| Bob Fitzgerald Coaching |
| Bob Fitzgerald Coaching ELAN Program $5,000 Scam towards Realtors. Contract states 10 lisitngs in 180 days plus addition services which were never rec |
| 10th of Apr, 2011 by User813895 |
The Bob Fitzgerald ELAN Program is a scam. They target Realtors across the country claiming you will recieve appointments from Expired listings & FSBO. They promise you 10 listings in 180 days and additional services as well. I was told that I can give them a list of zip codes to target and a price range, they will call to make the appointments. They charge $5,000 upfront and a 20% referral fee or $250 under 200k sales price. It's been over 6 months and I got 2 listings out of the 30 leads. In fact I never received 3 leads because they forgot to give me the information. In additiion of the 30 leads 10 were not even in the area I service. I guess the zip codes I sent meant nothing to them. Some where 2 hours away. Out of the 20 other so call leads many of them wouldn't meet, never called back or didn't show up. The message I received was
I got a HOT one for you". The additional service they promised which I never received were: Weekly Mastermind Group Call with ELAN Members; Monthly Interview with a Top 100 ELAN Member; Admission for (2) to the ELAN Retreat in Miami, Florida (4 day event); Coaching 911 access to Bob Fitzgerald and his team of ELAN Coaches. I emailed Bob and requested an appointment for us to talk to discuss my issues, he said he was too busy just email him. So I did, his response "ALL WE DO IS CALL". I guess the other services they promise are just thown in to make it sound better. When I emailed Bob again (because he won't talk over the phone) requesting a refund because he is in breach of the contract he said "he doesn't give refund he only makes calls". I'm lucky he calls 1 day per month. He even threaten to call my listings to tell them what he thought of me. I didn't know I was working for him, I thought he was working for me. At least that's what I thought I paid him to do. Another thing they never told me was I needed to sign up for Landvoice, which is extra. I complained to Bob he said he would refund the cost of Landvoice. Still waiting on the check. If you are a Realtor Beware of this Scam. |
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I am thrilled with the service I have received from Bob Fitzgerald. I have been in business for 9 years and conservatively I have spent over 50k on "Leads". This is the first service that I am actually buying listings, not leads. I have recently booked 5 listings and I have several in the pipeline. I do two things that really help.
1. I contact the lead immediately and let them know I am excited about meeting with them and I get additional information about their situation.
2. I deliver a pre-listing package to their door-step that gives them an overview about our serviced and track record.
Bottom line... This is a numbers game. Bob does the critical time consuming ground work of making the calls. I follow up and make the personal sales call to obtain the listing. It is a great investment of my time and financial resources.
Thanks
Patrick McGinnley |
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FACT: Prospecting isn’t new… nor is it complicated!
FACT: We have hundreds of clients that love the service that we provide. Clients that love the tens of thousands of dollars that they’ve made working with us! Anyone who is interested in our service can talk to as many of these references as they need to so they don’t lose out on taking listing after listings simply because a handful of agents out of hundreds choose to tell their one sided story on sites like this.
FACT: As I type this, we have over 300 agents in our prospecting schedule and by comparison we have had very, very few complaints.
FACT: In today’s day and age, most companies have people that complain on web sites like this. The only reason I took the time to reply was so that a handful of people with a single sided story can’t rob you of what others have called the single best investment they’ve ever made.
FACT: YOU ARE SMART! Simply read my reply and ask yourself… Does what I wrote make sense? This is my side of the story.
MY REPLY is very simple. Just think for a moment about what we do. We Call. We are telemarketers “calling” for sale by owners and expired listings. Prospecting isn’t complicated at all. If you’d like to see what our prospecting looks like watch this video…
http://fitzgerald-coaching-prospecting.blogspot.com/http://fitzgerald-coaching-prospecting.blogspot.com/
If you hired a telemarketer to work form your office, what would they do? What would you do? You would give them a list of people to call… they would call and set appointments and you’d make the presentation, handle the seller’s objections and get the listing. Right? Prospecting isn’t complicated.
