Bury (expelled)

[Phils-an-alki]

Did anyone ever say there weren't bad private owners out there? No.
Did anyone ever say they wanted to sell the club to the first dodgy chancer who rocks up? No.
Some pretty idiotic joining of dots here, but its hardly surprising when you've got something that's ultimately failing that you desperately want to try and justify.

[sparky]

Originally Posted by Phils-an-alki

Did anyone ever say there weren't bad private owners out there? No.
Did anyone ever say they wanted to sell the club to the first dodgy chancer who rocks up? No.
Some pretty idiotic joining of dots here, but its hardly surprising when you've got something that's ultimately failing that you desperately want to try and justify.

Well said.

[The Bapster]

The financialisation of Bury FC’s car park
Twitter
Facebook
LinkedIn
Print this page 11
AUGUST 28, 2019 By: Thomas Hale
Bury FC was today expelled from the English Football League, after failing to meet a deadline requiring it to secure new funds or ownership.

So it’s a good time to home in on the peculiar case of what happened to its car park over the past few years.

Stewart Day, the former chairman and property developer, took over the club in 2013.

By 2015, his now-failed property company, Mederco Limited, had taken on a lease on the club’s car park. It was initially for 209 spaces, though 49 were added later that year.

In 2017, according to Companies House filings, it paid £50,000 rent to the club.

But the spaces were sold on to investors for £9,995 each. Here’s the write up about it in the Bury Times as early as 2014. You can still register interest here, for a 9 per cent “NETrental return”.

As you might have guessed, this didn’t go well for those who bought in. Mederco is now in administration, and people who bought the car park spaces should be getting £232,000 a year, of which £190,000 is in arrears.

What about the underlying collateral - the spaces themselves? Well, here’s the administrator’s report:

The parking spaces themselves generate no income, and the Company must have therefore utilised other income streams to pay the sub under-lease rents.
This particular scheme is another example of fractional investing, where a property asset is carved up and sold on to retail investors. These are not regulated by the FCA, and tend to be aggressively marketed, often on social media.

They’ve also been cropping up all over the place, at a time of low interest rates and new freedoms for pensioners to invest their pension pots. It’s reminiscent of high-risk student accommodation developments we’ve recently been writing about, where investors are promised a fixed income on rooms.

Penningtons, a law firm in London that represents investors in such schemes, has pointed out similar examples of student accommodation schemes where investors have lost out in Bradford and Leicester.

More on this to come.

Related links:
Bury expelled from football league - Financial Times
The links between a former football chair and a failed P2P lender - Financial Times
How a £100 student accommodation scheme went wrong - FT Alphaville

[EnglishRed]

Originally Posted by Quay Red

Are there any Bury players that we could add to our squad to improve it?

Jordan Archer might be worth a look and would be affordable, and likely to come to this level. He looked like he had potential at Chester.
Posted via mobile theme

[International]

Administrator for Mederco says this £7m debt is difficult to prove and sells the debt claim for £70k to a company set up 2 days previously by Steve Dale’s son.

Did read that it was dodgier than that it was actually sold to Dale's daughter's boyfriend. That will fool anyone who investigates.

[ewloered]

Good article on the Daily Mail website today by Steve Parish ( Crystal Palace Chairman) regarding Bury. He said the biggest problem for clubs is the land they’re on! He’s saying if the goverment passed a law that only football could be played on them it would stop all the dodgy owners getting involved.

[the_holt_dragon]

Originally Posted by ewloered

Good article on the Daily Mail website today by Steve Parish ( Crystal Palace Chairman) regarding Bury. He said the biggest problem for clubs is the land they’re on! He’s saying if the goverment passed a law that only football could be played on them it would stop all the dodgy owners getting involved.

Wouldn't that cause an issue if a club with a small ground wanted to increase their potential by moving to a new site and developing a bigger new ground?

[pagl]

Originally Posted by the_holt_dragon

Wouldn't that cause an issue if a club with a small ground wanted to increase their potential by moving to a new site and developing a bigger new ground?

No. The ‘football only’ would pass to the new ground.
Then do what you want with old ground.

[Readred]

Originally Posted by pagl

No. The ‘football only’ would pass to the new ground.
Then do what you want with old ground.

That also wouldn’t have worked. Looks at us and Hamilton, he’d have happily moved the “football covenant” to somewhere out by Bangor on Dee. It should be something like only to be used for football with a board of custodians where local council/fans groups/board rep have to vote to move the covenant or something.