Off-plan, rip off: Families lose their life savings as Liverpool developments stall
Off-plan, rip off: Families lose their life savings as Liverpool developments stall
An investigation reveals the damage done – plus the rest of your weekly briefing
Dear readers — welcome to this week’s briefing. In this edition, we look at the human cost of Liverpool’s stalled property developments, after investigative journalist Matt O’Donoghue appeared on BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours programme earlier today to tell the stories of people who lost their life savings. Before the show, he kindly chatted to The Post about what his investigation found — and gave us a few details that didn’t go out on air.
On Saturday, we published a brilliantly funny long read by David Lloyd, who turned his acerbic wit to the future of Liverpool’s city centre and the ramifications of Marks & Spencer being nabbed “by the galácticos of shopping centres” Liverpool ONE. On Twitter, one reader said: “This morning's Liverpool Post goes perfect with your coffee. So glad to be reading David Lloyd again.” Another wrote: “I can’t shout loud enough about @liverpoolpost you know. Brilliant piece this morning by David Lloyd.” The piece began like this:
In ten years’ time, I confidently predict, local radio will be dead and the Radio City Tower will have been recommissioned as the UK’s highest indoor skydiving centre. I challenge you to bet against it. Just as I challenged my friends to bet against my prediction — ten years ago — that Debenhams will have gone bust and its Liverpool ONE site will be home to a 100,000 square foot, split-level go-kart track.
Last week, we sent two great newsletters to our paying members. The first was about two creative writing students who used poetry to challenge anti-Northern prejudices after their accents were made fun of at a tournament. The girls stayed up until 4am re-writing their poem for the semi-final, including several of the “snobbish” insults aimed at them within their new poems.
In the second members-only edition, we spoke to bus drivers from Stagecoach about why they’re going on strike this month and about how the job isn’t always as simple as it seems.
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🌞 This week’s weather
This week’s weather forecast is sourced from the Met Office and it’s for Liverpool.
Big Story: How off-plan investments in Liverpool have “wrecked thousands of lives”
Top Line: Thousands of investors in off-plan property developments in Liverpool have lost large amounts of their savings as developments stalled. On BBC Radio 4’s You and Yours programme, the journalist Matt O’Donoghue spoke to a number of the small-time investors who “had their fingers very badly burnt”.
Off-plan purchases are where buyers pay for a home in an unbuilt property. It’s usually cash up front, as there are no bricks and mortar to actually secure a mortgage against. This year, a third of all homes in the UK will be bought before they are built.
The Rise: Via a Freedom of Information request, O’Donoghue has revealed that £1.26 billion worth of off-plan property has stalled or gone into administration in Liverpool. One of these buildings was The Rise on Low Hill — a proposed block of 400 new homes owned by Primesite Developments Ltd, where work stalled four years ago. Since then, Primesite has gone into administration and owner Kerry Tomlinson has been declared bankrupt with liabilities of £39 million. The buyers have been left with nothing.
The show focused on those who had lost out, with some stories of investors who cashed in their pension funds. One woman, named Billy, made the investment with her pension on the assumption she would be able to let her granddaughter stay in it during university before using it to generate a rental income for her retirement.
“I thought this is fabulous, I can’t really go wrong with this,” she said.
A man named Mike also spoke, saying he had invested his pension in two properties in the hope he could give some of the money to his children. The fallout meant he was unable to retire when planned and his marriage fell apart.
“The stories are absolutely heartbreaking, these are savings that they’ve worked their entire life to pull together,” O’Donoghue told The Post.
Context: Currently, off-plan developments are largely unregulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the council say their hands are tied as it would require a change in planning regulation to address the issue. Billy, for example, had been assured an annual 8% return on her money, but when Primesite went belly up she simply joined the back of a very long queue of angry creditors. Despite being assured her money was being held in an Escrow account, it had actually been spent.
Kerry Tomlinson was contacted for the story. He apologised for the distress but shifted the blame onto two of his major backers, who called in their loans. He also argues it should be the job of independent solicitors to warn buyers that these are high risk investments and ensure they have a full understanding of their liabilities.
Bottom line: According to O’Donoghue, this is a national problem being played out on Liverpool’s stage. “It has damaged the reputation of Liverpool internationally as a place to invest your money and wrecked thousands of lives,” he says, noting that whilst these schemes exist across the UK, the city appears to have a higher concentration. To add insult to injury, an entirely separate developer has restarted building work on The Rise and the investors who have paid for apartments on the site have no legal entitlement to them.
Your Post briefing
Boy A — who stabbed 12-year-old schoolgirl Ava White to death in November — has been sentenced to a minimum 13 years in prison at Liverpool Crown Court. During his trial in May, which was covered in a beautifully tragic piece by Mollie, the 15-year-old wept as he was found guilty. At the sentencing, Ava’s mother broke down as the life sentence was read out by Mrs Justice Yip. Leanne White said: “My beloved Ava dies all over again every morning I wake up. The moment Ava died is now yesterday, tomorrow and forever. It is the past, the present and the future.” In her story, Mollie writes: “in the courtroom, I spent most of my time thinking about Boy A. What did he think was happening? When did he realise? What in his life led to this moment? Soon he will be sentenced as one of this country’s youngest ever killers, and no doubt his details will be added to a dreadful Wikipedia page I’ve been reading recently called ‘List of youngest killers.’”
