Being careful of Scams, Charlatans and Frauds

 Reply:Why didnt I move to Estancia Cafayate in the Province of Salta

Anonymous said...

This post is a bit out-dated but still applies to those looking to take advantage of the crumbling Argentinian peso to the dollar and be haggled into buying property at "La Estancia de Cafayate." As a previous resident and employee in the resort, I've concluded that what was marketed as a "Libertarian's Paradise" by the Casey Group has been nothing but a sham and all the blind Casey followers are either kicking themselves for a stupid investment or rationalizing all that wasted money as to "how could good old Douggie ever steer us wrong?" At the last Casey Research Event held in Cafayate, Doug had little to say about anything except for "You're all a bunch of chimpanzees!" And now he really does have the last laugh as all of his shares in LEC have been sold over to the ever corrupt Ramiro family. In just my short time living there, I can't put into words how sick and terrible this family really is -- from the aspiring political artist, marriage breaking, cheating on his American spouse son to the smooth talking politicot of the Salta Province father. This family effectively chased out any new businesses in La Estancia and has tried (but failed multiple times) to monopolize all services within the community.

The town of Cafayate is very charming though and can be a nice place to spend a week on your tour of Argentina. The times be a changin' though in the sleepy town due to all of this gringo-lovin corruption though. All Argentines, from the quiet villager to the newly arrived Portenos, love to say the same thing about the town -- safety. Everyone looks out for one another, including your belongings, and this was something I loved so much in the town. However, petty theft crimes are climbing now that Cafayate is on the map as a destination for rich, polo-watching, wine sipping idiots, the people, or its police, or La Estancia de Cafayate employees itself are beginning to take advantage.

So to all of you who heard the call and saw the wolf dressed as a sheep in the pasture, cheers to you.

A-

Thanks for sharing your experience.

I have absolutely nothing against anyone making an honest buck, or a million of them for that matter but I do have a problem with people being lied to or fooled. Even more so, I have a problem with people being tricked into parting ways with their very hard earned money. An important part of a well-rounded modern survival mentality is to learn to identify scams and con artists. I can sleep at night knowing that I did my best to inform people about what life in Argentina is like and even more so what life in a poor Argentine inner province like Salta is really like.

Argentina has already fallen apart, and these last couple years its been even worse than imaginable with the default, even worse crime and further breakdown of society. Its as if after the building crumbled, someone went on to salt the earth and pour gasoline all over the rubble. Today, moving to Argentina is as smart as relocating to Venezuela.

By now, anyone that bothered to do basic online research about Argentina and this man’s investment would have found my writings, which are based on overwhelming facts about the situation in the country and province. If after reading it all you still “invest” in such a place I just don’t know what to tell you.

But the reason I’m posting this isn’t to warn more people about this man yet again. Google “exposed” and this man’s name and you’ll find even more interesting facts. I’m posting this to warn everyone about the hundreds of people like him, that call themselves “investors”, “international man of mystery ”, “libertarians”, “Christians”. Especially in the survival community, I’ve noticed that with rare exceptions, those that boast about how great Christians they are, with a holier-than-thou attitude and bible-thumping narrative, they tend to be the worst. With “libertarians” something similar happens. Some people are true libertarians while others want to liberate you from your money. Same goes for “international rich big shots”, self-claimed billionaires that will let you into their inner circle for $99.95. Folks, these are people that have only one guiding principle which is to make as much money as possible (no problem with that), anyway they can(here we have a problem). There are self-claimed survival experts and gurus that do the exact same thing in USA, simply to make money out of you buying property or land in a way that suits their own best interest. 

I love Americans. Believe me I do. You’re fantastic, generous people and although there’s bad apples just like in any other society Americans are the nicest, good hearted people out there. But in many cases you also trust too much and tend to be naïve, usually giving people the benefit of the doubt if not just downright trusting complete strangers. Times are getting tough folks. Con artists and charlatans abound and there’s more of them every day.  Before parting with your hard earned money do a LOT of research. Read reviews, google information about the product or person you’re about to trust, may that be buying a 30 dollar knife in Amazon but even more so when buying a $200.000 retreat in Argentina or Idaho.

There’s people right now getting tricked out of their life savings and they don’t even know it. Just make sure you’re not one of them.

FerFAL