Stone Equity Group and The Investor's paradigm

General Real Estate Investing
41

Well a little about stone equity from first hand knowledge from dealing with them. As a ex property manager for there houses here in KC, I found that stone equitys method of remodeling a house is a little paint, maybe carpet, if not carpet then they paint the wood floors, their plumbing is just pieced together and usually when you turn the water on there are leaks. 90 percent of the time, there is no guttering on the house, so there goes the new owners investment down the drain, no guttering, facial boards rot, soffits rot, but why should stone equity care, they have sold the house to another unsuspecting out of town owner who has been promise a high rent for houses purchased in the hood.

The stone equity finds a property manager to rent the houses for them. Like us, we were renting the houses, but repairs still needed to be made to bring the house up to city code standards. SEG would never follow through after a house was rented, so we would take the rent money and make the repairs ourselves. The tenants knew us, not stone equity, and we were taking the heat for repairs not being made.

I have more to say, just not enough room on this site or time to say it. But to sum it up, stone equity doesn’t stand behind their product

42

That’s just too tempting to be true and it’s not acutally. Only confused people go there. It’s not practical if any body thinks I’ve no knowledge about property.

43

Evening ReiClub members,

What a great day, we donated a home today to a family in Columbus OH for “Make a difference day”.

I was reading David Trammel’s response and wanted to add light to the story. David Trammel was authorized to lease properties owned by SEG and certain SEG investors. David put 4 families into homes and never informed SEG or our clients. In some cases we found out within days of the tenant moving in and in one case we did not find out for a month. In none of the cases did David inform us the unit was rented until one of our agents found the properties tenanted. In all cases we had to move the families out. In some of the properties we do not install water heaters or furnaces until the unit is tenanted to avoid theft as vacant units are targets. We would get calls after the unit was already tenanted and have to scramble. After issuing a cease and desist to David Trammel and Jones Investment Group in August of this year they put 2 more tenants into units without authorization nor sent anyone the agreements. We have 2 other property managers in Kansas City that perform incredibly well and have helped clean up these issues.

Have a good night, jph

44

Hi friends, Jus a little of my sharing. I had invested on the oilpod investment which had also given proven track record of payment to the investors. Investor fly over to check on the company personally. there are people investing a few hundred thousand of USD. They organised high class party, meeting session, training for recruitor, investor, FAQ. even the popular investment interviewed MC n report this atlernative investment. so with magazine write up back up, people more believe the scheme can work.

The earlier investor even show us big paycheck, but look wat happen now, we got nothing back, except less than a yr of repayment.
they took 8 yrs to operate this biz n gone bust. this company is frm USA, there are actually many investor in a few country but we hardly know who are the group of investors even in spore. The Spore operator Mark Chang is nowhere to be found. Initially they pretend to be helpful, when it get to the point that nothing can be claim back, all the sale person disappeared too. none can be in touch. why let people manage your money? Report police so wat, nothing can be done. This is wat i learnt a lesson. (i also got tiltle deed chop by US lawyer n govt )

There are also warning in website forum saying it is a spam. but the gangho me still harbour with greed n jump into this trap. Really regret!

The best to invest your money to get avg 9% returns is buy unit trust with insurance related and do dollar cost averaging. be it you die or alive or perm disabled, you get to manage your money(alive) n your money back if death/perm total disabled occur. It is very liquid. anytime you need the money, you can liquidate the amt you need. You have peace of mind, you can sleep n eat even when mkt is down. the only thing you need to have is time. set a correct time horizon/goal, you will get your ideal returns. it had been proven over the past 30yrs. some more the company is back by our govt regulation.

Stock is too risky n tiring (need to monitor) though give high returns.

Because of greed that is why there are so many scheme around to tempt us.

By the way, SEG jus presented to us their scheme (abt USD30k, no member fee). I am actually worrying these group who are so tempted to make good money, so will always be offered with such scheme by their petite leader. Well, jus hope these group will be more careful. Key advise is do more research , research n research before you invest. Invest wat you know, don invest wat you don know. If it is a good investment (i got no comment on this investment), then congratulation! God bless.

45

Hey

I have bean an real estate investor for the past 20 years and I am amazed at how people react to a something that looks to good to be true without doing their home work.

I invested with SEG and like most real estate transactions things did not go as smoothly as I would have liked in the 50 or 60 deals I was involved with,very few did.

