Tulum’s real estate boom has occurred so rapidly and extensively that it has led to numerous frauds. While it attracted some serious developers, it also attracted inexperienced companies that got into a mess they were sometimes unable to escape, according to Bloomberg.
Estrella Ríos, a lawyer with an office in the area, says that for the past 10 months, she has been receiving at least two calls a day from people who bought pre-sale apartments in Tulum during the pandemic, only to realize they will never be delivered.
Most of the victims are middle-class foreigners, who used their savings to buy relatively cheap vacation homes near the beach. Some planned to offer their homes on short-term rental platforms to help cover their mortgages, as developers often advertised.
Many developers lacked soil mechanics studies, crucial in this area known for its fragile terrain. Others lacked proper planning or building permits. Some even stole the land they intended to develop. “All they had were very pretty renderings that were super Instagrammable, and that’s what they sold with,” Ríos said.
Many deceived buyers have spent tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees and trips to Tulum trying to understand what happened. But the bureaucracy in Tulum is such that it’s difficult—much more so for a foreigner who doesn’t speak Spanish—to understand how to carry out lawsuits and processes that often have to be done in person. They have no choice but to rely on local lawyers who charge them every step of the way. In the end, they lost all their money, in some cases their life savings, to developers who then disappeared.
Real estate fraud allegations involve projects and development companies with exotic names such as Akela Development Group, Solemn Skyview, Solemn Peaceful, Solemn Lagoon, Solemn Ocean, Solemn Downtown, Laguna Azul, among others.
In the state of Quintana Roo, where Tulum is located, land theft has become so prevalent, Bloomberg notes, that a local journalist asked President Claudia Sheinbaum about it during a morning press conference in December.
“In Quintana Roo, there are several cases of this type of fraud that have been going on for some time,” Sheinbaum said. The state “has had many national properties, dating back to when it was a territory before becoming a state, and many developers took advantage of this to seize national lands and sell them illegally.” She said she had asked the Secretary of Agrarian, Territorial, and Urban Development, Edna Vega, to work with the state governor, Mara Lezama, to investigate the matter.
The Quintana Roo government, through the Secretariat of Sustainable Urban Territorial Development (Sedetus) and in coordination with the Tulum City Council, recently issued a public alert regarding the existence of 26 real estate developments that lack the state or municipal reports, certificates, permits, and authorizations required by law.
Source: reportur
