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Dream home horror at Bosque del Lomas III (Villa Martin, near Torrevieja) bought from Tecnologia Urbanistica.
Thursday, February 23, 2012 @ 7:11 PM

IMAGINE BUYING your dream home in the sun and paying for it in full only to have it re-mortgaged by a rogue builder before being repossessed? This nightmare scenario is a reality for more than a dozen homeowners who bought properties on Bosque del Lomas III from Tecnologia Urbanistica.

RTN met with Iwan and Jill Williams last week, who arrived for a half term break in the sun to be greeted with a two foot high pile of official documents on their doorstep; papers from the Orihuela Judicial Court stating their property was to be repossessed by the CAM bank as part of their lawsuit to reclaim €4,885,000 in debt from the owner of the now defunct property developers.

According to the document, Iwan and Jill’s house had been remortgaged by the owner of the company for €77,000 - accumulated to €132,883 with interest that is increasing daily.

POWER OF ATTORNEY
61 other properties in the community 15 of which were paid for in full were ‘remortgaged’ by the rogue developer. Iwan explained: “We bought the house in 2004 for €150,000 through the estate agents, Atlas. They recommended Aroca solicitors and we gave them power of attorney to deal with the purchase.”

The couple then moved into the property and set about on a four year battle to get their deeds from the developer. Every time they came over on holiday, they would enquire with the solicitor as to where the deeds were and every time they were fobbed off.  So they found new solicitors that unfortunately turned out to be best friends with the solicitors of the property developer - so nothing was done.

JEOPARDY
The deeds were used by Emilio, the owner of Tecnologia Urbanistica, to remortgage the properties to enable him to buy more land to develop.  When the property boom went bust he couldn’t afford to repay these mortgages. He then conveniently disappeared to Brazil.  As CAM, purchased by Banco Sabadell for €1, couldn’t recover their €4.8 million plus interest from Tecnologia, they filed a lawsuit to repossess the properties mortgaged; of which Iwan and Jill’s is one.

Meanwhile, the couple’s new solicitor advised them to remove their belongings from the property; she suspects the house will have been taken by the time they return for their summer holidays.

And as if that is not bad enough, Iwan said: “House prices here are rock bottom so even if they sell they will only get 60,000€ maximum - so what happens to the rest of the debt? They could still come after the remainder and our UK home would also be in jeopardy.”

RTN has contacted all the other homeowners listed on the court documents and will be liaising with them to help find a solution to this scandalous situation.
 

***STOP PRESS***
RTN received an email from Iwan as it went to press to say that the Judge in Orihuela has informed his solicitor that on 21st June, 32 houses from the 61 affected on the urbanisation are going to be auctioned and one of them is Iwan’s property.


Source: Round Town News

 



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8 Comments


louise said:
Sunday, February 26, 2012 @ 11:58 AM

the article is not clear on one point -
1. as they appear not to have signed the title deed at the notary who agreed to hand the full amount of money to the constructor without the benefit of the signing of the deed .
2. if the deed was signed who allowed it to be passed over with a builders mortgage still in place.
seems to me the lawyer has failed in his duty of care as her held power of attorney.
at the end of the day the bank want their money so i suppose a negotiation with the bank has been tried?


peterc said:
Monday, March 19, 2012 @ 12:54 PM

Yet another example of the idiotic and convoluted legal system in Spain. What a deplorable mess, and an utter nightmare for those affected. How can honest people, employing professional lawyers, and doing everything right, get landed in such a mess? Iwan and Jill must be in a terrible state - but they need to fight this situation tooth and nail, by whatever means possible. It is precisely this sort of unbelievable occurrence that persuades thousands of would-be buyers not to touch Spanish property with a barge pole. Why can the Spanish Government not see this and step in to put things right? The housing market in Spain will continue to plummet when this sort of thing happens.


kevib b said:
Wednesday, March 28, 2012 @ 6:47 PM

utterly sickening!!!! i think the spanish law system think all British people are rich and take their lifes work away in the brink of an eye when it's the stupid ( yes i did say stupid) spanish law system that has done this.
Blood is boiling noe i'm off
ps
both posters above are 100% right


Mark Foreman said:
Saturday, May 12, 2012 @ 4:49 AM

When will people realise that when the language is Spanish the words Chaos, Catholocism and corruption follow:

Jaja if you think Spain is a nightmare visit the rest of the ex colonial Spanish banana republics. I know first hand Mexico and Colombia. Believe me Spain is a paradise!! Many (not all) would rob their own mother if they could get away with it....


Martin Cynberg said:
Thursday, June 20, 2013 @ 10:10 PM

We lost 50000£ our solicitor is useless and trying to get to the truth is unbelievable we went to court won our case and still couldn't get our money back the whole legal system stinks we now live a very poor retirement they have ruined our life these people need stringing including the lawyers and judges


kerric01 said:
Monday, July 28, 2014 @ 11:12 PM

Can anyone give me any updates/advice/stories etc regarding the whole atlas, aroca ,Tecnologia Urbanistica scam. We are fighting auction for january and then have a 2yr battle ahead of us. is it worth it , can we actually win, will we get anywhere???


mariadecastro said:
Friday, September 9, 2016 @ 9:39 AM

LEY 57/1968 Won Case in First Instance Court against BANCO SABADELL for our client who purchased an off-plan property from the developer Tecnologia Urbanistica at Colinas De La Zenia Elite Fase III in Orihuela Costa

We were pleased to inform our client recently that we had won their case against Banco Sabadell (formerly Banco CAM) in the First Instance Court.

The client paid their off-plan deposit according to the Purchase Contract to the developer’s bank account at Banco CAM (now Banco Sabadell). The client did not receive an individual Guarantee for their off-plan deposit from the developer, Tecnologia Urbanistica or from Banco CAM.

