Please advise - it's all gone SO wrong

heatherykins

I have no advice at all, I'm afraid - I'm not very bright on these things, but learning fast!

Just wanted to offer my best wishes - you're in my thoughts. Hope good things start happening and the good advice keeps coming for you. And hope the vile little creep who did this to you gets a good dose of karma - Nasty - don't know how he can get out of bed and hold his head up after doing that to someone.

Would give a hug if you were here! Take care and wish you all the best xxxx

lisawaters

I am considering sending this letter to the builder's wife personally. Any thoughts?


Dear Helen


We haven’t met, but you are possibly aware that your husband has admitted in court that he stole a large amount of money from me 18 months ago and that he was given a County Court Judgment, and the court subsequently awarded me a final charging order on your house on January 5, 2010. I don’t know how much you know, or how much or how little he has told you. But it’s all a matter of public record now and I am sure you would want to be aware of this. I had a call from your local paper this afternoon and they’re thinking about doing a story about builders who steal from customers. I told them what had happened over the job I employed your husband to do. They could have obtained the details from the public court reports. If it is published, we will be contacted by other reporters.

I'm living in a building site, in debt, broke, clinically depressed and on benefits. This is all directly linked to his consistent refusal to refund the money he stole and the stress over the past 18 months of trying to recover it.

I bought my house in February 2008 I had just enough money to renovate it, and your husband was recommended. He agreed to do the job and gave me an inclusive fixed quotation in writing. He asked for £20,000 in advance, and because he was recommended, I paid this. It was paid into your personal current account. More requests for money were met promptly and in full. I had no problem with the work he was doing.

Then he left the site.

After nine weeks of excuses it was clear he wasn't coming back. After many calls to him I engaged a solicitor to recover the money. I have been signed off work by my GP because of the physical and mental effects of this matter. My incapacity benefit was stopped in October and I have been living on about £50 a week in the shell of the house he walked away from, since then.

The solicitor obtained a CCJ against him for £22,050. She wanted several thousand pounds more from me to obtain a charging order against him. I couldn't pay her as I'd spent the last of my savings on a roof and my car was sold to buy a boiler and bathroom suite and I had to move in to the cottage, so I have had to process each stage myself. Living in the cottage was like camping on a building site. Dust got into everything, there was a single cold tap in the garage, and power came through four extension leads. It still does. There were no ceilings, walls or doors, and he left a huge hole in the back wall which was open to the weather and holes where windows I'd paid for should have been fitted. Water was pouring through the roof onto the first floor. This is how he left the house after promising for months that he was about to finish it and insisting I gave him a total of £38,500. I used the showers at the nearby swimming pool for several weeks. The cottage got a lot colder that January. And this January was worse. And I am still washing up dishes in the bathroom sink.

I obtained a final charging order against him last month. Outside the courtroom he promised he'd get a loan for the money he admitted to the judge he owed me but he did nothing further about it despite knowing that my next option was to obtain an order forcing him to sell your house so I would receive my money from the proceeds. I even offered him a couple of thousand pounds off if he paid in seven days. He said repeatedly that he needed to talk to you about the figures. Maybe he did? Five weeks passed and he did nothing except promise to ring me. I even left a message with you on one occasion. Did you understand what he was doing and why I needed to talk to him?

Because your house is in your joint names and the debt is his alone, it will be more complicated but not impossible for me to get the next stage, which is a court order forcing you to sell it. If I cannot get this, I still have quite a few options. I don’t particularly want you to have to sell your home, but it’s the best way of getting my money back if he continues to refuse to take out a loan. I sometimes haven’t got enough money for petrol and food to have my teenage sons stay with me for the weekend. He’s got £22,050 of my money.

I paid £170k for the house and never argued with his quotation for the work I wanted done. The house is currently worth £150k at most now because he left it in the middle of the work and it would probably only sell to another builder. It will only cost about £20k to finish it. That’s almost exactly what he owes me.


I will be able to get an Attachment to Earnings against him. He said under oath that he turns over £100,000 a year but hasn’t shown a profit or paid income tax for at least a year. He claimed that you also contribute to the household income quite significantly. Obviously you benefit from the money he earns or withholds from clients, so you are personally connected with this matter and the county court may wish to question you under oath. I obtain free legal aid and I can go on indefinitely pursuing this. I will get my money whenever your house is sold or you move or remortgage it, plus interest at 8 per cent. This means the amount you owe me will double every few years That asset will pass on to my children, so they will get it if I don’t.

I hope that most of what I have told you comes as a surprise. I would hope you were not aware of it. If you know all this anyway, there’s nothing more I can really add. I have tried to meet you husband half way all along but there is no point now.

If you are shocked at his behaviour and refusal to pay me back what he admits he stole, so that I can finish the house and be spared further problems, you may wish to let him know how you feel. You might also want to agree as a joint tenant in common that your house should be sold or remortgaged or a loan should be taken out against the very large amount of equity your house has built up.