So why do some agents that have a problem with this? We have set thousands of appointments for real estate agents there are four mistakes that agents make which end up causing them complain on sites like this. Decide for yourself who is at fault.
We do not want our telemarketers to be the real estate “expert.” That is the job of the agent. Our telemarketers do not discuss the current market conditions with a seller. Our telemarkters do not discuss home prices with a seller. Our telemarkters do not handle seller’s objections or answers a seller’s questions about the home selling process. We let the agent be the agent and we simply make the appointment.
This is an actual example of a typical appointment that was sent to one of our clients… then listed and then sold!
1. WHEN THE HOME SELLS, WHERE WILL YOU BE GOING?
Nana is already moved into her new home. She married her husband in August and they decided that he had the larger home, so they would move into his. Her home is now vacant, and she moved about a mile away.
2. IS YOUR HOME CURRENTLY LISTED WITH A REAL ESTATE AGENT? No. The listing expired at the end of February, and Nana was very unhappy with the results from her realtor. She thought about leaving the home off of the market, but decided against that because she is extremely motivated to sell.
3. HOW SOON WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE THERE?
Nana is already in her new home, and she wants this home sold as soon as possible.
4. DO YOU HAVE AN ASKING PRICE IN MIND?
$307, 900. She would like advice on her asking price though. She told me that she thinks she may have been overpriced because her agent started her at $316, 000. She wants to make sure she is priced where she should be to get the home sold.
5. HOW MUCH DO YOU OWE ON THE PROPERTY?
As of October, Nana still owed $171, 000. She has still been making payments on the home, so it is less than that now.
6. WHAT WILL YOU DO IF THE HOME DOESN’T SELL?
She hasn't even thought about that option. Right now, she really just wants to get the home sold and be free from it.
7. ARE YOU INTERVIEWING ANY OTHER AGENTS? Not at the moment. Jeremy will be the first since her listing expired.
8. IF WHAT (AGENT) SAYS MAKES SENSE… ARE YOU PLANNING TO LIST THE HOME?
Yes. She is extremely motivated to get this home sold, so if she thinks that Jeremy will be more productive for her than her last agent, she will definitely re-list with them.
Again, prospecting isn’t new nor is it complicated. The four most common mistakes that an agent will make using our service are…
1. The agent is too BUSY to actually do what it takes to follow up with a seller and convert the listing. Expired listings and for sale by owners are being called by a lot of great agents every day. It is very competitive and our telemarketers have had to stand out just to get the appointment for our clients. We IMMEDIATELY send the appointment to the agent but if that agent doesn’t follow up right away and confirm the appointment… what do you think happens next? If the agent doesn’t call back for days or in many cases even weeks then the seller doesn’t even remember that we ever called or loses interest and cancels the appointment. Without diligent follow up… generating that appointment was a waste of time. This is a challenge for some of our highest producers. They may earn six and even seven figures selling real estate but if they are too busy to follow up with our appointments then they are not going to get listings. Most of our agents will follow up right away, solidify the appointment and take the listings.
2. The second challenge that can be a problem with some of the higher producers is that they are already “buying leads” from so many other sources. Some have hundreds of leads from in their systems form lead generation services, web sites and services, marketing services, mailing services, call capture services… etc. The bottom line is that those top agents have so many leads that they don’t value nor follow up diligently with the expired listings and FSBO appointments that we set for them. In most cases this type of agent couldn’t even provide any feedback on an appointments that we set for them because they NEVER even looked at the e-mail with the appointment to begin with.. I don’t have a problem with an agent having far more leads than they can handle but unlike these other sources of leads, my team may have spent 3 to 4 hours and invested hundreds of dials to finally set that appointment. If they are too busy to open their e-mail or follow up with the seller to confirm the appointment then they aren’t going to like that I hold them accountable for not doing their job. This is a partnership and they aren’t holding up their end of the bargain. Most of are clients understand that it takes a lot of hours, dials and contacts to set these appointments and the value them as such and take listings.
