CASE STUDY

The impact of trust account fraud

Situation

The Client was purchasing a rent roll in Brisbane’s outer suburbs. The client needed to satisfy the rent roll due diligence clause of the contract. The multiple adopted in the contract of sale was 2.2 times annualised property management fee income. The time frame for the rent roll due diligence was 14 days from the date of contract.

Employment of Tarsi

We were able to determine the past income of each property managed and future income potential of the rent roll being purchase which differed from the information originally provided in the Buyer Information Pack.

The Seller, prior to placing the rent roll for sale, was unaware that there were any discrepancies within the rent roll. The Seller was confident that the employees of the business had kept up to date with the day-to-day operations of the portfolio and that documents were up to date and correctly completed.

The Seller was disappointed to find the number of discrepancies which were uncovered during the rent roll due diligence report, however, welcomed the opportunity to fix the discrepancies.

Upon employment, Opulence Consultancy undertook the review of the property management files being purchased by the Buyer. We liaised with the Seller, querying the results found and collated the information.

Upon completion of the review, a detailed spreadsheet and rent roll due diligence report was provided to the buyer which included a financial review of the rent roll, together with all search results and answers. We also met with our client, the Buyer, to discuss the findings.

Several discrepancies were found within each file ranging from, but not limited to, incorrectly completed forms, missing documents, incorrect bonds, property tasks which had been missed or not yet completed and incorrectly charged fees etc.

Outcome

The Seller requested an extension to the settlement date so that they could rectify the discrepancies which were found within the due diligence investigation, which was granted.

The Buyer re-negotiated the multiple from 2.9 times to 2.8 times annualised management fee income.

The saving to the Buyer was $20,000 in purchase price value / approximately 11 property management files. The purchase price saving had outweighed the cost of the rent roll due diligence.

The Buyer employed Opulence Consultancy, to undertake the pre-settlement review of the files, to ensure that the discrepancies had been rectified and was still able to capitalise on the $20,000 saved from the purchase price.