Developer rues buying car
A 26-year-old Christchurch property developer who registered a new Porsche 911 days before putting three companies into liquidation with $11 million of debts says he “probably regrets” the sports car purchase.
The liquidations of three of Harry Crawford’s 19 registered companies come weeks after the High Court ordered Crawford Group to pay about $1.4m in compensation to two Phillipstown homeowners over defaulted home purchases.
Crawford changed the company’s name to ChCh Group Ltd on February 15 – the day after the court judgment was delivered. Three weeks later, he put it and two others into voluntary liquidation.
Earlier this month, he registered a Porsche 911 GT3, valued at more than $380,000. Crawford told The Press he put a down-payment on the car two years ago when the market was “booming” and would have lost his deposit if he “walked away”.
“I probably regret doing it, and would actively like to get rid of it.”
The Phillipstown property owners now appear as unsecured creditors along with others in the first tranche of documents from liquidators, released on Monday. Crawford’s company, ChCh Group Ltd, owes about $1.6m.
The liquidator’s initial report, which relies on yet-to-be-verified information, estimates there will be no money available to unsecured creditors.
The report says ChCh Group was a shelf company used to buy properties, which would then be nominated to another company to complete the transaction. It had no bank account or assets, so once the $1.4m judgment was made against it, it became insolvent.
The report says Crawford first met with the liquidator on March 5, when insolvency options were discussed.
But on March 6, he registered a 2024 Porsche 911 GT3, which has a starting price of $385,000, to Crawford Group Ltd (the now liquidated Chch Group). He has since changed the car’s licence plates to one with his initials and year of birth.
Crawford disputes the NZ Transport Agency certificate of registration saying that was a dealer error, and the Porsche was in fact registered to another of his companies, Crawford Capital.
He said the Porsche had been heavily financed.
Cashel Street Townhouses Ltd, another company Crawford put into liquidation last week, is estimated to owe more than $4m.
The initial liquidator report says Inland Revenue is owed more than a million dollars in GST.
The remaining $3m is owed to unsecured creditors ACC, Crawford Capital Ltd (previously known as Crawford Developments), Chch Construction Ltd (another of the three companies placed in liquidation), Giftbox Boutique NZ Ltd, IRD and Crawford Developments sales consultant Sharaine Francis.
Crawford said delays, cost escalation issues and weaker than anticipated sales resulted in a “sizeable loss” on a Cashel St, Linwood, development.
He said that caused a “flow-on effect” as funds that were going to come out of that project were to be used to settle the Ollivers Rd purchase.
But he said there was nothing untoward about the issues, which were the same cost increases “that everyone faced” combined with a drop in sale prices in the area.
“We were expecting to generate a significant amount more revenue than what we did on that project, but just to get sold, we obviously had to cut down and meet the market.”
The third company put into liquidation is Chch Construction Ltd, trading as Crawford Construction, with outstanding payments of nearly $5m.
It owes $950,000 to preferential creditor IRD and about $4m to unsecured creditors including ACC, Kitchen Things and Rockcote Resene, but liquidator Brenton Hunt again estimates there will be no funds
available to unsecured creditors. Crawford said it was too soon to know whether there would be any money to pay the company debts, saying it would not be known until the final liquidator’s report came out.
He said the voluntary liquidations were not to avoid paying the Olliviers Rd homeowners according to the high court judgment.
“It’s not at all to dodge it, it's a company's that gone into liquidation because it’s insolvent.
“You can't trade insolvent and, because of the court order, the company's now insolvent.”
He said he intended to come to an agreement with creditors.
Crawford Developments has two developments under way, in Scott St, Sydenham and Rotheram St, Riccarton.
Crawford hoped sales in coming months would allow him to trade through his difficulties to “at least get something paid out to our creditors, but we just need time”. “It’s one of those things where we're sort of in a patch at the moment where the market isn't as red hot as it used to be.”
He bemoaned the attitude to property developers, saying “when times are good, we look like the best people in the world because we donate to charity... but when times are bad, we look like the absolute devil.”
Creditors have until April 21 to make claims to the liquidator.