Latest Balcones Status

Happy New Year to all and lets hope for good news on our investments in 2009.

Like all of you, we have been receiving updates from IAP Global Ltd (formerly IAP now in administration).  It seems to us that there is some in fighting between IAP Spain (not in administration) and IAP Global...there certainly has been a lack of information up until now.

These updates are talking about the options for Los Balcones (and other sites) with a promise of more information in the new year. They have proposed meetings to discuss the options and this is long overdue.

Sitting tight doesn't seem to be a realistic option as this could drag on indefinitely.

Flipping to another development sounds interesting, but there are many questions to be answered on this point including... what are the legalities? what happens to the current contract? who are these new developers and are they any different to San Antonio? what about the deposits already paid? what about rental potential from the new development?  the list goes on and who's to say that it will be any different to the Los Balcones experience!

This brings us to legal action and many of us have already started proceedings against San Antonio.  There is no guarantee of successfully getting our deposit back as even if we win the case, getting the money from an ailing developer could prove very difficult.

We have decided that our main course of action is to try to get our deposit back.  We have instructed independent solicitors to start proceedings and after a deathly silence from San Antonio to our initial letters, we are now entering the litigation stage.  But we want to pursue a plan B in the event that we aren't successful and so we are interested to hear what IAP Global believe they can offer us.

We would be interested to hear from others, especially those who are further along with the litigation process.

Regards

Helen & Andy

Hi Helen & Andy

We have just sent funds to the court procurator and are now waiting for our lawyer to confirm the date - as you say plan B still needs to be considered but at the moment I believe changing to another development has the same negative points as Los Balcones... Apart from the development swap we have not heard anything else from IAP Spain/Global - will post any news once we receive an update from the lawyer.

Good luck to all what ever plan you follow !!

cheers

Peter & Barbara

Hi Helen and Andy, I am also in the first stages of legal action to retreive our deposit. I presume you have all had the letter asking for more membership fees or else we are on our own with any existing purchases still to be completed. Does this sound like blackmail?

Reading your letters it seems we are all on our own anyrate. It,s amazing how good they are to us to knock 50% off and only change a one off fee which happens to be 4x what I paid last year. I wonder how many millions that will bring in. Makes you wonder what they want it all at once for. How do the rest of you feel about paying this?

Regards Browny

Hi All

I hate to be the bearer of bad news but have just returned from Spain.  San Antonio office in Villamartin is closed and there is a sign on the door which says closed for technical reasons.  We bought through Atlas so we called at their office and were told that San Antonio has gone into liquidation.  We have a property on La Cinuelica and we went to see our community administrators regarding street lighting and they confirmed that San Antonio is in liquidation.  I think there are still quite a lot of key ready properties for sale on La Cinuelica for anyone who is prepared to transfer.  I hope everything gets sorted out for you.  Good luck,

Regards

Maureen

IAG have issued last day for 50% fee reduction for membership £2500 is highly inflated from anything paid previously so not sure how this has been agreed? - I am guessing this is to ensure a large intake of cashflow and by securing eventual completions on properties I am sure will result in commissions received from developers to IAG hence the motivation.Would like to stay in touch on here to monitor progress

Hi

Can I respectfully suggest that if you are buying a property from Sanantonio you look at the off plan forum for Fortuna Hill Golf and Residential Resort.

Best regards

Madmau

Thanks Madmau, but I can't find anything under this heading on the off plan forum. I am looking in the wrong place? Regards Browny

Hi

Sorry I have just got your message.  If you type  Eye on Spain Fortuna Hill Golf and Residential resort  into your google browser  and click on the first item down it will bring you to the site. You will need to go onto the second page to get the latest information.

Regards Madmau

Copy of message posted on the Eye on Spain Fortuna Hills site.

HI

We have just returned from Spain. We went to look at the San Antonio Los Balcones building site. There is a skeleton cement structure of two buildings at one edge of the site and that is it. Apart from that the whole site is deserted-no machinery-no building materials-no sign of any work at all just a large area of barren land with not even a sign of any planned roads. After speaking to people locally I am sorry but I have to agree with Roy from Inspectahome that the signs are that the builder may well be heading for administration. I also agree that the DIY direct to the builder who already holds your deposit route is the way to go with a good independent solicitor. If you can negotiate a good discount with an already built key ready property which I feel sure you will be able to do then you can move away from any more contact with IAP. The one good thing I can say about San Antonio and probably the only good thing I can say is that his properties are very well built. I know someone who has lived in one of his apartments for 4 years and has not heard anyone complain about the quality. On the other hand we have relatives one of whom bought off plan in Bigastro and another who did the same at Turre with different builders and they have both had to move out of their properties after completion because of cracking walls and structural faults so be careful. Good luck.

Best regards

Madmau

Hello everyone - it is all very quite on the los balcones del valle front.  We are still going down the route of trying to get our deposit back via a lawyer in Spain.  Just wondered if anyone has already been successful - as you can tell just clutching at straws.

We are also still waiting..........

We had our court hearing scheduled for May 9th - on the day of the court hearing our case was then delayed until Sept 5th - so still waiting as well !!

Just had our preliminary hearing. As unable to agree a settlemt it will go to a final hearing scheduled for May 2011. How is any one else doing?

Our Hearing was delayed from May to Sept 20th - so not long to wait for it to be delayed again....... I am not expecting to reach a settlement as the builder want to delay as long as possible......anyways will wait and see and post the news when it happens.

We are also still waiting. We haven't asked when our Hearing is from our Lawyers so maybe we should be alittle more pro active [just a sign that we are not holding out much hope!]

As expected - the hearing was delayed again with no date given - writing this one off... where is that Euro Lottery ticket.... more chance of getting our money back that way!!!...

Just had our final hearing and awaiting sentencing that can take 6-8 weeks to hear the outcome.

How is anyone else getting on or have you written this off as a "no hope of recovery".

J.

That is a step in the right direction. we have not heard anything yet so will get onto our solicitors for an update....

here is an excert from a recent mail sent to us by our solicitors Costaluzlawyers

has anyone else got a similar mail ??

""

We are just about to launch the bank action based on legislation 57/68. This law states that banks are jointly liable for not having put in place a bank guarantee in order to secure your payments.

We are launching this action collectively for a number of our Eurohouse clients as Eurohouse is in fact in a creditors meeting due to its poor financial state. Eventhough your credits have been presented to the creditors meeting, it will take a substantial period of time to receive payment. Payments are made over a structured period of time based on an official payment plan. There are also cases in which depending on the exact financial state of the company, 100% payment is not always recoverable.

The bank action is therefore aimed at recovering the full amount plus Interests and legal costs, far sooner.

""

here is an excert from a recent mail sent to us by our solicitors Costaluzlawyers

has anyone else got a similar mail ??

""

We are just about to launch the bank action based on legislation 57/68. This law states that banks are jointly liable for not having put in place a bank guarantee in order to secure your payments.

We are launching this action collectively for a number of our Eurohouse clients as Eurohouse is in fact in a creditors meeting due to its poor financial state. Eventhough your credits have been presented to the creditors meeting, it will take a substantial period of time to receive payment. Payments are made over a structured period of time based on an official payment plan. There are also cases in which depending on the exact financial state of the company, 100% payment is not always recoverable.

The bank action is therefore aimed at recovering the full amount plus Interests and legal costs, far sooner.

""