Worth Unlimited Review: UFirst Financial rebooted
Back in 2006 United First Financial (UFirst) launched in Utah and offered members the ability to market a debt consolidation application called the ‘Money Merge Account’.
Then in 2011 UFirst stopped handling the sales side of their business (leaving their then affiliates in somewhat of a lurch) and instead outsourced it for the better part of a year.
With that seemingly not working out as planned for the company, UFirst have rebranded the Money Merge Account as the ‘Worth Account’, hired a new CEO, made some changes to their compensation plan and are now set to relaunch themselves under the new name ‘Worth Unlimited’.
Read on for a full review of the Worth Unlimited MLM opportunity.
The Company
As mentioned above, Worth Unlimited is the rebranding of United First Financial, who are commonly known in the industry as UFirst.
Operating out of the state of Utah in the United States, Worth Unlimited (and UFirst) was co-founded by Skyler Witman, Matthew Lovelady, Jonathan Bonnette and John Washeko (left to right in the photo above). The company replaced P. Thomas Chester with Spencer Clawson as the new CEO for the relaunch.
Back in the 1990s, Witman and Washenko launched the mortgage company ‘Accelerated Equity’ and marketed their Money Merge Account program.
In 2006 Lovelady and Bonnette were brought on board and Accelerated Equity was relaunched as United First Financial.
Clawson appears to have a history in executive management training and coaching having worked previously as the CEO of training company Innolect Inc.
The Worth Unlimited Product Line
The basic idea behind the Worth Account (formerly known as ‘Money Merge Account’) is that it reduces the amount of time it takes to pay off debt, thus reducing the interest paid to the lender.
The Worth Account is programmed with a considerable number of financial strategies that the banking industry has used for years to quickly eliminate their debt and build wealth.
24 hours a day, 7 days a week, the Worth Account is analyzing every aspect of your personal financial situation, to maximize your cash flow, pay off your debt in record time, and build up significant cash reserves in your bank account.
All without having to refinance, and with no change to your current budget. And, the best part of it is, the Worth Account runs all of the financial strategies for you, behind the scenes.
So all you do is log in for about 10 minutes a month, and follow the simple prompts of the program.
Specific details on how this is all achieved are being kept under wraps with Wealth Unlimited members being required to hand over prospective customers to a company sales team who then run projections and attempt to close the sale.
Wealth Unlimited does not share how the Worth Account product works with its members or customers.
The Worth Unlimited Compensation Plan
Worth Unlimited only have one product, the Worth Account and it comes in three varieties:
- Gold (no mortgage)
- Platinum (1-2 mortgages)
- Platinum + (3-9 mortgages)
The cost price for each of these products is taken directly from the amount of projected savings Worth Unlimited’s sales coaches calculate for prospective clients.
Whereas the previous incarnation, the Money Merge Account, cost a flat $3,500, the Worth Account costs 0.5% to 3% of the projected interest saved by the prospective customer.
There doesn’t appear to be any cap on the price of the Gold plan, however the Platinum and Platinum + plans are price capped at $3495 and $3795 respectively.
Out of this sale price, Worth Unlimited pay affiliates 15 to 30 percent of the final sale price of a Worth Account.
At the end of any given month, if members have generated
- $0 – $6000 in sales, they earn 15%
- $6001 – $12,000 in sales, they earn 20%
- $12,001 – $18,000 in sales, they earn 25%
- $18,001 or more in sales, they earn 30%
Unilevel Commissions
In addition to the retail commissions outlined above, Worth Unlimited also pay out residual commissions using a unilevel compensation structure.
A unilevel compensation structure places you at the top, with each new member you recruit placed directly under you (forming your level 1). There is no limit to the width of your unilevel structure with each new recruit forming a new leg.
When your level 1 members recruit new members of their own, they form your level 2. When your level 2 members recruit new members of their own, they form your level 3 and so on and so forth.
Depending on your Worth Unlimited membership rank, it’s possible to earn a commission on the sales made by those in your unilevel team.
- Supervisors earn 4% on level 1 sales
- Directors earn 6% on level 1 and 2% on level 2 sales
- Managers earn 6% on level 1, 4% on level 2 and 2% on level 3 sales
- Branch Managers earn 6% on level 1, 4% on level 2, 2% on level 3 and an additional 2% on all sales made by their unilevel team (down infinite levels I believe).
The compensation plan material I cited did not mention what the qualification criteria is for each Worth Unlimited membership rank, nor does the company website display any information on the subject (or anything about the compensation plan for that matter).
Joining Worth Unlimited
Membership to Worth Unlimited is a flat $149 fee and allows members to participate and earn in the company compensation plan.
For some reason, due to a corporate agreement between Worth Unlimited and ‘Market America’, Market America members are not able to be recruited as members of Worth Unlimited (despite the two companies having seemingly non-related products).
Conclusion
Commissions wise, barring any abnormalities in the membership level qualifications, Worth Unlimited offer a strong sales based compensation plan with a clear distinction between affiliates and genuine retail customers and sales.
I’m not too keen on the whole passing off a potential sale to a 1800 number (I’d prefer the person who told me about a Worth Account explain it to me), but if they’re able to attract sales without too much of a disruption to the sales process then I don’t see any problem with it.
As far as the Worth Account product goes, noticeable nothing much has changed since it was called the Money Merge Account. Rather than a flat $3,500, effectively the Worth Account is only cheaper on debts that have a greater payable interest of $116,666 (Gold and Platinum Plus plan) and $116,500 (Platinum plan) or less.
Keep in mind that’s the interest paid for the life of the loan and not the total loan amount itself.
If the interest paid exceeds the above amounts, customers are no better off than Money Merge Account’s $3,500 price tag, which ironically Worth Unlimited cite was a major roadblock for generating sales of the product – the other being a lack of ability of their sales force to close sales (hence the new 1800 sales coach line to close sales for members).
That said, if you can carve out a market for the Worth Account and successfully sell the idea to people without knowing the inner workings yourself or the cost price (not determined until after prospective customers have spoken to a Worth Unlimited sales coach on the phone), then I don’t see any reason to not entertain the idea of joining Worth Unlimited.
That said, with the challenges outlined above, naturally members would be at an advantage if they could share their own debt eliminating experience with potential customers.
With that in mind, I’d strongly advise obtaining a quote on the projected interest savings generated with a Worth Account on the 1800 line before signing on as a Worth Unlimited member.
If you yourself don’t have a debt that the Worth Account could be used to pay off, you might want to try family and friends to find someone who does.
Naturally you don’t have to sign them up, just get a 1800 coach to advise you on what sort of savings you’d be looking at so that you’ve got some idea when potential customers ask you about potential savings.
One final bit of advice (and a possible red flag I suppose) would also be investigating what the long-term policies are should something go wrong down the track.
Just in case something happened to Worth Unlimited or you might not be able to make repayments, it’d be good to know what your options are and how that affects your managed debt with the company. If not for yourself then again to explain to customers who enquire.
Good luck!
So in other words, you don’t even know what the f___ you’re selling?
What the f___ indeed.
I want to thank you for a comprehensive, and well balanced, review of this program. There is only one slight correction I’d like to make… and to add my own views as a user and Agent. The part about not knowing the “inner workings” is slightly inaccurate.
I’ve been with this company since 2006.. now with Worth. The company DOES explain the program in great detail… to both Agents (via Webinars) and to clients (via Coaching). The thing is though… it takes a good chunk of time to explain the math concepts that go into the software programming and, even with visual aids, it is still over the heads of some (GREAT advice you gave someone to have their own Savings Analysis done as part of their investigation).
Also, if “explaining the program” means explaining the computer coding that goes into the programming and algorithms then, yes, we don’t get into that (and I’ve never had anyone ask). People generally accept that software programming works, without having to know “how” it is done.
Part of the reason the sales have moved “in-house” is simply due to the many “moving parts” of this system – it requires the patience of a good teacher to learn how to, and get good at, explaining this. However between the banking strategies and math demos, there are additional “credibility” signs that give clients confidence.
For instance… the Savings Analysis provided to the client comes with a “money back guarantee of performance” (our average client does 20% better than their Analysis projected, once they are on the program), the parent company has an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau, and we have had many nationally known clients and supporters (plus 2 awards) over the years, as well.
But I WILL tell you this about the program… while the math and calculations done by the program give a user an extra “edge” over what they could do themselves… and getting out of debt the slow way, rather than the fast way, can leave thousands in savings on the table… what I personally see as the reason for this programs success is this… people actually STICK TO this program.
A survey was done in the financial planning industry that showed that, of all the people who go to a financial planner, only 14% of them have “stuck to” their financial plan by end of year 1. By year 2 it drops to 11%. I would assume that people seeking financial advice are more motivated than average, yet still a dismal %.
However with this program… 95% of people are still actively engaged and using it at the end of year 1… and more than 50% report getting better results than was originally projected with their Savings Analysis – on average 20% better.
This program has psychological tools built into it that motivate people to stick to their goals, as well as tools that help them to make better financial decisions. Our average homeowner client is paying off their 30 year mortgage, and ALL their debt, in 7-11 years (average), and saving over $120,000 in interest by doing so.
Additionally, our average client has a potential cash accumulation of somewhere between $400,000 and $700,000 more at the end of 30 years. Meaning… if you get your debt paid down quickly, you now have more to invest.
In fact some people don’t even use the program to get completely out of debt, but instead use it to manage a more sophisticated financial strategy of paying off higher interest debt, keeping the lower, and investing.
Regardless though of strategy… we see that our clients are (on average) a half million dollars (or more) better off when you compare it to what they had been doing in the past. Add to that… this newer program has reporting features that now enable it to manage the cash flow of a small business as easily as personal finances (and at the same time), and is also integrated with online banking for automation.
Other perks include free, lifetime support and coaching, and free upgrades. I bought version 1 of this program… just got a free upgrade to version 5. Also… they were right in that this company has a healthy mix of ONLY clients… and agents.
Agents are not required to buy our program to sell it (if they are debt free they would only be able to use it for money management and investing), and there is a one time fee to becoming an agent – no monthly fees. So really… we are a more of a “direct selling” model – not so much an “mlm” model.
The sales process works like this… Agent refers client to company for a Savings Analysis. That identifies that clients potential savings, (backed by a performance guarantee), as well as determining price for program. The company then sets a 1 on 1 follow up coaching appointment.
The client is then given the results of their Savings Analysis, as well as a full explanation of how it works, AND a demo (there is also a demo video on our web site). Many customers will make a decision to move forward on that appointment however, some will request an additional follow up appointment after that.
I LOVE the new sales process because while I had won awards for sales in the past with this, it was time consuming and I had to “train” my agents to sell. Now the company does it all, they train their people in a low key, “teaching” style approach, and it works great.
The commissions are a little less, but not much, and the business growth potential is greater. Now here is the most “controversial” part of this program though: When the clients Savings Analysis is done – those savings are based on their CURRENT budget and spending habits. So this savings is achieved without them needing to change their budget.
Of course, many DO change their spending habits, if not their budget… what I mean is that, because this helps people make better financial choices, people stop WASTING money on things that really don’t improve the quality of their life.
This means they then have more money to spend on things that DO improve that quality of life, as well as on paying down debt and investing in retirement.
By giving people a SIMPLE tool, we empower them to improve their money management skills in a way that doesn’t seem like “work” or “deprivation” but instead is exciting and motivating to them. People are in control of their OWN money (the company is providing a software and coaching system – not taking charge of any accounts), and can use this tool to become better stewards of their own money… as well as educating their kids on money management, debt and financing.
Perhaps this will help the next generation start their lives without being saddled with debt.
One more thing… while anyone can be a “referral agent” for Worth, our best referral sources are real estate and mortgage professionals, financial planners and insurance agents, attorneys, CPA’s, and accounts and BANKS.
I’ve done seminars in conjunction with all of the above (including Wells Fargo and 5th-3rd Bank). For those who become official agents, not only are you helping your clients be more financially successful (and stick with their financial goals), you also earn an additional income stream with something that is also a GREAT prospecting tool.
I had an agent who was new in insurance, and who used this program as a “cold call” tool. At the end of the year he had made a good income with this program PLUS his insurance business had grown twice as fast as others in his company that started about the same time as he had.
The thing is… there is a lot of competition in these fields and this program makes you stand out from the crowd. You get something DIFFERENT to talk about and something very basic and attractive to people… how to be debt free and how to do it in a way that is EASY.
It’s not hard to start a conversation by saying… “Is your house paid for?”
They have the audacity to ask Agents to pay again because they reorganized.
What make someone think they will be around for long. What value does ANY agent get from paying them $149.00?
Bernard… you get an opportunity to refer clients to a GREAT program that can truly change their lives for the better… and earn up to $1000 for doing so.
Also… the company REFUNDS you the $149 as long as you refer someone in the first 30 days that turns into a sale. So, essentially it costs nothing to come on board.
As for being around… they have been around since 2006… and while, yes, they had some challenges because of the economy.. they have recognized some of the “errors” made the first time and their NEW sales model is great.
One out of 3 appointments (on average) will get activated on the program. Keep in mind we still have people selling the old version of the program under the “Market American” banner and doing quite well.
Difference is though… Market American is an MLM and they have to do the selling. Worth is not an MLM and they do the selling for you – you only refer.
I was with United 1st Financial, which now is Worth Unlimited. Given the fact that Worth Unlimited (then U1st) just pulled the rug out from their existing U1st agents, you may want to reconsider representing them.
They also stopped paying commissions owed (to me) as agreed beginning in 2012. I contacted one of the Co-Founders who assured me not only that they’re still paying as agreed, but that he would resolve this matter for me.
It’s been over 1/2 a year, and after countless communications, still no response. Learn from the misfortunes of others; if Worth Unlimited didn’t honor their word then, would you trust them to honor their word now?
I agree with you Benard! Plain and simple, management lies.
Hi Tommy….
I’m sad to hear you saying that. I’ve been with the company since 2006 myself and didn’t have that experience at all. I have had no problem getting commission checks already from Worth…
In fact they implemented a “refundable enrollment fee” so that you get your $149 back along with your first commission (in first 30 days), and without saying anything, they made it retro-active and I got a refund on my credit card the day after it was announced. Also, bonus checks – really fast as well.
I’ve also been calling a LOT of people that were in UFirst before, and been bringing them on board. No one has mentioned any issues from before with unpaid commissions, though no one is perfect and I don’t doubt things can fall between the cracks.
You say they owed you this commission in 2012… but my memory is that they transferred all the sales side to Market America in 2010 – so you were supposed to be getting your commissions through Market America correct?
I know folks that are still selling the previous program version under the MA/UFirst name – I doubt they would be doing that if they weren’t getting paid.
As far as “pulling the rug out” – I know some people felt that way (so sorry)… but when the economy crashed and a lot of our realtors, mortgage brokers, etc., quit working in those industries, they also quit selling UFirst.
Sales took a hit, and, my understanding is that they were hoping MA (with their vast resources) would help the agents we had left build their businesses faster. The company went to a lot of trouble negotiating with Market America so that any of the existing agents could, not only move over there, but also take their teams intact.
For personal reasons, I didn’t make that move myself, and am glad, since it qualified me to come back on board with this new marketing program.
If you would call me or email me (click on my name to go to my site – I also just messaged you through Facebook) and let me know the name of the founder you talked to, and how much money was owed, I’ll be happy to follow up for you.
It would also help to have a greater understanding of whether you were working under MA, or ?
I’ve know the guys for a long time, and I’ve always found this company to have the highest level of integrity… hence the fact they now have 70,000 clients and an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau (despite the upheavals with the economy!).
I’m not saying that sometimes a mistake might not happen, a ball gets dropped, etc. But I know they try really hard to correct every mistake that gets made and I’ve seen them bend over backward to accommodate people.
In fact, you may not realize this, but there are a lot of folks in this company that made WAY more money than any of the founders did – and they set it up that way knowing that would happen. This is one of the best companies I’ve ever been associated with – It’s one of the reasons I was so eager to come back on board.
Tommy…. I would LOVE to get this resolved for you, (and I would love to get you back involved with the company, if possible). If you look at this NEW version of the program… you’ll see the reporting features, the integration with the online banking system, etc, has now created a program that can be used by a BUSINESS owner, as well as an individual, to manage cash flow.
The reporting features also work as a “tax tool” making tax preparation a snap at year end. AND, best of all, the “refer and earn” program is so simple it makes it super easy for client to recoup the cost of their program, and MORE, simply by referring (much better than before for the client side). PLEASE call me!
Sue,
Thank you for all the great information! I was with UFirst back in 2008 – 2009-ish.
I’m a Real Estate Broker in California. Because of the economy and the real estate market, I had little success selling the program. However, I did purchase the program and can personally vouch that IT WORKS! I guess I’m one of those people who does need support and this company has always been great at providing support.
I have an appointment tomorrow to upgrade to the latest version and I couldn’t be more excited! Thank you for your honesty and dedication to what I believe is a great program.
ah, yet another iteration of “pay us lots of money to have you pay ahead on your debt”, something anyone can do for free.
there is no complex math behind this program. if you double/triple/etc your payment, you pay down your debt faster. simple as that. there is no magic other than people falling for questionable or outright false advertising.
Of course, that is a great point … anyone can get out of debt on their own… the company says that all the time (no false advertising).
BUT… How’s that working for folks?
Americans are carrying record amounts of debt. Statistically, less than 15% of people will stick to a financial plan past the first year… drops to 11% in year two.
After the first four years of selling this program, 95% of our clients had “stuck” to the program… and our average client gets 20% BETTER results than we project for them in their Savings Analysis (the one tied to their guarantee). Our program helps people be more motivated and gives them the tools to make the best financial choices for themselves in a way that doesn’t seem like a “debt diet.”
Of course some people ARE highly disciplined with their money and don’t need our program but, generally, those people do not have any debt, beyond maybe a mortgage and, perhaps a car loan. And, if they are highly disciplined, they probably are already on track to pay it all off in well under 10 years.
The thing is… we don’t get to talk to those people. The people we talk to are the other 85% who recognize they want to be smarter with their money and be better money managers overall.
This program DOES do “complex math” (we show potential clients in their free demo) – it’s won two awards, in part because it IS unique. And while someone CAN get out of debt on their own… getting out of debt the slow way, versus the fast way, can leave tens of thousands of dollars in interest on the table.
Money that could have been saved if the person was more disciplined, and had a program that “did the math” so they could always be doing what is saving them the most in interest.
This is like a GPS system… for your finances.
Lots of smart people have taken the time to learn how this program works. We have 70,000 clients now, and still an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau. Also over 1000 testimonials from clients on the company site. These are from people who USE the program and know what they are talking about! :~)
People who are happy with their financial situation, projected to be debt free in 5 years or less (including their mortgage), should just keep doing what they are doing… they are getting good results.
People who are not getting the results they want… well… nothing wrong with investigating something that can help them get different, and BETTER results. After all, our SAVINGS ANALYSIS is free, so is a coaching session.
It’s all done over the phone and so it’s convenient too. … Skeptical? Again… “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau, 70,000 clients.
Our average client is saving over $120,000 and paying off all debt (including a 30 year mortgage) in 7-11 years – withOUT changing their budget. That’s (amortized) $900 in interest savings for each month of program use till they are debt free.
If someone isn’t already achieving those kinds of results with their “Do it Yourself” plan… well, here is something worth looking at.
Sue, sorry, but you are spouting the typical UFF misunderstandings/outright lies yourself.
100% False. In order to change your debt payoff, you MUST change your payments (or refinance). Changing your payments is changing your budget. PERIOD.
The typical line is that cash flow doesn’t change, which is an even bigger lie. Paying off a 30 year mortgage in 7-11 years involves ~tripling your payments. That cash comes from somewhere, so your budget not only changes, it changes MASSIVELY.
It doesn’t come from HELOC magic, no matter how much UFF/Worth sales people want to say otherwise.
Your “program” hasn’t won any award. The *business* won an award in Utah judged by locals. UFF agents love to claim they won an award from Ernst and Young. E&Y had nothing to do with the judging/nomination/etc. They *sponsored* an award.
There is NO complex math being done. These are simple interest calculations (simple as in uncomplex, not simple as opposed to compound). The funny thing is that the agents love to claim the calculations are “optimal” when they have been demonstrated to be less than optimal (especially when you throw in the massive cost of the program).
If the salesforce was honest and merely said “our software tells you to write a bigger check each month towards your debt”, I’d be fine with it. Of course, that wouldn’t sell much software.
Again, feel free to google anything I’ve mentioned. Money Merge has been exposed for what it is (disguised larger debt payments) for a long, long time. We’ve exposed the UFF lies to many potential customers, all of whom once they realized what they were paying for told the UFF to take a hike.
This company rebrands its debt payment software everytime it’s exposed on the internet widely enough. Worth will come and go and be rebranded once again. Rinse, repeat.
The math is straightforward. The marketing is anything but.
Calvin
Ah, just like Andy “Ad Surf Daily Ponzi” Bowdoin claiming he got an award from President Bush and Congress, without mentioning it’s a donation award for giving $$$ to the Republican party.
Sorry Calvin… I know you are well intentioned, but you are misinformed and misunderstanding.
When the company does a savings analysis, it is based on the clients CURRENT budget. Whatever savings they show is tied to the money back guarantee.
Since it IS based on their current budget, then (obviously) those results are achievable without any changes to it (for instance, they may redirect money, but they are not having to make any more money, nor are they adding any new debt or bills – even the cost of the program is factored into the savings analysis).
This is just an argument over semantics… you just misunderstood the wording.
DO people send more money to their debts? Of COURSE, that is explained to them in the presentation… however that money is right there in their budget already, it simply starts getting redirected.
Most is their discretionary income that, in the past, has just been slipping through their fingers and misdirected to things that are not as important as achieving their financial objectives.
Do they change their budgets even though they are not required to? Yes, quite often. Once people get on the program, they get motivated and start making smarter financial choices, possibility eliminating things from their budget that are unnecessary… all rewarded by seeing their savings increase, and debt pay off get shorter.
DO they make more money? if they are smart, yes. Because our new marketing program simply pays people for referring, without doing any actual sales, this means that clients can refer potential clients… and easily earn a few extra hundred, or thousands a month, without getting a second job.
This is a HUGE benefit over our old sales system as, in the UFirst days, the majority of my clients had no interest in becoming an agent, so didn’t have the opportunity to “refer & earn.”
