Posted by John Behle on March 12, 2002 at 04:12:21:
I have no idea. I haven’t heard of Home Business Technologies. Beckley was in Fairfield in the mid 80’s. If the company you are talking about was there at that time, it probably was one of his.
who is Ed Beckley? - Posted by tang-0-rang
Posted by tang-0-rang on March 11, 2002 at 12:14:21:
I seem to recall the name, but not sure. I have never seen or read his material myself. Can anyone give me insight into what information he provides, and would it still be valid and useable today. I found some old literature that I can purchase but I dont know if it is worth the money. Any good experiences with it? anything I should know? thanks for your time.
Todd Williamson (CO)
Where to get his course. - Posted by GL(ON)
Posted by GL(ON) on March 11, 2002 at 15:25:24:
Apparently Joe Kaiser saw my Ed Beckley post way back when, and bought up all the courses from the guy who was selling them out of his garage. Now he is offering them for $49.95.
http://www.nothingdown.com/old_catalog/catalog.html
I’m not sure I would pay that much. In fact I’m sure of it.
Informercial King of the 80’s - fallen guru - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 11, 2002 at 13:26:23:
Ed was at one time king of the infomercials. They sold 15-25,000 of his courses per week and he had about 700 employees. He also sold about 10-15,000 of Tim Taylor’s credit courses each week.
The bad news is hundreds of those employees handled incoming calls from customers wanting refunds and their job was to “re-sell” them. Most of the refunds weren’t that the course was bad, but that the commercial was good. They hadn’t even received the course yet, only woken up the next morning with buyer’s remorse or were severely chastised or threatened by a spouse.
Ed had several courses. His earlier ones were much lower quality. His later infomercial course was actually pretty well put together - though I never reviewed it thoroughly. No question, most of his experience was in marketing and his short lived millions came from that. I don’t know how much real experience he had, but he actually was pretty bright. I met him and talked with him. He didn’t come across in person as he did on television.
He invited me out to film an infomercial because he wanted to do one on paper and liked my materials. I was actually quite impressed with their organization, but concerned about the deceptive nature of the infomercials. It was one of the first infomercials to appear as a real talk show. Problem was, his audience were employees, the questions and segments were scripted and the call in questions were from someone in another room on a microphone. He didn’t use phoney success stories or anything, but the commercial implied that it was a real talk show. At that time, that was quite convincing to people, but most know that it the shows are “scripted” now.
I turned down a very lucrative offer to market my course because I did not want to be associated with the type of image Ed put on. Most said he came across like a very bad “used car dealer”. I also called Tim Taylor to see what he thought of the relationship and he wouldn’t talk about it - so that concerned me.
Apparently they weren’t keeping up with all the refunds and eventually ended up with a class action suit and action from the attorney general of the state. My understanding is he was convicted and put out of business.
So, as to his course - it might be worth a few bucks, but I wouldn’t pay alot. It appeared to be a rip off of Robert Allen’s course - which pretty much came from the “Making it Big on Little Deals” course by Miller and Schaub (excellent course) Read Beckley’s with a careful eye to be wary of techniques or practices that might be impractical or un-ethical, but you need to do that with most courses.
The funny thing with the education industry is that people tend to base decisions on popularity. If someone markets heavily and becomes well known, the seem to get more respect from others. If they build a big flashy organization and put on expensive seminars they can charge thousands. If they put on an infomercial or agressively market their book, suddenly they are elevated to the status of guru and sage. All this is regardless of the quality, reality, depth or source of their educational material. And of course, their material is shiny and pretty - and stupidly valued more because of it.
Sometimes good material like Miller and Schaub’s course is taken and redone and redone and redone until it hits a watered down infomercial version - like Beckley or Sheets.
Ed Beckley blast from the past. - Posted by GL(ON)
Posted by GL(ON) on March 11, 2002 at 13:08:19:
I have his course on tape and I enjoy listening to it. One thing that occurs to me, if this dweeb can make money in RE then so can I LOL.
He was one of the original Nothing Down boys. The course I have is dated 1984.It is called " No Down Payment, a program for creating a real estate empire from nothing in the 80’s". It is mainly about creative financing, doing deals in spite of the tight money and high interest rates of the early 80’s. A lot of this is obsolete now because interest rates are low and loans easier to get.But that’s not to say it won’t work.
