Anyone knows about Roy Macdonald and his One Life

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I did the course many years ago. They had a money back guarrantee then. I was not impressed and asked for my money back.

Do they still offer the money back guarrantee?

Terryw
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Hi Lesia

Yes that brings back memories. There was a lot of dancing and jumping around - probably 10-15 min per hour at least. Lots of video watching (We watched Titanic and another movie with Kevin Costner and baseball). Supposed to be inspirational. HAd to take off shoes at the door, and Roy did squirt people with a watergun (for coming back late etc).

Back then the refund was the course fee of $5000 less $500 for the hotel (5 nights in a 3 star hotel). Now I beleive he has constructed accomodation on site at the Hunter Valley.

Not sure about the endorphines??

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Hello maxolau,

I was a Roy McDonald student a few years back. The company was SMW back then. He is a very charismatic person!

My initial impression was very good and I not only did the 4 day course, but several follow-up courses. I also used his financial planning services. What I found was that there was little substance once you got past the veneer. I was able to get a refund for one of the courses I did (a few grand).

My understanding is that things went down hill quickly at SMW, hence the new name and new start. Most of his staff left, he lost licensing rights to one of the main tools he was using at the seminar, there were also registration problems for his financial services arm, and products that one of his partners recommended have performed quite badly......

Craig.

When I went to the intro seminar, I (and many others) got the impression that the 4 day seminar was on investing. Well, the first 3 days were on mental development/motivation type stuff. This is fine if you know what you are signing up for. The forth day was on investing, but I found it a bit general, and some things similar to what I had read in a John Burley book (so why pay for that). There was a few advanced techniques, but gone over very quickly with most of it going over people's heads.

The 5th day was an extra course and was on options trading. half the day was taken up with basic share type questions, and explaining what an option was. Imagine going to an advanced options trading seminar when most of the audience had never even owned a share in their life before.

Incidently, there was nearly 200 people there when I went. Cost about $5000-$5500 per person.

Terryw
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Hi,

I have a friend of mine that went, well him and his wife, they said its great for personal development but little substance overall, probably not worth the five grand based on there comments overall.

I did his program about a year ago, have increased my wealth by securing $1million dollars worth of property using an option and made $20k in the last year through trading, and increased business income by $10k.

Small increases thought would not have come about if i didnt do the program.Heaps of people have crap to say about heaps of programs, i learnt one thing so it was worth my while.No one in the world can guarantee you 1 million, but Roy got damn close.

Just thought i would shed some light on the crap storm above

.......And this had to be your first post having just joined today. How far back into the archives did you have to go to dig up a thread that hasn't been contributed to for nearly two and a half years?......................

Cheers....................Michael.
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Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it now. Boldness has genius, power and, magic in it.

I wonder whether passion99 is one of Roy's minions......

It was amazing to see how passionate the core group of helpers became towards him. They were nearly all early to mid 20's and I think very impressionable. But over the course of a couple of years involvement I realised they quickly disappeared and were replaced by other 'totally committed' helpers. Just another aspect that gradually turned me off the whole organisation.

A great study in one persons ability to influence others.

Craig.

Hi, 
It's interesting to read these comments about Roy McDonald and One Life. Has he been laying low for a while. I just received an email from him.  I'm not sure where he got my details, though I into wealth creation an I am on a few forums etc.  Though his ad is appealing, there are better, cheaper and easier ways to strive and prosper.  I won't be going to his free Creating Financial Success seminars. I doubt he'll teach me anything that I can't find out for free.

Cheers
Belinda

Anyone who is gullible enough to give Roy Mcdonald $1000's for a slick sales and blindingly obvious  advice such as investing in real estate rather than spending your income is not smart enough to really make a killing. Can they not even see the irony iin giving money to a salesman to be told to save it?

Education is fine, but buy a book like "Building Wealth through Property Investment" for $30 and then invest the thousands saved. Or a book by someone who really knows business. "Screw it Lets do It" by RIchard Branson. For those already in business, Brandolgy or The E-Myth have great advice by people who have achieved a lot more than seminars, and then its up to your natural talent to do the rest.