Now, when we give people this program, they get, not only a tool to make them better money managers and save thousands in interest… they also get a “vehicle” that can allow them to make more money without a second job. More money that can get them out of debt even faster.
Even before our new “refer & earn” marketing system… our average client was getting 20% better results, than the savings analysis originally projected. We get that from the survey’s we send clients… the same way we get their testimonials.
Are you really disparaging the Ernst & Young award? Any company that has won one will tell you that there is a “vetting” process after you get nominated (to see if you qualify to be considered), and the award is determined by a panel of independent judges… all prominent business people unconnected to the contestants and Ernst & Young.
Yes, on the local level (we won the Utah region award), they are local judges. But the fact these are independent judges, and not Ernst & Young iteself, make this award MORE credible, not less.
Since the PROGRAM is the only product the company sells, the “vetting” process certainly encompassed the program itself. It would be ludicrous to think it did not. In fact, multiple people came into the company and worked with the program, putting it through all kinds of scenarios.
K.Chang… not at ALL the same as Andy. Why? You can google “United First Financial” and the Ernst and Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” award and SEE yourself that the company was awarded it… (there is even a video on YouTube of Skyler going up to accept it), AND if you do some due diligence, you will see how the award is determined.
This award is considered to be one of the more prestigious business awards a company can win – go look it up. This award cannot be “purchased” and it is a REAL award. I respect you and your insight, but that comparison is specious, as I’m sure you’ll agree once you do the research.
Calvin… Our program no longer requires a HELOC, though, that “money shuffle” does achieve extra savings and people might elect to get one down the road to use as part of the program. You seem not to understand how that works (revolving interest calculations versus amortized).
The “heloc money shuffle” that this program can do, is simply simulating how an “offset mortgage” works (google it). Those mortgages out perform a 30 year fixed (when used properly), which is why the vast majority of mortgages in the UK and Australia are offset mortgages now.
The vast majority of the money being used to pay down debt is the clients own discretionary income… something we explain in the presentation of the program, and even mention in our videos.
The thing is… most people don’t use their discretionary income to pay down debt… they blow it on things they don’t really need. Our program motivates people to stay on course, and gives them a tool to make quick, and easy, financial choices.
As far as “complex” … most people would be unable (or not willing to spend the time) to make the comparative calculations necessary to look at the (on average) 11-13 lines of debt most American’s have, and determine the optimal amount of debt acceleration, and to which debt it should go each time.
Can it be done? Obviously, it’s just math … the folks that programmed the software put it together. The company has even said in one of their VIDEO presentations that people can do something similar on their own (so how is that deceptive when it’s right in the VIDEO?).
I even had a client do his own DIY plan to compare to our Savings Analysis (a different program than the actual software though) … he came within 6 months of our payoff date and it only took him 40 hours to accomplish it.
After, he bought the software. He said, while he COULD do the math, it wasn’t worth hours of his time to recalculate everything with his changing financial picture, when the software did it in seconds.
Our savings analysis software said his payoff date (27 yr mortgage and about 10 other debts) would be about 12.5 years. After a year of using the ACTUAL program, his payoff was down under 10 years.
But really… the “math” is just a small part of why people LOVE this program. Yes, it gives them an “edge” but in reality, the biggest value of this program is how it makes it EASY for people to manage their money better… and how it MOTIVATES them to stick to their financial goals.
“Exposed?” No, only in your mind. I can appreciate that you may have seen a poor presentation of the system (one of the reasons we now do them in-house instead of relying on agents to do them). In reality, nothing has been exposed, since there is nothing TO be exposed.
This company never claimed this program does anything other than what it does… act as a “financial GPS” system calculating your quickest way to zero debt and advising movements of money to manipulate the interest you are paying to be as much in your favor as possible.
It helps people see the light at the end of the tunnel and motivates them to stay on track. Also, new reporting features make it easier at tax time.
I imagine that you, and the other “skeptics” truly believe what you say and are not bad people, but you have never used the program and it sounds like, from what you say, you didn’t get a quality presentation. Also you have never even SEEN the program in action, because you would have to own it to do that.
The software used to do the Analysis is not able to do exactly the same calculations the actual software does… because it is forced to only look at a “static” picture. The actual software works in real time, constantly recalculating the variables of your financial picture… which change daily.
While I see you get some enjoyment bashing this company, (in fact, it seems to be an obsession – are you some kind of competitor to our company?), you’re misperceptions are simply that.
Clients who are considering this program have the opportunity to decide for themselves if they want to use the program or if they want to keep doing what they have been doing. Over the years, 70,000 of them have taken an objective look at this, compared it to what they had been accomplishing on their own, and make a “leap of faith” to try something new.
They didn’t let fear hold them back from making a decision to become better money managers and transform their financial future.
Now, if those people were unhappy with their decision to move forward, if they were not getting the results they expected, I think any reasonable person would conclude that the company would not have the VAST amounts of testimonials that we do, nor would we have an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau.
Bottom line… Calvin and a few self proclaimed “internet skeptics,” who have never seen or used the program personally, say “no!” Fair enough… BUT…
70,000+ people, who actually use the program, not only said “Yes!” …they bothered to write in with thousands of testimonials complimenting both the program, and the customer service (and we still an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau after over 6 years). Which group has more credibility?
I purchased the MMA program in late 2008. I upgraded when Worth Unlimited came into existence.
I have a 30 yr mortgage of $208,000. After 48 monthly payments I was showing that I am on payment #99 on my amortization chart.
If I continue to follow the “GPS” with no refinancing (which means starting the high interest again) I’ll be paid off in 12 yrs. IT WORKS!!!!
Searching EY Entrepreneur website turned up nothing when searching for company name containing “worth”, all regions, all years. Here, try it yourself.
http://eoyhof.ey.com/SearchHallofFame.aspx
Besides, it doesn’t mean anything even if it’s true. Equinox was riding high in 1996 as it topped the fastest growing company list in Inc. Magazine. in 1999 FTC closed it as a pyramid scheme. FHTM for a while touted its BBB “A rating”, except it’s FHTM Canada that got it.
Ah, turned out the FOUNDERS were awarded something in 2009, when they were operating as United First Financial, Sue. Get your own facts straight. Worth Unlimited had won nothing.
Oh, there are many ways a MLM can be suspicious… a suspicious product is merely ONE of them. Other ways to be suspicious is the way it’s being marketed, and the way compensation’s paid out. Which way have you defended Worth Unlimited?
Oops, make that 2008, not 2009.
YES K. Chang… you are correct. That is why i said to google under the “United First Financial” name. The award went to United First Financial, headed by Skyler and John.
Skyler and John also head up the Worth Unlimited marketing “arm” for the program. SO… it is the SAME company… only with two different marketing approaches… UFirst and Worth. The infrastructure of the company is the same (for instance the client support – same people. accounting – same staff, etc) … only thing different are the names given to the marketing approaches.
You probably know that Skyler and John are also the innovators of the software… the award was given when we are on (I think) version 3, but I could be off a bit on that. We are now on Version 5 of the program with new features, such as reporting for taxes and integration with 13,000 financial institutions for auto-updating.
I’m not sure what you are asking in your second paragraph about being “suspicious” – but happy to clarify for you if you will rephrase.
As to the marketing approaches. You could compare to a company that decides their shampoo needs updating for a new market. So they change the packaging, give it a new name, add new fragrances… but in reality, the basic shampoo is still the same quality product.
They might continue to sell the shampoo in retail outlets where sales have been strong under the old name. But they take the new product packaging and new fragrances and sell in in other stores and/or salons. Same product… two different ways to get in front of potential customers.
In the corporate world you see a similar approach with other products. Automobiles are sold by different dealers but made by the same manufacturer. Some companies have stores that are corporate owned while, at the same time, they have independent franchise owners too.
Today I even learned that Jockey, the clothing company, has a line of clothes they sell through a direct sales approach. Same parent company… I’m guessing the same manufacturing facilities producing the clothes, but different ways to get in front of customers and different structures for compensating a “sales force.”
Another way to describe it is…. I am Sue. I used to be married to John Smith and my name was Sue Smith. Later I married Bob Brown, and my name became Sue Brown.
Am I a different person? Am I entitled to list accomplishments achieved when I was Sue Smith, even though I am now Sue Brown? I think most would say “Yes” – I’m the same person, just a different name.
Does that clarify somewhat what UFirst has done? We are still marketing the product under the name UFirst, only through Market America (as I already explained). We ALSO market the program under the name Worth Unlimited.
For people interested in making money marketing the program they can choose to work with Market America… or with Worth Unlimited. I used to market under the UFirst name, before the Market America involvement. However I didn’t join Market America (for personal reasons – they are a good company), so I was eligible to REjoin the company under the Worth Unlimited marketing program.
This is why it’s mentioned in the review that we cannot have someone sign up as a “Referral Agent” with Worth if they are in Market America. It has to do with the agreement our company has with MA… ethically it is not right to try and “lure” people from them, into this new marketing system.
OK, I stopped reading your wall of text right there since the lies started right there.
OK, so the budget doesn’t change? So you don’t make ANY additional payments to the debt, yet is magically goes away?
Sue, here is the hard facts that you are blatantly omitting. It takes ADDITIONAL PAYMENTS to accelerate the debt payments. Making those additional payments CHANGES YOUR BUDGET.
Semantics? No. Real changes in where people are spending their money? Yes. Changes they can easily make without software? Absolutely. If you can do 5th grade math, you can pay down your debt faster, months to years faster, than the worth “pay us to write an extra check: BS.
Paying off a 30 year mortgage in ~8 years involves almost tripling one’s payments. So, if a mortgage payment goes from ~$1000 to ~$3000, you don’t think that alters someone’s budget?
If a person’s budget has $1000 in savings/discretionary income, the system applies that to the debt. It’s just that simple.
Guess what, changing $1000 from going to savings to going to debt payment is changing your budget. That $1000 a month is no longer available… it’s going to your debt.
Lying people like Sue are charging people $3500, or now a % of the interest savings to have you just write a bigger mortgage payment each month, something you can already do for free.
The only thing Worth/UFF/etc does is slow down your optimal debt paydown period by taking a significant amount of money from you.
Sue, sorry, you are either an incredibly financially ignorant person, or an incredibly immoral scammer. Either way, people should avoid you like the plague. Get an education or get some morals. Or perhaps both.
All the UFF/Worth system does is take thousands of dollars of your money so that you can apply your discretionary income to your debt, something you can already do for free.
Feel free to search the internet regarding the UFF product, it’s been thoroughly debunked, hence the rebranding. Still the same falsely advertised product.
There’s absolutely NO mention of United First in the Worth Unlimited Website. How *do* you know it’s really the same company? What’s YOUR proof other than they have the same founders?
Pretty simple actually… are you defending the product, defending the business model, or defending the comp plan? Sounds like so far you’re defending just the product.
In response to my disgruntled comment above, it turns out that both founder Skyler and John contacted me recently. All commission issues were resolved. More than that, they genuinely cared and were saddened by my experience.
Although I do not represent Worth, I am failure with their product as I sold it for United First Financial. The program does work. Yes, it does make additional payments on your balances utilizing a strategy called “strategic pay-off” taking into consideration factorial math.
The reason they claim it does not affect your budget is because the “strategic pay-off” takes into consideration your pay, frequency of, your debts, both fixed and variable, and all methods of payment available.
It then guides you in the most mathematically effective way to pay your your bills utilizing your current financial portfolio creating “interest accumulation (another key function)” normally overlooked, essentially creating additional discretionary money, in addition to minimizing interest exposure (called interest cancellation – another key function), by cash flowing through credit cards that can be paid in full monthly creating even more discretionary cash normally lost to interest charges.
These 2 math principles (interest accumulation & interest cancellation), combined with strategic pay off create a compounding effect that allow you to more rapidly pay off your highest interest accumulating accounts (that doesn’t mean your highest interest rated debts…a home mortgage may have a lower interest rate, but can cost you more in interest than a higher interest rate on a credit card that has a smaller balance).
So from the consumers perspective they still pay the same amount monthly as before, yet are still able to contribute more towards their monthly balances than what is required, AND as debts get paid off the program doesn’t reduce what you were accustom to paying (unless you tell it to), and then it applies those payments from balances already paid off towards your remaining debt more rapidly creating the ability to get out of debt in 1/3 to 1/2 the time.
There is no magic. This is a math concept that has been in the works long before United First Financial was ever created. If you want to learn more, purchase the book “Own you home years sooner without making extra interest payments” authored by Harj Gill published in November of 2003.
This book was also featured in an NBC news broadcast-
To learn more about the 4 math principles, watch:
K Chang, it is the same product. The same worthless, falsely presented, doesn’t do anything you can’t already do for free product.
The award was earned. It was a local competition in Utah, judged by locals, that was sponsored by Ernst and Young, but they had no role in the nomination process or the judging. E&Y will verify that.
They do deserve an award though for being entrepreneurial. They got people to pay $3500 for software that spent all their discretionary income on their debt to pay it down quicker, and yet convinced their customers that it was the software, not the massive extra payments.
Of course Sue will have you believe that you don’t make bigger payments, since your budget doesn’t change.
Accelerated Equity and Development, then United First Financial, now Worth Unlimited …. same crap, different name. They have to keep changing their name as the websites exposing the product for what it is keep moving up the search results.
Math doesn’t lie, sellers of the software do.
Tommy, it doesn’t do “factorial math.” It merely takes your paycheck and pays it to a HELOC. It withdraws a larger amount from your HELOC and pays it to your mortgage. The net effect is that applies all your discretionary income to your debt, ie, making bigger payments.
It also adds $3500 in debt to pay for the worthless software, making repayment FAR from optimal, plus accumulated interest on that $3500 and the small to large additional HELOC debt.
For typical situation, the total additional cost of the software is north of $5,000. There is no optimization, the result is not optimal, nor is the approach.
Does it “work”? Sure. But it doesn’t work any better than merely applying your leftover money to your mortgage each month.
(Ozedit: “call me for the real story” type posts are not permitted)
ps…it doesn’t require a HELOC anymore.
K. Chang.. Re: UFirst/Worth… The review above spelled it out already and I clarified it further in my first post. Yes, on paper, they are two distinct business entities (common for companies to rebrand, or have multiple marketing approaches) and, as such, that doesn’t appear on the website.
However we are, de facto, the same company (support staff and management, etc) and we even explain that in many of our webinars.
If you don’t believe me and want to verify yourself that they are, indeed, the same, just call the company and ask them to explain… They have a tollfree number and these are some of the nicest business people you will ever meet 🙂
Calvin, (aaak! My feelings are hurt – LOL!) Neither the company, nor I, said you don’t make bigger payments, you misunderstood and others (besides myself) have told you that you misunderstood and yet you continue to misrepresent our program.
If you truly are that confused, you should really SEE a presentation of the program and a demo (like our 70,000 clients have), before spreading more misinformation around.
I’m not sure what your motivation is to distort the facts, twist people’s words and libel the company (and myself), perhaps you are one of those competitors? Do you sell some other type of financial program?
Tommy (who is no longer part of the company, as he said) IS familiar with the program and his explanation of the program is accurate. It’s about strategic payoffs and movements of money to reduce interest.
But regardless of the “math” what some fail to recognize is that one of the biggest values in the program is that it simply helps people be better money managers and provides them the tools to motivate them to stick to their financial goals… Something many people struggle with.
People that are highly disciplined with their money tend to have no debt. Those people have no need for our program. The other 85% of folks are looking for ways to be better and many are interested in financial tools, and strategies, to help them succeed.
K.Chang… As for “defending” … Do I need to? The product is great (70,000 clients so far, plus awards and nationally known endorsements) the comp plan is straightforward and accessible to all who are interested (I can email you a copy), there is no ongoing cost/investment to be part of (refer to) the company (even the one time enrollment fee is refundable right now), and the company (UFirst, the parent company) has earned an “A” rating with the Better Business Bureau after SIX years selling this program!
UFirst and Worth share the same customer service, admin, management and accounting departments because they are simply different “marketing arms” for the same product and support staff. I see nothing needing “defending” but you are a reasonable person so if you have a specific point, I’m glad to discuss.
I hope this clears up these questions. Anyone that wants to learn more should simply do what the reviewer above recommended… get a (confidential) free savings analysis and demo using their own numbers… (done over the phone/computer).
Ask your questions of the company and get accurate answers. Ask tough questions.. We’re used to it 🙂 Do your own research, make your own decision.
One thing that isn’t wise is relying upon the opinions of folks like Calvin, who (if they don’t just have ulterior motives) have obviously not bothered to do that for themselves. That’s like taking flight lessons from someone who’s never been in an airplane.
Tommy.. Calvin doesn’t own the program. At first I just thought he was a victim of a poor sales presentation back when we had independent agents doing the sales, and that he was legitimately confused.
However he spends so much time obsessing over this, I suspect there’s something else going on here (you know what I mean). If he were well intentioned, he would have taken me (and others) offers up to have a presentation/ demo done.
He could pick up the phone and call the company himself and say he’s one of our “Internet skeptics” and wants to be proven wrong. However he doesn’t do that, he just hangs out out forums looking for a chance to “spring” 🙂
Sorry Sue, you are still a dishonest scammer. Nothing has changed. I have NEVER claimed to have owned the program. I do not spend $3500 to write a bigger check each month.
As for me being “obsessed”, I have explained this to you and many others MANY times. One of my close friends was almost taken by a con artist just like you on the UFF product. She asked me about it, I showed her the simple math, and she told the guy off.
Sue, you still can’t refute the math. No UFF agent can. A few have tried, all have failed. One even quit once he realized how much he had been misled.
So Sue, let’s really see how much of a liar you are. Tommy claims one can “recalibrate” the software not to use any discretionary income. So, do you agree once can repay their mortgage faster without increasing the payment while paying the software fee?
You continue to portray the software as something it isn’t. It’s ALL about prepayments. Any handful of pennies per month that can be saved with the HELOC shuffle are dwarfed by the cost of the program. You are paying your debt with your money. Nothing less.
Again, feel free to prove the pages and pages of math that have been presented to the scamming sales team of AME/UFF/WU. You keep crying foul, “you haven’t used the program”, yet you can’t refute **the actual numbers.***
Math doesn’t lie. AME/UFF/WU agents do.
And Tommy…. I paid off my 30 year loan in 6 years doing what people like you paid $3500 doing… making bigger payments. I just didn’t pay for the ability to something everyone can already do for free.
$3500 is NOT an investment, it’s a fee. Anyone with any sort of financial knowledge understands the difference.
(Ozedit: YouTube link removed, video already published above in comment #21)
In the NBC broadcast they even state “this is nothing new,” referencing a book titled “Own your home years sooner without making extra interest payments” authored by Harj Gill still available for sale today originally published in 2003.
So you’re right Calvin, the numbers don’t lie. Nor do I see you disputing that the program works. I think this is more about you and your gifts. Clearly you are good with managing your debts. Congratulations regarding being debt free (or paying off your mortgage in 6 years).
Unfortunately a lot of people are not in the same position and could benefit more from paying the fee to offset a substantial amount of interest (more than $3,500) they normally would’ve had to pay without the software.
The software is nothing more than the GPS’s that are relied on regularly today to guide people through the most time conscientious and cost efficient route to accomplish their goals.
Keep in mind, the program doesn’t require a HELOC anymore, and you can keep you monthly budget the same, not having to dip into your discretionary money to accelerate your payoff.
That doesn’t mean the program wont recommend that, more importantly it provides a dashboard highlighting the additional interest costs affiliated with that decision, and still propose an alternative solution that then doesn’t utilize your discretionary cash that still can accelerate your current pay off date.
Simply put, if everyone paid their 30year mortgage off in 6 years like you Calvin, you’re right that there would be no value in paying the fee.
I guess my question is, why would you steer them back into the direction they’re already at? Who doesn’t know that if you make additional payments to your mortgage you could pay it off faster?
Since everyone already knows that, what you’re proposing is no different then what most people have already opted out of doing.
You’re doing it (defending it). So perhaps it’s your subconscious that’s acting?
And please spare us the bandwagon fallacy (70000 people can’t be wrong!) awards parade (any one remember Equinox’s DSA membership and won Inc’s top faster growing company?) and “nationally known endorsements” (easily purchased/sponsored)
Calvin…. As I suspected… you have not even seen a DEMO and presentation of the program by someone at the company…. you heard it 2nd hand from your friend.
Since you haven’t seen our presentation, nor our program … and since you refuse to… how much credibility does that give you?
As for what YOU say… “agents say” …. are you claiming to be psychic now too? You know what every single one of our agents say 24/7?
If you saw a presentation… you would know exactly how we present this program and why 70,000 people have opted to invest in this tool.
As for your friend…. is she out of debt now doing it on her own? Has she been as disciplined as you were? I’m curious.
I talked with one of our past clients a couple of weeks ago who had paid off their mortgage, and all their debt, in just a few years. According to them, they could never have done it (stuck to their plan) without the help of our program.
We hear that all the time… in fact if you go to our company website you’ll see LOTS of testimonials (over 1000) from our customers… praising everything from the customer service, to the program itself and how it’s helped them.
Your experience is great… but you can’t discount the experience of tens of thousands of other people just because it’s different than yours. Their opinion is just as valid as yours. More, since they actually know, and use, the program.
I can appreciate that you were highly disciplined with your mortgage and got it paid off early… good for you! Now how much time have you invested in helping your friends do the same thing? How are THEY doing?
Are you charging them for your time in helping them? Do you devote as much of your time to them… as to this? Would they like to compare the results they got from your help or that they did on their own… with what our program could have done for them?
As for paying off debt early without using any discretionary income at all… yes, that is possible in many cases and, if you understood the math concepts, you wouldn’t even ask that question. As to not “increasing the payment” WE NEVER SAY you don’t increase payments… we say that your “Minimum monthly payment doesn’t increase” – two different things.
If your mortgage payment is $900 that payment never changes. What does change is that periodically the program will direct you to send additional principal payments. This is in our PRESENTATION… you should really see it so you can discuss this from a more informed viewpoint rather than trying to twist words around.
The same arbitrage principles banks use… this program uses in how it’s programmed to look at peoples debt picture and direct them to move money to save interest. Again, something we EXPLAIN fully when we do a presentation and demo for a prospective client.
Big picture though… keep in mind that math in THEORY is different than financial management in PRACTICE. Everyone knows HOW to get out of debt quicker… just send more money!