Stone Equity Group sometimes have their problems, but all of the issues I had with them, they resolved in a timely manner and and to my complete satisfaction.

I had a 6 month CD that was paying as high as 4.5 % a couple of years ago and dropped to 1.25%. Instead of rolling it over I decided to take the money and invested it with SEG and am now receiving about 22% cash on cash return. I think that is pretty good.

I wanted an income stream and this investment provides me with $450 per month cash flow after paying the service fee. Which brings up a comment that why pay a service fee instead of just getting the money from the land contract buyer. Well I have other properties that I manage and collect the rents, but I also have properties too far away for me to manage successfully. Its hard to collect from a tenant or show the property or arrange for repairs. Its better that the buyer do the repairs and the service take care of the payment collection and they send me a check that includes a monthly amount to cover the tax’s and insurance (impound account) I use that to pay the tax’s and insurance just like I do with some of my properties that have mortgages and no impound account. I keep the money in a separate account and collect interest on it and then I pay the tax’s and insurance. This provides me with a little bet more income and Its worth it to me. Other properties I have I contract with a property management company’s and they charge around 7% to 10% per month which in my case ranges from $75for a $750 a month rental to about $150 a month for a $2,200 per month property. I find that it pays in some cased to use a property management co. . . Different strockes for different folks . .

As you can see I am not an experiences writer. All I can say is that the SEG investment so far is performing as well as they said it would. I have real horror stories about so called normal real estate investments including land contracts, lease options, rent to own, etc. etc. But for now this one is working out.

I plan on doing another SEG investment when another one of my CD’ matures.

Good luck to all. Real estate is a great investment tool if you do your home work and learn from others . . .

46

It never ceases to amaze me! Whenever someone posts something negative about a company, 5-10 new members join and their very first post lauds how wonderful their dealings have been with the company in question. Then they mysteriously disappear and never post again…

47

So what. If it helps someone to decide for them selves to invest or not to invest in something being talked about on this site. Its good that investors with experience post positive or negative information.

I visit web sites that have information about an investment I am interested in or am checking up on and it helps me to decide what to do.

Just because I only posted one time, on this site, does not make my experience and or information worthless. I have been successful dealing in real estate and I don’t expect others to fallow my lead. I feel that each person must do their own research and due diligence and come up with their own conclusion as to what to invest in.

Again, just because something sounds to good to be true, sometimes it is a good investment. Do your homework!

I for one, believe that luck is when preparation meets opportunity.

Lots of luck to all

48

It doesn’t give you credibility either.

49

juano101 just to prove us wrong post something about anything on this site. You chose, just anything at all.

That is the credibility gap we are talking about

How can sombody be so involved with this business and only have intrest in this one single thing…not one sigle type of thing but only this one thing? That doesn’t make any since at all.

50

Here is the employee list for Stone Equity Group, perhaps Juano101 is actually http://activerain.com/stoneeg Juan Mares

And watch this video and then read the headline. http://www.sandiego6.com/mediacenter/local.aspx?videoId=620743@xetv.dayport.com&navCatId=5
Something fishy is going on here. They will not get any of my hard earned money.
http://www.sec.gov/litigation/litreleases/lr18182.htm

I know from attending one of their seminars that John Powell claims to be a laguna beach resident and this is a small community of residents, too bad the SEC doesn’t have pictures.

51
juano101 just to prove us wrong post something about anything on this site. You chose, just anything at all.

That is the credibility gap we are talking about

How can sombody be so involved with this business and only have intrest in this one single thing…not one sigle type of thing but only this one thing? That doesn’t make any since at all.

Boy the response was overwhelming!! :anon

52

I came back to view this site again and was still amazed at the negative attitude some people have when it come to investing in real estate.

I do not work for SEG. I am retired and invest in real estate as something i enjoy doing. I retired from a government top management position and invested in real estate part time.

I learned early in my real estate investing that there are a lot of negative people that found fault in everything I was doing and kept telling me how I was going to lose money or it was not a good time to buy or it was too good to be true or if it was that good of a deal why didn’t the seller keep the property or why would someone offer me an opportunity or information that they could do themselves if it was so good and so on and so on. If I had listened to them, I would not have made the amount of money I did and I would not be living the kind of life I am enjoying today.

