Are property investment courses worth it?
You’ve probably seen adverts for a huge variety of different property investment courses online. If you’re on social media, they are probably being marketed to you incessantly. But are property investment courses worth it? Will they really deliver the results that they claim?
They are usually sold by self-proclaimed “property gurus” making claims of easy riches. Commonly pictured outside their mansion, next to their fancy car, wearing an expensive Rolex. They will make it sound like anyone can get rich from property if you just pay for their course.
In this article we help you to make an informed decision.
Knowledge
First thing to address is why you might be considering a property course in the first place. What do you want to learn?
Most courses are sold on the premise that there is “secret information” or a “hidden strategy”. A “magic formula” to guarantee success. They make you feel like there’s an easy way that you don’t know about.
Beware! It’s a scam!
The truth is that there is no magic formula. If you’re looking for something to guarantee easy success, you won’t find it.
All the knowledge and information you need is freely available online and offline. With just a tiny bit of effort, a quick online search will unearth everything you need to know. If even that sounds like too much effort, property won’t be for you anyway!
Are property investment courses worth it? Rarely in terms of knowledge. They may be a convenient way to bring together basic knowledge and principles. But all the knowledge you need is available for free. It therefore makes little sense to pay for a course just for generic information.
Free seminars
You may have seen free seminars advertised. Maybe you thought there’s no harm in attending since it’s free?
Beware! It’s a scam!
These companies aren’t running free seminars out of the kindness of their hearts. They are almost always just a huge sales pitch. They share very basic information that makes success sound easy. Then they will aggressively upsell to a crazily expensive course where they claim you’ll get the secret information.
Once they have you in the room, the sales pitch begins, and they start to drum up excitement. People will be herded to the back of the room with their credit cards. Then encouraged to sign up to the “premium course”. Often with “early bird discounts” only available today and with “limited availability”. They will make you feel stupid for not signing up there and then.
Are property investment courses worth it? The free seminars are basically an opportunity for them to sell to you, so don’t expect to learn much. Even just based on time cost they are unlikely to be worth it!
Unrealistic outcomes
Most courses will make big promises and unrealistic claims:
- Get rich quickly
- Invest with no money
- Passive income with minimal work required
They make it sound like success is easy once you pay for the course. You’ll have loads of passive income without any hard work or investing any of your own money!
Beware! It’s a scam!
This should always be a huge red flag.
Just think about it. If it was as easy to make money in property as they claim, everyone would be rich!
The truth is you do need money to invest. These strategies will involve hard work. Success happens over the long term in property; you won’t get rich quickly.
If it sounds too good to be true, it always is.
So, are property investment courses worth it? Certainly not if you’re expecting a silver bullet or easy path to riches. Prepare for disappointment.
Who are they?
If you’re still considering enrolling on a course, think about who is selling and leading the course. Have they actually done what they are teaching? Do their claims stack up? You need to do your research.
A quick check on Companies House will tell you a lot.
The “guru” claims to have made multi millions from property. Yet their company was only incorporated a year ago and they are yet to file annual accounts. Massive red flag!
Put the company or person’s name into Google. Don’t just look at the top results. Those will be paid ads and could include false testimonials. Dig back a few pages to see what is said about them on social media. Also check reputable forums like Property Tribes. Some of the most unscrupulous people have loads of positive reviews. But when you dig a bit deeper it’s clear that many people are getting ripped off.
Look at who is teaching the course or seminar. Many course companies have a figurehead guru showing off their success to reel in clients. But the courses are then run by employees with minimal real world personal experience. Basically, they are salespeople teaching off a script.
What is the strategy?
There are loads of different strategies in property investment. Almost all of them can work, but they certainly won’t all be suitable for everyone. Consider what strategy they are teaching and whether it is right for you.
As an example, think about Rent to Rent. This is a strategy very popular with course providers. They can sell it as an easy way to generate income with “no money down”. This makes it an easy sell to cash strapped wannabe investors.
The principle of the R2R strategy is very simple. Essentially, you rent a property from a landlord that you believe isn’t achieving its full potential. You then rent it out to other tenants for more money, often by converting to a HMO.
