Property Search

Boa noite, amigos,
I think an elderly friend may have been scammed. He says he owns two apartments under construction, with constant delays. He won’t say where the apartments are located. Can I find the apartments he owns?

Couldn’t his attorney do this? I’ve been to a cartório and found documents on a deceased American’s property a few years ago. I had the address then. I don’t have an address now for a property search.

Can I do this? Does my friend’s attorney need to do this? Or is there a Brazilian jeito? 😀

Thanks for any advice.

Alan
-@alan279

Pre construction units or buildings  have no  title registration as a deeded unit, whether it is owned by the builder or the actual buyer.  The only document that you can access at that stage  is the "Registro de Incorporacao".Sometimes, a Promise of a Purchase might be registered under the same Registry of Deeds ( Cartorio de Registro de Imoveis  or worse, Cartorio de Notas  ).   

Also, property searches in Brazil require you do be granted the Title Id or "Numero de Matricula", where you can scan the City's Records where the building resides through that ID . Only,, Pre Construction units have no such ID document, so a search is moot, and will lead you nowhere.

When you search a pre-construction project, at best, the local Registry of Deeds might have , under the  Registro de Incorporacao., contracts made by the parties involved in the pre construction  transaction . it's not an actual transfer of deed but rather a promise of a transfer of deed. 

As such, the contracted parties undergo a mutual agreement where one pays and the other promises partial equity against payments, and later, either through a cash deal, or a bank note, the buyer gets total or partial transfer of ownership, thus generating a Matricula and Titulo de Posse.

Tax Authorities seldom ever publish ownership databases in Brazilian Municipalities.  I| got lucky two years ago, and scooped a lot of Sao Paulo ( one million entries ), because some idiotic city  clerk fell asleep. 

In my hometown, the database is still open.  In Sao Paulo, no longer.

@alan279  I'm a Brazil Lawyer. Usually those constructions are done under the "Lei de Incoporação Imobiliária (Lei 4.591) . But it can also be done in different ways. The units can only be legally sold after due registration (Cartório de Imóveis). There also many ways to proceed, let me know If you need further guidance.

Registro de Incorporacao = Building's Permit.

And  Philippe Andrey . No open solicitations allowed!  You can only send the targeted party a private message. 

Boa noite, amigos,
I think an elderly friend may have been scammed. He says he owns two apartments under construction, with constant delays. He won’t say where the apartments are located. Can I find the apartments he owns?

Couldn’t his attorney do this? I’ve been to a cartório and found documents on a deceased American’s property a few years ago. I had the address then. I don’t have an address now for a property search.

Can I do this? Does my friend’s attorney need to do this? Or is there a Brazilian jeito? 😀

Thanks for any advice.

Alan
-@alan279

"I think an elderly friend may have been scammed. He says he owns two apartments under construction, with constant delays. He won't say where the apartments are located. Can I find the apartments he owns? "

No, He is not getting scammed.  He is getting short changed.  Big difference.

Let me enlight you and every unsuspecting dupe at this forum...

In the days of yore, builders built large vertical structures with OPM's ( Other People's Money ) . On those days, the buyers were bankrolling most of the project through pre-construction payment plans.  I actually had a "compadre" of my father who got wealthy doing this  Her is deceased. He built quite a bit on Vila Clementino,Sao Paulo ( Vila Mariana ).

And then came Encol, a Real Estate Developer who built all over and left a lot of buyers holding notes and no finished projects.  Building skeletons.   https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encol

I actually saw a completed and delivered project near Moema ( Planalto Paulista ). Shody Construction, an evidence of piss poor management of money by the Developer.

So the governing bodies to the Construction Industry intervened, not to bail out misled buyers, but rather to regulate how funding ought to be done since thereafter.   

Since then, any large construction project, in theory, must be approved with a funding plan that does not rely exclusively on buyer's installment lay-a-way payments. 

Now, a Developer must secure alternative sources of funding. Either through Bank Bridge Loans, their own working capital, and or Securitization ( through Secuitizing firms, obviously )  of the Development Project. 

