A less than Fantastic Freebie to avoid: Robert G. Allen

I'll probably get flamed for writing this, but oh well. Robert Allen has been hawking "Get rich quick" schemes involving real estate, the internet, and network marketing since before I was born. Real estate expert John T. Reed writes that Allen is "little more than a financial publicity stunt man" whose advice is "generally terrible." Reed warns that you could "wind up in jail" following Allen's advice.

Now Mr. Allen is "giving away" a copy of one of his books if you fill out a form. He'll even pay the shipping! Sounds like a no-lose, right? Wrong. Read the fine print: "To receive your free book (you won't even pay for shipping and handling), you must complete all fields below, and our consultant must confirm your mailing address during the personal phone session."

Now color me a cynic but why is that Amazon.com will ship me $100 worth of books without confirming my mailing address, but Robert Allen needs to have one of his "consultants" call me up to make sure that I actually meant what I typed into the website. It's almost like the free book carrot is just a ploy to get a phone number so they can try to sell you the thousand-dollar "training sessions" Allen's known for.

I haven't tried this offer out but here's my advice based on what I've heard from others: unless you currently feel that you're not receiving enough telemarketing calls at strange hours, don't give Robert Allen your phone number and definitely don't give him your money.