- This topic has 6 replies, 4 voices, and was last updated 18 years, 5 months ago by
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Hi all,
a word of warning about buying off-plan from an agent. Ours was an assigned contract. The agent bought the property himself for 196,000 euros, sold it to us 9 months later for 245,000 euros with an assigned contract and a 2 year wait for completion. The completed property has many problems (as described in previous thread). We thought about getting all our money back as amongst many other problems, our apartment is about 10% smaller than as descibed in the contract.
However, we can only get back the money paid to the developer. The profit made by the agent is not protected by the bank guarantee and we are advised it is money we cannot get back. He has pocketed 50,000 euros and there is nothing we can do (unless we want to throw loads of money at a court action, with no guarantee he would pay up if we won).
People should be aware that if buying with an assigned contract, the bank guarantee does not protect all the payments you make. How can this be legal? Surely if you are told that a bank guarantee protects your payments, it should protect the total amount you pay, not just the bit that the developer receives.
I was totally unaware that agents could buy and sell in this way, and that a bank guarantee in such circumstances is nearly worthless. In our case, of the 130,000 euros we have paid so far, we would only get back 80,000. The agent has pocketed the rest.
I hate agents. 😈 😈 😈
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Hi Claire,
the person who originally bought our property, bought several (not sure exactly how many) properties in his name and sometimes in his wife’s name.
He then sold them via his company, the estate agent. He is the director of the estate agent. We thought he was just the “agent” for the seller and not the actual seller.
Not a bad little earner for him. If he sold 20, (and I think this is a low estimate, given the promotions he used and the number of properties he showed us) he has pocketed a million euros.
Laughing all the way to the bank. 👿 👿
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I’ve reported them to the local OMIC, and shall wait to see if they can do anything, if only to protect future clients.
Something should be done about these assigned contracts though, even if it is only that the sellers of offplan properties have to obtain additional insurances so that all payments of the purchaser are protected.
🙁
An article to warn people of the perils of assigned contracts wouldn’t go amiss either.
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Wigan girl – what your agent did is unbelievable. Is he a member of the IN Network (a lot of agents on the CDS seem to be – they have all the MLSA listings). If so you could complain to the network, as on their website they go on and on about how reliable and honest all agents who are members of the Network are !! Their website is http://www.theinnetwork.com/eng/home.asp – Click on ‘About us’ and the link to ‘Code of Ethics’. Looking at the code of ethics and thinking of all the big players who are members of IN it is obvious that the code is a work of fiction of the highest order !! However, it might be worth your while seeing what kind of a reply you get from them. Good luck and hope you get some satisfaction from OMIC.
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