Easy, right? But two things that are a problem… 1) the vast majority of people are not disciplined enough to stick to their plan all the way through to fruition, and 2) Getting out of debt the FASTEST way, versus just “faster” – could save tens of thousands more dollars in interest.
You know that, I’m sure. If you don’t … check an amortization schedule or mortgage calculator.
I’m not going to waste my time playing numbers with you… as the company would be HAPPY to show you a FREE Savings Analysis and Demo, plus more fully explain the math concepts … it’s what they do. If you want to book an appointment to have one… just call the 800 number.
Do it for free. Go to your library and check out Dave Ramsey’s book. I think there is some free stuff on his website.
Sue, as I suspected, you can’t even get simple facts correct. I have seen the presentation. Have posted slide by slide corrections to their *mistakes* in the scam.com forums. I have seen countless analyses, and *corrected* dozens that overstated the paydown potential because the agent mis-entered the information.
The math is simple to check. I have also demonstrated in the scam.com forums that the algorithm is sub-optimal with real results from the program posted by an agent (we simulated a month by month paydown using full prepayments versus UFF bloatware).
Seriously, you know you’ve been proven wrong countless times. You know you wouldn’t step up and take my challenge on the Friends in Business Board. The UFF software and agents have been booted around the internet dozens of times over. You can admit it. We know it’s true, you know it’s true, we know you know it’s true.
Of course you aren’t going to “waste your time playing numbers”, cause the numbers show the software is a colossal waste of money. A spreadsheet template can perform $5k+ better due to the boat anchor of a price tag…. for something you can do for free.
Get some ethics. Boo-freakin-hoo, ya scammer.
Tommy…
If you don’t increase your payments or refinance your debt, your debt payment does not accelerate. That’s simple math that cannot change.
One MUST either increase principal payments or reduce an interest rate to change a payoff date. There is no way around it.
Your budget or savings MUST change somehow.
Regarding Ramsey…. Ramsey certainly has some great points, but his debt snowball approach misses a very important concept in terms of teaching the costs of debt.
Ramsey pushes paying the smallest debt first, rather than the debt with the highest interest rate. Paying the most towards a $2,000 loan with a 5% rate is not smart if you have a $10,000 loan with a 20$ interest rate.
Unless special terms of a loan contract dictate something odd or there is a important tax implication, always pay the highest interest rate first, regardless of the relative balance.
I think that it’s important that recommended methods do as much as possible to teach the reasons why so that people can learn about good practices rather than relying on overpriced, inefficient black boxes.
Hi Calvin,
I appreciate your commitment to the truth. You’re right, you can’t pay the same monthly towards your mortgage and accelerate your payment. But you can pay your bills in a different order from different accounts to minimize interest exposure simultaneously maximizing your interest accumulation to create discretionary cash you normally wouldn’t have had and still keep your total monthly budget the same (while still making your minimum payments).
To conclude, “NBC’s Saving You Money Team” had a different experience than you’ve described after getting on the program themselves;
to view click here:
Now their experience is subject to opinion, but so is yours, and mine. You’ve made your opinion clear and I’m glad you’ve shared it for those who can benefit from it. Sue and my opinion is more aligned with the “NBC’s Saving You Money Team’s” perspective.
That doesn’t make your opinion of the software’s value law, nor does mine, or Sue’s. Regardless of what you or i, or she thinks, “A difficult decision is only hard to make when you don’t have all the facts.”
People should evaluate your strategies and what they’ll need to do to accomplish their goals that way, as well as evaluate any other strategies proposed and what they would have to do following that path to accomplish their goals. Then they should compare side by side and a weigh the pros and cons to make an educated decision for themselves.
Me not having followed your path can only share in my experience regarding the software program, and you not having used the software can really only advise them on the method you’ve utilized to achieve your goal.
I don’t think anyone is benefiting from the bantering back and forth when in reality we both have the same goal and just have experience regarding different methods to get there.
You’re strategy will work better for some then the software program, and there will be another group of people who’ll benefit more from the software rather than your strategies…and then there will be another group that will benefit more from Ramsey’s strategy.
The most important thing is that people stop losing so much money interest, how they get there is up to them. No program or strategy can succeed with out the consumers devotion. Wishing you all the best!
@Calvin
He fully admits that paying off the debt with the highest interest is the way most people would go about it. His method is ultimately “If you can’t pay cash for it, don’t buy it” and that includes cars, houses, etc.
Tommy, wasn’t that reporter exposed for having a financial “stake” in the report? 🙂
Rather than a local news station advertising for his friend, how about an actual article in Kiplingers?
http://www.kiplinger.com/article/real-estate/T040-C000-S002-don-t-fall-for-this-mortgage-pitch.html
The math has been done many, many times. For typical people with normal sized bills, changing the order you pay your bills creates less savings in arbitrage over a year then you will find in your couch cushions.
The additional interest on the $3500 price tag alone will dwarf the arbitrage, much less the actual $3500 additional principal.
Putting your income in a savings/checking account with the highest interest yield you can find and pay your bills on the last day they are due (never paying late) will optimize your arbitrage. It is *exactly* that simple.
UFF software does not do this. You are paying money for an “optimizer” that does not product optimal solutions when the optimal solution can be determined by merely following “rules of thumb”. No math is even required.
You keep talking about “having used the software”. It’s just math. Whether a piece of software told you to move money from account A to B or pay a certain bill at a certain time, the effects can all be determined with simple math.
I don’t need worthless software to tell me how much principal is reduced by making a $1234.45 debt payment to a 5% fixed rate mortgage on March 1st versus making a $2345.67 debt payment to the same mortgage on April 1st. The calculations are simple.
If AME/UFF/Worth Unlimited/etc agents were honest about what is going on, this software wouldn’t sell at this price. Instead, we have people like you talking about the power of arbitrage in absence of additional payments.
The handful of dollars that *might* be saved with typical numbers is absolutely destroyed by the $3500 PLUS INTEREST price tag.
You absolutely are doing the general public a disservice here.
Hi Calvin, although I enjoy chatting, consider this my last response. I’ve got 4 kids and a wife that deserve my attention considering I have no vested interest over and beyond desiring debt free families, friends, community, economy..after all, I don’t represent U1st or Worth and have no vested interest in the conversation.
Yes, the software program utilizes arbitrage to create discretionary money without requiring you to to have to put in more than you’re already spending on a monthly basis (totaling all fixed and variable expenses in addition to your mortgage).
Then with the discretionary money (even change) that it creates utilizing arbitrage, it prompts you to pay that on top of your minimum payments which in turn accelerates your payoff without you having to tap into the discretionary money you’re used to having.
Just as you’ve recommended a common sense strategy to pay additional payments towards interest, the Kiplingers report you referenced recommends another common sense strategy; the bi-monthly payment.
Their biggest concern stated at the tail end of article is not that the software doesn’t work, or even the cost.
In their own words: “Salespeople challenge whether you’ll follow through on your own — as if spending $3,500 for software will ensure that you’ll use it. Tell that to couch potatoes whose high-end exercise equipment gathers dust.”
I’ll respond to that in saying that I try to take my family on vacations more often than I normally would have
because of a vacation package I’ve pre-paid $9,000 for; wouldn’t you? But everyone is different, and doing the same thing doesn’t always guarantee the same results.
You like to state what the software does or doesn’t do, but i caution others reading this to learn what the software does or doesn’t do from someone they know and trust that has utilized the software.
As for the fact that you don’t need software to tell you how much principle is reduced by making a $1234.45 debt payment to a 5% fixed rate mortgage versus making a $2345.67 debt payment on the same mortgage…good for you.
I’m not trying to sell you on purchasing anything. I’ve already complimented you on your math and money management skills.
As for me, when it comes to recommending anything, first I like to get to know the individual looking for advice or solutions, prior to making any recomendations. So understand my posts are not recommending a software program for anyone with whom I have not met with to understand their needs.
That being said, there are people out there that may not be as skilled as you mathematically, but have developed their skills in other trades. There is a group of people out there that would be glad to pay for something that does such calculations for them.
We all know cost is only an issue in the absence of value. In other words, one man’s trash in another man’s treasure. What you may discard, your neighbor may think is worth $3,500.
As for the reporter being exposed for having a stake in United First Financial…why don’t you post that article too so I can agree with you.
I never saw any such article, and wouldn’t make a judgement from reading the internet blog of a stranger (who’s adamantly and admittedly told me what a software program that he never purchased or used does or doesn’t do).
To conclude again.
Having not followed your path, I can only share in my experience of utilizing the software program to accomplish my goals. You not having used the software, can really only advise on the method you’ve utilized to achieve your goal (discussing or advising on something you haven’t done would result in speculation, educated or not).
I believe that in reality we both have the same goal and just have different experiences regarding methods on how to get there. You wouldn’t pay $3,500 for this software, and I would borrow money to purchase it based on my experience with it.
You state that the software program as well as United First Financial’s distribution model is a disservice. How can I discount your opinion. Just know that there is nothing you can say to convince me that United First Financial and it’s software program isn’t worth every penny for doing what it’s done for me based on my own personal experience.
That doesn’t make my opinion or experience any more valuable than yours, it just is what it is.
Different strokes for different folks. You’re welcome to do as you please, but it seems futile to debate our opinions or experiences any further (for me at least…as I’m not sure what you want to accomplish by telling me or others for that matter a contradicting experience regarding a software program you haven’t purchased or used).
Again, I wish you all the best and congratulations on your money management success! You should be proud, not everyone is debt free like you! Blessings.
Tommy,
Here is a FACT. If pay $3500 for a this software and apply it to a new 30 year mortgage anything even remotely close to normal loan sizes, interest rates, bills, etc, where there is ZERO discretionary income to apply to your mortgage, you will save exactly zero interest on your mortgage, take the entire 30 years to pay it off, AND…. have more than $3500 debt on your HELOC when the mortgage is paid off.
The arbitrage you keep speaking of is measured in pennies. The additional monthly interest on the $3500 is measured in dollars plus the actual additional $3500 in principal. You pay more interest than you save when there is no extra money. The ONLY thing saving you money is YOUR EXTRA MONEY.
This isn’t different strokes for different folks, this is merely ignorance of simple math. You paid $3500 to think that moving money around is saving you thousands upon thousands of dollars in interest when it is merely the extra payments the software is tricking you into making.
You literally paid $3500 to become more financially ignorant. I don’t mean this as an insult, merely pointing out the truth that no salesperson is ever going to tell you.
Calvin,
Thank you for telling me your opinion about my experience. Although what you stated is not what i experienced, you must have missed the part where I wrote previously that continuing this conversation creates no value and is a waste of energy…
unless arguing back and forth about our different experiences is your objective…then that sounds like a losing scenario mathematically.
It requires no math to understand that you can not tell me about my results without seeing them for yourself, and you can not talk about your experience or determination of value regarding a software program you’ve never purchased or used.
It takes no math to see that there are no questions anywhere in this reply, therefore I am not looking for an explanation or response. I appreciate your opinion that I’m financially ignorant, and I pray that you don’t make it a daily occurrence to judge people based on your opinion and calculations of how their experiences should have resulted.
It’s my opinion that when calling someone ignorant (which is like calling them a fool), it minimizes the value of what you’re trying to communicate; Proverbs 23:9 “Don’t waste your breath on fools, for they will despise the wisest advice.”
I can accept that it is your opinion that I’m a fool, and encourage you to not waste your breath any further, unless your objective is to have your advice despised …as that is what you are beginning to accomplish. Mathematically it seems that was the end result you’ve had with others in reviewing this blog.
Based on my personal experience with the software, it was worth more than $3,500. Your opinion and all your math calculations can not change my personal experience.
Thank you again for your perspective. I truly wish you the best.
Tommy,
I’m not trying to answer your questions. I didn’t respond as if you asked a single question. I’m just trying to help people avoid your mistakes and correct the misconceptions you are helping to spread.
You’ve stated (not asked) that this software creates arbitrage. It can. It usually does it poorly, but it can. You’ve stated that that arbitrage helps pay down the debt faster. It doesn’t, even when it does the arbitrage perfectly well, not with the anchor of a price tag.
You didn’t ask if it did, you stated it did. Your statement is wrong. No one has to own the software to know that is wrong. Simple math proves it is wrong. The company is open about what the software is doing, they just lie about what is generating the savings. One can run the numbers and see the results.
The funny thing is that the software doesn’t do the arbitrage optimally, even though agents run around saying it does. I’ve actually seen the software in action. You keep saying I’ve never used it. I’ve never OWNED it. Seen it…. sure.
I’ve run numbers side by side with it (and watched it get more and more behind each month versus just paying ahead without it).
I respond for people reading this, not you. This software is about pumping all your money into your debt, it isn’t about arbitrage. You saying otherwise doesn’t change it. Again, not looking to change your mind, merely let readers know that you are absolutely, mathematically proven wrong.
Don’t waste your money on AME/UFF/Worth. It isn’t worth it. It adds to your debt to let you do something you can already do for free… pay your own money to your increased debt.
Not the experience I had.
That’s the great thing about the truth, it’s true whether you believe it or not. Math says you are absolutely 100% wrong, I just happen to be the messenger.
UFF sales dropped like a rock between the housing bubble bursting and the internet being littered with agents’ false claims being proven wrong…. hence the name change (plus they needed to abandon their sales force).
Plenty of information out there on the product:
http://www.bargaineering.com/articles/united-first-financial-money-merge-accounts-scam-or-legit.html#comment-285847
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/finance/741118/
Googling “United First Financial” brings up plenty of places where this program has been debunked.
Dear Fellow Truth Seekers:
Anyone who buys or sells a house pays 6% commission to the real estate agents (3% on each side), that is $3,350 for each agent. The same 6% is an average commission throughout most industries.
Would you ‘pay’ a 3% commission to someone who showed you how to ‘Save $120,000 in Interest’? Of course you would!
They gave you New Information and a Skill you did not have before, otherwise you’d have known how to save the $120,000 yourself!
(Ozedit: Christopher Columbus… seriously?)
Worth Unlimited has helped 70,000 People save Millions of Dollars in just a few years….
(Ozedit: removed offtopic ad-hominen attacks)
If you pay more towards your debt each month, the debt will go down faster.
There, the centuries old information is not out in the open for everyone to see.
Paul, if you want to run some numbers, I’m happy to start embarrassing the AME/UFF/Worth Unlimited crew yet again, as are dozens of other people on the internet.
The HELOC shuffle losses money against the $3500 price tag plus the additional interest owed on that money. It’s ALL about extra payments. For 30 years -> 7-11 years, it’s all about MASSIVE extra payments.
Feel free to try to disprove math.
I have viewed the website and their products and was introduced to the program by Sue. I have to say that I would be one of those 85% of people who need a financial GPS.
I believe that this program is geared more towards people who need more financial discipline, such as myself and the software seems like a great tool to utilize. I have not joined yet as an agent but I did my free savings analysis and felt as though I’m on my way to becoming debt free.
I do not have a mortgage but I have a mountain of debt and feel like this program can help someone like me. It is true that everyone is not a financial expert and believe it or not, what may seem simple to a few, may not to the vast majority.
I do not believe these guys, “Worth Unlimited” would have wasted their time developing a software and system that could help thousands, if it were that “simple” IMO. Plus, our society as we know it, is moving at rapid speed. Some people just do not have the “extra” time to actually sit down everyday and analyze their spending habits.
That’s when, I believe, online banking came into effect; to help make life and budgeting more simplified. In addition, people who were experienced professionals in the field of banking, finances and possibly debt management counselors, got together to form an idea to help people handle their debts more effectively and save more money.
This is why I believe they came up with the “software”. Most Americans are crying out for help with their debts, rich and poor and I believe that the beginning of financial healing starts at the consumer level.
Although I do not have a personal testimony of this software, I anticipate investing in it in the near future. I am confident enough to say that it could be a good tool for me to use because it serves a good purpose, “DEBT RELIEF”.
Anyone can feel good to be out of debt; rather if they are genius and choose the “Do it on your own approach” or get help to facilitate it; it’s discretionary.
Tonya, understand that the very first thing you will be doing with your “mountain of debt” is adding $3500 to it (or whatever their ridiculous price is nowadays).
You got your free analysis. Great. That’s what any online loan calculator could have done (also for free) that has the option for “extra payment.” This software just tells you to take any money that you don’t spend and put it towards your debt.
If you want to optimally pay down your debt, follow these simple, and more importantly FREE steps:
1. Stop spending money on anything you don’t need. Software won’t change this, only you can.
2. Pay the minimum monthly payment to every debt you have (car payment, credit card etc) EXCEPT the one with the highest interest rate. Apply all your extra money you have each month to that debt with the highest interest rate.
If you don’t have any extra money, you can’t accelerate your debt payoff (barring a refinance of the debt). Software won’t change this fact.
Keep repeating step 2 each month. Once you eliminate the debt with the highest rate, move to applying your extra money to the next highest rate debt. Rinse, repeat until you don’t have debt.
If you can refinance any of your debt to lower interest rates, that will help you as well. That is yet another thing that only you can do, the software won’t do.
There is no “GPS” attribute to the software, it’s just going to tell you to pay all your money to your debt each month (and add to the payoff date versus the steps outlined above due to the additional debt plus interest from paying for the software).
These AME/UFF/Worth salespeople are some of the most financially ignorant people I’ve ever dealt with. Not knowing how to manage finances is not as bad as actively giving people bad advice and misinformation.
They keep saying I am giving misinformation, but they will not challenge the numbers because math is math. There is zero genius to this software or “do it themselves”.
Either way, you are paying your money to pay your debt. Simple as that. Best of luck with your debt management.
Calvin
LOL Calvin. I find it amusing that you think that people don’t know to do what you just described. Of COURSE they know “how” to get out of debt by themselves.
The thing is… most people simply lack the discipline and motivation to stick to their financial goals. There are lots of reasons for this… but you’d have to understand psychology and human nature to “get it.”
See… everything people do is for a “FEELING.” We’re conditioned from an early age in this country to be consumers… we’re bombarded with “feel good” advertising, and buying a new car we don’t need, a new outfit, eating out at a restaurant, gives us a great feeling, maybe even a “buying high.”
Statistically, “Debt Diets” don’t work any better than actual diets do. Ask followers of the “debt guru’s” how many times they have started, and stopped, their diet.
I’ve had Ramsey followers who had tried multiple different programs, and each worked until, of course, they stopped following them. His advice is good… but people still have difficulty following it.
See… NOT spending money just means you are depriving yourself of the “high” you normally get from buying stuff. And, sadly, your financial plan just doesn’t give you that “new car smell” – it doesn’t give you an emotional motivation (reward) for doing the ‘right thing.”
The Worth Account DOES.
We know after 4 years of using our program that 95% of our clients had “stuck to” their plan and were using the software regularly. Even now, 6 years later, we find our average client is getting 20% better results than their savings analysis initially showed them.
As one client said… When you SEE it, you can EFFECT it.
Besides the math features, reporting features, the free coaching and support, our program does something very important… it gives people more than just a tool to make better financial choices, it also gives them that “emotional feedback” – that encouragement they need to stick with their plan.
Every time they DON’T spend money they FEEL GOOD when they look at their “financial GPS” system and see they are not only on track, but possibly ahead of schedule. It’s sort of like a financial “carrot on a stick.”
You like to insult people that are connected to our company (people you don’t know and haven’t met)… but you really are failing in your mission to discourage people from using our program because we have people coming on board as clients, and as referral partners, EVERY day that have 20+ years in financial services and other high level, high education careers.
Some are CPA’s, some are attorney’s. Some are engineers. These are people that have read what you wrote Calvin (because I’ve directed them to this site to do so). Then they looked at our program and came on board.
As one of my newest referral partners told me just this week (after having his Analysis run and seeing a DEMO of our program)…
“I’ve been in Financial Services for most of my career. I’ve never seen a program that does what the Worth Account does, how the Worth Account does it. If more people used this program, there wouldn’t be the debt problems that we have in this country.”
One of our Referral Partners previously was a founder of, and partner in, one of the largest insurance organizations in the United States. His company wrote over 65 BILLION in policies in one year alone. You don’t think someone like that knows what they are doing?
So, while you natter on with your nay-saying. We’re showing people an easy, effective, and award-winning financial management tool to help them achieve their financial goals. They are coming on board, they are writing us testimonials, they are referring their friends and clients.
And, by the way… didn’t you read the review above… and the info I posted?
Our program doesn’t cost $3500 anymore. That is more the “max” it costs. It can also cost well under $1000 too. It’s all based on what people’s financial circumstances are, and what it is saving them.
Most people would happily spend $1-$3 if they knew it was guaranteed to save them $100. They’d especially do it if they knew they had a shot of it costing them $0.
My last client… on track to pay off in under 6 years, instead of the 28+ years it would have taken them doing what they were doing (and they had been trying to get out of debt on their own for years).
Their investment in the program ended up being something like 7/10ths of a percent but, of course, if they refer another client or two down the road… they’ll end up making more in referral fees then they paid for the program, making the program, in effect, free.
See, when we give someone this program… we’re not only giving them a program that is going to make them a much better, maybe even an excellent, money manager… we’re not just giving them a program that is going to save them tens of thousands of dollars in interest… we’re not just giving them a program that they can “earn” the use of for free, by referring others… but we’re also giving them a simple vehicle that will allow them to earn more money… without getting a second job, having to sell anything, or working any harder.
Now imagine they use just HALF that money toward their debt… an extra few hundred, or few thousand, a month toward their debt, is going to get them debt free even faster, of course.
This program is going more and more VIRAL every day. it’s truly as our new tag line says… a “personal economic recovery system.”
Sue, LOL. I’m going to flat out say it… You are a liar, a fraud, and nothing short of a criminal.
It’s funny that the statistics all you agents have quoted have NEVER changed over the years. They are magically EXACTLY the same year after year. And the BS claims you guys make don’t change either, even thought they’ve been PROVEN wrong time and time again.
“No change in cash flow”. Wrong. “No change in budget.” Wrong. “No change in your payments.” Wrong. “Optimal payoff time.” Wrong.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. But the best is when you nutcases talk interest rates. You guys compare an APR of a HELOC to a cumulative interest ratio of a mortgage. It’s a joke (and an actual criminal offense… regulators force people to use APR’s for a reason, to stop people from doing exactly what UFF agents did left and right).
This program is so VIRAL that the companies have folded over and over… having to rebrand because the lies on the internet piled up over and over with each brand.
I have helped DOZENS of people avoid this BS. Same result every time…. “that’s all this is? same as extra payments? My agent said no extra payments.” (or some other typical UFF lie).
