£7.5k lost on auction property reported to Action Fraud?
Hello, here’s a salutary lesson. Having missed out on a property sold at auction at the beginning of February, I saw another house, less than a mile away on Rightmove. It was being marketed by a different auction house and was lot 1 in their auction.
I contacted the auctioneers by email and registered for the auction, sent my solicitor the details from the legal pack and instructed him to act on my behalf in the purchase, should my bid be successful. On the day, I bid and won the lot. I arranged and paid for building insurance, let my solicitor know, paid for the searches, and the auctioneers sent me an email with the memorandum of sale and request for the payment of the deposit and fees, totalling £7.5k. The email included a link to pay, which had a unique transaction reference, and which I used to pay.
When I received the receipt, it was not from the auction house nor the registered owners of the property according to the legal pack, but from Barham Property. I did a Companies House search on them and it turns out to be, as I later discovered, alleged fraudsters who previously owned BP Auctions. At the time, I was concerned, but not overly so, having been ‘exposed’ like many others with a small portfolio, to the ‘sell-your-property-for-close-to-market-value’ ads all over social media. According to their business model ‘coached’ by these property ‘gurus’, some of the properties acquired by this route are put straight to auction, with the property company acting merely as agent for the vendor.
However, since then the advertisements for the auction properties have been removed from Rightmove, the website has gone, and my solicitor found that the solicitors on the memorandum of sale had not been instructed to act for the vendor.
I have reported this to Action Fraud, and have a crime number. I reported to my bank, who are also investigating the fraud and when I spoke with the fraud investigator on 7th March, he has two other cases from the same auction. The search shows that Barham Property purchase properties on bridging finance through Together Finance, a large number of these charges have recently been satisfied, presumably from the proceeds of fraud against legitimate purchasers like me.
This does mean, though, the Barham Property does own assets, so in theory Action Fraud should be able to recover some money. However, it also begs the question of whether Together Finance have been paid from the proceeds of crime and are therefore themselves open to prosecution.
Under the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 (PoCA) in the UK, a bridging finance lender could potentially face liability if they are found to have knowingly or negligently facilitated or failed to report financial crime, such as money laundering. The Act requires financial institutions to conduct due diligence and report any suspicious activity to the National Crime Agency (NCA). If the lender had no knowledge or suspicion of the fraudulent source of funds and had conducted proper due diligence, they may not be held liable. However, failure to comply with anti-money laundering (AML) obligations could expose them to prosecution.
Lastly, it was impossible to see who the recipient of the payment was until after the payment had been made and if HM Land Registry had their backlog of transfer registrations up to date, it would have been possible to ascertain who the actual owner of the property is, and therefore auctioneers would be able to exercise due diligence in not marketing a property where the auction vendor was not the actual owner.
This has totally put me off purchasing at auction.
Susan
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Member Since April 2021 - Comments: 95
11:41 AM, 12th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Thank you sharing. I’m sure you’re pursue all avenues to try to recoup and I hope that you do get your moenyback
Member Since May 2018 - Comments: 2021
12:31 PM, 12th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Andy at 12/03/2025 – 11:41
Thank you Susan for sharing your experience so that we can all learn from it. I don’t have any knowledge of Barham Properties although there appears to be a petition about this here.
https://www.change.org/p/criminal-action-against-bp-auctions-national-fraud
Member Since June 2019 - Comments: 781
1:25 PM, 12th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reporting anything to Action Fraud is essentially useless. They only take action on multimillion pound frauds and prosecute only about 2% of cases. Any other organisation ignoring 98% of the customers would be declared as fraudulent themselves. If you don’t believe me please look at their trust pilot feedback.
Member Since October 2022 - Comments: 409
2:39 PM, 12th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Today on R4 further developments where an empty property with no mortgage was ‘sold’ without the Titleholders knowledge. The sellers stole the identity of the Titleholder. Advice to owners of properties which are empty or mortgage free or owned by elderly residents and in hospital to register with HMLR property alert service.
This includes leasehold flats put up for auction. There are incidents where the legal pack contains false information relating to the lease and the legal ownership.
This means forged or altered lease documents so no application made on the registered title at HMLR so after auction a transfer /assignment of the genuine lease registered but a forged /altered lease given to the purchasers and the proceeds of sale not gone to the titleholder but to fraudsters named on the forged lease documents and service charge etc not paid to the Landlord on the genuine lease registered at HMLR.
No application on the original titleholders Title even though registered on Property Alert service and only the transfer/ assignment registered to the purchasers on property alert service. Otherwise if not registered on this service the original titleholder will not know. This is title theft and ID theft.
A purchaser at auction would need to obtain title number and obtain the name of the titleholder and the lease direct from HMLR and compare with the legal pack.
Member Since June 2015 - Comments: 194
3:42 PM, 12th March 2025, About 1 year ago
You can set up property alerts with HM Land Registry which send you e-mails if there is any movement on a particular property.
May not give you advance warning but it will tell you within a day or two of any chnage to the register.
Can do up to 10 properties for free.
This is link to sign up page:https://www.gov.uk/guidance/property-alert
Member Since October 2024 - Comments: 22
8:25 AM, 15th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Paul Essex at 12/03/2025 – 13:25
Agreed. I have tried them twice. There is nobody to talk to and it takes weeks, if not months to receive any response. Another useless Government Dept staffed by (un)civil servants on fat pensions.
Member Since October 2022 - Comments: 409
6:33 PM, 15th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Thank you Simon Lever. The issue with long residential leasehold property is unscrupulous agents pursuing leaseholders for service charge as debt under the wrong jurisdiction that is the Insolvency Act and evict unlawfully via a Possession order (not allowable see ‘Ezekiel’. ).
This means the lease is not forfeited by the Landlord under S146 LPA 1925 so no application made on the Title. What is registered on the Title is the transfer not assignment at the auction of the genuine lease but a substituted lease handed over to the purchasers in the legal pack.
The titleholder if not registered with HMLR property alert service will not know that they are still registered as titleholder and bear liability for non compliance with the lease.
Member Since July 2013 - Comments: 1266 - Articles: 1
10:27 AM, 16th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Paul Essex at 12/03/2025 – 13:25
Action Fraud is a reporting system, they don’t prosecute anyone. If they think it’s sufficient they refer back to the police to prosecute
Member Since May 2014 - Comments: 49
11:03 AM, 16th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Hi folks,
The police are well aware of BP Auctions – they have taken money from lots of people. Banks have been refunding people as well. Persist, you will get your money back.
Search for the facebook group “Action against BP Auction”. There are plenty of examples there.
Good luck.
Member Since June 2019 - Comments: 781
12:30 PM, 16th March 2025, About 1 year ago
Reply to the comment left by Puzzler at 16/03/2025 – 10:27
The problem is that the police just send everyone to Action Fraud, who ignore the little people even when they have huge amounts of evidence and quick action is essential so they don’t send them back to the police for follow up.