Wasting Time

It’s a matter of degrees. I’m happy to have a chat to anyone or meet with them and do some preliminary calculations/ scenarios for them but they need to decide after that if we are going to work together. Too much paperwork to muck around with for all parties at that point.

Hi Yule7575,

Yes that’s right. If you know what you want or don’t want it should be fairly easy to choose by having a bit of a chat. The first question I would ask is do they deal with investor a lot (they will all say yes I suppose) but then drill down and ask about whether they recommend putting all business with the same lender and cross collateralising or if they prefer to use stand alone structures. If they don’t understand that then alarm bells should ring. Also if they jump straight into talking about % rate that would be another alarm bell. They should be asking lots of questions as to you current and future plans, what LVR you would want to start at and why etc.

You need to trust the person you’re dealing with – and it’s your right to speak with more than one service provider (in any field) before deciding on who you’ll use.

Like Marty said – a quick chat over the phone or a few emails normally provides an idea of whether the person you’re dealing with knows their stuff.

The thing that gets irritating for brokers is when we put in hours to prepare advice/structure and the client takes that advice directly to their local branch/broker. It doesn’t happen too often though.

Another thing to mention is that some brokers will want to make sure that the fit is right for them too – if something doesn’t gel, they might decide to give the business a miss.

Cheers

Jamie

Don’t be embarrassed – we were all there at one stage. You’re doing the right thing by educating yourself and finding the right professionals to help you move forward!

I remember one of my first posts on an investing forum a loooong time ago is what is an Interest Only loan! Glad I’ve a lot since then!

Great question yulie,

I think that any person has the right to ask any question at anytime.

Our business is not about making a quick sale its about being each other business partner

I have just told one member of this forum that i have to charge him $500 to discuss anything further. Going back through my emails I see the first time he contacted me was in 2007. I recalled various long phone calls numerous hours explaining loan structures, deductibility of interest etc. He would go away and the resurface approximately every 12 months. About last year he rang me for another 1 hour conversation and then he sends me a loan structure email on the letterhead of another broker, meaning he had been shopping around. He contacted me again and I said I have to charge you $500. He asked me if I was serious! Then he went away, recently coming back again last week saying XX (a broker) was in Europe and he needed a question answered urgently – by this time he had changed banks. This time I politely told him to not contact me again. He still doesn’t understand that I made absolutely no money from him and wasted hours and hours of time talking and emailing him.

And the thing is it seems he still doesn’t understand how to structure a loan and has set things up badly.

Like in any situation, there is such a thing as taking the mickey. As the brokers have mentioned above, it’s absolutely reasonable to have a quick chat at the start so that both parties can determine if the working relationship will be a good one, and for the client to understand if the broker can indeed assist them given their requirements. However there is no shortage of people that treat the poor brokers as a free advisory service over and over again. There is certainly a point where it becomes just plain rude. Everyone started their investing journey somewhere with little knowledge, and had a quick chat with lots of folks while stumbling around in the dark trying to get up to speed. The key is to remember that when doing so, to be polite rather than demanding, and to remember there needs to be a limit, because at some stage during the work week, the broker needs to earn an income, so he/she cannot work for free all week.

I think respect and understanding are the keys.

A basic understand all the professional regardless, agents, brokers, accountants, builders….. we all need to respect people’s time and effect.

Connect with right people, people with passion on what they offering.
Clearly time waster or people just want to cut other people’s deal is not really welcome anywhere.

I have respect with many brokers and other professional on the forum.

I would encourage people do an initial interview with professional, after that choose one or two, then focus the energy on something else, let the professional doing their job.

After all, investing is about team work to go for the same direction, not to waste time of blaming or changing a good team then forget the big picture ahead.