Sue, if you all marketed this software for what it was, a loan amortization scheduler (ie, the same thing any free online loan calculator can do), you wouldn’t make jack on it. So, instead, you lie to people. You tell them “no extra payments, no change in budget, no change in cash flow, etc, etc, etc, etc.
Get some ethics and tell the truth. This program isn’t “worth” jack. A $30 budget software sold at staples has all the features that this crap offers, and thousands of more features. Nothing like marketing a software marked up %10000 over the competition to people already spending too much money.
I will agree with one quote: “Most people would happily spend $1-$3 if they knew it was guaranteed to save them $100. They’d especially do it if they knew they had a shot of it costing them $0.”
The simple steps that I posted that have been around for CENTURIES outperforms your crapware and is GUARANTEED to cost them $0. Your crapware is guranteed to cost them thousands to tens of thousands and will to underperform those steps.
You and your crapware are pathetic. Math is math.
I really don’t understand why you continually misquote our marketing. We do NOT say what you say we say… and our actual clients know that. I’m not going to waste more of my time trying to correct your misstatements… I’ve already done that before.
I won’t stoop to calling someone names, or calling them a liar. I will say though that (for whatever reason) you have completely mischaracterized our program, and our marketing. Of course, that is apparent to anyone who actually does their due diligence and realized that your information is inaccurate.
Fortunately there are people out there that are smart enough to do their own investigation and aren’t swayed by anonymous denizens of the internet. Those people are getting debt free and sending us testimonials about how much they love our program.
Yawn. Heard all this marketing bullshit before. Sorry Sue, you’re heading for a major disappointment.
So you don’t say “No changes to your budget?”
That’s funny, because you have said it several times in this very blog.
From your BiggerPockets page…
Anyone is free to google “Sue Copening cash flow” and see the bigger pockets page with the quotes.
Gee, seems you did say those things. But we already knew you were a proven liar.
Cash flow dramatically changes as all your money is leaving you to pay your debt (which is fine for paying debt, but why pay $3500 to pay what you can already pay?)
Budget changes…. debt payments change…. all things you say don’t change.
And for the record Sue, you proved you are a liar with your own words. Your lies are what can go viral. 🙂
Let’s let the readers define that Calvin. As you know… When we run a Savings Analysis for a client, it is based on their current budget (and includes program cost). We ask them how they are spending their money and the savings that the program calculates is based on that budget. So the savings that program guarantees is based on them not having to alter (change) that budget.
Now of course, in real life, DO people change their budget? Of course. Once they get motivated they will often stop making less wise financial decisions. If they spend less on things less important to them than their financial future, then they are redirecting money to smarter things.
If their overall “out-go” stays the same though, because the money that usually went for something unnecessary went toward debt payoff instead, is that a “change” to their budget?
Some might say “no,” as the overall out-go stayed the same. Some might say “yes” because the internal budget numbers changed. Regardless, the initial projected savings was based on the budget as it was when the client got on the program.
It they choose to change it in order to get even better results than projected then, good for them. However the Savings Analysis projection was based on them not changing their overall budget.
I’m not going to re-explain everything all over again; you’ve heard all this before and choose to take things out of context and twist them around. We have gotten on a “loop” and it’s getting tiresome.
I’ll just close by saying that for every person you have convinced to keep pass on our program and just trying to get out of debt by themselves, we have thousands who got on our program who are happy and sending us testimonials and referrals.
NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Absolutely fundamentally WRONG. This is why I call you financially ignorant.
The analysis you provide is if they CHANGE their budget such that their discretionary income is CHANGED from not being spent to being spent on their debt. You are having them spend money on their debt that they are not spending now.
That is a change. It’s amazing that you don’t get that. Well, you do, you just have to apply the marketing lies in order to make the program seem like it’s doing something that a free online calculator or a 5 second spreadsheet can already do.
Yes, there is a loop. You lie. I correct your lies. Rinse, repeat.
Calvin… Loop again. YES… of course they are using their discretionary…. that is part of our presentation.
We also explain to them when they give us their budget that the program IS going to use their discretionary toward debt reduction and to be sure to include a $$ amount for “entertainment” in their budget as well. Often we make them cut their “discretionary” number in HALF if we think they are being too optimistic about it.
This is why you need to see a PRESENTATION given by the company instead of trying to guess and pre-judge, or hear 2nd hand from someone else.
Interesting, is “Sue” getting cloned, or is Sue simply using 2 different addresses to post?
No… still just me – LOL. One was from my phone K. Chang – I guess it had a different one in “auto-fill.” I have two main businesses, plus a personal email. Not sure which it used. (Ozedit: recruitment spam removed)
Got to get back to work…. have a national speaker for Worth in town tomorrow doing a meeting for a bunch of financial advisors and interested parties. Preparing for it now.
Appreciate ALL you do with Behind MLM… while folks like Calvin can be a bit of a pain… they really help us because they ask the “tough” questions that many consumers have in their minds anyway… and your forum gives us a chance to address them.
I’ve been sending potential clients and Referral Partners here so they can see what to expect in the way of questions, and how to answer them in a way that makes sense.
Our program is NOT for everyone. As Calvin likes to point out… it IS possible to get out of debt all by yourself. However I doubt any of those highly disciplined people HAVE debt, or that they are looking at our program.
For everyone else, this is an option that I can certainly recommend that they take a look at and consider. Our testimonials speak for themselves and our clients range from “average joe” working folks to highly educated financial professionals, bankers, real estate investors, etc.
It’s simply a tool for better money management, debt reduction and wealth building.
Sue, I have seen the boiler plate presentation many many times. I’ve told you this MANY MANY times.
On past sites, I have given a slide by slide reply to the presentation, pointing out mistakes, outright lies, and a few truths.
What’s even funnier is now you are saying that not only does the budget “change” in that you are massively changing their payments, but you are advising them how to make other changes. All these changes without making any changes.
Hilarious. You make politicians look honest.
Original mortgage amount: $200,000
Interest rate: 6.5 percent
Term: 30 years
Monthly payment: $1264
Total interest paid on your loan: $255,088.98
How much you will really pay in full at the end of your term: $455,088.98
*Make an Extra ( One ) payment per Year:
Original mortgage amount: $200,000
Interest rate: 6.5 percent
Term: 30 years
Monthly payment: $1264
Additional payment per year of: $1264
Total interest paid: $199,098.92
Total cost of your loan when paid in full: $399,098.92
Pay off date of the loan is reduced by: 6 years! and You just saved $55,990.06 for this FREE advice. LOL
The two of you have entertained each other for the last five years or so? I found some posts dating back to 2007 or 2008, with a similar discussion as this one. 🙂
Sue has a point, “it’s not about money, it’s about FEELINGS”. She has a type of clients that “solves” problems differently than the solutions you’re telling them about. They are looking for SPECIFIC types of solutions.
She probably has other types of clients too, but the type I was talking about “solves” problems temporarily by buying something. They buy any kind of solution they can believe in, something they FEEL is the right solution for them. They will do it even when that type of behavior is the CAUSE of the problem rather than a solution.
It’s very easy for them to make decisions about buying solutions, but it’s very difficult to make plans for how to solve something on their own. Most of us have some areas we prefer to avoid, where we’re willing to pay others for a solution we can believe in.
“It’s not about money, it’s about FEELINGS”. You’ll have to offer some solutions to the emotional side of it before you can offer any solutions to the financial side.
All scam artists make you feel good. Bernie Madoff made people feel good about their investments, too.
The fact is, if you let Worth Unlimited’s product direct your mortgage payments, you’re costing yourself the software cost plus the unneccessary interest charges on that cost, plus unneccessary interest charges due to the inefficiecies of the product.
Plus, owners of the software have reported that people move money that they can not move, leaving them effectively insolvent.
None of the above costs or dangers should make you sleep better at night. This is a predatory product, sold with lies that Calvin has nicely pointed out, that has no reason to exist other than making a small minority of agents and the owners of the company rich.
If you want software to tell you how to accelerate a mortgage, get an inexpensive copy of Quicken or any other budgeting software. Anything is better than this “Worth Account”, or “Money Merge Account” as it used to be called.
To be clear, if the Worth Account were free, it would *still* be a bad idea to use it. It would still cost you money to follow it, would still potentially leave you without enough money to pay your bills, and would still take more time than simply paying your bills online and sending any money above a contingency amount to your mortgage.
Because that’s all you have to do every month to beat the MMA:
1. Pay bills
2. Set aside some money for unexpected costs
3. Send whatever is left over with your regular mortgage payment
That simple plan will beat the Worth Account, every time.
M_Norway,
I have a way to add 1+1 optimally to make two. Some people say that any old $0.99 cent calculator will add 1 and 1, but this one does it optimally.
Is it possible for someone out there to use a cheaper way? Maybe. But 95% of our clients have added 1 and 1 to make two far better than those with out, 20% of them have even added 1 and 1 to make two more optimally than we originally said they could.
This calculator is only $3500. It’s a bargain.
No one is saying that seeing the effects of spending on debt repayment isn’t valuable. We are just saying that there are free calculators on the web that will do this. A simple spreadsheet will do this (better, no less).
If this software were $35, I would endorse it (provided it were marketed honestly, which it isn’t remotely). $3500 for a calculator is immoral.
Saying it’s optimal, saying it uses the banks money, comparing APR’s to simple interest to payment ratios (which aren’t interest rates), etc, etc is fraudulent, and in some cases, simply illegal.
and for the record….
We have offered free spreadsheets to potential customers that track the effect of payments/spending on debt repayment. Everytime, the reaction is “this is all the software does? That’s not what the agent said.” Of course, because the agents *have* to say that the software does ridiculously complicated things.
People don’t pay $3500 for a simple loan calculator. Those are already free. They need the Sue’s of the world to commit fraud to convince them that the software is magic.
@calvin
You’ll need to read post #50 and #52.
* “What does the customer want?”
* “What does my competitor offer?”
* “What can I offer to compete with her offer?”
* “… and how do I do it?”
Tonya in post #50 is aware of the price, and that’s why she has made extreme efforts to convince herself about how “right” the solution is for her. To be able to move her closer to your solution, you’ll need to start from her own set of ideas.
Sue’s post #52 tells about all the rewards the program is offering, and the RESULTS her clients gets. She’s not talking about “software”.
People don’t buy “software” or any other “products”, they buy their own ideas about what the product will do for them. That client have also visualised the use of it and some expected future results, in her own imagination.
To pay down the debt. I am not selling a product, I’m putting the information that has existed for centuries on how to do it. Sue sells software that hides that information in a black box to make it sound more complicated than it is.
The competition to Worth is free or 1% of the price, for better performance.
As for Sue’s stats, I have zero doubt they are completely made up. They’ve been spouting “our customers average paying off their mortgage in 6 years” right from the start. Well, it takes ~10 years to be able to have data to say that. Made up BS. Don’t fall for it.
Heck, Kiplinger’s, a well respected finance publication, published an article literally titled “Don’t fall for this Mortgage Pitch” in regards to this product.
But it certainly sounds like I am talking to another salesman with a vested interest in selling this pitch, not just speaking the truth.
There’s a lot of information between the lines there, in the first 3 paragraphs. She has probably tried different “standard solutions” many times, but they have failed for her.
People who have tried to offer her solutions earlier have obviously failed to deliver working solutions. They have probably delivered solutions that works for themselves, rather than adjusting the solutions so they can work for her.
You’ll need to start from THAT viewpoint rather than from your own.
Your competitor is offering SOLUTIONS (from the customer’s viewpoint). I’m pretty sure the solution is over priced and has an income opportunity connected to it (to make people accept the price), but that’s another side of the case.
The customer is willing to listen to anyone who can offer her solutions from her own viewpoint.
Your strategy allows her to mix in almost all of her favorite sales arguments in her answers.
Sue has visited this website before, around the time when ZeekRewards was shut down. She probably knows that we’re trying to be relatively neutral, e.g. allowing something similar for both parties in a discussion.
This website is an MLM review site, with a rather critical viewpoint (according to most pro MLM-ers).
Link to some information? That’s one of the main ideas here, “sharing information”.
I’m a former salesman, business to business sales.
Vested interest? No, I’m one of the regular contributors here, and I’m mostly ANALYSING different topics, not selling anything.
I have actually read most of your comments, and spending $3,500 on debt reduction makes very little sense to me, too. But I’m analysing it from many different viewpoints, not solely from my own.
Link to kiplingers:
http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/2008/05/prepay_mortgage.html
this software “solution” tells you how much sooner you will pay off your debt when you apply your extra money to your debt. that’s the same solution that spreadsheets, free online calculators, etc offer, as well as the standard budget softwares that are ~1% of the price.
we have offered solutions. they have offered hype, ignorance, financial lies, and outright fraud.
Thx. One of the main ideas here is “sharing information”, or actually providing a platform where people can share information about MLM companies / opportunities. It’s typically about factual information, but it’s mostly about the companies themselves and the opportunities they offer.
The website itself is relatively neutral and unbiased, but critical in most cases. It’s designed to attract information from a “balanced” audience, from the viewpoint of an ordinary audience without any specific profession or education (e.g. nutrition “experts” wanting to discuss specific nutritional products for months is not the right audience).
The website is not promotional, and normally it isn’t a very good idea trying to use it in that way. It isn’t an anti scam site either, they are normally designed for a more specific audience.
If people are being cheated in an opportunity it’s probably a factual information of interest for a wide audience, but the opposite argument will be of interest too. The audience here is expected to balance each other to some degree.
Paying ahead your mortgage is NOT ‘not changing your budget’. Clearly the extra payments have to come from SOMEWHERE? So clearly something was cut, probably from the “discretionary” funds?
AME/UFF/Worth is all about hiding facts. Some of the claims around the net by agents are ridiculous. One agent in Iowa claimed the program could take almost 2 years (1.9) off a 30 year mortgage with no discretionary income, merely from the algorithm doing it’s magic.
Sadly, adding $3500 to the balance of a typical mortgage, with no changes in payments or interest rates will delay the repayment by 6 months to a year due to the additional $3500 and the interest it accrues.
Facts are the last thing the agents want to discuss. MLMs should stick to creams and pills where results are at least subjective. Math is math is math.
I should probably have said that in a different way. It STARTS from a relatively neutral and unbiased viewpoint, when reviewing a company or opportunity.
In reality, the audience will probably balance itself in one direction or another, e.g. because some topics will be more actively discussed than others and attract specific types of readers. The same effect will also apply to follow up stories, they will go in the direction the story leads.
Can you give us a quick overview? You have followed the company for almost 5 years.
I have found the FatWallet forum, page 110-111.
* UFF was banned in Canada for illegal marketing?
* It had several “restarts” or “rebrandings” in 2010 and 2011, e.g. “the PILL Method”, “ACT” and probably several others?
* the 70,000 sales force was “sold” to Market America?
* some “Sorenson Investment” has been involved?
* people sold some books?
You can of course fill in some of the details, your side of the story. It has obviously collapsed and been restarted a couple of times, or several times.
BTW, your website was clearly product oriented, so I don’t have any problem with that.
M. Norway… My “take” and memory on this is as follows…
“UFF was banned?” – if you read carefully you’ll see that “no” – there was SPECULATION by the “internet skeptics” based on a supposed “complaint” about a link from a website that went to another web site that then linked to something on the American site that PERHAPS didn’t comply with Canada laws.
Giving that the benefit of the doubt, and assuming that is even close to being accurate… The “legalities” of MLM’s and direct selling companies are murky from country to country… so it’s pretty common for something to be “in compliance” in one country and be questioned in another.
Since this seems to be around the time the economy crashed and the company was in the process of transferring the sales side to MA, I don’t know if that “complaint” went anywhere.
Probably not, as usually all that happens (since the company had already done a LOT of legal work before they went into Canada), would be that the issue would be fixed to be within compliance guidelines.
As far as whether those laws even apply to the company.. they might not anyway, as this company is NOT a typical MLM company. We have a commission plan that is like MLM, but the way the product is “distributed” is not.
See in MLM companies you are typically not able to be part of the company without “consuming” the product (monthly auto-ship). There is a monthly cost attached to it and the reason it gets described as a “pyramid” is because they have few (if any) customers outside the “network of agents/reps.”
However, the way this company is structured has always been a one-time enrollment fee (like a license), and no ongoing cost. We have many, many clients who were NOT agents (2/3rds of my clients were not agents), and we also had many people who signed up as agents who were not clients, often because they were already debt free.
The Pill Method and ACT were not “rebrandings” of the company at all. They were simply the names for marketing approaches various teams within the company were using to market (and train) their agents. They were names of their “sales systems.”
The marketing rights and the name “UFirst” were “licensed” to Market America (I explained all that above already – I don’t know the terms of the license… however often something like that contains a performance clause, requirements and some kind of term. ), and the company negotiated with MA so that any agents that wanted to move over to MA could do so and keep their teams in place.
Some choose not to do that because, with the “economy crash,” many agents had already quit selling the program anyway (because many were in professions hard hit by the economy and had left those professions all together or were scrambling to focus on their core business). Most of our agents have always been in real estate, financial planning, banking, mortgages, etc.
Frankly, I give Skyler and John a LOT of credit in that they were able to keep the company afloat, keep sales coming in, keep support going for clients… all the things they promised.
A lot of other companies here in the U.S. did go under… Bear Stearns, for example… companies that had been around a LOT longer than this one. So, that they survived… and have even THRIVED… is saying a lot about both the company… and the product.
I’m not sure what the “Sorenson” thing is… however I know that the company has had investors bring in some new money. Previous to the economy crashing, when the company was still new… TWO major U.S. Banks tried to buy the company as well, but were turned down.
The core company never went “out of business” at all… the same two founders… Skyler & John… have kept the company going… kept the customer service department and administrative staff going, etc.
Now, this “re-branding” as Worth is simply a different marketing direction for the core product… the software and coaching system. It’s still available through MA as the “money merge account” and through Worth as the “worth account.”
Think of it like a clothing manufacturer who might make the same quality clothes for two different “brand name” resellers. Same product, different branding.
Books? Not sure what that refers to. However the initial concept of the Money Merge Account was a “work around solution” to mimic the results of an OFFSET Mortgage. Those make up 70% of the mortgage market in Australia and about the same in the U.K. and Europe.
They perform better than a 30 year fixed (typically paying off in about 2/3 or 3/4 the time with comparable cash flow) and a guy named Harj Gill had written a book about how you could “do it yourself” utilized a line of credit and “shuffling” money to knock down the amortized mortgage with it.
Our program just took those math concepts and programed them into the software so that someone wanting to do it would get the most precise math… AND… MOST IMPORTANTLY… would have a tool that would be an “accountability partner” and motivate them to stay on track.
Other than that, the only books I’m aware of were some “booklets’ the company produced as training aids for agents to explain more about the program.
(Ozedit: offtopic comments removed)
Anyway… Hope this helps. And, by the way. One of the reasons the company does a completely FREE savings analysis, a demo for the client, and gives the client a money-back, guarantee of performance, is so that people can SEE FOR THEMSELVES and make their own assessment and decision.
This program doesn’t work for everybody… but for those it DOES work for… it’s LIFE CHANGING and we have the testimonials from clients on our web site that demonstrate that.
UFirst was banned in Alberta, because their template agent sites violated Canada’s Competition Act due to their claims of potential income were vastly greater than the truth, which is that the median average UFirst agent had 0 sales. Zero. The last list of actual user accounts was 30K or so long, iirc.
I was in contact with the Competition Bureau, trying to get them kicked out of Canada, when they basically ceased operations up here.
Disgruntled UFirst employees used to forward me internal emails which painted a fascinating picture of the dysfunction at UFirst as they struggled to figure out how to handle falling sales and the negative attention they were receiving online, and John Washenko wanted out of Canada for months before they finally pulled out.
The Fatwallet thread is huge, but it contains a lot of conversations with agents, some of which eventually realize that the MMA (or Worth Account now) is not efficient.
In fact, one of the things that makes the MMA (or Worth Account) a scam is that they could have changed the algorithm to a simple debt snowball approach that would only be a few lines of code long, and outperform their lauded “MIT”-written algorithm that is supposed to require millions of lines of code.
The MMA software directs large transfers that make no sense to anyone who knows how interest in calculated, but looks impressive to the mathematically-challenged.
Further, there has never been a print function in this software, and the user agreement prohibits users from taking a print screen.
From high cost, to brutal functionality, to criminal inefficiency, plus the fact that it has always been marketed by people who literally can not explain what the product is doing, this product is a total scam.
Then you have no idea what MLM is. Multi-level refers to how the sales force is organized (and paid). Has nothing to do with “distribution”. You basically claim that it’s not MLM, but fits description of a MLM. Thus, your explanation is not believable.
Sorry if my point was unclear to you… let me try again.
I’m speaking of what most people think of as “mlm.” I said we are not “TYPICAL” mlm. If you only look at how the sales staff is structured and paid… then most sales departments would be considered MLM.
I worked at a retail store owned by Penny’s. My sales staff got commission, as manager, I made a bonus based on sales, my district manager did as well, as did our national sales director. This is how many retail sales organizations are structured. That is technically multi-level, both in structure and in how compensation flows down the line.
In other areas of product sales you have a retail store (or web site), a distribution company, a manufacturer. Each make a % of the product along the way.
What many people think of as “MLM’s” are those companies that, not only have a multi-tiered compensation structure, but that also require you to BUY their products to SELL their products.
This creates a situation where almost all their customers are “internal” customers and creates a situation where, once the company reaches saturation and can no longer “recruit” … it doesn’t produce enough income to keep from falling apart. People who are unsuccessful cancel their auto-ship, they have high attrition, etc.
A more stable company is one where they have a lot of EXTERNAL customers. People who want the product because of the product… NOT because of the “business.” We have always had that… most of my clients (in UFirst) were not agents and had no interest in being so.
Now, in Worth, though we have the best of it all. Clients who refer can earn a referral commission… even if they only refer once. If they refer 3-4 times, then they will earn more in referral fees than their program cost them.
Others who are NOT clients, but who want to refer can do so as well. Our best referral sources have always been financial planners, insurance agents, mortgage brokers, bankers and realtors. If someone wanted to make this their full time business, they could also do so.
As you know there are many different ways to structure a business. I was explaining that while we paid out commission like an MLM… we don’t have those other aspects that people don’t like in an MLM and that they associate with MLM. Such as…
… we don’t require people to buy our program to be part of the company and earn commission.