Those already in sales or the military will recognize the semi hypnotic techniques used in seminars like his to make them seem so amazing. Positive affirmation, sleep deprivation, repitiotion of the blindly obvious. Not trying to single anyone out, but more these overpriced seminars in gernal and encourage people to get knowledge from real experts for a reasonable price and not be victims to salesmen.

And this from the SMH

September 13, 2003

Breaking down his students' emotional defences in the name of financial security has made wealth guru Roy McDonald a very, very rich man. John Garnaut reports.

At a secluded 80-hectare bush property in the Hunter Valley, 30 kilometres west of Cessnock, Father Dave Smith took off his shoes and entered the Born Rich lecture hall.

The Anglican priest, who is acting rector at Holy Trinity in Dulwich Hill, where he trains disadvantaged youths in boxing, had paid $5500 to learn how to manage a small inheritance on behalf of the church.

The hall's windows were covered and the air-conditioning was uncomfortably cold. A swarm of consultants encouraged 100 "students" to cheer before Strategic Management Works' owner, the wealth-creation guru Roy McDonald, entered the room.

When the man finally arrived, he was the only person allowed to wear shoes. From then on he was addressed as "the Government".

What followed, according to Smith, was five days' deprivation of food and sleep in the name of financial security. He said conditions appeared to be manipulated to reduce the emotional defences of the group and enhance the power of McDonald. = 4) { b = 1; } else if (name == 'Microsoft Internet Explorer' && ver >= 4) { b = 2; } else { b = 0; } if (b == 1) { var toolkit = java.awt.Toolkit.getDefaultToolkit(); var size = toolkit.getScreenSize(); width = self.innerWidth; if (width >= 780) greater = 1; } else if (b == 2) { if (document.body.clientWidth >= 780) greater = 1; } if (greater == 1) { document.write("
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Some who have spoken to the Herald say they have profited from the Born Rich experience. Others, however, say they regret spending thousands of dollars on the courses and business and real estate ventures. Some say their emotional lives have seriously suffered.

"I believed, when I signed up, that I was going away to do some training in financial management," Smith wrote to McDonald after the Born Rich seminar. "I did not realise that I was being inducted into a cult."

McDonald, 58 this week, says he owns 24 companies that turn over $30 million a year - most of that from course fees conducted though the Sydney-based company Strategic Management Works. Born Rich is his showcase seminar. Its graduates feed McDonald's network of accountants, property developers, real estate agents and financial planners.

Complaints against him have recently increased. Both the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and the NSW Office of Fair Trading are investigating his activities, according to the Office of Fair Trading.

McDonald grew up poor in Bankstown, failed his high school Leaving Certificate and had made his first million selling real estate at age 28.

In 1988 he struck it big by holding off desperate developers before finally selling a small corner of land at what is now the Optus building in North Sydney for $7.2 million. He had paid $184,000 for it 14 years earlier.

During the 1980s McDonald shifted his sales focus to financial advice.

One of McDonald's senior managers from the early 1990s says he was the "absolute best" salesmen he has ever seen. Declining to be named in this story because it would be detrimental to his current business, the manager describes McDonald's unusual tactics.

"Roy would break people down, and then show them a way out. If he made someone cry he would come racing out of his office, saying 'I got through'."

That manager quit in the mid-1990s as he grew concerned about the content and methods of McDonald's financial advice.

Aspiring investors are recruited at free public seminars each Tuesday night in Crows Nest. A billboard promises to turn $1 into $1 million within seven years.

Inside, a dozen volunteers and commissioned consultants usher newcomers through to the seminar room, where a tanned and impeccably attired McDonald gently assures them that his is not some kind of cult or get-rich-quick scheme.

He walks up and down the aisle, hands constantly gesturing to match his message, asking audience members by their first names if they are with him. Clients and colleagues describe McDonald as the most charismatic man they have ever seen.

Soon he has the audience chanting "tax is optional" - a feat replicated even when McDonald appeared only on video in one seminar attended by the Herald last month.

After two hours, the presentation climaxes on the importance of making a decision. All you have to do is make a decision to change your life, he says, snapping his fingers. That decision is to put your credit card down for a $6000 discount "option" on doing Born Rich.

