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Bucharest City Residence | Melbourne Residence | Bucharest

Melbourne Residence, Bucharest, Romania

I believe that MRI abused the natural trust that people normally give. A good investor will always take risks once he understands what they are and that is what a strong economy is based on. By lying about the risks or by hiding them, MRI have wasted people’s time and money, resulting in a situation where investors are not working for themselves for a profit, but working for MRI at a loss to themselves.

I purchased 2 apartments for €164,000 each through MRI in the “Melbourne Residence” complex in Bucharest in September 2006. I am writing this mail to talk of my experience with MRI Overseas Property in an effort to demonstrate that MRI is not independent of the legal firm Legal Independence (I believe).

When I agreed with MRI to the purchase in September 2006, a representative of Legal Independence was in the office to arrange the transfer of the holding deposit of €3,000. This representative shared an office with the MRI staff in Bucharest. In December, the MRI representative, Mr. James Daly, told me that the 35% deposit was required immediately, as the apartment would be complete by January 2007. I did not have a solicitor at that stage and Mr. Daly said that I did not need to have one in place to pay the deposit. He requested that I transfer the €112,000 into the account of Legal Independence, which I did in January 2007. MRI told us that Legal Independence would send us the contract as soon as they had it available.

I had decided not to use Legal Independence for the conveyance, as it was obvious to me that there was a risk that they would not act in my best interest, as they shared an office with and get much of their business from MRI. Also, they were recommended by MRI. I had decided to use an Irish firm called “Overseas Property Law” for the process.

Regular communication with Legal Independence identified delays with the development of the contract. They also requested extra fees of €1,600 to be sent to cover their legal fees. I responded on each occasion that the fee is not relevant as I would not be using their services to buy my property. They ignored this statement each time and requested the fee on each consecutive mail.

By the end of April 2007, I still had not received my contract and Legal Independence advised me that I must use Legal Independence to purchase the apartments as there is not enough time to “change solicitors”. At no stage had I asked Legal Independence to represent me. They said that I would lose my apartment if I was to use someone else. They also said that the price of €164,000 was a price that was agreed between Legal Independence and the developer South Pacific, and that if I was to use a different solicitor; I would have to renegotiate a new price. Furthermore, if I was not going to do further business with them, I would be required to pay them for their time, an amount that would have to be calculated.

I documented all this correspondence and in May I put it to MRI that they had put me in a position where I did not have a choice of which solicitor to use. MRI was then forced to instruct Legal Independence to transfer my money to my solicitors account which they did so. I was not asked to pay Legal Independence for their time.

My Solicitor (Overseas Property Law & Michael Lynn) then stole my deposit and fled the country in October 2007. The Irish Law Society has recently compensated me for most of the loss.

The apartments have been plagued with problems and are still not completed. There is no indication that they ever will be. I have managed to contact 7 people who also bought into the same development as we did. We communicate as a group and share information. Those who used Legal Independence, received an email in March, which recommended that the full amount be paid to the developer by end March independently of whether the development was completed or not. I suspect that if Legal Independence represented the interests of the client, they would be recommending that the full amount should NOT be paid until the development is complete.

I recently discovered that there was a mark-up of greater than 50% on our development which was contrary to the 2% that MRI told us of at the time. This eliminated any possibility of making any money on the investment.