… we don’t have a monthly “nut” to crack. There are no ongoing expenses to be part of the company. No auto-ship or monthly marketing fee. This is an aspect of MLM that people don’t like… as it means that they can potentially spend more than that make. With us, their only ongoing investment is their time and if they are already talking to clients about money or real estate… not much time at that.
… our one-time enrollment fee is even REFUNDED if you refer someone who becomes a client in the first 30 days. This means for many of our referral partners – there is ZERO cost to “learn, refer & earn.”
Personally, because we are not what people think of as a “typical” mlm – I think the most accurate description would be a “multi-tiered affiliate program.”
I think I’m missing something, or perhaps you’re not explaining it properly. You wrote:
But a few paragraphs later you wrote:
Isn’t that the SAME THING? Except Worth does not “require” you to buy in order to sell?
But how many salespersons in Worth are NOT also a client? If a majority actually are, then this exception means nothing.
i guess it depends on your viewpoint. There is a “client” side and a “referral” side. As I’ve stated before… 2/3rds of my clients have NOT been agents also. I believe you, yourself, have pointed out the “flaws” of a business that requires internal consumption and how that can be a “weakness.”
And… there is a difference, in my opinion, between someone who looks at the “business” side, and takes it seriously as part of the professional suite of services that they may offer to a client (as many of our insurance and financial professionals do), and someone who is a a user of the program, but who just happens to get in the occasional conversation with someone and ends up referring them over (not all clients bother to refer.
And some do it casually and don’t even bother with getting the referral fee – even though I encourage them to sign up so they can).
I would guess the “cross over” of people who are both clients AND agents (who are taking the business side seriously and earning money) is about 1/3 to 1/2. I can’t know for certain company wide, I can only guess based on my own personal sales and that of my team members.
It’s the non-REQUIREMENT (no ongoing cost) issue that make the difference here.
For someone who IS looking at the referral opportunity… the fact that there is no requirement to buy, and no ongoing expense to be part of the network… seems to be something they are impressed by.
After all, if you aren’t sure how many of your clients this will be appropriate for, the fact that you can refer a little, or a lot, without worrying about having a “break even” or “nut to crack” makes this quite attractive.
I think the thing is… for people who are unfamiliar with the nuances of various business structures… because our structure is atypical… they perceive us as more of a “mainstream” type of company, After all, even a lot of the big box retailers – Office Max, Office Depot, for example, have “affiliate” programs. The difference is… theirs are only 1 level… not multi-level.
There are lots of other companies that have multi-tier programs… some real estate buyers programs, many insurance companies, LOTS of software download companies, domain registration companies, even various loyalty programs.
Also, outside of formal networks… many business professionals pay a referral fee for client leads.
So Sue, you are still (dishonestly/ignorantly) stating that the money “shuffling” between line of credits and mortgage is generating savings?
It is ALL about MASSIVE extra payments. Nothing more. Nothing less. Any potential savings from optimizing payments by a day are two are dwarfed by the $3500 price tag and additional interest on that $3500.
I like how you say you are all about facts/truth, but you can’t seem to stick to the truth to save your life.
And for the record, a company using the exact methods of the UFF were banned in Australia because of the exact claims you are making here…. it’s all about extra payments, nothing whatsoever with the HELOC shuffle.
Mathematically proven to be a lie. No change in cash flow… except the big change in cash flow needed to pay down the loan ahead of time. With no change in payments, there is no change in the paydown time. Period.
One of these days Sue will learn how a loan works. Or maybe simple addition and subtraction. Either that or she knows how they work and she needs to learn how to tell the truth.
@Sue
Did you have to pay to work there? Was there a compensation plan? Were you an affiliate of Penny’s?
No. You didn’t have to pay them to belong to the company. There was no MLM compensation plan and you were an employee, not an affiliate.
Comparing retail stores under the “everything is multi-tiered” definition is silly. Anything with four wheels is a car guys…
Yeah… that’s the definition of MLM.
There is no difference, you are both affiliates. Anybody who can earn something in an MLM company is an affiliate, end of story.
Yeah you and everybody else out there. “But we’re not MLM!” is a pretty tired argument in the industry and pops up frequently. Usually when affiliates of a company believe the norms of the industry (usually related to retail customers) don’t apply to them.
If your company uses an MLM compensation plan, then you’re an MLM company. Call it “multi-tiered”, affiliate this, blahblahblah it’s still MLM.
@Craig Hansen
Thanks for the information. It brought some clarity about the Canadian part of the story. I won’t dive too deeply into details going too far back in time, but an overview and WHERE to find the details were helpful.
Thanks for the information. I won’t dive to deeply into the details in your side of the story either, but I will use them to “fill in the picture” when I have an overview of it.
“Don’t dive to deeply into the details” and “get an overview” are simply methods I use to avoid getting confused, and I needed them in this case.
The FatWallet forum tells me about problems relatively similar to pyramid schemes, e.g. a saturation point where it all starts to collapse in a market. You can’t blame finance crisis for that, there’s 2-3 years between 2008 and 2011.
My viewpoint so far is that there is/was a flaw in the marketing model. There’s also a flaw in the price strategy, drawing negative attention towards it in nearly all places where the program have been discussed. You have had people following you around the internet for YEARS.
I haven’t looked into the technical side of it, i.e. what the program does for customers and how well it does it.
I have partly looked into the psychological part of it, e.g. whether it solves something by organizing something for people, or motivational factors. That was just to identify those areas.
My perspective here have been from the viewpoint of a salesman, e.g. I have flagged the reactions to the price rather than the price itself. A CFO would have focused on a “technical analysis” of the price, e.g. all the different costs involved.
This is an exact retread of MMA? Same exact scam only with a different name? They still promoting their sophisticated algorithms, and factorial math? The factorial was my favorite part of the MMA scam.
No, the “mathematical engineer” from GE propulsions lab was always the best part. I guess it makes sense since they are trying to recreate a new math instead of use the math that’s been around for a while.
Craig, of course they can’t explain it. You know by now (and Calvin reminds us), it took a mathmatical engineer from a NASA subcontractor to develop the algorythm. The sophisticated math is beyond mortals to understand.
But seriously, it’s remarkable to me that all these years later this piece of garbage is still being sold.
Pardon my ignorane, but with rates on mortgages so low, isn’t it more that obvious, pay the high interest debt first, then if that 3.5% mortgage really keeps you up at night, just add to principal payment each month?
Sue, you are right, it’s remarkable that people in such careers are as innumerate as any average group off the street.
$1000 is a bit better that $3500 but not as good as zero. We’ve been saying for what seems like a decade (a) make all minimum payments due, (b) take whatever you can and send it to the debt with the highest (tax adjusted) rate, (c) repeat.
Suggesting as most agents do, that there’s any savings created beyond the results from prepaying principal with one’s own money is untrue.
Worse than this, no one can sufficiently explain how the potential victims of this fraud start out under so much debt they can’t sleep, but when an agent enters their info into the program, they come up with a full 20% of take home pay as extra inxcome. That doesn’t reconcile nor does it reflect reality.
Joe, Sue would sell her family down the river to make another sale. She’s proven she will say whatever lie is necessary to make her commission.
It takes a special kind of immoral person to stick with these lies this long.
Morality in business is normally about making the business become profitable, and of course about legality.
Wikipedias definition:
So discussing morality is rather meaningless if you discuss it from a different teaching / Code of Ethics than what the topic is about. Some of the basic rules are common within several different Code of Ethics, some are NOT.
A person with high moral standards can be completely immoral if he acts within the wrong area, trying to use his moral standards there.
We will usually focus on the business itself. Eventually it will be up to the readers themselves to decide what they consider to be “moral” or “immoral”, or maybe it’s about what they consider to be “acceptable”.
We will NOT focus very much on the laws in each and every country, or on all the different Code of Ethics. Topics like that will probably become too specialised for most people.
Um, what? Morality has nothing to do whatsoever about profitability. While I completely agree that one’s definition of morality will vary, morality isn’t about money, it’s about honesty, it’s about doing the “right” thing.
Usually the golden rule is a common starting point. I doubt if Sue would like it if people tried to sell her software for $3500 that told her to pay her light bill on time to avoid late fees and discontinuation of service.
Of course the software wouldn’t even make the payments for her, it would just tell her to pay her bill on time. Of course, they’d be claiming millions of dollars in savings in fees and quality of life improvements by avoiding dark days.
If you ignore morals, a pyramid scheme is great business model because you can make tons of money if you do it right. Morals are *always* relevant.
Profitability has something to do with morality. It’s considered very immoral to apply non-business morality to something if it’s in conflict with business morality.
E.g. “moral price setting” can lead to loss for investors and problems paying employees. An argument about “In the current economic situation, we shouldn’t earn anything on our customers” can be very immoral.
But my main point was about how meaningless it would be to discuss morality. People usually have different Code of Ethics. Discussing the businesses themselves or the business models is much more plain and simple.
I suppose the two major banks that tried to buy the company are “innumerate” as well? And all the 70,000 clients are just not as smart as the handful of “skeptics” we have on the internet. And that our “A” rating going to an “A+” rating is just, well, meaningless.
Sadly… the “skeptics” are left-brained numbers guys, with no real grasp of human nature or people, which is why they don’t understand the popularity of this program nor why it works so well.
Someone said “no one can sufficiently explain how the potential victims of this fraud start out under so much debt they can’t sleep, but when an agent enters their info into the program, they come up with a full 20% of take home pay as extra inxcome. That doesn’t reconcile nor does it reflect reality.”
WOW… certainly mistaken here (and/or just making stuff up again).
First… a LOT of our clients are not at all overwhelmed with debt. They have some debt, but are good money managers with good cash flow that just want to be BETTER with their financial. life.
Second… It’s been explained (numerous, numerous, numerous times) that when the company runs a savings analysis, they ASK THE CLIENT how much “discretionary” income they have. They explain that whatever amount they tell us will be used toward debt payoff.
Sometimes the company will even tell the client to “cut it in half” – as we do NOT want a savings analysis to be even slightly unrealistic… it has a money back guarantee attached to it, after all.
Don’t we think that if a savings analysis inaccurately reflected that 20% of their income was “discretionary” that they would NOTICE that little tidbit? And if that was inaccurate, they would SAY something immediately? Here’s a hint – yes, they would.
And if someone GOT a “screwy” Analysis like that… got on the program… it didn’t work for them.. don’t you think that they would be a MAJOR pain in our neck? Don’t you think it might interfere with our “A+” BBB rating and our whole referral-based marketing approach? Hint. yes, it would.
If someone doesn’t have enough discretionary income to make the program work… the company will NOT SELL them the program We turn people down for this program all the time. Our whole marketing approach is dependent upon REFERRALS.
It does no good, long term, to sell the program to someone who is not going to be happy. United First Financial has an “A+” rating in the Better Business Bureau (recently UPGRADED from an “A” rating) precisely because clients are achieving the results promised them (note that under the Worth name there is a “B” rating only – because it is so new. – it has 0 – zero – complaints under Worth).
The reason this program continues to sell is because it WORKS. It helps people do something they would not do otherwise.
And.. by the way… that SIMPLISTIC approach to debt reduction DOES NOT WORK!
Why doesn’t it?
Because (in general) if someone was financially disciplined enough to follow through with that simplistic plan … they would not have debt to begin with. Financially disciplined people do not get “over their head” in debt to start with. So we’ll call that debt reduction strategy the “Catch 22 Plan.”
I find it humorous that a handful of people are so desperate to discredit this company they will resort to libel, fiction and name calling. And yet… I find it completely unsurprising that it’s not working.
People come here… read what they say, do their OWN research, and get our program anyway. People ARE smart enough to think for themselves!
They then write us testimonials and refer their clients, family and friends.
I find it humorous that you called us names, then accused us of name-calling.
Which “TWO MAJOR BANKS” ????
You’re surely not using some information put out by those behind Worth Unlimited as “fact” are you ???
See how easy it is to pull off internet fraud ???
Put out a press release and it suddenly becomes “fact” for many victims / people
Some of the American “Success Formulas” can cause situations like that, e.g. “I want to become rich, I want to become famous, I want to have followers”. You should have specified the TYPE of followers more carefully. 🙂
So people will need methods directed towards the right side of the brain (visual, emotional), rather than towards the left side (logical, mathematical, “words”)?
There IS a huge difference there. The left side of the brain responds to plain logic and is generally very “organised”, but it’s also heavily dependant on it. The right side responds to visual images (visual IDEAS) and emotions, and is less “organised”. It can accept ideas even if parts of the logics are missing.
So people are basically looking for “visual” solutions, e.g. visual ideas they can believe in and FEEL is right for them, ideas that motivates them emotionally rather than explains something to them logically?
Good to know that Sue continues her obvious and blatant lies.
First, UFF agents have tried to sell countless copies of this crapware to people with no discretionary income. Sue, you are not the only agent. And sadly, despite your moral bankruptcy, there are worse ones out there than you. Far worse (which is pathetic given your zero credibility).
I’ve received dozens of “analyses” over the years from UFF scammers. First, most agents don’t include the $3500 in the analysis.
Second, literally more than half entered the income wrong (some overstating income by more than double…. so many agents seem to be under the impression that stated income is always in biweekly terms, sometimes entering monthly paychecks as biweekly income).
Third, no one who is “good at managing cashflow” pays $3500 for a BAD calculator.
See, this is the BS marketing spin that SUe is all about. Notice in her post she says that her clients are good at managing money. That’s when she’s talking about the software. Again, they are good with money, they aren’t even overwhelmed by debt. Then, later in her post, when talking about just following simple rules we are proposing… people are now idiots. They can’t get out of debt… it doesn’t work. Spin, spin, spin.
Sue, either people are idiots or they are good with money. The idiots are the ones that get into irresponsible debt and then spend $3500 on something that is free.
I got one agent in Iowa to take down her blog by way of the attorney general after she stated that $1 of monthly discretionary income removed 1.9 years of mortgage payments (despite the actuality being it added almost a year due to the $3500 anchor).
Sue, this isn’t left brain versus right brain, this is our brain versus no brain.
I’ve made this challenge to you before and you ran like the wind…let’s simulate a simple scenario. You with your $3500 anchor, me with a checkbook and addition and subtraction.
– $5000 monthly income
– 30 year brand new 4%, 30 year $250,000 mortgage ($1,193.54 payment due on the 1st each month).
– $3000 non-mortgage expenses each month, due on the 15th.
Let’s compare the payoff month by month, we can see the true effect of that $3500 boat anchor you call a price that does no optimization whatsoever. But we know Sue won’t touch this challenge with a 10 foot pole because the numbers are never in her corner, unless you count her made up statistics.
PS: Sue the Better Business Bureau is a measure of how well a company can write a check. A UFF client complained to the BBB about the UFF and her demand for a refund, the UFF’s reply was “@#$k off”, which counted as a reply in the BBB’s eyes. They literally only care if there is a reply, not what the reply is.
The BBB jumped the shark about 10-15 years ago.
Feel free to discredit the math.
And if exposing the UFF lies is not working, how come the company is on it’s third rebrand now? Why did UFF owners direct agents to stop posting on the internet after being disproven literally 1,000’s of times?
Keep pushing this higher and higher in the google page ranks. You’ll get back to the UFF days where the first google page was fatallet, scam.com, bargaineering, etc…. all sites with the truth about the software instead of your marketing BS.
@K.Chang
I’m sorry… I wasn’t talking about you – why would you think I was? As far as I remember you are respectful and ask good questions – I’ve never heard you resort to name calling? I even mentioned previously that I have respect for you, that hasn’t changed.
It’s quite disappointing that you can’t have a discussion without resorting to slurs and trying to twist my words around ;~(. Hopefully everyone reading this will notice that I NEVER called anyone an “idiot” – that is YOUR wording, and, I suspect, it may say something about the kind of person you are.
I also pointed out that we have a variety of clients… not all people are the same. Some are good with their money…. some not. It was YOU that tried to say that someone that was “overwhelmed” with debt could just use a simple DIY plan.
I simply pointed out that (for that segment of the market), that it is counter-intuitive to think that someone that has allowed themselves to get overwhelmed with debt will have the financial discipline to get out of it on their own.
If they did… why haven’t they? If they are disciplined – why, exactly do they have that kind of debt?
And being financially undisciplined does NOT make anyone an “idiot” as you say. It simply makes them normal.. like the majority of American’s that are in debt. What might not be smart, is failing to recognize one’s own strengths and weaknesses, and failing to take steps to help oneself change for the better.
As for these “dozens” of “bad analysis” you are telling us about. I don’t doubt that some agents might have done a screwy Analysis occasionally through lack of good training, or not attending any (you can lead a horse to water). I also don’t doubt that there is an occasional “bad apple.” That can happen in any company and that is why there are policies and procedures so the company has the power to terminate an agent that is not representing their program properly.
However… if that happened in the past… THIS IS NO LONGER AN ISSUE, and will not be, because this is one of the reasons why the company no longer has Agents doing the Savings Analysis and the sale … but is doing them all in house.
I can’t imagine it was ever a huge problem though (remember you’ve ‘talked to’ – as you say “dozens” of our clients or potential clients – that is only .0003% – 3/100ths of 1% – right?).
You can get a distorted view of a picture when you are focusing only on a very small % of people who are seeking you out because they are confused or disgruntled. In general, HAPPY clients wouldn’t be engaging with you (especially after you insult them) so you would not be ‘talking’ with them.
If you look at our BBB rating… you’ll see we have very, very, very, few reports or complaints. Of course, the difference with a BBB complaint and the internet in general, is that you canNOT be anonymous with the BBB whereas, on the internet in general, anyone can make up a screen name and say anything they want – and often that is what competitors do, as well as those who somehow think that our program is going to “hurt” their business some how.
As for not including the $3500 cost of software back then… that was certainly NOT standard practice – nor how the company taught and trained agents to do an Analysis. Also… at least when we were doing one with a HELOC – the Analysis software automatically included it as the starting balance on the LOC.
I know when I did an Analysis the cost of the program was something I always pointed out FIRST thing…. because I wanted the client to KNOW those savings were taking the cost of the program into account… it was a “selling point!”
Of course now the cost is simply a % (usually .05 to 3.5%) of the projected, guaranteed, savings… so it can be as low as $750. This new pricing structure makes the program more accessible to a wider market…. especially young people who are coming out of school with a low % rate, (but huge balances on), student loans, that they will be burdened with all their life if they don’t have a plan.
As far as income numbers… they are always stated (right ON the analysis) what the cycle was… weekly, monthly, bi-weekly. In fact, if it was bi-weekly the Analysis stated that extra payments would be counted as discretionary and used toward debt payoff.
So.. if those issues you are bringing up were true (we can only take your word)… they are moot now anyway. There is no longer a potential for miscommunication or misrepresentation there – those issues have been corrected by the company in this new rebranding and sales approach which is always conducted by the companies well trained, in-house coaches.
In fact the company has done an EXCELLENT job of looking and all the issues that had problems in the past, and they have addressed them. We have never claimed to be perfect… but in my opinion, it’s not bad to drop an occasional ball – it’s how you pick it back up that matters.
Our excellent reputation, testimonials, etc., among our actual CLIENTS, says we have done a good job there.
I really can’t help you with your assessment of the BBB except to say that, if you look at UFirst, you’ll see that we have an “A+” rating, only 15 complaints at all in the last 3 years (seems like only 3 having to do with the product itself – rest are billing or customer service issues), and all are closed with 0 unresolved.
Worth is too new to have a meaningful rating, but we also have 0 – zero – complaints filed so far.
By the way… you are incorrect about how the BBB works. If someone complains and their complaint is not resolved to their satisfaction – that is how it is noted. I’m seeing no “unresolved” complaints at all so I wonder as to how accurate this ladies story is (might she have exaggerated to you? – because, if not, she had the opportunity to report back to the BBB that her complaint was not resolved).
Regardless of any random, individual ‘story’ – to me, seeing that only .0002% (2/100ths of 1% – right?), of the 70,000 ever bothered to file a complaint with the BBB (which takes about 10 minutes online), and yet over 1000 sent in TESTIMONIALS and gave us permission to publish them on our website… well, if I was evaluating a company I’d find those statistics pretty darn good.
Yes, you are correct. Of course, we can’t say for certain why it is that so many of our clients tell us they find it easy to stick with our program when they have not been able to stick to previous debt reduction plans. However they do all the time.. and you’ll see that show up in our testimonials too.
Personally I think it’s a combination of factors…. the LIVE, unlimited coaching and support by the company is always there if they are having issues or questions (other software you are left to you own devices).
Also… the program provides people with GOOD FEELINGS when they see their plan working – keeping them motivated and balancing out any “negative” feelings they might otherwise feel if they were on a “debt diet.”
It’s a subtle difference, but when people feel GOOD about NOT spending their money.. they are more likely to keep it in their pocket and put it toward their financial goals.
Another thing is… because the program provides constant feedback as to their potential savings – based on their history and results so far… it actually can “punish” them in this way…
See… Psychologists will tell you that a “fear of loss is greater than the anticipation of gain.” – so when a client is on-track to save (for instance – $120,000 – our average), and if they start getting off-track – they will see that potential savings number drop.
So, because they have mentally “pocketed” that $120K in savings they think to themselves… “Holy moly – I just LOST $20,000, or $10,000” – or whatever it is. Losing that potential for savings is a powerful motivator to get back on track.
Of course now, our newest two features… the reporting features that make tax time easier, and the auto-updating, make the program even easier to use and, perhaps, even can provide the potential for greater savings. I used to teach tax strategies / tax law for the self employed.
There are statistics out there on how much the average small business person OVERpays their taxes (according to the GAO – by about $8-$10,000 per year) and one of the biggest reasons is a failure to track, and document, deductions.
Because of our new features, people may find the software is helping them do a better job in that area as well.
Calvin, u are right…I 100% agree with you!!!
Sue….GIVE UP ALREADY!!! U got sucked into a group that made you believe how to take peoples money versus you working with a reputable company that will show people how to do that for free.
Have a good day! I got ppl to go help!
So, Sue, I noticed you skipped over the challenge as usual. Scared of the obvious outcome that your software trails behind simple century old addition and subtraction by thousands upon thousands of dollars?
As for the very possible price increase…. “as little as $750”, but ignore the possible tens of thousand of dollar price tag now Sheesh.