The First Instance Court has now found the Bank guilty according to its legal obligations under Article 1.2 of LEY 57/1968. The bank must refund the amount paid to the developer’s account plus interest at the legal rate from the date the money was paid into the account. Legal costs were not imposed on the Bank due to the fact that the Judge is of the opinion there was conflicting jurisprudence regarding banks liabilities according to LEY 57/1968 at the time the Lawsuit was filed and the Bank submitted its written defence.

Re: YOUR CASE AGAINST BANCO DE SABADELL S.A.
PO xxxx/2015

Please find attached Sentence No. xxx/2016 from the First Instance Court No.1 in Orihuela.

Your case against BANCO SABADELL has been won.

The final paragraph of the First Instance Sentence delivered on 5 September 2016 and notified on 5 September 2016 states:



“Upholding the Lawsuit filed by xxxxxx against BANCO DE SABADELL S.A. with the following pronouncements:

1. I declare the legal responsibility of the entity BANCO DE SABADELL S.A. pursuant to Article 1.2 of LEY 57/1968 and therefore condemn the financial entity to refund the sum of xx,xxx Euro, being the amount deposited in the account opened by the developer in the said bank.

2. The amount indicated will accrue interest at the legal rate from the date of payment, or in this case, the date the funds were deposited in the account opened by the developer in Banco de Sabadell S.A. The interest rate will be increased by 2 points from the date of this Sentence according to Article 576 of the Civil Procedure Act.

3. Without the express imposition of costs of the proceedings”


So BANCO SABADELL is sentenced to refund the amount of xx,xxx€ plus interest at the legal rate from the date the funds were paid into the developer’s account opened at Banco Sabadell.

The Judge did not impose costs on the bank; therefore each party will pay its own costs.

Interesting statements from the Judge in the Sentence were:


“On 12 November 2015 the plaintiffs filed a Lawsuit against Banco Sabadell, requesting the conviction of the bank according to its responsibility under Article 1.2 of LEY 57/1968. The plaintiff requested the refund of the total amount paid to the developer under the Purchase Contract plus interest & costs, alternatively, the amount actually credited to the Banco Sabadell account opened by the developer, which was 3,000€ less than the total amount.

Banco Sabadell opposed the Lawsuit and said that it had not guaranteed the funds and that the funds were paid to an ordinary current account opened by the developer, over which the bank had no control or monitoring.

The Preliminary Hearing was held on 8 March 2016 & the Trial was held on 23 May 2016.

Documentary evidence was provided to prove that xx,xxx€ was entered into the former Banco CAM (now Sabadell) account opened by the developer. However, there is no evidence to confirm that the amount of £2,000 paid by cheque was entered into the developer’s account at Banco CAM. This leads us to analyze the alternative claim for xx,xxx€ being the amount actually paid to the developer’s account at Banco CAM.

The former Deputy Director of the Banco CAM branch in which the account was held, gave evidence at the Trial. She stated that the account was an ordinary account opened by the developer and that it was very difficult to control and monitor income in this type of account.

It is a completely reprehensible attitude of the bank knowing that it was an account opened by a developer which was funded largely by amounts paid by buyers to purchase off-plan homes. However, this does not prevent this account to be considered as a Special Account according to the regulatory framework.

Therefore, the bank has a legal duty to ensure these funds were guaranteed by an Insurance Certificate or Bank Guarantee. Having failed in its legal duty, the bank then has a legal liability.

The bank should not allow the opening of accounts or the placing of deposits in those accounts, without first ensuring that the developer has assumed a legal obligation to guarantee the repayment of the funds.

The bank was fully aware of the business of the developer and the fact that the account was being used to receive funds from off-plan buyers. The fact that the account was opened as a normal current account, as alleged by the defendant bank, cannot prejudice the plaintiffs as the Supreme Court Sentence of 30 April 2015 confirms.



Banks that receive funds from off-plan buyers into developer’s accounts, although not called Special Accounts, must be responsible to the buyers for the total amounts paid to these accounts opened in its branches. This doctrine, if there is any doubt, has again been reiterated and confirmed by the Sentences of the Supreme Court dated 9 & 17 March 2016.

As for costs, the plaintiff requested costs to be imposed on the bank. Even though the Lawsuit has been upheld substantially in its alternative claim for the amount deposited in the developer’s account at the defendant bank, there is more or less uniform criteria in the Courts of this city (Orihuela) and in the Provincial Appeal Court of Alicante, to understand that the question before the prosecution regarding the liability of the Bank according to Article 1.2 of LEY 57/1968, has resulted in contradictory jurisprudence comparable to the existence of doubt. So I plead the faculty contained in Article 394 of the Civil Procedure Act not to impose costs on the bank. The Supreme Court Sentence of 21 December 2015 which clarifies the responsibility of financial institutions had not been published at the time the Lawsuit was filed (12 November 2015) or when the bank filed its written defence to the Court”


BANCO SABADELL has 20 working days from the date of notification of the Sentence, which was 5 September 2016, to comply with the Sentence or to file an Appeal to the Provincial Appeal Court of Alicante.

Although any appeal must be submitted strictly within the 20 working day deadline, we may not receive notification of an Appeal or of a firm sentence from the Court for a few weeks after the deadline due to the workload of the Court.

If an Appeal is filed by BANCO SABADELL it will be necessary for us to file an Opposition to the Appeal on your behalf.


geecee71 said:
Sunday, February 26, 2017 @ 8:32 PM

The owners of TU (the Martin Family) have resurfaced and are sneakily trying to rent the empty commercials at bosque de las lomas. privately before they are repossessed.
Disgusting. More unsuspected people will loose their savings when the repossessions finally happen.



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