First I bought a book by Scott McGillivray for $30 including shipping. I then was invited to a free seminar on Sep 24 where we were convinced to buy a 3-day seminar for $1,997 that will teach us all about investing in real estate. We also purchased the tax/liens package for $997. We were very excited to learn all that which was happening the weekend after.
When we went to class on Sep 30, just before lunch we were given a form to fill out about our financial situation in the premise that they were going to help us achieve our financial goals.
After lunch, we were pulled to meet our mentor (Carrington Fisk) who proceeded to give us one example on how we can purchase real estate. After that it was all about the money that we had and immediately we were told that we should buy the platinum package for $24,997. We declined and were told to think about it. We started having our doubts then and talked about this being a scam. Because I trusted Scott McGillivray, I convinced my husband that this cannot be a scam and we should continue with the seminar. The second day, we met with more people and one of the participants came in with a scam report and demanded a refund. We don’t know what the outcome was for them. We were advised by the presenter (Keith Bradshaw) that the scam report was generated by the internet from outside of the US. We were more skeptical then but still continued with the class. My husband is more skeptical and on the way home we talked about not purchasing the package if asked.
Early that third morning, Oct 2, before class we were pulled by Carrington Fisk. We tried saying “NO” in multiple ways (almost 90 minutes) and all of you out there are probably laughing at us for not walking away. We got sucked into it anyways with promises such as we will get a mentor immediately and we will make the money back and some by Mar etc. While I was kept busy looking for funds by calling my credit card companies, my husband was briefed about what to expect and signed the paper. We were not briefed verbally or walked through the document that he signed.
On Monday Oct 3, we called to find out what we needed to do. We were referred to another number and when we asked the person, he said we can only answer real estate question. Another red flag for us but we were still trying to understand the process. The following days we were busy making arrangements to go to Las Vegas. We did not know that we had 3-days to return the package for a refund at that time. We found out later in our contract but not verbally told to us. During this time, my husband’s health went downhill because of the stress, waking up at night with low sugar and blood pressure that skyrocketed. He is a cancer survivor with high blood pressure, diabetic and also limited heart function (quintuple bypasses that are now blocked and no longer operable).
We called to cancel on Friday Oct 7, and left a message but no one called us back. On Monday Oct 10, after multiple tries Jason (quality assurance manager?) called my husband back. He proceeded to tell Jason that he cannot follow through with the program because of his health and would like to get refunded. Jason told us that we missed our 3-day deadline and will not be able to refund the money to us. He persistently told Jason that he cannot do it and Jason insisted that he will not give us a refund. We just have to do the program which by his own admission will cost us more money. The same night, we contacted the credit card company to initiate a dispute.
The next day, my husband seek advice from a lawyer friend and was told to return all the materials and send a letter demanding the refund. He sent a registered letter which was signed for. We also proceeded to send all the materials given to us (the CDs and booklets) to the address on the contract. The package was undeliverable.
In the meantime, we also contacted Carrington Fisk and explained the situation to him requesting that he helped us get our refund. It looked like he tried but he kept sending us a note that he was not getting anywhere either.
I also posted a comment on Scott McGillivray’s facebook: Income Property and Personal sites asking him to help us get our refund back. Within about 15 minutes the posts were removed from both sites.
To date, we are $23,000 in credit card debt since we wrote a check for $4,997.
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