Back to the BBB… unresolved issues. Typical BS. A BBB issue to be resolved merely takes a reply from the company. The reply could be “f off!”, but as long as they literally send a reply, it is considered resolved.
The swindled customer can provide video tape of themselves being robbed at gunpoint by the business, as long as the business replies “wasn’t me”, it’s resolved. Feel free to investigate this. The BBB is about collecting fees, not any sort of truth in business.
You can dance around the truth all you want. You’ve claimed the magic algorithm optimizes everything with it’s “factorial math”.. .let’s see the optimization in action and do the simulation.
If your software wins, I will sing it’s praises on the highest mountain. If century old, outdated, underpowered, non-optimal approaches win, you agree to stop selling the program.
We all know you won’t even acknowledge the bet, because numbers tell the truth, your made up statistics don’t mean jack.
If you want to play around with numbers call the 800 number and get a Savings Analysis.. they are free and that is what that department is there for… to run numbers and explain the program.
The last “challenge” I engaged in with a “skeptic” that wanted to go head to head on the math … it took him 40 hours playing around with his debt and spreadsheets to come close to “matching” our Analysis savings and debt pay off date (he got within 6 months and around $20k short in savings (and he didn’t have the cost of the program to factor in) so he did pretty well.. though it took him 40 hours to do what our program did in 60 seconds.
Of course… he ended up buying the program since it sort of proved the point about the complexity of the task on a day to day basis if one truly wanted to maximize savings).
Of course, the Analysis program is a different program than the software itself… and is only taking a “snapshot” in time and can’t possibly calculate savings based on transactions, interest rates changes, and cash flow, that haven’t happened yet.
As far as engaging with you…. as charming as you are… I don’t have that kind of time to waste entertaining you with your internet hobby (go ahead – start the name calling – LOL).
On PRICE… As it has already been pointed out… there is a % and a $ amount cap on the price of the software and coaching system. So it maxes out at about $3500, making the $ range from $750 to $3500.
What people are paying for is not just software… it’s unlimited live coaching and unlimited upgrades to the program. I think the pricing is quite fair for something that is helping people save tens of thousands of dollars and that they can use for life (people “spend” more money than that on the lost depreciation when they buy a new car).
Also.. you KNOW about the $ cap already … why do you insist on “playing dumb?” Or… are just hoping to further mislead?
I’m wondering how credible folks think you are, overall, when you can’t even get the most basic things right.
For example… someone can just read the BBB web site.. they will see that your information is incorrect… the BBB lists all the categories of “resolution” or “non-resolution.”
But even if all 15 complaints in 3 years were “unresolved to the clients satisfaction” (not the case) – it is still a ridiculously low % of complaints filed versus satisfied clients and overall sales.
So out of all the clients we have… 2/100ths of 1% of them filed a BBB complaint. SERIOUSLY? Obviously this is not a statistic that is “made up” – anyone can verify it.
Sue I call complete BS. So you “accepted a challenge of a skeptic” who couldn’t figure anything out, yet you won’t accept anyone’s challenge in public?
Yeah, yet another lie from Sue. Typical. Sue, we’ve explained this software to agents who didn’t get it. I get that you know the software doesn’t optimize jack and you won’t accept the challenge because you know you will lose.
We’ve seen the analysis before. We usually have to correct the agent’s mistakes (missing fee, incorrect income periods, new mortgage versus existing mortgage). The analysis is merely what you would get from a free mortgage calculator (minus the mistakes)… discretionary income applied to debt.
So, again, would you like to run the scenario in public or do you just agree that the software doesn’t “optimize” anything and merely costs you more money. And we need to see the software, not the analysis.
Remember all those agents’ claims, including your own, that the software does 20% better than the analysis.
As for the sad BBB these days, “resolution” in the eyes of the BBB means the company merely responded. Not that the there was any agreement, meeting of the minds, etc. Merely that there was a response from the company. That is the basic fact you aren’t getting.
BTW, if there is a cap to the price, I will admit a mistake there. My problem, of all things, was using you as a source. You said the price was a % of the savings. You didn’t mention a cap.
At $750, this software is still 30 times more expensive than typical budget tracking that has 100s of times the features, and none of the fraud.
Err, umm, sure.
Ring the very place which is the source of the problem and ask them to give an independent analysis.
That’ll work.
Sue, would you like me to post “Kim in Utah’s” experience with UFF and the BBB? The software told her to over draw her checking account, and she didn’t, and the UFF claimed since she didn’t follow the instructions, she wasn’t entitled to a refund.
She wrote the BBB who said they would only get involved if she offered a “middle ground” offer (which the UFF was offering $0 for their “satisfaction guarantee”).
At the end, the BBB was kind enough to offer their binding arbitration service to resolve the issue, at her cost of course, otherwise the case would be marked “resolved.”
Nice, eh? The BBB is pathetic, but I can see how they’d look good to a person with no morals such as yourself.
Now back to that challenge you won’t take because you know you will lose….
Littleroundman, the analysis, if done correctly, is fine. No one is saying one can’t repay their debt following their steps. The problem is that they push the “optimization”, the HELOC shuffle, “other people’s money” crap, etc, etc, etc. This is merely paying ahead on ones debt with your own money.
There is no “factorial math” going on. The HELOC shuffle actually slows down debt repayment versus full prepayments. It’s all the Sue’s of the world out there trying to make the software more than it is…. an incredibly expensive debt calculator.
Like the free ones on the internet, well, except it’s not free. Not even close.
That’s exactly my point.
The second part of Sues’ line from that post reads:
Maybe it’s just me, BUT, if I was looking to find the truth about a suspect “opportunity” the very last thing I would do is ask the company behind the “opportunity” if it was a scam or not, ESPECIALLY if said company was asking me to cough up $3500 for something others say is overpriced.
@Calvin, no factorial math? Let me ask you, if you had a 24% credit card, a 12% credit card, a 6% car loan and 4% mortgage, how many calculations would you need to go through each and every time you wrote a check?
Don’t get me wrong, there are some out there with advanced degrees in sophisticated algorithms, but for us regular Joes, it’s beyond our ability. When MMA first came out and I saw the image of a chalkboard with all kinds of formulas, and those danged integral symbols, I knew I was outgunned.
There will never be a shortage of new suckers who will fall for any scam. And this one is faith based, most agents not knowing how it works and unable to honestly answer any questions about it. If you have the interest you can search for MMACompR33.pdf where I compiled over 33 full articles I wrote on the money merge scam.
In a weekend of tinkering with a spreadsheet I produced one that effectively does what MMA does without the cost or risk of using HELOC. If it’s any consolation to me, Madoff took people for far more than this and no one would listen.
It was about getting a savings analysis (and an explanation of the program). It was an answer to Calvin’s challenge about something, e.g. “I’m working mostly in sales, call the guys who works with math and the program itself”.
But calling the 800 number won’t solve anything. I believe Calvin know more than enough about the program and potential savings, so it will only give him types of info that he’s not interested in.
THE PRICE
From a market perspective (potential buyers, bystanders), the price is way to high. It also makes very little sense adding more debt in the start of a debt reduction program.
A price can be defended by logical factors. I haven’t identified any of them yet, but business economics have many such factors (e.g. limited market, seasonal product, development costs, sales costs, etc.)
The price STRATEGY is a potential problem, the “% of savings” idea. One post here tried to compare it to real estate commissions, but you’re not buying a house here. You’re not buying the savings either, you’re buying a software program plus support. Some of the arguments here have been misleading.
MLM
The situation in Canada was very similar to the collapse of a pyramid scheme, with too many untrained distributors trying to make an income out of it.
It looks like the MLM model is the central part of the business idea here, rather than sale of software.
Software can normally easily be sold without having an income opportunity attached to it, without having thousands of distributors recommending it or having professionals to close the sale, without the savings analysis.
It doesn’t make much sense as an income opportunity. You have no recurring sales, and will earn MLM-commissions only 2 levels deep. The market will be saturated relatively early, so you can’t expect any residual income other than for 1 or 2 years max.
SALES STRATEGY / PRICE STRATEGY
It IS possible to sell a product for a very high price, make a buyer ACCEPT the high price. But that strategy will also limit the market to very few types of customers, and reduce the sales volume and increase the costs per product sold dramatically.
It’s probably something like that what has happened here. They have added lots of unnecessary expenses to be able to sell it at a high price.
Customers looking for debt reduction methods could easily have done the calculations using a web based calculator, but then they would have been less dependant on advice from “professionals”, and less vulnerable to sales arguments. And then they wouldn’t have accepted the price, either.
If the program is so difficult to sell that they really NEED to pick out vulnerable customers to sell it to, then there’s a flaw in the business idea here.
@Sue
I will also try to find some solutions that can work, but I can’t make any flawed ideas work.
M Norway – When we all discussed MMA 5 years ago, the conclusion was simple. Fastest method?
a) Make all minimum payments to all debt (obviously, don’t ignore these)
b) Take any extra discretionary money at month end and pay toward the highest interest debt.
c) repeat.
The software doesn’t add any real value beyond this method. It does the math to calculate your debt free date (which adds good feelings, I suppose) but that’s not cash in your pocket, just a reporting of date.
It also creates a dubious “true cost” by telling you what the future value of any expense would be if you paid the debt instead of buying the item.
Using this convoluted approach, I’ve determined the software itself has a true cost of $27 billion. Yes, twenty seven billon dollars.
How? Well, the David claims 12% is a reasonable rate of return. And why stop the future value of money calculation at the debt’s end, it’s really going to cost you for your whole life. But if a 20 year old puts the $3500 into a Roth IRA, it can grow for 70 years and he then leaves it to his grandkid, where the kid takes money out but still invests for 70 more years.
140 years of compounding turns $3500 in $27B. The David said so. And this is no more absurd than the emotional claims the agents of this scam make every day. Only I know my math. (Note – before you ask, it’s only worth $608M after inflation, too bad)
The program has a market because it is offering solutions close to what the customers are asking for. The customers are not asking for logical or mathematical formulas, but for other types of solutions.
To make them become interested in logical or mathematical formulas, you’ll need to add other types of solutions to the final solution.
The idea “math is math” will fail, because this is about PEOPLE rather than about math. People will normally repeat the same type of behavior or thoughtset over and over again.
The program has a market because it has psychological factors built in. It visualizes what it does in the calculations, e.g. by moving virtual money between virtual accounts on the screen. It gives directions about what to do and when to do it, and it also gives lots of feedbacks about the results.
A mathematical formula is not a solution, but it can be a part of a solution. A logical plan can also be a part of a solution. If you combine those two parts, you may still miss some vital parts before you have a complete solution to something.
“The right solution” can often be about what people are INTERESTED in, not about how “useful” it is, “better quality”, “technically better solution”, “less expensive”, or whatever other arguments people are using to defend their own ideas about something.
Don’t offer a mobile phone if people are asking for a smartphone, but you can probably offer a smartphone if people are asking for a mobile phone.
And I don’t offer either. The rule “pay highest interest rate debt first” is actually all one needs. All else is nonsense. The ‘coaching’ comes from people reading off a script.
At least when one goes to AA, they know a bit about their sponsor. With this software, you get the illusion that something magic is going on in the background, but it’s nonsense.
Truth is, as Calvin or anyone who wrote 5 years ago on MMA will tell you, our issue is less about the ‘coaching’ the ‘good feelings’, etc, and some of us don’t care about the MLM aspect, while other focus mostly on that.
What we object to is the sales pitch that can only be called a lie. All of the savings comes from one paying down principal with their own money. All of it. The HELOC shuffle, which I understand all to well, ‘can’ create a tiny bit of savings, but in practice not even enough to pay the cost of the program, and certainly not enough as it’s not implemented correctly.
If the agents would refrain from using the terms “no change to budget” and all the references to nonsense like Factorial math, I wouldn’t care that this stuff exists. But, as it stands, as it’s marketed, it’s a fraud.
Years back, I had interaction with an agent who insisted he was a good Christian, and trusting that I knew my math, asked me what sales script I considered ethical. I responded, and he thanked me for it.
He focused on the fact that by using the HELOC to hide one’s income as it came in, the program made every purchase emotionally painful, but saving and paying debt a positive. He openly admitted that the shuffle was an emotional tool, but it was your own money paying the debt, not this movement back and forth.
In the end, his sales script was honest, and he thanked me. Others continued to repeat nonsense. One agent when asked whether to deposit to a matched 401(k) or pay off a 6% mortgage went on a psychotic rampage, telling me that “most people who had 401(k)s lost all their money.” Wow. I must have missed that.
If you fear the market, use the bond or money market fund, it’s that simple. But don’t tell me that a dollar for dollar match is only a 100% gain (true) but prepaying your mortgage is a 500% savings. (uh, also true, but ignoring the time value of money.)
If they’d stop talking about how in the early years, you effective interest is 180%, because that’s the ratio of interest paid to principal paid (utter nonsense) I’d be happy.
In the end, these folk are nearly all taking a simple math problem that they don’t understand and selling the use of software that they can’t explain by making statements that are factually false.
@JoeTaxpayer
They will do it even when it doesn’t work very well, as long as it’s their own “favorite type of solution”, a solution that will allow them to repeat what they always have done.
THAT is the true problem here. UFF is repeating its original business idea with few modifications. Sue is repeating her strategy and methods. You are repeating the same old stuff. Calvin is repeating his old stuff. You have only changed websites from time to time.
None of you are really analysing what’s wrong and what can be done. All of you are assuming the cause of the problem is “out there somewhere”, “it’s the OTHER party that has to make modifications”.
The cause of a problem is never “out there”. We place it “out there” when we don’t want to make any changes ourselves. “Out there” is actually a method people use to comfort themselves, to feel good about themselves in one way or another.
M_Norway,
With all due respect, you are missing a big part of the history of this program. Math is Math is absolutely an argument because this program, despites Sue’s inaccurate claim otherwise, was originally marketed as “paying down your debt using the banks money, not your own.”
UFF went took their advertising to the brink of illegality, and their typical agents took it so far passed the legal line that the line was out of sight.
This isn’t a matter of “providing a solution”, it was a matter of outright fraud. And that’s the beauty of the MLM model from the scammer’s perspective.
A company can produce a product, then hire an independent sales force to sell it that makes ridiculous claims while the company sits back and reaps the rewards, claiming ignorance of their ignorant sales force. Pursuing individual agents is annoying for law enforcement versus going after a big company.
@Calvin
Post #119
Another way of putting a fraudsters’ tactic is:
Find the source of your targets’ pain and offer to fix it
Their algorithms are flawed. If you are familiar with the system, you know it prompts you to take large HELOC advances which accrue interest months at a time. I’ve proven that there’s actually a theoretical savings to be had, and it’s the litmus test for the naysayers who understand that as well. We know the ideal shuffle requires borrowing the delta from average daily balance to the $5000 monthly income. Any more than that and the savings go negative.
My question to you is this – how bad does the system have to be? How exaggerated must the claims be before they are outright lies?
When I first made my remarks on the HELOC shuffle, there were three reactions. Certain naysayers that accused me of heresy, others who still could not fathom the concept, and those who said, sure, my writing stood to reason.
But if I hear you correctly, so long as the client ‘feels good’ and ultimately succeeds, it’s of no concern the program itself is flawed? < Asking, not putting words in your mouth.
That’s what business is about. “Deliver a solution to a problem, aka cover some needs in a market (and make a profit on the process of doing it)”.
The idea will of course work in scams, too. Ponzi schemes are about delivering people’s DREAMS of becoming rich, or the DREAMS about being smart investors.
It’s actually one of the KEY PRINCIPLES in business, in ANY business.
As well, it’s one of the reasons internet fraud and pseudo MLM scams are increasing at an exponential rate.
Many people are STILL refusing to recognize the whole point of ‘net fraud and, indeed, fraud in general is to make the fraud-du-jour look as close as is possible to a legitimate operation.
Among the squillion reasons given for the demise of Zeek Rewards, it was completely unnecessary to go beyond the fact it was offering to pay 1% a DAY interest.
Likewise, an MLM without tangible products is illegal, bound to fail and guaranteed to be profitable for many/most who participate.
Worth Unlimited, or any pseudo MLM can APPEAR to be using a legitimate business tactic as they like, the fact it/they have no legitimate product AND allow recruitment only members to remain is all that matters in the overall scheme of things.
Sue, I had access to the emails running between Skyler, John, Rex Huang (their lawyer) and the rest of the board back when they were trying to raise capital. ALL the emails until early 2011.
UFirst employees were always sending me this stuff – I didn’t even ask for it. I don’t know why they sent it to me, except they seemed to enjoy my style of mocking the company.
I can tell you this for sure: No banks were ever in the picture. I sent the one email from Rex about a “Sorensen Group” that showed interest needing to sign NDAs, to forensic accountant and scambusting blogger Tracy Coenen, who made it into one of her blog entries about UFirst:
http://www.sequenceinc.com/fraudfiles/2010/08/united-first-financial-is-being-shopped-to-private-equity-groups/
That’s the only interested party ever mentioned in their emails, but the exact company is a bit of a mystery. Sorensen Management Services went so far as to deny it was them. Sorenson Capital is the probable company Rex was talking about. They advertise that they will buy your company.
I also forwarded Tracy the email that agent Richard Schaffer sent to the board and top agents, plotting how to pull the rug out from the existing agents and start a new MLM:
http://www.sequenceinc.com/fraudfiles/2010/07/ufirst-financial-this-is-what-a-collapsing-pyramid-looks-like/
In the end, they did jettison their pyramid. Now they’re trying again as “Wealth Unlimited”.
This is just an evil group of people, preying on those who are bad at math by tricking them with bogus claims about “factorial math” and costing them money and unnecessary interest costs instead of helping them make good decisions with sound math.
Oh, and I wrote the best debunking article about factorial math, too:
http://www.sequenceinc.com/fraudfiles/2008/08/united-first-financials-new-math/
Sue, we have you dead-to-rights on every angle here. Every thing you write is either a lie, or incorrect. I can even pull up things you wrote under your old pseudonym of “Bob Trout” if you like. You can write pages and pages of text, but you can’t get away from the math or the truth.
The websites I checked were clearly focused on retail sales, the program itself rather than the opportunity.
Oz came to the same conclusion in his review. But it has a too limited market, so the opportunity will “collapse” in local markets similar to a pyramid scheme when a market becomes saturated.
I didn’t say it IS a pyramid scheme, only that it ACTS relatively similar to one. Or at least it did so in Canada, if I have interpreted it correctly.
I haven’t even checked the technical qualities (or flaws) of the program. I will normally NOT dive too deep into “the pool of details” (unless it’s really needed for some reason).
Technical problems are normally relatively easy to solve. The problem I identified in post #119 is much more difficult to solve, because people will have problem identifying it clearly and how it affects them.
The mathematical / logical plan has one major flaw = it hasn’t been adjusted to the customers’ needs. It’s an INCOMPLETE solution. It has a flawed idea that the customers automatically will adjust themselves to the solution, but in reality people don’t work that way. The most important factor here is the PEOPLE, not the math or the logic.
Sue’s solution is focusing mostly on the people, but (from my viewpoint) it has some logical flaws. I’m not talking about the program itself here, but about how the business idea is set up to work.
I see. I actually don’t care about the MLM aspect. I’m a math guy. I’m the guy that aced the math SATs in high school. I respect the numbers and take offense when people who have no clue use them to lie.
As I said, if they didn’t have a flawed system, and stopped lying, I wouldn’t care about the price or the MLM.
“What do you give clients for their $3500?”
“Coaching. Then call us from stores and we talk them down, saving them from frivolous purchases and telling them to send that money to their debt.”
Charge $5000 for the above for all I care. At least it respects (even ignores) the math, and contains no lie.
We are analysing the business model / income opportunity, but also related issues. We’re not doing any detailed product analysis, that will normally derail the topic and lead to never ending discussions between 2 or 3 people, e.g. “nutrition experts” discussing their favorite dietary theories.
The audience is defined to be “normal people, without any specific profession or education (e.g. lawyers, accountants, “nutrition experts”)”. The website will of course attract any type of professionals from time to time, but it isn’t PRIMARILY designed for any specific professions in any way.
“Normal people” are expected to have some basic knowledge and experience, e.g. they are ASSUMED to know the difference between a “correct authority” and a blog (e.g. in the cases where we use expressions like “pyramid scheme” or “Ponzi scheme”).
I’m not limited to any specific method. I have a relatively wide range of business experience, and I can normally cover a wide range of topics related to businesses. I can also cover a wide range outside that key area (if needed).
I have pointed out certain “issues” in post #88 and #115, without going into details about it. I haven’t analysed any details there. I will normally work from a specific perspective = “overview rather than details”.
A very simple overview of the product: It is sold fraudulently. If you think that doesn’t merit focus, I would say discussing business is not your forte.
As for offering a solution, i have pages and pages of emails between myself and prospective UFF clients from 5-10 years ago. They mostly ended “thanks for the simple spreadsheet” or something along those lines.
We offered an alternative SOLUTION to the UFF product for a fraction of the price, that price being free. And the solution including knowledge of how interest and savings worked, rather than am overpriced, overhyped black box.
I know. You were in the group I cited as being in agreement. The Shuffle was a clever idea but of little value.
In my effort to debunk MMA 5 years ago, it was best to explain the theory behind it, negating the agent’s claims that we didn’t understand how it worked. It worked poorly enough that it didn’t cover the program cost.
You, Craig, Late2Game, there were another two or three regulars. Our only difference was that some focused on the MLM aspect which as I said, I didn’t really care. I cared about bad math, lies, ignorance.
“Eat well and exercise.” That is a simple (and free) fact but how many of us do it?
Very interesting thread between the literal “math is math” argument and the typical overly positive marketing of someone’s product, in this case “our software will help you pay off your mortgage in no time!” My 2 cents worth: knowing something and acting on it are two different things.
I think there is value here on both sides. Math is math and paying off your mortgage sooner is going to require discipline. That is a fact. But this software is one tool that could help some people with that discipline.
I think people are intelligent and can decide if $3500 is worth the investment to them for this particular product. It might be if this software can help keep you on your debt reduction path (like a trainer can help keep you on your health path).
If you are doing it yourself, then clearly you don’t need this tool. And obviously there are other paths, spreadsheets, free calculators and software out there. The question is, what will work for you?
To me, I know I need to eat well and exercise, yet when that cheesecake is in front of me at the end of a meal at a restaurant, I’m more tempted to get it. Seems like a small indiscretion — one piece of cheesecake isn’t going to make me fat! And the process repeats itself — left to my own devices I’m more likely to sacrifice future gains for current pleasure.
