I never partnered with anyone again, and realized that my lane was LTR landlording, whether personally or through PMs (mostly PMs now.) I did not need to try other things in real estate, including STRs. I even tried syndications (as a LP,) and learned that I can do better on my own - at least without breaking promises/making myself a victim of fraud, the latter I warned others about on a deal I was being pitched (and time proved me right.) (I may also be stuck for many more years in a syndication that was supposed to exit in 2017. I may never see most of that money again. But that one wasn’t exactly fraud.)

Along the way, I attended a number of free seminars that hit my area (and more recently webinars,) to see what information I may be missing out on. Unfortunately, I have not come across any seminar that wouldn’t attempt to get me to sign up for hundreds/thousands of dollars’ “worth” of a workshop, where I’d subsequently likely be pitched tens of thousands of dollars “worth” of additional “education” and alleged mentorship. So, while I haven’t paid a dime for those, I have met some people who have - who still have nothing to show for the investment, not one I know personally. The (few) gurus I have come across at these seminars, all kind of remind me of that syndicator I had a suspicion was lying (which he was.) But I have not met all the gurus out there.

That’s my bias on the subject, in a nutshell. Where does that leave your question?

You are already on the right track: You have purchased an investment property - what a great way to learn by being hands-on! And you are certainly aware of BP. And I presume that you can find good podcasts, YouTube channels, etc. - for as narrow or as wide of a net you may want to throw out for your own “real estate investing.”

But if you should still have an inclination to trust some guru with a paid mentorship, I’d suggest to go above and beyond their standard contract, which will likely stipulate what you owe them in far better terms for themselves than what they owe you in return for your money: I’d ask them to stipulate - in writing - what “mentorship” your money (at each level of a “workshop”/“education” they expect you to pay for) will actually get you, and for how long. And incorporate that written promise into the contact as an addendum/exhibit. (And look out for any language in the original contract that may say something along the lines of “no promises made outside of this document may be enforceable.”)

I have nothing to sell you. Perhaps someone else here will share their success story from a paid mentorship. You’d have to verify their claims, as you are - wisely - saying you would.

Good luck.