Saturday, October 10, 2009

Misleading Advertisement for Riverpoint Apartment



A reader forwarded me an interesting email chain with an agent, about this advertisement for resale of an off-the-plan apartment in Riverpoint in West End.

The apartment a 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom apartment, which has an internal size of 66sqm. This is very small for a 2 bedroom apartment. The second bedroom is not large enough for a queen bed and has no windows and has a sliding door because the room is too small to have a normal swinging door. The kitchen comprises benches along the wall.

This is the advertisement. Some text: "On Offer in Stage 1 of The Riverpoint Development is An Affordable Lifestyle Apartment On The First Floor, 94m2 of total Area, with 2 Large Bedrooms, 1 Bathroom & Upgraded Finishes." Two large bedrooms, who is this agent kidding?

But the real issue is the drawing included, as shown above.

The floorplan shows a tiny bathroom with a shower only. However, the drawing included in the advertisement shows a large bathroom with a bath and a shower.

When this was brought to the attention of the agent, Michael Mangelakis, of Street Property Sales, he replied in an email
"The artist impression of the bathroom has been used in an indicative manner to present the type of finish being supplied at completion." and then in a follow up email, Mr Mangelakis says: "You obviously have not looked at the photo’s properly. They are all marked with “indicative only”. I think you need to stop wasting my time. Goodbye"

The advertisement is clearly misleading -- showing a drawing of a bathroom from another apartment, and saying it is indicative of the finishes, where it is not indicative of the size, layout or features. The text of the advertisement does not make this clear at all. It is clearly misleading and deceptive. I would not want to buy or sell though this agent!



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