So, when the principle of the strategy is so simple, why do people pay thousands for a course?
The answer is because it’s incredibly hard to implement in reality!
People pay for the course because they think they’ll unlock some magic secrets to make it easy. But they won’t. It only works if you commit insane amounts of time and effort. Not to mention the risk that you take on.
- They will market it as a “passive income” strategy. It isn’t. It’s a job and it’s very time intensive.
- They will market it as “no cash required”. But you’ll almost certainly need to spend your own cash to improve the property before higher rents can be achieved.
- They market it as “low risk” due to not needing to invest any cash. But it relies on achieving full occupancy and tenants paying on time. If they don’t, you still owe rent to the landlord. Not to mention investing your own cash into an asset that you don’t own!
- They make it sound easy and in principle it is. But in practice it’s very hard to find suitable properties. It breaches anti sub-letting terms found in almost all mortgages, leases, and insurance policies. That makes it very hard to find willing landlords and ensure full compliance.
Courses like this are targeted at desperate vulnerable people, usually with little or no money. They then encourage them to spend what little savings they have on a high-risk strategy.
Think about it. Assume it really was that easy to achieve passive income from Rent to Rent with no money required. Why would they go to the effort of selling courses on it? Surely, they would be too busy with their expertise making a fortune doing it themselves?
The obvious answer is because it’s far easier to sell courses on R2R than it is to implement the strategy!
Can it work? Sure! That’s how they get away with selling the courses. Everything they say is technically possible. But it involves a huge amount of time, effort and risk. That’s why 99% of people will never implement successfully.
This is just one example.
Always consider what the course is teaching and whether it’s suitable for you. If you think it might be, you also need to check their claims make sense.
Are property investment courses worth it? In most cases, no, they aren’t. Especially when the strategy they teach doesn’t stack up to the claims they make.
Are all property courses a waste of time and money?
You’ll probably get the sense from this article that I’m not a big fan of property investment courses. For the most part, that is true.
What I object to is that most courses are held by salespeople pretending to be property experts. They make deliberately misleading claims and usually target desperate people who are least likely to benefit. They mostly upsell basic generic content with no accountability.
It’s not that all courses are automatically bad. Some could be beneficial, especially if they qualified clients first to ensure they are suitable. Then provided ongoing support to help them implement successfully, rather than just supplying generic information. But with so many scams on the market, you need to really be certain before proceeding.
Is there a better option?
It depends on what you’re looking for.
There is no hidden formula or secret to success in property.
We live in an age of easy and plentiful access to knowledge. Everything you need to know is free and readily available online.
Lack of knowledge isn’t the issue.
So, if we accept that unrealistic claims are a scam, why else might somebody consider a property investment course?
Let’s assume you’ve done your research and understand the strategy in theory. You accept that some hard work will be required. You also have some cash to invest and have realistic expectations.
What else might an investor need support with?
Confidence to act. Support from somebody who has already done what you’re trying to do. Help to understand the risks, avoid mistakes, and make optimal decisions.
Real-time problem solving. Courses can give you the knowledge before you start. But you’ll still almost certainly encounter challenges along the way.
Network. Even when you know what you’re doing, you’ll still need professional support. Mortgage brokers, solicitors, accountants, letting agents, etc. Having access to trusted professionals can be invaluable.
For all these things, working with a coach or mentor is likely to be a better and cheaper option.
With a course, you generally spend time learning the theory, then you are left alone to implement. With a coach or mentor, you get step-by-step help to implement the strategy. They will help you to overcome challenges as and when they arise. With a course, if the problem you encounter hasn’t been covered, you could be stuck.
If you’re looking for coaching or mentorship support, consider working with Fintentional. Our property mentorship service provides honest advice and practical support to ensure success on your property journey.
We qualify every client before we agree to work with you. That means if we don’t believe you have a realistic chance of success, we won’t work with you! We will send you away with some free advice that hopefully helps you to save your hard-earned money.
To find out more, you can book a free call.