And I think that’s true for most people — engaging in small immediate pleasures often obscures and sacrifices larger gains that could be obtained later.
I believe that one aspect of this software shows you where a little extra money now applied to your larger debt will have a greater payoff than if you spent that extra money on something today. Seeing right in front of you the pros of using that money to pay down debt gives you a current sense of satisfaction for something that you won’t realize for years (total debt reduction).
In other words, it gives you an emotional payoff to save/reduce your debt today.
Maybe this software isn’t the best that’s out there. Maybe it won’t help you. But as one tool that’s out there, maybe it will help someone become and stay more fiscally disciplined.
I would like to hear from people who actually use the software. I could hire a trainer to be more physically disciplined and thus become healthier in the long term (I would still be doing the work, but they would help me with the discipline on a regular basis). That investment may be worth it to me, but may not be worth it or necessary for someone else. I think it’s a similar example here.
If I could get debt free faster with this tool, much like a business may invest in a consultant today for future gains (or savings), I could see this as a valuable investment for some.
Can you do this on your own? Absolutely. Can you do it even better and faster? Sure, that’s mathematically possible. How many people are? I think the number of people without fiscal discipline is pretty big.
I like the idea that this and other tools are out there to help people see just how their poor financial decisions affect them in the long-term and help them take action to become more fiscally responsible today.
I agree that selling this as a “cure-all” with no sacrifice necessary is misleading. But trainers sell you on how healthy you will be, not how much pain you will be in while doing the exercises, otherwise who would sign up?! Getting people to take one step at a time towards fiscal security is a good thing I think, and what I believe happens over the course of using this software program. But I could be wrong.
I would like to hear from people who actually use this product as opposed to those who sell it, or those who don’t use it (or need it). I just prefer reviews from people who own the product versus the stores (or sales people) who sell it or those who don’t own it.
I don’t understand how the program works without the HELOC. If I receive $5,000 in monthly income and pay down the mortgage, altering the average daily balance (isnt that the mechanism that reduces the payoff?), how am I supposed to get back in there and use any of that for my monthly expenses, without the HELOC?
@Curious..
regarding the usual comparisons to personal trainers, GPS, golf coaches, etc, etc, etc… the problem is that paying down your debt outside of refinancing is doing one thing and one thing only, paying more.
The more you pay, the faster the debt goes down. it is that simple. There is no expertise needed. Personal trainers, GPS’s, golf coaches, etc all have expertise that the customers want. That’s a monumental difference.
you have fallen for the hype, focusing on the HELOC instead of money. If you receive $5,000 in income, and your expenses and house payment are $3,000, you have $2,000 extra to go towards your debt.
Ignoring the HELOC, just take the $2,000 and send it to your debt. Or use this approach, take out $5,000 in HELOC, to pay $3,000 in expenses and $2,000 in extra debt payment, then pay it off with your $5,000 in income.
Same result, other than any HELOC expenses/lost interest with the software and the $3500 anchor of a cost.
That’s why we say math is math. The software isn’t doing anything special other than charging you money to write an extra check each month, as always, something you can already do for free.
Thank you, Calvin, for answering a lot of my questions. I have a coworker who keeps trying to sell me on this(she’s an agent on the side), yet can never answer any of the specific questions I ask and pushes me to call into a webinar instead.
Specifically, she kept saying I wouldn’t have to change my budget. Several of the Worth proponents keep calling this semantics, but to my mind upping my mortgage payments is indeed changing my budget.
Perhaps it would be different if I had debt other than our mortgage, but my husband and I live within our means and have been lucky enough not to have any unexpected money woes like high medical bills. As such, this program would be unable to help me.
We keep $15,000 in a high-interest account (higher than our rate on the mortgage) for emergencies, and use any extra to make additional mortage payments, usually 2-3 a year.
We could live off of saltines and pay it off more quickly, but we have already created a budget using free services (currently Mint.com) that allow us to track our spending and decide what spending habits are wasteful and what are necessary for us to feel content.
While I understand not everyone is money savvy and may need professional help, I do find the sales tactics to be disingenuous.
I am a liberal arts major, not a math whiz, and found the sales pitch (which was little different from what was put forth in these comments) to be in an ethical grey area as it seems to deliberately phrase things in a way that could easily mislead those who are not very financially competent.
Honestly, if I hade multiple debt sources and the program could do more than a free online service and made things easier for me, I would be happy to pay a fee if it was presented in a more forthright manner.
Having to hunt through internet forums just to get basic specifics is a turn-off for me, as was having my questions deflected to a webinar because “it’s all very complicated, they have an amazing system of techniques.”
New cars have a “new car smell” because they are new. Rebranding common sense and basic math as something unique bodering on mystical is marketing at best and lying at worst, especially given the price. Comparing it to a realtor’s fee is specious, because, while the average person could learnt o be a realtor, it would be a time consuming process to learn the in-and-outs of a transaction you only do a handful of times.
Managing your finances is a life-long task, and is easily learned. Additionally, a real estate agent is doing actual legwork, whereas this is a computer program.
I don’t usually post in comments sections, but wanted to make an exception to give people pause about what it is they are selling.
Alexandra, if all of the AME/UFF/Worth potential customers took the two minutes that you took to stop and realize not only the lack of product value but also the lack of ethics when presenting the product, they wouldn’t have sold a single copy of this software.
Congratulations in having some common sense. Well done!
I have to say I was at the inaugural launch party of UFF in Las Vegas back in 06′. The concepts to pay off debt and become debt free and to make a living as an agent seemed so great and promising until I dug further into what it takes to for the average American to become ‘debt free’….
The concepts of using software to optimize one’s financial decision making at the consumer level in their program is very promising. Simply plug in your income and debt figures and bam you have a forecast of how much interest you will save and how long it will take to pay off your debt. What a great tool!
Here comes the ‘however’…
I knew if from the start. Why sell this product through agents and instead of packaged as a software product like Quickbooks or a Quicken program? Heck I would love to have this MMA or WorthAccount integrated with a Quicken Program.
That $3,500 fee in the UFF days paid a hefty commission. If you launch a product geared towards saving people money why charge so much? I know that many people rolled that $3,500 fee into their HELOC never having to ‘pay out of pocket’ (yes you pay that fee plus interest later on) but it come on UFF founders… realize what type of product you created which was access to a financial software tool.
If this product was priced as the product it was from the start then we would never have these rants between Calvin and Sue over the years and my goodness the overall confusion about what this product is or any disputes about it’s value.
Another problem when UFF launched is that they would let anyone become an agent. I gotta give the UFF founders a ‘come on man!’ on that one. The MMA was and is a financial tool.
Yes, I realize that many of the top leaders to start were top insurance and financial professionals however, I did meet some sketchy UFF agents along the way that would say anything to make a sale of the MMA product… especially the MLM goonies
Quicken Deluxe is a $50.00 financial tool and the Money Merge Account is $3,500 a financial tool as well… because of the price alone the value is just not there and will never be there for the masses even with the new re-branding and price structure which reminds me of how debt consolidation companies operate—-> charging based on how much they ‘save’ you.
Again UFF / WorthAccount owners… why are you needing to have this agency structure to sell your product and at a cost much much higher than a basic financial software tool…?
There may be value in this product if it were priced like a Quickbooks or monthly subscription like the $9.00 Netflix…
I know that one can utilize a HELOC and leverage between accounts to pay off debt with out the MMA / WorthAccount program (Calvin has clearly made this statement obvious in his threads) Discretionary monies towards debt pays off debt faster.
How much and to what debt and to see an instant snapshot of applying “x” amount to “x” debt is what a financial tool (spreadsheets included) can easily help compute like the MMA / WorthAcount product… Let’s not dress it up like a magic pill proclaiming to the world this one tool is worth the savings you will receive and is far superior to what is available already.
The UFF Founders were mortgage guys that wanted to help people accelerate the pay off of their mortgage faster than the traditional methods of the bi-weekly plan but just took the wrong approach to introducing it to the market and yes even the relaunch of it…
It all comes down to perceived value… Could you imagined if the MMA / Worth Account launched today as a $2.99 app????
Frankly, for that much I could have hired a real financial advisor for cheaper, and gotten better advice, IMHO of course. 🙂
The confusion about this product come solely from UFF agents completely misunderstanding and/or misrepresenting the product. It really is that simple.
As for “which debt to apply to”… highest interest rate. Bam. That simple.
As for the UFF founders… these are not “guys that wanted to help people get debt free”, these are people that want to make money. Period.
The amount of misinformation their sales force has put out there and their complete lack of any effort to correct this misinformation speaks directly to their (lack of) integrity and their true intentions.
Speaks volumes about the “training” they got, as you pointed out later.
On the other hand, this is also a hint of their… weaselness, as they can always point at the affiliates and say “they’re doing it wrong, that’s never how we MEANT them to do it…” Plausible (maybe not?) deniability. 😉
Chang, that’s a huge part of MLM in general… sell a fairly or very generic product, have an independent sales force promise the moon and the stars and charge through the nose.
Authorities don’t want to take the time to go after individual sales people making false claims while the parent MLM can sit back and say “we never made those claims.”
From Calvin:
Absolutely! This is the snake oil that was fed to the agents from the start like all other MLM companies edifying the founders or principals. I was fresh out of college when I took the snake oil but now ward off the MLM scammers like the plague.
Every month there is something in MLM that is in “pre-launch” or is the next “game changer” or “opportunity of a lifetime”
Or how about the real estate investment guru’s that make more money selling their coaching programs and books than investing in real estate…?
Clever and influential people just taking advantage of a captive ignorant market….
I think that Worth Unlimited is awesome. Many can say what they want to say, but at the end of the day how many of these financial gurus or even banks would offer you 8 ways to make money while you are trying to pay off you loan? Not too many, if any at all.
It’s an opportunity to help people while you’re being helped. It’s an opportunity to earn more in 1 sale than some people are earning in a week on a part-time job.
Who can complain about that? Only a person who has another agenda.
It’s all about life to me, loving and being loved. Where is the love? Can’t we all just get along here?
Depends on what you have to do to get paid, doesn’t it? By paying into the system yourself, and recruiting people who also pay into the system to get paid, you have what’s commonly known as a PYRAMID SCHEME.
And there is no loving pyramid scheme unless you’re benefiting from it, is there?
No, it’s an opportunity to screw people while being screwed. You are a snake oil salesman. A conman. A crook. Take your pick. You sell people the ability, for THOUSANDS of dollars, to pay extra towards their debt with their own money, something they can already do for free.
It’s not about being loved, it’s about telling the truth. If Worth salespeople told the truth about what they sold, they wouldn’t make any sales. Stop lying to people and live an ethical life.
or, merely change your same argument to this:
One can earn more in one armed robbery than they are earning in a week on a part-time job. Who can complain about that? Only a person who has another agenda.
You are selling a product for thousands of dollars that doesn’t do anything people can’t already do for free. If the product was so great, you’d think the owners could be successful under one brand name instead of having to change their name every so often because people have thoroughly trashed their product online.
The truth hurts. Get some ethics, conman.
Sue/All. Sorry to resurrect an old blog here but if you see this I had to laugh out loud when I saw Calvin say that he posted in scam.com ha ha.. The conversation should end there. I would certainly rest my case after that one Sue.. ha ha ha
Seriously? who sits in front of Scam.com all day and runs 700 calculations per day on their debt then recalculates after every transaction to see where they can cancel the most interest?
Can you do it yourself? Of course you can. Can I scratch math equations out on paper? yes I sure can but I would much rather buy a calculator to do it.
I can also churn my own butter and grow my own corn instead of buying it off of those scammers at the grocery store..
Whats the point? Its a software program that costs money which shows the average person how to cancel interest. Does it work? YES, does the average person know how to do that on their own?? Absolutely NOT. Nor WOULD they, even if they did know how.
People dont need calculators either but DAMN, they sure do sell allot of them.. STUPID STUPID STUPID arguement from Calvin…. Just consider the source.
Oh and they didnt just decide to change their name to “get a new lease”. The product was bought out by a bigger company because it was in demand and it made sense.
700 calculations per day? What are you smoking?
income – expenses = optimal extra payment. once a month. faster than worth/uff/etc. 3rd grade math.
reality is a bit harsh for you scammers, isn’t it?
Or you can spend a few minutes at these two sites and figure it out for free:
http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/debtplanner/debtplanner.jsp
http://www.bankrate.com/partners/sem/mortgage-calculator-rates-tl.aspx?ec_id=m1082165&ef_id=Uq@GRQAABIh-WSSq:20140117233931:s&MSA=0640
“Oh and they didnt just decide to change their name to “get a new lease”. The product was bought out by a bigger company because it was in demand and it made sense”
They sold it to a different company… with the same owners as the original two companies? Odd statement coming from “common sense.” Your lies never end, do they scammers?
$3500 is NOT an investment, it’s a fee. Anyone with any sort of financial knowledge understands the difference.
Wow. Seriously, wow. I couldn’t read all this, I skipped ahead. You people are acting like Jr. High kids picking a fight behind the school. I’m right – you’re wrong. No I’m right – you are wrong. No …
Some of you are more polite than others but you all are trying to get your point across and, perhaps, convince someone to believe you.
I don’t have the product (under any name) and I don’t have debt. But if I did want such a product I might be inclined to believe thousands of people who have actually used it over a handful of “experts” who have not used the product.
I know people who have bought a Neon or a Saturn. They can get from one place to another just fine. They probably think a Ferrari F12berlinetta is a waste of money, a rip off. Why would anyone pay so much for a car. Unless you have driven one you wouldn’t understand.
Unless you have USED this product, Shut Up!
Maybe the product has no value to you. That doesn’t mean it has no value to others.
Let me clear up a couple of things… One from Chang… “By paying into the system yourself, and recruiting people who also pay into the system to get paid, you have what’s commonly known as a PYRAMID SCHEME.”
Actually, the company does NOT require anyone to buy the program to earn from referring to the program. There is only a REFUNDABLE enrollment fee that you get back as long as you refer a client in the first 30 days that gets the program (Our Agents no longer have to “sell” – only REFER and our in-house team does the Savings Analysis and presentation).
After that, only a $50 year renewal fee to support your websites. Many of our agents are FINANCIAL PLANNERS and those who own pretty large companies… they are often debt free themselves, we don’t sell the program to those that don’t have a need for it.
While our compensation system IS multi-level, we are not at all like a typical MLM where sales are “forced” on everyone in the company through an auto-ship.
NAME change – I believe I explained that our program is a cloud based program. Over the years we have had several companies try to buy us… 2 of the top 6 banks in the country made offers, in fact. We have never sold the actual product.
When we sold the “name” to MA, we were simply selling the “marketing rights” under that name. The ownership of the software itself didn’t change and people that today buy the program under the old name, are getting the same program that Worth is selling.
Worth is just the new “marketing arm” for our in-house “refer & earn” program. You could compare to a company that makes cereal… and sells some under the name Kellogg, and some to a large retail chain that puts their own name on it. Cereal is the same, boxes are different.
Basically it’s like “Private Labels” which we are now also selling. A bank, credit union, financial firm, real estate firm, or any firm that wants to brand this program as their own can get a private label account which allows them to brand the program with their logo, set their own commission structure and even customize the pricing.
One of our private label accounts has been selling about 300 of our programs a month since they came on board. You may start to see this program out there under other names and think… that looks a lot like the Worth program. Well, it probably IS.
FEE… you may consider the fee high, surely there ARE other programs that are less expensive that someone can use to try and pay down their debt… there always HAVE been. But here is the thing… paying off debt the SLOW way, versus the fastest possible way, will cost you THOUSANDS more in interest (so an inferior plan could easily cost you well more than you would have paid for this). Of course, that depends on if you even STICK to your plan.
See… a lot of these other programs and methods people find difficult to use, they might be required to sit in classes, play with spreadsheets for hours, etc. For whatever reason, most people will not stick to a financial plan until they have reached their goal.
However OUR program is “plug and play” – you’re up using it immediately, you have free, unlimited coaching until you feel comfortable, AND, because of this, we DO have a high number of people who stick with it until they are debt free… in the first year, well over 90% of people have stuck to it, and overall our average client (according to our feedback surveys) is getting 20% better results than they initially thought and man, many have become debt free in the 8-10 years we have been selling this program.
I talked to a client from 2007 who paid off all his debt in 2012. He’s been using it since to stay on track and feels it has helped him put twice as much into his retirement as he would have otherwise.
It doesn’t matter how “cheap” someone’s program is if people don’t USE it, right?
What people are paying for with their fee is this…
~~ continual research and development – upgrades are FREE
~~ lifetime license
~~ lifetime coaching and support – also free
~~ plug and play. If you can type numbers in boxes, you will find this EASY.
Another NOTE… when you are compensating a sales team you have to take into account the TIME is takes to sell and market.
This isn’t like holding up a tennis ball and asking if you want yellow or white. We have to do a free SAVINGS ANALYSIS to even determine if we can sell the program… not everyone qualifies. Then we have to explain the program, do a DEMO, etc.
We spend from 20 minutes to 2 hours talking with each client that gets on the program, depending on their level of knowledge going in and the questions they ask.
Look… most people pay MORE in closing costs on their mortgage to get INTO debt, then they spend with us to get OUT of debt. Our “cost” usually falls between 1/2 of 1% to no more than 3.5% of what their potential savings result is, if someone isn’t saving as much, they don’t pay as much, because we DISCOUNT the program for them.
We really don’t get clients objecting to the fee once they see their savings potential. They look at it like a return on investment and our average client is still (with lower interest rates), saving over $100,000 in interest and are still paying off all their debt in an average of 7-11 years.
We’re not discussing the utility of the product, but how it’s sold. Try barking up the right tree?
You’re reciting what some PR-written summary of “what should I say if someone asked if we’re a pyramid scheme”.
That “you don’t have to buy” defense is not sufficient as the sole defense against charges of pyramid scheme, as there are many ways around the problem.
You also need to know what is the percentage of how many people who *did* buy the program vs. those who did not, yet referred customers, as well as comp package to see if one’s incentivized to purchase one for self in order to qualify for higher rewards.
If you want details, see FTC vs. Burnlounge decision.
Chang… I respect you, you’re a smart guy. And you are right about the nature of pyramid schemes… however technically “pyramid scheme” is a legal term, right?
“A pyramid scheme is an unsustainable business model that involves promising participants payment or services, primarily for enrolling other people into the scheme, rather than supplying any real investment or sale of products or services to the public.” (Wiki)
Additionally, typically these “pyramid schemes” also charge people to get “into” them, right?
While Worth does have a $149 enrollment fee to join our “Referral Network” … we actually refund that in the first 30 days upon their first referral-sale of, at least, the Platinum version of the program. There is no monthly cost to be a part of the company and only a $50 yearly renewal fee to maintain your two websites.
This means that someone can be a part of the company, “refer & earn” with $0 cost to do so for the first year, and no requirement to purchase the program either.
We don’t need to force people to buy our program… they buy it because they save money using it.
While I can’t give you statistics on consumers versus agents for the company overall. I can tell you that for my sales personally… about half of the people who purchase our program have not become agents.
Of my agents, about half have not purchased the program.
So, roughly, it’s about 50% of my group that are both consumers and agents. This has been true through my involvement in this company, which began in 2006.
Additionally we have companies (private labels) who are selling our program who don’t even offer the opportunity for someone to become an agent… as they are simply retailing the program to their clients and their clients are unaware of who “Worth” is, the program is logo-ed and branded to that company.
However we DO “incentivize” Agents somewhat to buy the program. Here’s how…
When someone becomes an agent, if they buy the Platinum program, or refer/sell the Platinum program, in the first 30 days, they get promoted to the Director level where they earn more commission for every sale, earn over-rides on two levels below them (their recruits) and also are qualified to refer/sell the Private Labels.
By getting rolling quickly, they are, essentially, skipping over the standard qualification that would normally be equal to about 2 personal sales and 4-5 team sales.
This does give people an incentive to make a decision on a purchase quickly IF they were already considering it. HOWEVER, they still have to qualify! We do a Savings Analysis on everyone prior to purchase.
If they don’t have significant savings, they don’t qualify for the program at that time. I’ve had 4 sales this year fall through because the company determined their income was too “iffy” and they were in a situation where they were not consistently making more than they spent.
We DO have an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau. We like to maintain that rating and the way to do it is by not taking advantage of people and by standing behind our program with the free upgrades and lifetime coaching/support that our clients are paying for.
I want to address something Brad just said as well… he said… “Another problem when UFF launched is that they would let anyone become an agent. I gotta give the UFF founders a ‘come on man!’ on that one. The MMA was and is a financial tool.”
Brad makes some VERY valid points, and ones that the company has recognized and corrected. Like Brad, I was also at that original company launch, and saw the same things he did, so I adjusted my approach and support of my agents accordingly.
Price … has been adjusted to be more of a sliding scale, so that those who save less, pay less. We also have a version for those with only consumer debt that can be had for as little as $750.
Keep in mind though that people aren’t really paying for “software” – they are paying for unlimited, lifetime, coaching/support AND free upgrades for life. I bought Version #1 and am now using Version #5, which is much more sophisticated with even more bells and whistles and tools to make doing my business taxes much easier.
Agents … the company recognized that it was a mistake to allow anyone to sign up and expect them to accurately and professionally sell what is, as Brad states, a financial product.
While we DO still allow anyone to sign up… our sales system has deliberately been changed now to a “refer & earn” system. The company is controlling the presentations by doing them in-house, using people who have, most of them, been with the company for YEARS.
Previously, even before the company did this, I had taken this same approach with my agents, and would allow them to simply refer the client to me for the presentation and Q&A. I found a lot of people loved and believed in our product… but it didn’t always translate into an ability to explain it.
Brad is right… the mistakes made in the marketing model in the beginning are directly responsible for the miscommunications and misunderstandings with this product. It fueled a rather rabid subculture of people who based their opinions off these misunderstandings.
Some were misunderstandings caused by a few “less than professional” Agents who may have misstated aspects of the program. Some were misunderstandings by people who simply misinterpreted the program because, after all, they were not using it and just guessing really at how it worked).
Fortunately, the company has recognized the areas that needed “tweaking” to better represent and market the program. I’ve always been proud to be associated with Skyler and John as they have a high level of integrity and have always been willing to listen, to ask for ideas, and to implement change where needed.