Jeremy Hunt has selected Liverpudlian Esther McVey as his deputy prime minister if he wins the Tory leadership campaign. McVey, an ardent Brexiteer who set up the Blue Collar Conservatism caucus, is not seen as being closely politically aligned with Hunt, but he says their differences are a strength. “She has won a lot of elections against Labour in the north, I have won them against Lib Dems in the south and I think we will be a formidable campaigning team,” Hunt said. The Guardian pointed out that McVey has won only one election against Labour, taking Wirral West from them in 2010. She then lost the seat in 2015 and was moved to her current constituency, Tatton in Cheshire.
Meanwhile, Damien Moore — who represents Southport as Merseyside’s only Tory MP — has backed Tom Tugendhat. Military veteran Tugendhat is marketing himself as a moderate and a clean break from the Johnson era, having never served in the resigning prime minister’s cabinet, unlike many of his rivals. Moore said: “Restoring integrity, building a strong team, tackling the cost of living crisis and levelling up are all things which I believe Tom can deliver for the whole UK.”
A far-right extremist from Rainhill, near St Helens, has been jailed for three years. Scott Mason, 36, was found with a banned push dagger and step-by-step instructions on how to make home explosives. He is said to harbour extreme, racist and anti-Semitic views. Mason was charged under the Terrorism Act 2000, along with other offences related to the possession of extreme pornography and the intimindation of witnesses in a previous domestic assault case.
Liverpool, of course, is a dream of a city. But to Carl Jung — the Swiss psychoanalyst regarded as one of the founders of modern psychology — it was literally a city that only existed in such a form. Having never visited, Jung wrote in a 1927 essay that it was "the pool of life” based on a vivid dream he had. 95 years later, a mural — created by Glasgow-based street artist Sam Bates, also known as Smug — has been unveiled on Harrington Street, bringing Jung’s description to life. The mural also contains references to the Cavern Quarter, including a giant walrus, a nod to The Beatles’ famous song I am the Walrus. More here from the BBC.
Home of the week
A three-bedroom mews cottage in the Wirral was recently reduced to £299,000. It has a living room with a log burner, built in bookshelves and wooden floorboards in the upstairs bedrooms.
Post Picks
🏞️The Canal and River Trust are hosting a social walk starting at Ellesmere Port on the Wirral on Wednesday. The Ramblers Walk grading system has it ranked as easy, meaning peak physical fitness is not a required condition. The walk is free but has to be booked.
🥊Boxing on the beach might not sound ideal for the soaring temperatures this week, but Beach Boxing UK is a non contact workout without a single punch thrown. There’s 20 minutes of cardio after going through simple Muay Thai technique, followed by meditation and stretching. As they put it, it’s “nothing too strenuous.” Head to Crosby beach this Friday. Tickets are free.
📕Books and Banter — that famous combo — will be returning to the Williamson Art Gallery and Museum this Thursday. The event is “an opportunity to talk about books guided by theme” with “tangents more than welcome”. The theme this time is The Big Jubilee Read and the list of books is available on the website. Places are free but limited.
🌍On Thursday, social enterprise Regenerus are gathering at Bootle Canalside to chat about how communities can combat climate change together. The event will be between 12pm and 5pm and will include a series of talks and workshops. Information here.
Our favourite reads
Boys from the Blackstuff, the classic TV drama about the struggles facing a group of unemployed Liverpudlians, is returning to life in the form of a stage adaptation. This Guardian piece details how James Graham, who wrote the acclaimed BBC One series Sherwood, has been working on the project that will premiere next year with its original creator, Alan Bleasdale, for two and a half years. “Boys from the Blackstuff has lived on here in Liverpool,” says Bleasdale, who is now 76 and has avoided interviews for over 20 years. “The series had the most profound effect. I got more than 4,000 letters, and in those days these were from people who had to sit down and write and then go out for a stamp.” Describing the original, Guardian arts and media correspondent Vanessa Thorpe writes, “it was hailed as a show that would shape understanding of British history.”
Telegraph restaurant critic William Sitwell headed north to visit Liverpool’s Lerpwl, situated on the Albert Dock. Sitwell describes his confusion as the chef explains how the meal was made (“Then add me to the picture: southern posh twit, attempting to tune in to the Scouse accent, I’m like a jar of award-winning green chutney. In a pickle.”) but heaps lavish praise on the trout, mussel and lamb cawl and cheese course, “soft milk bread dripping in the creamy Welsh Mon Las.” You can read everything he had to say about the food, and about chef Ellis Barrie’s attempt to describe it, here.
The Critical Friend, the newsletter of the South Liverpool Debating Society, conducted a brilliant video interview with Katya Minakova, a humanitarian worker, teacher, historian and organiser of The Dnipro Debating Society in Ukraine. In the video, Katya talks about “the dilemmas facing Ukrainians with Russian relatives, the psychological effects of the war on children and why a negotiated settlement with the Russians is so unthinkable.” There is a longer audio version of the interview also on the Critical Friend website.
Photo of the week
Gulls taking off from the Museum of Liverpool. Thanks to Post reader Phil Challinor for the photo.
Letters from readers
This article is brilliant and really resonated with us ‘You don’t wanna react and get angry because you become the stereotype’, Liverpool Literary Agency
The M&S move is interesting to me. Mainly because in 2003/4 I worked in a bar opposite the architectural offices that were planning/designing Liverpool ONE. Lovely people who on a Friday after work could demolish between them nearly a keg of San Miguel. They would discuss the mystical future of L1. One or some of these people told us that M&S was banned from moving to the estate. Either because John Lewis was to be flagship and that would be close competition, or because the council wanted to make sure the BID area as it is now was important and relevant. Go karts, penguins and Flannels: Liverpool attempts to lure shoppers away from Amazon. Elli
I was told that M&S was encouraged (with business rate discounts) to stay on Church Street so that the street stayed relevant and popular with shoppers.