Singing Pig

Hi everyone,

I am new to property investing, however me & my husband are in the process of buying our very first investment property in Kings Wharf, Warrington. We didn't really do the necessary research and the rent is £60 a month short of covering the mortgage.

We really want to be in a positive cash flow situation with our second property and so i have been reading property books and doing research on the internet. We were going to attend seminars/workshops to educate ourselves more, but i've noticed this can be very expensive as i've seen prices range from £300 - £5k!

Anyway to cut a long story short as i was searching the internet i noticed adverts for company's that do alot of the legwork for you and get you discounts on properties. Obviously this can be risky as no doubt there are alot of unscupulous people out there, but tic ltd (www.ticltd.com) caught my eye and i would really like to hear from anyone who has had any dealings with them.

Thanks

i have never heard of them  - but they specialise in off-plan new build.  may i suggest that you read all of Massive's posts on here  - he specialises in new build, and offers great advice.   But, also do a search on Inside Track who specialise in selling property seminars and then off-plan new build  -  and also look for Coventrykid's posts.  Finally do a search for one of the longest threads on SP  ever - called  PBS  Portfolio Building Services.

happy reading !

The first 3 properties (offplan apartments) I bought were through the type of company you are looking at. All of them are producing negative cashflow.

The next 3 (houses) I sourced myself. Two of them give positive cashflow and the other I am selling for a considerable profit.

I read SP regularly and have done Glenn's and Rialto's courses - both are highly thought of on this forum.

Brian 

Hello, did you go ahead with TIC Ltd at all???  I did back in 2005 and now trying to GET MY MONEY BACK from them WITHOUT SUCCESS!  I think they have gone bust (dated 30th April 2008).

This is my story!

Hello all

I am sorry to learn that you have personal and professional problems with TIC.

I sourced in excess £45,000,000 of properties in 05/06 to these jokers and they ripped me off for hundreds of thousands of comission and went direct to many of the contacts. I have also sourced to other Mayfair clubs, housing associations and trust funds. The way tic worked was to get mugs like me to target small to medium size builders who really needed sales to keep thier cash flow going. The builder always set his own GDV then we would try to negiciate anywhere from a minimum of 17.5% to 30% discount for a sale on the whole block of which the client got between 5% to 10% whilst tic made anywhere between 7.5% to 20% on the clients investment. Once the site was launched it was gone within 2 to 3 days. They collected a 10% deposit from clients and said they would match the 10% to make a total discount of 20%. Your 10% deposit or part of the deposit is passed onto the builder.

The company is also run off shore so good luck getting your monies back. If you want to learn more about tic boss  Anthony Baker then go to http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23372708-details/Millionaire%20boss%20humiliated%20as%20tribunal%20rules%20he%20sexually%20harassed%20employee/article.do to see what type of person you are dealing with. I know other people in my situation. I also know of some very upset builders they delt with. I hope I have been of help and good luck getting your monies back. If anyone wants to email me privately then please feel free.

I wish this kind of information was 'out there' 2 years ago when I first got with TIC. I was really shafted by these people.

I'm not a novice property investor and I made money with property in the 90's when the market was quite flat and also had properties running with positive cashflow. I sold up though to get a deposit for my house and to pay for my marriage and associated bills.

However by 2005 I had saved up a considerable sum and was looking to invest in the (then booming) housing market. I was looking more for a development opportunity rather than a buy-to-let, but thanks to Sarah Beeney now every housewife or person with a hammer thinks they are a builder, and any property needing development was going for vastly overinflated sums. I searched for months for properties but was always pipped by dubious investors paying way under asking price (ie mates of the estate agent), or professional cash buyers, or more usually amateur developers paying over-the-odds prices.

So eventually I looked at off-plan buy to lets, TIC turned up as the company who could offer large discounts on these builds with very low entry costs. However this proved to be a huge mistake by me, and all of their customers.

They took almost 100k off me, and left me with 3 properties, all running hugely negative. They are are in huge negative equity so I can't even sell up. And a fourth property which has exchanged but not completed, and now TIC have dissapeared with my deposit. As they were set up as a limited liability comany, all their losses will be written off.

I am now looking at bankrupcy as a cannot sustain the losses every month that these properties are running with. I dont want to lose my house too as I have a wife and young kids. This really keeps me awake every night and stops me from concentrating at work, its a living nightmare.

Any advice for someone about to go bankrupt?   

Fer - i am so sorry to read about the predicament you are in  -   you are not alone - there are many many folks in your position, but, i know that wont make you feel much better.   there but for the grace of god go many of us.

there is a forum called www.ridingtherhino.co.uk  which is all about debt and how to deal with it and johnny who runs it has a HUGE knowledge and is a very helpful bloke  - give it a read  - its no where near as large as SP but some most useful info on there

bw