I do want to point out though, that even throughout the “controversy” that existed (solely here on internet blogs and chat boards), there was never any controversy among our actual CLIENTS and industry leaders.
The company maintained an “A” rating in the BBB, it won awards, was courted by top financial firms, and banks, who wanted to buy the company, or the program, etc. In other words, the opinions of actual users, and industry professionals, has overcome the opinions of a handful of nay-sayers on the internet.
Interestingly, I’ve had folks who started out as “skeptics” by reading these blogs/chats, who have come on board as clients or agents once they finished their research. I welcome more and am open to chatting with anyone about this program and my personal experiences over the years with it.
And are you aware the referral sale, i.e. your cost can be rebated contingent on enrolling someone else, is ILLEGAL in all 50 states?
Since you just described a referral sale: refund upon initial sale to some other person.
Look it up rather than quote Wikipedia at me. Wikipedia is fine as general reference, not for legality discussions. For pyramid scheme, you need to refer to Koscot and Burnlounge decisions.
That IS concerning… can you dig up the law on that for me? Because of course we have attorneys and I would suspect they run through these things with them. If you are right, I’ll let them know we need to change this.
But question… why do you think it would be illegal? If it was simply called a “bonus” it wouldn’t be illegal right? After all, a lot of companies do have what they call a “quick start” bonus.
I can dig up some sources.
Jeffrey Babener, MLM attorney:
NOLINK://mlmlegal.com/iowalawcases.html
I haven’t read that one, it focused on MLM more than referral sale.
Here’s another, a short definition article:
definitions.uslegal.com/r/referral-sales-contract/
I copied the whole article there, but it was so short that “Fair Use” should apply.
It is confusing, but on my read it doesn’t seem like either of those apply. They are talking about purchasing products and consumers referring customers. It’s possible that perhaps I wasn’t clear in what our “enrollment fee” is for.
The “enrollment fee” is a one time fee for people, or companies, to enroll in our “Referral Network.” By doing so they are receiving two websites for marketing purposes and are plugged into our compensation plan for referral of potential clients. This is the fee to enroll in the business, unconnected to the purchase of any products.
An Agent is never required to buy our program. That is a separate decision from being part of our referral network.
Some in our referral network are actually corporate entities, such as financial firms. Some are people who are debt free, and would have no real need for our program. As I mentioned, in my personal experience only about 50% of our people are agents AND clients. The rest are one or the other.
The thing is… the company really has no need to make money from our “Agents” or “Referral Partners” (everything is sales driven only – no economic benefit for recruiting) … however if we made it completely free for people to enroll it would cost us, as there is a cost to the company for the resources each enrolled Agent uses in terms of bandwidth for sites, and administrative costs.
You can also imagine it would be a nightmare as some lunatic could decide to just enroll hundreds or thousands of fake people into our system (or real people without their knowledge) … there’s numerous ways it could be problematic.
So to discourage “looky loos” we charge the one-time enrollment fee, but then we refund it back for those that do take an active roll and get their first client in that first 30 days. Anyone that is serious should be able to do that easily.
We don’t refund it to an Agent for buying the program for themselves, it’s just a bonus for getting the first customer referred in quickly. Perhaps the reason we don’t refund it for a personal purchase is connected to the law you mentioned?
@Sue
No.
Are retail customers or affiliates primarily purchasing versions of the program?
You mention your own spread is about 50%. That’s pretty good but we need to know what’s going on company-wide. You could be an anomaly.
If company-wide the split is about 50% then that’s great to see.
The cost remains, commissions paid do not cancel it out.
Or they buy it to “earn more commission”, which is pay to play.
If it were that simple, Sue. Lots of Ponzis refused to call themselves “investments” when that’s what they are. I don’t know how legal is WU, but I do know many of the arguments used by its affiliates to counter the critics are wrong. And that worries me, esp. if it was taught at the corporate level.
The enrollment fee is essentially a buy-in to Worth Unlimited income opportunity. Isn’t it?
Food for thought indeed.
worth unlimited can easily work around this, by making this enrollment fee refundable , for within a few months of signing up as an agent.
the product ,while being a real world niche product , seems inflated.
though it is not incumbent upon an agent to purchase a product on joining, the fast start program , muddies the waters, making sales suspect.
it is very difficult to decide the legitimacy of such a program without access to real data about who is purchasing maximum amount of products, and why.
In other words, make it NOT contingent on a sale? That would work, but begs the question: why charge it in the first place? The excuse “just to make sure you’re serious” doesn’t really fly.
Which is all I am asking WU folks to do… understand they are ASSUMING their opportunity to be legal… when there’s actually very little proof one way or another. Any proof they have is actually equivocal (can go either way).
I wrote, at length, about the Money Merge Account. I don’t care how they market this. MLM isn’t the issue. The underlying math is simply wrong.
I was able to explain the use of a HELOC better than any agent, and describe the ideal situation in which any benefit might be obtained, but the benefit itself was marginal, at best.
When a marketing scheme says “no change to budget,” it’s a lie, plain and simple. In the end, the mortgage acceleration comes 100% from the client’s extra payments.
PT Barnum said there’s a sucker born every minute. Good thing, else this company wouldn’t have any customers.
“Factorial Math”? Give me a break.
I am a user of the Worth Account. I will be debt-free in less than 6 years. That includes a mortgage, car loan, motorcycle loan and other debt.
I can’t explain how the Worth Account works, but I do know it has me excited and has given me hope. I have taken control of my finances now.
For me, and I’m sure for other users of the system, being able to see everything on the dashboard, makes me want to do even better. So I find myself looking for cuts I can make to my spending to make the results even better.
I have tried to make a budget before, but I was not disciplined enough to stick with it. Now I can’t wait to log into the Worth Account to see where I am at and to do the action plans. I recommend it for people like me.
Oh-bloody-dear
Repeating myself…
Sue, you guys are *still* trying to peddle this dog of a product?
JoeTaxpayer is right – the savings are from your own money. Moving money between credit and debit accounts is a shell game, that at best can save you a couple bucks a month, but more likely costs you money in the long run.
“Money Merge Account” or “Worth Account”, it’s all the same con.
I used the account. I had access to the company demo. Company workers used to leak internal data that anyone could get their hands on. The username and password of the demo account used to be demo/demo.
The software makes you move money around for no benefit at all, and usually to your detriment.
The simple method of reducing your spending and sending whatever you have left over, above a contingency amount, to be paid against your mortgage capital, will outperform the Worth Account.
It will especially outperform the Worth Account because of the money you’ll save over not buying it, but even if you bought it, the best thing you can do is abandon it.
Internal emails showed that 75% of MMA users had abandoned their purchase. This was only about 3 years after launch.
Factorial math is an attempted buzz phrase. Google “MMA factorial math” and you’ll find my debunking blog post on that one.
Quickly, the factorial math claim is about calculating how many ways you can order the acceleration of a number of debts. If you have 10 creditors, it seems amazing, but there are actually 3.6 million different ways to order 10 debts, just like there are 3.6 million ways to stack 10 cookies.
Seriously. Factorial math doesn’t tell you which to attack first, but I will:
Attack the debt with the highest interest rate first.
Feel free to google that as well. Some will tell you to attack the small debts first, and that’s good for morale to see one debt disappear, but the very fastest way to get rid of a series of debts (assuming you can’t consolidate them into a lower interest loan, which is even better), is to attack the highest rate debts first.
For years we asked people like Sue to explain, with numbers, why they think this might not be the case, and why the Worth Account (now) would know better.
They will not do that. They know if they post an example that shows how, the error or lie will be caught immediately.
So, don’t buy it. Having worked with some people who bought it and then realized they had been scammed, you will not get your money back if you say you are not satisfied.
If the software asks you to overdraw on one account to pay another, you will not get your money back for the Worth Account. They will not cancel your monthly payment. They will insist you are not using it right.
If you fail to cancel in the first three days after signing, then you are out that money. Period.
Lol… Yes, Craig, our sales are rocking!
I’ve got to ask… Aren’t you tired of rehashing these talking points? Is bashing this company your only form of entertainment? Do you see this as a threat to your business somehow or do you think people should just stay in debt?
I want to point out that two of the top six banks in the US made offers to buy our company to get this program. These are multiBillion dollars companies with attorney’s and mathematicians who inspected this program before making an offer.
A third leading bank is the one who nominated our founders for the “Entrepreneur of the Year” award from Ernst & Young. To win that award our company was also scrutinized and a panel of judges made the award.
We have done more than 300 million in sales since I first joined this company in 2006, and we STILL have an “A” rating in the Better Business Bureau for both companies.
I don’t doubt your personal perspective is what you believe, but I’m not really concerned that you and Joe have “issues” when we have thousands of happy customers with different opinions. After all, in any population you find a % of people who are outliers (or who have ulterior motives).
I am happy to see that you admit that the money shuffle does get you extra savings over what you could do on your own and, yes, we have always said the majority of savings is with your own money. Of COURSE it is. Our new version doesn’t require a HELOC as it just attacks debt where it sits… though clients that have them will perform better.
This program is simply a tool to help you achieve the most aggressive debt pay down you can for your personal cash flow, and a motivational tool to help you stick with it. After all, the difference between a rapid pay down, a slow one, or a “start and stop” can be additional savings of tens of thousands of dollars.
I’ve talked to many of my past customers over the years and found that those who were not significantly impacted by the economic crash (like losing their job, huge income decline, etc), were not only still using the program successfully, one had paid off all his debt and had been using it to aggressively funnel money into his retirement fund.
The folks I talked to that had quit using it had done so only because their income had changed so much they had no extra money, though several credited the program with putting them in a financial place that made it easier to weather the financial storm. Those people were getting upgraded to the new version and getting back on it now that their income was back on track.
In short, to address your negativity… I’ve not yet seen anything that pleases everyone all the time and the Internet, where people can write whatever they want without even using their own name, allows a small minority a voice.
However our BBB “A” rating is proof that yours is a VERY minority opinion. The higher standard the BBB requires, giving your real name, filing a report, etc., allows companies to address VALID complaints as opposed to amorphous gripings in cyberspace.
Our “A” ratings show how well our company handles those with legitimate complaints and our sales show how well liked our program is.
The company has tweaked many things in the 10 years the product has been out there. Our most recent version prints reports, helps with taxes, business and personal finances, allows auto -updating AND our new pricing gives clients discounts based on factors such as their projected savings…
If they aren’t saving as much, they don’t pay as much, yet still get a tool for life, unlimited upgrades and unlimited support.
If you haven’t been upgraded to the new version (if you are telling the truth about owning it), you should call in yourself and get upgraded.. Upgrades are free.
Great info from ALL!!!
For me trying to understand whats going with this is to reduce it the lowest common denominator! That being (using their video info) $5400 income only one bill a $200,000 mortgage!
If we get a Line Of Credit or use a credit card our goal is to get a 30 day interest free loan by using someone else money! Thus saving money on the mortgage interest.
My problem with this is … how do you pay a mortgage without incurring the cash advance fee from a credit card 3% and the daily interest charged at posting? Same for the LOC?
Sue Copening, you were caught using the pseudonym “Bob Trout” back in the day on another message board to agree with yourself, as I recall. You’re not an honest person.
This product is an absolute scam. If people want to use software to show them how pay down debt faster, any copy of Quicken or other budgeting and banking software will do that for a hundred bucks or so. And it will crush the Worth Account in terms of usability and efficiency.
Alberta kicked UFirst out of their province due to UFirst’s marketing practices. I was working with the Canadian Competition Bureau to get UFirst kicked out of all of Canada, forwarding what I had collected on UFirst, when they ceased all marketing activities.
Why did I do this? I hate seeing people scammed. It offends me.
My very trusting but mathematically-challenged friend nearly bought it, but thankfully asked my opinion first. I’ve opposed this product ever since. Every now and then, I’ll take to Google to see where this scam stands. It seems to remain on life support.
If what you claim was ever remotely true, this product wouldn’t need resuscitation. It is still sold through MLM channels because it is overpriced crap. The shell game of moving money around between accounts impresses people who don’t understand what is going on.
They think those transfers are doing things they are not doing. There is no magic. Real costs are going up needlessly. Any acceleration of debt repayment is a direct result of more money being applied to the debts, in a less efficient way than if you avoided the Worth Account in the first place.
Your response to this, as we all can predict, will be a wall of text. If you had anything, you could post sample calculations. You won’t.
I’m not sure what you are talking about with the Trout thing… I’ve always used my own name on here. I did used to have an agent named Bob though.
As for the rest of what you say, again, that’s your opinion, but I’ve worked with the numbers myself, as have many people, and the money shuffle certainly does make a difference because interest is calculated differently with a line of credit.
If you aren’t seeing that, you must be doing it wrong.
But, as you state, the majority of the savings ARE in using your discretionary to pay down debt. Our program just gives people a tool to do it the most efficient way possible.
As you point out, not everyone is a math or financial expert, and would not have the skill, or time, to do it themselves. Our program provides the tool, and helps motivate them to stick with it.
You are welcome to your opinion, though I think it’s a little odd you have now contradicted yourself. You previously said, (didn’t you?), that you had used this program yourself? Now you are saying you did not, only that you prevented your friend from buying it. So you haven’t used it, nor do you know anyone personally that has?
Question… Your friend that you kept from buying this… Is he debt free now? How is he doing on his own?
By the way… You are implying we ceased all marketing activities. No, we sold the marketing rights to Market America who has continued to market the program.
Yes, sales took a hit during the worst of the economic downturn, but now are exploding again.
Worth is simply a new “marketing arm” for the program, as I already explained. You’ll see it above in the thread.
Paul… if you have the program, just call the free support. They can answer specific questions.
In general though… I’m not sure you can avoid a cash advance fee. Also some cards have “sneaky” terms. For instance one of my cards had 0 interest for a year EXCEPT for cash advances which triggered a full interest rate for that amount and put it in front of other charges (meaning you’d have to pay balance to zero to eliminate the interest).
However, you don’t need to use a credit card to pay the mortgage. Instead, don’t use cash advances but use to use it to cover only those daily expenses that you can pay off entirely at month end, thus “floating” that amount of money for that time period. Does that make sense?
Or, if you have a zero interest card, then float out a little longer than a month, throwing your income into the card(s) as it comes in.
One of my clients utilized several zero interest cards to float about three months of expenses for 9 months, then paid balances down before interest was triggered.
Using a credit card the same way as a HELOC does work, but you have to make sure that, if you do, the total of interest you pay on it is not significantly higher than your mortgage rate (it can be a little higher because it’s calculated on avg daily balance).
So if the 3% is the only thing you pay (otherwise its a zero rate card with no triggering of % on cash adv amounts), then it can sub in for a LOC easily.
I just don’t like giving specific advice because I don’t have access to knowledge of someone’s terms on their card or a way to know if they are missing something that would alter my advice.
The most efficient way is apply the maximum amount on debt with the highest interest. What’s so special about that?
Nothing. It’s like buying the most expensive GPS available for the sole purpose of directing you to your neighbor’s house. Seriously – that’s exactly what it is.
Sue, After reviewing the Mike & Mary story. I noticed their total debts were approx $30,000 besides mortage.
A refi plus costs and a new mortgage of $235,000 at 5% vs their old 4.5% loan. Paying $2,173.49/mth the home is paid of in 12 years. A payment of $3,784.66 the home is paid off in 6yr’s.
I also noted after subtracting their payments at 3% of balances. They were paying approx $883/mth on the cards. Added to the mortgage of 1013 = $1896/mth. Yet they brought home $5200. That left $3,304 for food, utilities, expenses, entertainment.
That is a lot of money to only have $200 in their savings acc. 🙂 Why would I need a $3000-$4000 software package do this myself? Thanks Sue. mortgagecalculator.org
I see Sue (Bob Trout) is still around lying, cheating and stealing. Still feeding on the uninformed, charging them thousands over time so they can pay their own money to their own debts, something they’ve been able to do for centuries for free.
It’s sad that you are still making false claims about banks interests in the “program.” I like how banks with their billions can never compete with tiny companies with no interests. Sue, we all know there was no interest, just like the marketing statistics are made up.
It’s sad you have to make money scamming people. But lord knows it’s who you are at your core, so you won’t be stopping. You’ll move on to the next scam when this brand name goes the way of Accelerated Equity and UFF and loses it’s reputation. You should do the high pressure time share con, you’d fit right in.
I was only 24 when I attended the launch of U1st Financial in Las Vegas in 2006. Through the first year as an agent I met the top trainers, owners, and higher up agents on board.
All friendly and driven to make a difference for their clients. Never felt like it was some type MLM business where you were trained to recruit the world.
In 2006 it was easy to wash the $3500 fee into a HELOC and commence the experience of using the Money Merge Account Software. That is where the “no money out of pocket” came into play.
HELOCs at the time where easy to come by with the real estate market pre-crash and values still ample…
As time went on I found it difficult to sell the program knowing that despite the savings on the back end we could “potentially” save people…. the $3,500 fee was a flat rate for “software access” no matter the size of home or debt to cancel.
When the banks started to freeze HELOCs as the housing market declined… I knew the vehicle that paid for my “software access” sales was gone and it would be an even harder sale.
As soon as the crash hit I was out as an agent and felt pretty bad I ignorantly overlooked the simplicity of this this product and the company’s complete failure to price it correctly from the start…
The company then re-launches / re-brands into the same “software access sales” company to include all debts with no HELOC required.
I thought when I heard about this… GREAT! but… how much would the software access cost be for people with only CC debt VS those with a mortgage….?
% of the future debt is the new way to charge clients for software access… Unfortunately the % methods completely overprices the software access yet again…
The idea behind providing a “financial GPS” tool to help visually show people a snap shot of their time to be debt free and their savings is what sold me on this product initially. This tool would help properly leverage a HELOC to incorporate savings and debt pay off goals.
This tool shows people that their home is NOT an investment but a DEBT that will require you to pay in every month with an amortization schedule that is front loaded in favor of the banks… “If I make extra payments “X” I will save “y” or if I have more discretionary income “x” I will save “y” paying off “z” debt… It will keep you in tune with your budget vs debt pay off at all times.”
But… the price tag now and before is for “software access” and that fee is sadly just too much.
There are software access platforms just as sophisticated people use to construct fantasy sports line ups for crying out loud! lol
PAYING EXTRA TO YOUR MORTGAGE SAVES YOU MONEY NOT THE SOFTWARE ACCESS! It is a tool to guide you therefore should be priced based on what the product is… consumer software access… around $99 a year is the charge for mint…
Let’s not ignore what this program is… “SOFTWARE ACCESS”.
If I were the owner of this program I would find a way to incorporate this into a widget with your major personal finance software platforms.
This is a niche idea to systematize the leverage of one’s HELOC and perceived budget to pay down debt and help forecast one’s ability to pay off debt at a specific forecasted time.
U1st made a HUGE mistake in launching with an independent sales agency format to sell their product as well as completely overpricing their product.
If re-launched now they could have re-luanched as an affordable subscription based app platform.
Brad,
Even if the MMA were free, it slows debt repayment because it’s inefficient. I don’t know how the programmers made it so inefficient, but that was confirmed back in the day.
If you compared the results of a free MMA with a simple prepayment formula (prepayment=income-expenses), the simple formula won every time.
And the MMA isn’t free. Back in the day, I calculated that, besides the fee, the program costs another $1000 or more in inefficiencies.
That shows the MMA was a scam from the start. It needs to look complicated so that people who don’t understand math are impressed.
It has always been a bad product, it was sold using a pack of lies by a sales force of morons (which kept debunking it rather entertaining), and even the money back guarantee wasn’t worth the paper it was printed on.
I never heard of a refund, though many people came to us for help in getting one.
It was an honour to help take down this scam. I search for UFirst when I remember it, which brought me here. Even the people in head office knew it was a scam, and someone was forwarding us internal emails and login information.
We knew what UFirst was planning long before the salespeople. We had access to the master agent list. We had access to the MMA itself, which is how we tested it and found it was so inefficient.
Last I knew, Don Daniel was still selling this scam as “The Pill Method” to more people who can’t do basic math. And then there was the “Worth Unlimited” rebranding, which seems dead.
This software doesn’t need to be cheaper – it needs to become extinct.
SO…… It is now October if 2018!!! this conversation started in 2021!!! 6 years, and guess what? Worth Unlimited is still going strong!
It’s all about the discipline – you either have it, or you don’t. People who have it, great, pay off your own debt your own way, people who dont have it, suck up the fee and get going. christ!
6 years here, ya’ll could have paid off your debt by now! wow! Better idea…. don’t take on debt, then you wouldn’t have to figure a better way out! You’re all so freaking smart? why do you have debt to begin with? LOL!!!
This Company and their product is NOT a scam, it is an answer for the people who need it, so shut the front door….people like this Calvin guy! really?
OMG! you’re so great and so smart, spend your time helping people then, not steering them away from something that may help them.
Whats wrong with you people? Seriously. Sue, Who the hell? why would you battle with these people? they are idiots.
Meanwhile Worth Unlimited’s website ranking is 7.3 million (Alexa). What’s that work out to, 20 odd visitors a day?
You do yourself no favors running around the internet claiming otherwise.
Sometimes talk about mortgages reminds me of this topic and I Google it to see if there is any more discussion.
Diane, it’s effectively dead. It exists now mostly to keep monthly payments coming in.
More people should just stop paying. I advise people to cancel their payments. Cancel their credit card the payment is coming from if they have to. Just stop paying these scammers.
Someone on the inside of United First Financial used to leak emails to me. I had access to all sorts of high level conversations. They were crying about declining sales years ago before the rebranding.
John Washenko was whining that they should pull out of Canada, which was rewarding for me, because I was feeding info to the Competition Bureau of Canada to get them turfed, and they left instead.
Their lawyer Rex Huang was hunting for investment firms to pump money into them, and no one was biting, because most investment firms aren’t that stupid.
All the development of the “software” stopped. They did a white label product through another pyramid scheme, they rebranded to “Worth Unlimited”, they had Don Daniel spin off the PILL Method sales technique which is crap, and none of them ever really did anything. That’s because the product is an obvious scam.
The math has been done to death, they don’t have the money to pay magazines which exist to promote the companies that advertise within their pages, and now they are just riding out the payments from people too lazy or too uninformed to cancel.
I’m proud we managed to kill this thing rather quickly, but it wasn’t going to survive on it’s merits, even without our involvement.
How does the math behind this system work?
Figures are detailed in the compensation plan section of the review.