3. The most common problem that I’ve seen after setting thousands of appointments for real estate agents is that some simply don’t have the skill it takes to convert a prospecting based lead. The first question that we ask every potential client is have they worked with expired listings and for sale by owners in the past? They are not “come list me” referrals. It is not difficult to handle basic objections about the seller’s price expectations or the fact that the seller may have a friend in the business but an agent doesn’t want to hear that other agents are listing the same type of appointments day in and day out. It is easier to simply “trash” our appointments because the seller had some basic objections rather then educate the sellers and take listings. I’ve spent more than a decade coaching agents and the bottom line is that if they can’t help a seller see the benefit of listing with them then they are going to have to stick with working with buyers. There was an agent that posted that we sent him 52 appointments and he didn’t take a listing so the program is a scam. Never once did it cross his mind that he only helped prove my point. We can set the appointments but we can’t take the listings. Most agents in our program would have listed at least a dozen of the exact same appointments. Again, only a handful of the hundreds of clients we are prospecting for complain at all.
4. Finally, how about common sense! If you hire a telemarketer you’ll need to provide them with phone numbers... If you don’t want an appointment in a particular area, don’t put that seller on your list… If you want to be in the call schedule this week, make sure we have your numbers in time… We work on referrals so you will have to communicate when you take listings or we will stop calling until you do…
When an agent writes a post that says they only received a few appointments… they never tell you that they haven’t sent in their prospect list in months and ignored every attempt to get feedback on any listings they have taken. There is ALWAYS more to the story.
Imagine a site like this for your sellers. The seller wants way more for the home than it is worth… they refused all the advice you gave them about the market and price reductions but they still went online to complain that you didn’t do anything to sell their house and that people should beware of listings with you. You’d simply direct them to sellers who took your advice and were thrilled with your service! If you are still unsure about our service, e-mail me and I’ll arrange for you to talk to as many agents as it takes to see that they are making thousands and thousands of dollars with us and so can you!
Bob Fitzgerald
[email protected] |
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I just got a call from a gal at the "Elite Listing Service". Her name is Kathy Murpha. Sounds totally legit, but when I checked with the Mike Ferry organization, they said to "run for the hills". I guess this scam gets a lot of folks, and it almost got me, but I was tipped off by the fact that they wanted me to send a check instead of taking my credit card number. If I used a credit card, I'm protected against scams, but with a check, who knows where it is going.
Now, I stumbled across this site, and noticed there are some positive comments about Bob Fitzgerald. Now, it just me, or does it seem really funny that the person positive posting just happens to be Bob Fitzgerald? So if this is legitimate, why would the Mike Ferry organization say to run? I'm steering clear. |
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As a realtor, I am constantly trying to find ways to bettermy business. When I heard that Bob Fitzgerald coaching would call leads and set appointments on my behalf, at times when I was unable to be making calls myself, it sounded like a perfect opportunity. They charged an up-front $5000 investment as well as a 20% referral fee should I receive a listing from their services. With their claims to set appointments and create clients for me, it was sure to be a worthwhile investment.
Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth. After working with Bob Fitzgerald coaching for the past 8 months, they have not given me one good lead, let alone any transactions at all. They work off of the same call lists as I do for lead prospecting. I have been able to set 32 appointments with 21 closed sales with my limited time available to make calls. They forwarded very few and all of which turned out to be bad leads that I didn’t meet with.
Initially, when I started working with Bob Fitzgerald, they informed me of their policies as to when to send in our lead lists—the lists they use to make calls. I asked if I could send in lists more often than their suggested due dates. After receiving permission, I started sending in pre-scrubbed lists once a week—every Tuesday for 8 months.
I contacted Bob Fitzgerald coaching 8 months later to find out how often they were calling my leads and asking if I could see a log of the calls they had been making. Rather than addressing my concerns, Bob Fitzgerald coaching put the blame on me for not sending my lists in at the appropriate times. As stated above, I had been sending in lists once a week, with express permission from Bob Fitzgerald coaching, for the previous 8 months.
Needless to say, my frustrations and disappointments with the Bob Fitzgerald Coaching program are too large to express in words. What I thought would be a $5000 investment has become nothing more than a frustrating waste of time and money for me and my staff. My goal now is to prevent any and all other agents across the country to avoid this scam at all cost. He should be driven out of the business. |
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