My goal is to inform the rest of the world about my experience with Autumn leaf investment club.
Prior to investing with Autumn leaf investment club I did an internet search and found only things that were posted by ALREIC. My conclusion is that they were to new to have pissed off to many people. I hope the people that read this can benifit from our situation.
The last time I checked the BBB, AUTUMN LEAF had a D rating, currently it's an F. What are you guys doing? The BBB is very liberal they remove past claims after so many months giving the business a fresh start
http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository. Aspx? CompanyID=100011125
The company has many problems each one is toxic to their business
First, they say that the customer is important. I don't think they truly understand what customer service is. From day one it's been cumbersome getting a call returned. As a matter of fact, I can't think of any group associated with AUTUMN LEAF that had great customer service, it was marginal at its best.
Second the advice AUTUMN LEAF gives seems to be contingent on the market condition. As an example over a year ago we were unfortunate enough to listen to AUTUMN LEAF's advice and purchase a Victorville Single Family Home (SFH). We were told by various people in AUTUMN LEAF, you will certainly make $100K in a year; this will offset the negative since the rents won't cover the mortgage (-1000/mo). We were told "After the property appreciates and the loan is seasoned, we can do rate and term refi in 6mo to 1 year". Thats only true if the equity goes up. Lets talk about autumn Leafs property management; the PM in Victorville is Anne Simmon sister (conflict of interest, that was never mentioned). She was just asleep at the wheel. We contacted her weeks prior to closing to ensure we would be ready to market the rental right at closing. We didn't want to waste any time. When the property closed she never even knew about it, I had to tell her so we were late marketing the property. I confirmed that the escrow company informed the property manger a few weeks prior. After closing, I contacted the PM every couple weeks, the property was vacant, I asked should we lower the price or advertise differently? She just brought no ideas to the table; it was like this was her 1st job. There was no for rent sign, we were told that a sign might attract robbers, what a load! I regret I waited 3 mos to fire the AUTUMN LEAF PM. Three weeks after finding my own PM, they had the place rented and it's been rented ever since. We purchased for $305,000 and it was appraised for 310,000 over a year later. This is not enough equity to refi without me paying down the second. As of today AUTUMN LEAF is still advertising 30-40% appreciation, not even close to reality. Thats just dishonest! I understand that markets change but why are they still advertising this typr of appriciation???
At one time I gave AUTUMN LEAF the benefit of the doubt and presumed that there intentions and ideas were good, they just had problems executing. I thought the issue was with management and Autumn Leaf's ability to organization. While this may be true I would now add I dont feel they have my best interests in mind.
We came very close to buy FLA realestate from them. Once again, they just could not make it happen (thank God). The employee turn over was so great that every two weeks we ended up working with a new person on these deals. Meanwhile I put doen my deposit for a spesific unit. After months of floundering around I asked for my deposit back, that took Autumn Leaf almost a year. They were very argumenative and defensive about the situation.
I said it before and Ill say it again, if AUTUMN LEAF would have taken care of its investors (at least this one) they would have converted me into a salesman and I would be singing there praises.
Lessons learned:
1. References are Key
2. Avoid the risk of speculation (increase of equity)
3. Purchase cash flow properties
4.0 Down is to aggressive 1-20% down is a good thing
5. Go with your gut
Chris
san Jose, California
U.S.A.
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