He does have a couple of chapters on leases and lease options.
A year or 2 ago I posted a link on this site, to a guy who had a pile of new unsold Ed Beckley courses. I think he was selling them for $29.95 or something. At that price they are cheap entertainment. And a lot of the ideas are still valid.
thank you… - Posted by tang-0-rang
Posted by tang-0-rang on March 11, 2002 at 22:15:03:
John,
thanks for the great information, I think I will pass at this point and use the money to buy a new’er up to date book or course. You mentioned another name that sounds formilliar, but again I dont know who he is. Who is Tim Taylor? thanks again for your time.
Todd Williamson (CO)
Re: Informercial King of the 80’s - fallen guru - Posted by GL(ON)
Posted by GL(ON) on March 11, 2002 at 14:55:17:
Thanks for the background information. I never saw the infomercials at all, I bought the course in a second hand store for $20. At that price I got my money’s worth.
I have quite a collection of cheesy books and courses from the 80’s but by no means all of them. I still enjoy them for themselves and do not expect them to make me rich.
Speaking of background, commodity guru Ken Roberts got his start in what he calls “real estate show biz” with some of the leading guru’s of the early 80’s. He said it slowly dawned on him that none of them had actually done what they were claiming to have done, and they were really phonies. I always wondered which ones he worked with. Maybe they were all phonies.
Re: Ed Beckley blast from the past. - Posted by John
Posted by John on March 12, 2002 at 16:53:01:
My first course…bought in Feb 1989…and I too enjoy listening to it from time to time…
ah memories…
J.
The high pitched energetic “dweeb” act. - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 11, 2002 at 13:42:35:
What I found interesting was that what you say was his whole plan. His “Dweeb” as you say personna was purposely to make people feel that if he can do it anyone can. He was actually much brighter and normal than the infomercial made him appear.
Now the approach is build up the “guru” with mega-star status with a brain the size of a small planet and put on lots of success stories. Some of the stories of course are “dweeby” to fill that need of “if that unemployed, disadvantaged, kindergarten dropout can do it - surely I can!” and the viewer drops the remote in a wild scramble for the telephone and credit card.
The latest pitch now appears to make it look like the student will be mentored to the point where they too can be on the informercial, cruise or what have you. Throw fame into the mix. Much of the time the success stories on some of the informercials received their training elsewhere. Sometimes when the story is real, they leave out the fact that the student in the story didn’t receive their training from that “guru” or that their true success comes from other training. I’ve had several of my successful students appear on other people’s infomercials because of the “fame factor” or the business they receive from other students.
I had one of my students tell me how he ran into one of the big name gurus in the same hotel as one of my seminars. As John told of his success, the guru tried hard to get him on his next infomercial - even though he explained that his success didn’t come from that guru’s course.
Tim Taylor - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 12, 2002 at 04:10:23:
Tim Taylor was the credit card king. He had something like 400 credit cards and taught on how to build and fix credit. His techniques mostly worked, but created quite a stir and many changes among credit card companies and credit bureaus. It would be a valuable course for learning how to improve credit, but many of the credit building techniques are outdated.
Roberts started with Hal Morris - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 11, 2002 at 15:53:17:
Seems like I first saw him at a “Real Estate Superstars” road show with Hal Morris. Morris had a foreclosure course that was so similar to DelDotto’s that I have always believed that is where Dave got his course. I believe Hal’s course pre-dated DelDotto’s. They even told the same jokes and stories. “Let’s go to Hawaii!” they would cheer throughout the presentation. Filled with endearing stories about their family where they could always conjur up tears - and emotion from the crowd.
All the wonderful antics of the “Real estate Evangelists!” Running down the isle with a hundred dollar bill. Standing on the table and yelling out they have a success story. Getting the audience to cheer. I was in a room one day when one said how he had a cash flow of 40 million per week (now he is divorced, living with his parents and doing electrical work), said Robert Redford is his next door neighbor (sure - 20 miles away), Donald Trump subscribed to his newsletter (not likely) and a few more fascinating fabrications.
