Three family members have lost a total of RM622,152 to three individuals, who claimed that they can help the latter purchase semi-detached homes built by Selangor State Development Corp (PKNS), reported The Edge.
During a press briefing on Monday (13 August), Kepong MP Lim Lip Eng’s Political Secretary Yew Jia Haur presented the victims which include Oh Ngan Mooi, who revealed that she was approached by one of the perpetrators by the name of Lim Lay Bee, who offered to sell a semi-detached home in Taman Selayang Mutiara for RM260,000 in 2015.
“Lim told me that her husband, Low Fook On is a property agent. She said he has been selling PKNS’ Taman Selayang Mutaira houses at much lower prices because he has connections inside PKNS. He asked if I was interested to get one and the price that he offered was RM260,000,” said Oh.
After checking the property, Oh accepted the offer, which she believed would include bribes as the houses are only being sold by PKNS to indigenous people (Orang Asli).
“The project is an affordable housing scheme project, which was offered to the Orang Asli at RM99,000 when its first launched. Some units were opened for application when some Orang Asli family chose to not to accept the offer. However, the applicants must fulfil a few requirements, such as they must live in Selangor and the household income must not be more than a certain amount,” noted Yew.
After Oh forked out monies for the deposit and booking fee, her husband Teh Kang Huat and daughter Annie Teh were also persuaded by Low to purchase two units of one-storey semi-detached homes in the same area for RM69,000 each.
Overall, Annie and Kang Huat respectively paid RM137,400 and RM159,031, while Oh spent RM325,721. These amounts were paid in 2015 to 2016 to Low, Lim and a certain Parimala Damarajahu, who had claimed to be one of the property owners.
“We paid more than what the offer price of the house was, for the “under table” money and utilities registration deposit. For example, RM9,800 for TNB bill deposit and RM2,000 for insurance.”
“Low told us we can ask for refunds when the ownership is transferred. He told us if we decided to pull out at this point, we will not get the house and all the paid money will not be refunded. We realised it was a scam when we found out at the PKNS office that the names of the owners of the three houses were not ours,” said Annie.
However, they found out they have been swindled after noticing that their names were not recorded in the PKNS website as home owners of the said properties in May 2016.
The family then filed a police report after Low, Lim and Parimala became uncontactable. But the authorities have yet to apprehend the scammers.
Yew clarified that PKNS does not appoint any property agents to market units at its low-cost residential projects, and all would-be homebuyers need to apply directly at its office.
Image sourced from Malay Mail
This article was edited by the editorial team of PropertyGuru. To contact them about this or other stories email editorialteam@propertyguru.com.my
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