people featured in magazines

[eks883]

just wondering what your thoughts are.

magazines like YIP or API always features "everyday investors" sharing their success stories.

question is, where do they find these people? do these people get paid?
why would they want to share their strategy to the world?

for example some people are proud to say that they always buy under market etc.... so in future if they buy, won't the vendors know that they are always offering under value and their hand is now exposed?

 

[Corey Batt]

Ego stroking.

 

[Henley]

Hi,
Many 'everyday investors' are put forward by the companies they are clients of. these 'companies' are usually the advertisers of the same magazine - ie Positive Real estate etc - can be a little easy to pick which strategy fits to which company when you read enough of them,
Also, if you need your ego stroked, you can send them a peice on your 'journey' and on slow months they will include it too.
Re giving up their strategy. you may be over estimating the readership of these magazine is a lot bigger than they are, not every vendor (or investor) reads these magazines

 

[Singo]

The advertisers get their clients to share the story a lot. In an interview/feature, if a company or mentor is mentioned, probably it is through them the magazine got it. And people are approached through forums like Somersoft as well, I reckon.

 

[chrispy]

From here

Quite a few of us have been in these magazines.

Chris

 

[depreciator]

I got paid to do that centrefold in Cleo all those years ago.

 

[Aaron_C]

I think most people there actually don't get paid for it. Just trying to share their story with others.

 

[nww]

Im over the property Mags.

They suck you with front page headlines like 30 year old with $6 million in property
and then when you read their property ownership list you find they only
have $50,000 in equity.

 

[strongy1986]

Most of the stories are young couples who worked in mining and own 4 house and land packages with no equity.
I stopped reading them because most of the people interviewed have no actual strategy towards their investing.

An exception was the pizza dude from broken hill who bought dog boxes, rennoed and gets 30% yields. Great story

 

[oc1]

I think most people there actually don't get paid for it. Just trying to share their story with others.

Aaron definitely did it to boost his ego

 

[impala67]

...for example some people are proud to say that they always buy under market etc.... so in future if they buy, won't the vendors know that they are always offering under value and their hand is now exposed?

In theory yes, but in reality I've found some people are just desperate to sell, for a variety of reasons, and/or are selling at the wrong time. With one of my units the owner bought elsewhere and it was vacant 6 months after a failed auction.

Also, a lot of people don't see the value in what they have, e.g., after a clean up or minor reno etc.

 

[wategos]

Do these magazines ever have stories of people who've lost a lot in property? (I've never read these magazines).

Sometimes these stories are more interesting, warnings and schadenfreude I suppose.

 

[geoffw]

From here

Quite a few of us have been in these magazines.

Chris

What Chris said.

We have had reporters in here from time to time looking for people with stories.

Often they don't want the big achievers. They want people with a few properties as it gives readers something they feel they can reach.

It's not always a good thing to be in a magazine like that. I had always kept a low profile about property but when the magazine came out I was always expected to buy the first round of beers at lunch- with ten people and only time for two or three rounds.

 

[allsuccess]

In some cases, I have found that the numbers they put in those mags don't add up. e.g. millions of loans on 50K salary. It could be that I may have missed something

 

[Terry_w]

I got paid to do that centrefold in Cleo all those years ago.

But did you show your portfolio?

 

[eks883]

another thing i noticed is sometimes, the featured people have multiple properties and equity now. however if you look at when they bought it was during the great boom.....i feel like during that time, any person and their dog can pick a winner because the prices just kept of rising.

 

[impala67]

But did you show your portfolio?

LOL

 

[alexlee]

.i feel like during that time, any person and their dog can pick a winner because the prices just kept of rising.

So, why didn't everyone above a certain age end up with multiple properties if it was so easy and prices just kept rising?

 

[impala67]

So, why didn't everyone above a certain age end up with multiple properties?

...Fear & Ignorance would be my guess.

 

[geoffw]

Hindsight I so wonderful.

I missed out on about four year so growth because I thought things had peaked.