This will be the last post that I will make about SEG or my experience with them. I don’t care if anyone else invest with them or not. I did and I will again. I have and will also invest with others that offer me a good deal. I don’t care if anyone be leaves me or not. I know who I am and what I have accomplished.

I know those that want to invest in real estate and become successful will not pay any attention to those that are negative and do there home work before investing in any investment. They will take the opportunities presented, do their home work and end up enjoying life while other will continue to doubt that there are good deals.

I was given some good advice by a successful real estate investor that I met when I first started. He said that one secret to becoming rich is to watch what poor people do . . . and don’t do that. The reason they are poor is because of what they do. Instead watch what rich people do and do that, because the reason they are rich is because of what they do

I will still read real estate forums, because I am still learning and enjoy reading about others that have succeeded and how they did it.

53

Nothing to say

54

Wow :shocked

Talk about “Drama” :argue

Very entertainig though.

55

I usually don’t read blogs or write in them, but I felt like i had to start doing that.
I had a bad experience with Stone Equity Group and the fact that I am still dealing with them and they are not delivering what they promised so many times is what has made me join this group and post here;
I bought a property from them last year almost a year ago and paid $23900 believing all the promises that they made at their presentation; after the property was “repaired and fixed to standards” and ready for people to move I was cited by the city where the property is, with a bunch of violations to the city code and took many many calls and solicitations to have them taken care of from Stone Equity Group; after putting a person in the property, the company that finds these renters took a $1000 fee (this was nowhere written in the contract) and I never got the background check paper about the renter even if I asked for it many times ( did they do one?);
then the renter stopped the payments.
So, after many months and after being cited by the city for a list of violations, and being billed for the property taxes, I am still not receiving any money at all.
After complaining with the Stone Equity Group many times and also complaining with Marshall Reddick people, because they are the ones that sponsored this group at their seminars,
the Stone Equity Group said that they would take care of me rebuying the property back within 30 days (I also signed a contract for that); after months they still haven’t kept their word: they say that they are still trying to evict the person from the property.
I already contacted the BBB Better Business Bureau with this story (and discovered that I am not alone),
and I did contact a lawyer ( he already send them some papers).
So my experience with Stone Equity Group has been a nightmare so far.
My advice to everybody… do your research before investing…

56

Hello everyone !

I just wanted to share my experience with SEG.

I met them at one of the seminars of Marshall Reddick where they explained how their process works and how you can make money buying their homes. I assume people on this forum are familiar with their system details so I won’t go into details.

What is notable is that they present it so nicely that it makes you wonder what’s in it for them. They use expressions like “revitalizing communities”, “we buy whole neighborhoods and rehab the homes”, “we just want to help americans to achieve the American Dream”, etc.

While talking on the phone with Danielle Oyhancabal which is their Real Estate Consultant me and a friend of mine were asking lots of questions just to make sure we understand how the things work and what are we getting ourselves into.

I asked Danielle to send me a few properties as example so we can get an idea of what kind of properties we are talking about. She told me that she cannot send me properties that are part of an existing client portfolio unless I am a member. Ok, so I signed up and I gave her my credit card number to be charged for $1000 which she claimed that it will be charged only at the end of the following week. The transaction was pending the next day :cool

She sent me the properties as promised. After a bit of googling, I found listings for two out of the three properties. A property from CA was listed for $10500 (which they would sell me back after being rehabed with $59900) and another property from IN was listed for $15000 with an estimate of $5k-$8k in repairs for some drywall damage (which they would sell me back for $34900). Good deal, huh ?

As an aside, I emailed the listing agent of the property in CA to see if it’s still available. The next day I got a reply confirming that the house is still available and I can see it at any time. So much for sending me houses from “existing client portfolios” :biggrin

These findings explain many things and among them the need to pay cash. It is obvious that the properties are not worth as much as they claim so taking a loan on it would not work. Once you are in escrow they will use you your money from “escrow” to buy and rehab the property and sell it back to you and keep the profit.

BTW, their sales pitch is brilliantly designed to make you believe the whole thing. They sprinkle various items throughout that makes you believe that you are getting a good deal (you’ll be getting a property for pennies on the dollar, the houses are valued for much more that we are selling them for, we are also waiting in the same round-robin queue to buy a house as our clients, etc) and that they are doing this just because they want to help people (the video with the house that they just donated, revitalizing communities, etc).

Needless to say, I canceled my “reservation” the next day.