I am sorry that I can’t help you make this decision.


Yours faithfully

lisawaters

never-in-doubt wrote: »

Its perfectly fine to go to the press, so long as you give facts and not opinion (i.e. say he promised this and promised that - do not say he's a to$$er who should be shot!) then it is perfectly legal to go to the press. Any slander/libel would be direct with the press dependent how they word the article - however, not for you to worry over.

At the end of the day, may be worth asking the paper if the builder will agree to repay before they print the story and ruin his reputation, thus he'd be out of business soon enough as a result...

I'd also look to sell it to a magazine before the local paper as magazines pay for exclusives like this, take a break will pay £500 - its better than nothing I guess....

Good Luck whatever you do.

What I am doing is writing to Take A Break....! Back in a minute!

lisawaters

heatherykins wrote: »

I have no advice at all, I'm afraid - I'm not very bright on these things, but learning fast!

Just wanted to offer my best wishes - you're in my thoughts. Hope good things start happening and the good advice keeps coming for you. And hope the vile little creep who did this to you gets a good dose of karma - Nasty - don't know how he can get out of bed and hold his head up after doing that to someone.

Would give a hug if you were here! Take care and wish you all the best xxxx

Thank you! xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

maysmummy

Wow- what a letter!
It's very detailed and long and expresses your feelings very well. But I wouldn't send it because I think that it may cause her to go to the police (if not someone else!) claiming that you are harrassing her.That's the last thing you want- a police caution.

never-in-doubt

maysmummy wrote: »

Wow- what a letter!
It's very detailed and long and expresses your feelings very well. But I wouldn't send it because I think that it may cause her to go to the police (if not someone else!) claiming that you are harrassing her.That's the last thing you want- a police caution.

Type "Without Prejudice" at the top, this will stop them being able to use it in court though, and that letter is not harassing and as it is the first contact, there wouldn't be an issue.

Obviously if she reported it to the police then the OP simply tells the police she is sorry but thought it would do good, even refer them here for proof that it was not meant in any threatening or harassing manner.

I'd consider sending it, but to be fair I do suspect the wife knows and is happy to play ignorant whilst they live the high life. Thus it may fall on deaf ears - its a hard one to call....

niccatw

lisawaters wrote: »

Hey babe. Thanks for the suggestions. My GP is great but can't do more than she has. I'm in with the local mental health team, with MIND, with a counsellor and a reflexologist (my weekly pamper and sob). Problem with depression is it can take years to go. I'm in year 6 of this episode but it's inflamed by all this stress. I'm a medical marvel really! I have nothing but praise for the health professionals helping me. Gawd bless the NHS.

I'm so glad you are receiving the help you deserve to help you through this. I completely understand how difficult and long a battle it can be to work through an episode of depression - and debt and stress only exacerbate that. I also know some of the recent changes to incapacity and DLA benefits appear to defy common sense and seem to forgo "the person at the centre" (which is supposed to be the model social and some medical services work to) in favour of, what I can only descibe as red tape! I really feel for you honey and wish I could wave a magic wand for you.

Staying here is driving me frilly and I can barely stand the daily reminder of how bad things have got. I sleep on a blow-up lilo on the floor and the mess and wires sticking out of the walls and ceilings is there when I close my eyes and again when I open them the next day. On those nights I can sleep!

Oh honey, I wish there was something I could do! I think I speak for all of us here when I say I have the utmost respect for you, you have been coping admirably well under the circumstances and if there was anything I could do to change your situation, belive me, I would.

I haven't really anyone that I can stay with, and you'll perhaps understand that if I walked out of here I would never ever come back.

If I could afford buildings insurance I'd burn the place down tonight. Preferably while I was asleep.

Please, please, please, if you feel this way, contact your counsellor, MIND, out-of-hours service or the Samaritans. I know the problems seem unsurmountable at the moment, but nothing is worth your life. You have come so far, with the right help you can sort this out and have a lovely cottage. And your children will always need their mother (even though children often have a funny way of showing this )

Sending you big squashy hugs xx And I wish I could do more. Please take care honey!

mrs:optimist_2

vaporate wrote: »

Yes he has, stealing is a criminal offence.

I really do feel for the OP. Words fail me basically.

That's what I was thinking...surely it IS illegal??

niccatw

Oops, just thought I'd explain I somehow couldn't see pages 3-5 when I posted my reply (#88). It's probably seems a bit out od synch!!! Am glad to see you are sounding more positive now! Keep it up - we're all here to listen, rant and reave with you, laugh and cry with you, empathise and offer advice where we possibly can!

toinfinityandbeyond

Hi, just read all 5 pages and cannot believe someone can do that to someone else. Just wondering as couldn't see,whereabouts do you live? Some people on here may have some diy bits and bobs in their garage for you ie plasterboard??
Good luck x