In theory, this would be just the assurance buyers so much needed.  In  reality, it only provides limited warranties from a project going sour for lack of cash infusion.  You still need a developer's healthy balance sheet, and cushioning money of your own  to account for project  delays and cost overruns. 

Since 2006, a number of developers started getting cheap money, sometimes through private Equity ( Read Foreign investors mostly, and in particular American Firms ). So they went all out and open up their books through IPO's.   

Once again, this would be some windfall, only it did not fare as such.   Free money lends to monkey business practices ( mostly stretching many slated  projects thin),  and "living at large ".  Plenty accounts of Developers buying expensive yatchs, keeping trophy mistresses on the side, syphoning money to Miami, London, buying luxury cars. 

Recently there was a situation with a well heeled surname, Horn, who ran a company called Esser. His closer relatives successfully ran another Real Estate Development Firm and Property REIT, Cyrella.     

Well, Mr Horn ( the wrong one, not  Ellie but rather Alain and  Raphael Horn ), their firm  had some cash flow issues ( they were banging out TV Commercials with stock firesales ).  So he decided to stiff his Securitizing Firm ( the former  Ourinvest, then headquartered at Avenida Paulista ), and a lending Bank ( Safra ).  This came out in the specialized trade rags, so true story.

As a testament of his shody dealmanship, there is an unfinished building on the lower digits of Rua Augusta, started and unfinished by them.  And another one close by Barra Funda's Transportation Terminal.  A lot of his brethen, mostly Jewish, got screwed. The broker salesman, a nice elder Jewish Uruguayan man himself, fell so ashamed he retired from the trade in disgust. Lots of apologies issued in his behalf, however little he could do himself. 

It goes to say, pre-construction buys are  not  a scam, but the transaction  is rife with pitfalls.  AS a licensed broker, I adamantly oppose you folks to get into such deals.   All you need to verify, is to take your prospecting seller//developer and plug his name under reclameaqui dot com dot br.  You will have plenty anedoctall facts to get you scared out of your wits.

Now, to our fellow member, Allan,

if you really want to get your beak on this hornet's nest, it is your predicament.

Wronged buyers do resort to legal action, mostly through Class Action Lawsuits.  All you need is your friend's full legal name and plug it on Google Search .  If his name comes under https://www.jusbrasil.com.br/   database, then you have a fair chance to identify the adversarial parties.   Which might include the Faulty Developer.

To scan jusbrasil is free. To get under the case details, then you need a licensed attorney to comb their databases.  Soi, you will pay the retainer fee or the initial consultation.

Faulty Developers have what we conventionally call, projects portfolio.  Sometimes, the Developer's name is not in full evidence under the legal docket.  They use proxy companies to each and every project as a legal shield.   Each project has its own Tax ID and namesake, with assigned management, partners, working capital, business address. All pro forma stuff.

Just for illustrative purposes, let's create a Fugazi company.  Sunrise Ranch Empreendimentos SPE Ltda.     That SPE is a dead ringer.  It indicates you have a company that has been created exclusively for that specific project.

So, my five cents to you all happy campers.. Stay clear of pre construction deals and their rosy prospectuses. You are getting fleeced. 

Oldie is good. Lots of opportunities there, for savvy  and well heeled and schooled buyers, there is.    As for the suckers, quoting P.T. Barnum, "They are born every minute"

A couple adjusting statements here are overdue...

1.Securitizing firms, have in their contracts, that every sale made on the bankrolled project , the first dollar ( or real ) collected is theirs. 

2."Free money lends to monkey business practices" 

What I meant by that is that  Private Real Estate Development Firns ( As "Incorporadoras" ) are opaque on their bookkeeping  So you can't examine the books just under the pretense you are buying a couple units from them. 

Public Held Companies are not any better.either  Hence therein the practice of cooking books.  Sam Zell, a late Real Estate Investor, bailed out from Public Held Gafisa after he realized he was getting taken to the cleaners.  You know, the raspy voiced diminutive in stature, but grand in his iendevaors, from Chicago ( Private Equity Residential ). 

@sprealestatebroker Thanks for all the info. I think I’ll keep my beak out of this hornet’s nest.