FALSE CREEK CONDOS: Eleven people demand deposits back from Millenium Water
John Bermingham
Province
Cyclists ride past the Olympic Village condos at 1633 Ontario St. in Vancouver on Friday. Eleven people are trying to get out of their purchase. Steve Bosch — PNG
Eleven condo buyers at Vancouver’s controversial Olympic Village want to back out of their pre-sale deals.
Lawyer Bryan Baynham said his clients don’t want to move into the suites any more — and they want their deposits back.
The unhappy buyers say washers and dryers haven’t been installed in their units, and the $5,000 electric fireplaces aren’t working properly.
“Once you lose faith in a project, people say ‘I just don’t want to be there’,” Baynham told The Province on Friday.
“It’s a whole series of things,” he added. “Nothing seems to go right with this project.”
The buyers put down deposits of between $60,000 and $300,000 for False Creek condos priced from a low of $550,000 to units that sold in the millions of dollars.
They’re being asked to close their deals by the end of the month.
On Thursday, Baynham filed writs in B.C. Supreme Court against developer Millennium Water on behalf of six of his clients, who have addresses in Vancouver and West Vancouver.
Baynham says the City of Vancouver is the owner of the property, after bailing out Millennium when it couldn’t get financing. But that’s not disclosed in the sales agreements, he says, so the contracts are invalid and should be rescinded.
“If the city is a developer and is marketing the units, they had to sign the disclosure agreement,” Baynham said.
The Province requested interviews with the buyers, but they were unavailable for comment Friday.
Meantime, the man hired to sell the project and the woman who runs the city’s operations both disagree with the disgruntled buyers.
Realtor Bob Rennie, who says he’s currently closing 264 pre-sales in the 737-unit project, told The Province only eleven buyers have a problem.
“There’s a lot of buyers that are very happy with their purchase,” he said.
Rennie said Millennium, and not the City of Vancouver, is the developer they’ve signed deals with — and those deals are now closing.
“These people have bought in a development owned by Millennium,” he said.
Rennie said it was unfortunate the buyers and their lawyer went to the media with their complaints about appliances and fireplaces.
“Those are things you sit down with the developer, and you resolve,” he said.
Vancouver City Manager Penny Ballem said it’s normal for some buyers not to want to go ahead with their deals.
“We’re not at all concerned about it,” said Ballem. “We’ve never been the developer and we don’t intend to be.”
“The city is the lender, we are the bank,” she added. “We are not the developer. We are not the marketer.”
Vancouver real-estate lawyer Kenneth Pazder said the average buyer signs a pre-sales contract that is written by the developer and may not understand all the fine print.
“[The contracts] are so one-sided,” he said. “People are completely taken off guard.”
Pazder said it’s impossible to predict where real-estate prices and interest rates will be when the contract eventually comes to closure.
“People don’t understand them,” said Pazder, who has referred clients to Baynham to litigate. “They don’t understand the risks.”
Pazder suggested that it’s time for the provincial government to introduce a prescribed pre-sale agreement, similar to a rental agreement, that’s legally enforceable.
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