Losses are estimated to be $734,914, with $245,000 alone owed to trade creditors. But Inland Revenue debts were put at $119,000 and unsecured creditors were estimated to be owed $178,000.
The agency once had a connection with Harcourts and still appears under the Companies Office record as trading as Harcourts Client First.
However, a Harcourts spokeswoman said today: “Harcourts has not had a business called Client First Realty work with us for a number of years”
In January, the Herald reported on how two companies which operated under the Harcourts banner were put into liquidation.
Pinnacle Real Estate and Pinnacle Real Estate Rentals, trading as Harcourts Pinnacle, are both in liquidation. They are owned by Rasheed Muhammed and traded from the agency’s offices on Pavilion Drive, Māngere.
Muhammed told the Herald in January that Harcourts Pinnacle continued but under an entirely new company formed last September. That is Pinnacle Realty and he is the sole director.
With the Greenlane-based Client First, the liquidators have released a schedule of creditors naming Coffee Suppliers, Kainga Productions, Open 2 View, Paramount Collections, Real Property Photography, Sharp Corporation, The Warehouse, Trademe Property, Permark Industries, gift business Boxxy and Blush, Auckland Packaging Company, Quickmap Customer Software, REINZ Ventures and Rex Software, along with TIMG and VN Video.
Real Estate Institute figures show Auckland median prices rose from $1.03m to $1.3m in the year to November 2021. In February, they were at just $1,026,000.
The company was only incorporated in May 2018 and traded from 139 Great South Rd, Greenlane. The Advice Hub is a related company.
Yesterday’s Barfoot & Thompson data showed that agency had 5741 available residential properties for sale up till the end of March in the areas where it operates, which include Auckland and Northland. That is up on the 5382 properties it had for sale by the end of February. More listings are going on the books but people are not buying all the properties being listed, showing a mismatch between the buyer and seller markets.
Usually, the agency’s available listings run at 2000 to 4000 properties for sale at the end of months in the period from 2013 till the end of March this year. But sales numbers did jump from 633 in February to 1061 last month.
On the Greenlane agency’s failure, the accountants said: “The Inland Revenue Department has not yet provided us with a creditor’s claim form but we understand that there are amounts due in respect of GST, PAYE and other payroll deductions amounting to approximately $147,726.”
The accountants are calling for creditors to make their claims known and noted that Sharp Corporation had registered security interests for copiers and a printer. Coffee Suppliers also have a security registered.
“The assets available to the liquidators on appointment were the small creditor balance in the company’s bank account,” they wrote, referring to $126.
And then there’s the court case: “There are current proceedings before the High Court to which the company is a party. The liquidators have advised the court of the liquidation and confirmed that ... the liquidators do not agree to the proceedings continuing.”
What that court case involves was not specified.
It is bad news for those without security registered over the business.
“We estimate that unsecured creditors are unlikely to receive a distribution in the liquidation,” they concluded.
Anne Gibson has been the Herald’s property editor for 24 years, has won many awards, written books and covered property extensively here and overseas.