Born Rich arrived in Sydney in 1990, when McDonald says he licensed the name and content of a course run by Bob Proctor, an American "multi-tier" marketing guru. McDonald says he began to borrow methods and teachings from self-help gurus Anthony Robbins and Robert Kiyosaki (the author of Rich Dad, Poor Dad) and confrontational self-awareness organisations such as Landmark and Insight.

The program has also incorporated neuro-linguistic programming techniques from the new-age "journey therapist" Brandon Bays. Fees range from $6300 for the five-day course (or $4500 for the "early bird" discount) to $21,000 for the Billionaire program, since renamed the Success Club.

McDonald says he does not lead any form of cult or promote any particular religion. "We use references from all the great works including the Bible, Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Bob Proctor, just to mention a few," he said.

A number of participants described an intense "high" during and immediately after the course, which persisted long enough for them to recruit new members, postpone demands for refunds, pump money into investment schemes and sign up for more courses.

The most serious allegation against McDonald is that Born Rich involves psychological techniques that should not be conducted in a public and uncontrolled environment without trained counsellors.

Father Smith says participants were under great pressure to conform or risk being punished with group ridicule or blasted by McDonald's giant water gun. Some were abused and humiliated and broke down in tears or screamed.

McDonald instructed a distraught young man to relive on stage a childhood experience of his father forcing him to eat his own faeces, says Smith. McDonald then instructed participants to conduct similar "integration" processes with each other.

McDonald describes the process differently. "The technique is basically a conversation, looking at their position in life and setting some targets. Now what comes up is a lot of stuff." He says the young man's experience on stage was healthy and says he has received a letter to that effect. The seminars are supervised by his partner, Katrina McGilchrist, who is a "fully accredited therapist with 'the Journey' (a new-age emotional healing technique)."

A former professor of educational psychology at Avondale College, Dr Lyn Gow, who attended Born Rich in January, says McDonald destabilised her and others until they felt they were drowning, and then threw them the only rope.

Gow was enthusiastic about the initial Born Rich course after she completed it. Her family has paid $47,000 in course fees in less than a year. But she soon crashed into disillusionment after mortgaging her house, losing her shareholdings and watching her family's health and relationships deteriorate.

Gow has been demanding her money back since April. On Tuesday, when she had co-ordinated a protest with others demanding a refund, McDonald offered a conditional return of course fees.

Smith got most of his money back. He says he receives about one letter each week from unhappy Born Rich graduates. Most of them do not wish their stories to be publicised and do not maintain contact.

Their efforts to speak out are not helped by McDonald's message that illness and difficulties are self-inflicted.

Others, it seems, are pleased with the results and remain committed.

Paul, who does not want his surname revealed, completed Born Rich in May last year with his wife Debbie. He says Born Rich made them half a million dollars in property trading profits and "changed our lives".

Many pay $400 to join McDonald's "SSS" squad, which earns commissions by recruiting new members.

McDonald says he's in for the long haul. "This is my passion. I'll be doing this for the rest of my life."

As for Smith, he never did invest the inheritance in McDonald's scheme. He put the money into 200 hectares of bushland near Taralga, and hopes it will become Australia's premier adventure camp for children.

My wife and I were clients of Storm Financial P/L which most people would be aware of went into administration leaving investors with huge debt, my wife and I included.  We turned to Roy McDonald and his OneLife program to assist us in creating other income streams.  My wife had also recently lost her father and McDonald really played on these two issues.  He got us 'while we were down' and promised he would teach us real estate investing and share trading.  Consequently we handed over $4000 which really stretched us.  We later found his program was nothing more than a home study program in 'positive thinking' and 'mindset' and all that crap.  He has refused to refund our money. 

Unfortuneately for McDonald, I have 22yrs experience as a detective.  I am inviting anyone who believes they were screwed by MCDonald to email me personally to discuss what avenues are available to them to have their money refunded.  Your emails can be sent to aldevilliers@hotmail.com and pls title it 'Roy McDonald' as I don't waste my time opening all emails.