Complaint Review: Real Estate Investors Network - Sydney Select State/Province

According to the REIN website, this is what REIN is all about:

"The REIN Group helps people in wealth creation through property investments. In fact since 1996, we have helped more than 3000 people! And for most of these people, until they met us they didn't know how to invest in property or didn't think they could afford it.

The REIN Group makes property investing easy. We support you every step of the way through the whole process and have a proven system that provides our clients with:

• Education - through books, seminars, personal meetings and regular updates



• A personal investment plan and cash flow analysis



• Recommended investment properties



• On-going support and annual reviews



• A network of approved professionals to make your investments hassle free - we call it The REIN Group circle of safety

We are an independent real estate network - designed specifically for
INVESTORS.

We understand what investors want and we get you a property that will act like an investment should, i.e. be rented, lower your tax rate and give you capital gain, all in the safety envelope of affordability.

At The REIN Group we source the best investment properties around Australia. We are very selective and work closely with research houses to find the right properties.

And before we recommend any property it must past The REIN Group test. It must have strong yields and capital growth and good cash flow. We do the homework and run the numbers - so you can be confident in your
investment decision - a decision based on sound fundamentals.

Make you feel all warm and fuzzy doesn't it? Well let me tell you something. REIN is the brainchild of an absolute rogue who can't be trusted, called Jim Downs. If you want to know more about Jim you can find out here: www.jimdowns.com.au Well at least that's Jim's own version of himself. He seems to be a legend in his own mind!

Like most shifty con men, Jim can actually come across as not a bad sort of a bloke. He talks the talk and even had Australian cricketer Glenn McGrath recommending REIN and his strategies at one stage. Fortunately it appears that McGrath eventually saw the light after being quizzed by the media about the negative rap Downs had started to receive from many unhappy clients. Jim Downs is nothing but a lying, cheating conman. Period!

The website blurb above is almost entirely made up of B/S. In fact, when compared against the real performance of this company is so wildly misleading Downs should have been charged under the consumer laws for misleading and deceptive conduct. To demonstrate this let me explain:

I purchased a property through REIN a number of years ago. The personal investment plan and cash flow analysis prepared by Jim Downs himself turned out to be based on wildly speculative guesstimates of future performance, which never came close to materializing. I believe now that he knew (or should have known) this. Dishonest or incompetent, which is is Jim? 

As for the recommended investment properties, well I found out later that Jim Downs simply recommends any properties that he can get his hands on to sell. The truth is that many are grpossly overpriced to hide his huge sale commissions that he charges the developers. Despite all his highly optimistic projections my property, reduced in value by close to 80,000 over the 7 years that I owned it. This was after Jim had apparently  negotiated a special 15% discount with the developer for REIN buyers. What a load of B/S!

The calculations carried out  by Jim himself on this property suggested that I would only be out of pocket by $35 extra per week. (negatively geared)  The truth was that the real figures were closer to $210 per week from my own pocket. So my friends, that is the REIN 'Circle of Safety' for ya! Absolute bollocks! 

So why am I coming out on here and stating my case? Well the simple fact is that when I tried to get some answers from Jim as to why all this happened, his attitude was appalling. He was full of excuses blaming everyone and everything he could except himself. After promising to get back to me, he failed to do so, and then avoided all m y attempts to contact him. Finally when I did speak to him again using some telephone tactics to fool him, he became angry and abusive and refused to discuss the situation with me. 

I did some investigation work and discovered that a number of REIN buyers had purchased in the same complex as me. They had all had similar experiences as me. But I have since learned that there are literally dozens of unhappy REIN clients who have all been given the run around by Jim Downs when they hit him up about their poorly performing investment properties. Some he has threatened with defamation and slander to shut them up. Well I say bring it on Jim. You can threaten me all you like. I'd love to get you into a court room you weasel.

In the initial stages when Jim first  started receiving client complaints, and the complaints had started to attract media attention, Jim offered to help some of his clients out financially. I understand that one of his clients he had agreed to pay $4000 a month to but a few weeks later and as soon as the media attention disappeared,so did Jim's promises of financial assistance. Apparently he couldn't afford to be paying them.

Well I see from Jim's website that he can afford quite a lavish lifestyle up in Darwin where he currently resides with his new boat moored at the marina.  Latest is, Jim is now spruiking developments up there and is holding regular seminars looking for new suckers at Mantra Pandanas on Knuckley Street in Darwin throughout the first half of this year.

A word of warning to anyone thinking of purchasing investment property through this man. Do not believe a word he says. All he wants is to profit from your lack of experience and he will say anything he needs to get you to buy. He is a dishonest conman with absolutely no conscience. Do become his next victim.