Bank Guarantee

Hi all,

we are currently beginning legal proceedings with respect to our property in Arcos and have appointed a new lawyer to replace the one recommended by Sunset and we are uncovering some disturbing facts. As I mentioned in a previous thread, it turns out Romanber have never heard of us "officially" because the original contracts were between the purchasers and Sunset Estates and between Sunset Estates and Romanber. When Sunset folded our contracts should have been transferred to Romanber which they were not.

When Sunset went under we enquired to our lawyer at the time about the situation and specifically whether there was a Bank Guarantee in place and we were assured that our contract was now directly with Romanber and that we had a Bank Guarantee. However, our new lawyer has since been told by the previous one that there is no Bank Guarantee and that the contracts were never officially handed over to Romanber which is why they have never heard of us.

I'd be grateful if someone could let me know if they definitley have a Bank Guarantee (and have laid eyes on it) and I would recommed that those of you that think you have one insist on getting a copy of it. I'll update this thread when I find out any more information.

Tim.

Hi there, I was also told by Luis Mendez that our contract was with the builder and there was a bank guarantee - I have also been told that completion is due before July 2009 - I was told by Sunset November 2007!!

 I did pop over in October and it was being worked on - in fact I received an email from someone that lives there and they were told by the architect that should be ready to complete in May

Gill and Pete

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. As I mentioned, we were told the same thing but our new lawyer has since been told by him that we do not have a bank guarantee and Romanber say they have no knowledge of specific purchasers, she is trying to resolve this once and for all.

However, while Googling for information about these guarantees it seems that it's very common for the developers to drag their feet, not provide one at all or provide a "fake" one taken out through a front company, which isn't worth the paper it's written on. I would urge you to request a copy of the Bank Guarantee from your lawyer and to validate that the company providing the guarantee if genuine, apparently there is a Government blacklist somewhere of these front companies, I guess Google will tell you where.

Obviously our laywer is only working on our case but I get the the impression from what she says that this is not specific to our case but is same same for other purchasers too. Hopyfully this will turn out to be a misunderstanding but it won't do any harm to check the validity of your Bank Guarantee and the status of your contract.

Tim.

Hello,

In fact, it is quite common that developers did not provide the bank guarantee, although it is mandatory. If you bought the use through a Solicitor, I would question then why did they not do the necessary checks, as the BG is, as I just said, mandatory.

We have won a case were the client did only have a photocopy of a BG, although it was not a straight forward case, as the bank insisted saying that the original BG was cancelled. The fact is that, at the end of the day, the buyer is the beneficiary of the BG, and if it has been cancelled without its consent, then this cancellation must not be considered and, therefore the bank will be held responsible.

Feel free to send us any question with regards to BGs, as we are quite familiar with them and also with the different strategies banks use to delay/try to avoid paying the BG.

Kind regards,