The following day I get a call from Danielle asking me what’s going on. I told her about the property that was listed for $10.5K. She said that this is because this is a foreclosure and it is before being rehabed. I replied by saying that they’ll have a hard time to make me believe that they’ll put in $40K-$50K worth of remodeling into the house before selling it to me. I told her that I can do that myself and get the house for a much lower price. At this one she replied that I’m a real estate investor and I was just trying to extract information from them and hung up the phone.

I tried to keep this post as factual as possible in the hope that I can help other investors make an informed decision.

Regards,

rumberobueno
57

Morning REI Club Members,

I will be the first to say that we are not perfect and mistakes happen from time to time, which we go back and fix. I also understand that real estate investing can be stressful because there are so many variables and tenant default is one of the variables. This is a risk of home ownership and part of the down side of real estate investing. Here is a summary of Mr. Sabatini’s purchase.

PURCHASE, SALE, POST SALE
In summary the home was purchased by (deleted) for $23,900 and then sold to a land contract buyer for $50,050 within 45 days on 08/01/2009. We emailed the contract on 8/14 to (deleted) along with loan servicing set up docs for a 3rd party loan servicing. The land contract buyer contacted us 10/20 and said that they have been trying to make the October payments but the account number for the loan servicer is not working. We contacted the loan servicing company and they said that they still had not received the loan setup paperwork from (deleted). Additionally Del Toro would not release the September payment because they did not have paperwork from (deleted). 11/2 We spoke with Jessica at Loan Servicing company and apparently buyer tried again to make payment online but it was kicked out because she entered the wrong account number, we called buyer, no answer, left message. 11/5 Yusuf, a VP at our company flew out and went to home, (deleted)(buyer) was not home, left note. 11/16 Del Toro informed us that the tenant still had not paid so we referred to a local property manager for eviction.

In closing we are disappointed that the tenant defaulted as this hurts our relationship with (deleted)and has now become a public scene. I think its important all readers understand that we don’t take financial responsibility for tenant default, and that if this is an expectation than our company would not be a good source of properties. Our clients understand that this is a risk of real estate investing and comes with the territory. At the same time we are always interviewing property management companies to find the best local representation for our clients.

Thanks, jph

58

Joshua,

First and foremost I would say it is NEVER a good idea for you to post personal information about one of your customers in an online forum.

Second, it seems as if your business model is set-up to be a turnkey investment operation. If that is the case then why are you pushing properties on people that you don’t even have under contract (stated in the above posting). The blame is totally on your shoulders because your company’s sole purpose is to make the real estate investing experience as low stress as possible. How can you not take financial responsibilty for YOUR buyer backing out? Especially if it was in the contract that you would repurchase the property? It is one of the primary responsiblities of your company? To make sure that you are putting qualified buyers into the homes you are selling? Did your “tenant” put down any money? If so was that forwarded to the property owner?

At this point I would not waste anymore of your time posting here on an internet forum. I would suggest that you make your sole focus fixing your business model and your company because from what i have read it sounds like BOTH are broken.

p.s. I am going to delete the buyers name from your previous post.

59

Chris,

The customer initially made it public which was the reason for my response. I would hope that readers appreciate my responses as we value our reputation. Chris, we are not a turn key investment company as this word is incredibly misleading. To me this word implies that clients do not need to take an active roll in their investment, it implies that nothing will go wrong. You will not see this word in any marketing or on our website. The fact is in real estate something is almost bound to wrong over the life you own a property. Whether a hot water heater goes out, it takes longer to fill a home, or the tenant defaults these are all risks of investing.

If a property manager rents your property and 4 months from now they default they will help you refill the unit but not cover the expenses. They would be out of business. The risk is with the owner as they also have the upside of cash flow and appreciation. That may not be a popular statement, but its the truth.

SEG has 4 full time post sale relationship managers that assist clients with service tickets and rehab tickets post sale. Our post sale services should in no way be considered turn key, rather they are commitment to our clients that we will remedy warranty issues and assist where possible to give the best chance of success.

Also we have never sold or marketed a property that we did not own or have under contract. Our profit is created by adding value through rehab.

I hope this shed some light and I appreciate your open mindedness.

jph

60
Also we have never sold or marketed a property that we did not own or have under contract. Our profit is created by adding value through rehab.

joshuahost: I can provide you with proof that your statement is incorrect.

Regards,

rumberobueno