Ken Roberts seemed at that time to be a down to earth guy and had an interesting course focused on loaning people in foreclosure money to bring the payments current and later foreclosing as 97% went back into default within a year.
His theory was to get in the back door of a foreclosure deal by being the white knight lender, not the thief out to steal the property cheaply. Seems to me his approach was some VERY nasty interest rates and terms that really didn’t give the borrower any kind of a chance. The results of many in California doing that type of deal are some laws that were passed giving a right of recission to the borrower and a limit on the amount of interest that can be charged in that type of distress situation.
Ed Beckley Fan Club? - Posted by GL(ON)
Posted by GL(ON) on March 11, 2002 at 14:45:39:
I didn’t mean it in a bad way LOL. He looks pretty nerdy in his photos too. I understand he was a former high school teacher, and wound up heavy into transcendental meditation. I don’t hold any of this against him.
If you want a course by a gravel voiced former slaughterhouse worker there is always R— Wh----- LOL.
Hal Morris I Remember Him - Posted by phil fernandez
Posted by phil fernandez on March 11, 2002 at 20:00:25:
John,
Just shows our age if we both remember him LOL. Hope to see you in Atlanta next week.
Re: Roberts started with Hal Morris - Posted by JD
Posted by JD on March 11, 2002 at 19:44:56:
Love the 'real estate evangelists" line. You should write a ‘what ever became of’ book detailing the starts, the highs and the current lows of some of the fallen gurus. I’d buy it.
Re: Roberts started with Hal Morris - Posted by GL(ON)
Posted by GL(ON) on March 11, 2002 at 17:14:34:
Very interesting details. I never saw any of those guys in action, or heard of some of them.
The way Roberts tells it he was always looking for a way to get rich in those days. He went to a real estate seminar about foreclosures. The problem was to get in to see the people, and talk to them about their problems. There were a lot of guys bugging them and it was hard to get a foot in the door. Well it seems he had just read a positive thinking book that changed his life. When the teacher was stuck for how to get in the door, it occurred to him that he knew the answer from a life insurance salesman’s course he had taken. So he told the teacher and they wound up doing some foreclosure deals together.I think he said seven foreclosure deals. Then he wrote his own little book and went around with some of the “heavy hitters” as a kind of side show.
He never mentioned any names.
First a Peakock - then a feather duster - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 11, 2002 at 15:36:12:
I was trying to remember what it was they were in to. The whole place would shut down two or more times per day for their meditations. He had about 1/4 of the town of Fairfield Iowa employed. They were a calm and peaceful bunch and very gracious. I’ve never had the treatment from an organization that I had from them.
When I saw that they had somewhere around 400 telemarketers on the phones just trying to save the orders that came in at 3:00 am from bleary eyed, depressed people grasping for hope - I wasn’t surprised to hear of their refund problem later.
I think he had no clue that reaching out to the masses with his “dweeb” style (not my term) would result in thousands of refunds that would eventually do his company in. I think he was also hit with problems from some of the claims and guarantees he gave out in his show and literature. The infomercial world was new and had really only been explored a little by Paul Simon. As they say, “Pioneers usually die with arrows in their backs”. Unlike some of the “Circus Circut” he didn’t just re-emerge selling phone cards or a new course on a different subject.
I’ve always liked the comment made when Trump had his fall and was at a low point “First a peakock - then a feather duster”.
(I do know how to spell - the censor wouldn’t let me spell it the right way.)
Re: Hal Morris I Remember Him - Posted by John Behle
Posted by John Behle on March 16, 2002 at 13:34:01:
Atlanta sounds fun. I’d love to go to a convention and actually sit in on sessions and network with people. I felt so lousy at the last one that I pretty much only came down to give my presentation and then went back to recover. Now that I have the heart fixed, I am in intensive daily treatments for my back. I’m determined to get my back working right so I can get back to giving seminars, etc.
Re: First a Peakock - then a feather duster - Posted by Paul ut
Posted by Paul ut on March 12, 2002 at 02:23:52:
Now that you mention Fairfield, Iowa. Was Ed involved with HBT(Home Business Technologies)? I had called on them for their drop shipments to seminars. Just wondering.