Around 150 people who shelled out thousands for deposits on off-plan apartments at Salford Quays are still left in limbo four years after they were supposed to be built. Furious investors are rejecting a request from developer Fortis to surrender the leases for which they each paid about £100,000 - 50 percent of the asking price of the apartments - to convert them into loans.
The apartments in two blocks should have been completed in 2018 after investors from across the globe bought them off-plan. But all that remains on the site are empty shells. In a letter to the out-of-pocket leaseholders of the 'Herreshoff' and 'Danforth' buildings, Fortis says the deal would allow the funds to become a loan "enabling us to obtain a new planning consent and build out a new project".
The letter, seen by the Local Democracy Service, goes on to say: "This in turn would allow us to repay the funds paid to date by you on completion of the project. This proposal would only work if a large percentage of clients agreed to this revised structure and unfortunately this has been an impossible task due to a number of factors but mainly the understandable hesitation and concern that some clients have with the current situation."
