When you testify in court, you raise your right hand and take an oath to tell “the truth, the WHOLE truth and nothing but the truth” … and we’ve all heard the saying that “a half truth is a lie” and we know this to be true.
The latest half truth from Roger Barrow, the purported President of the Development Owners Association (DOA), the organisation responsible for the upkeep of the non-residential parts of the resort, is that the costs are in the 2020/21 budget for significant improvements to the main swimming pool including a new filtration system and extensive retiling. www.losclaveles.eu
What he doesn’t say – the WHOLE truth – is:
- That the 2020/21 budget has not been approved by owners, and that these works are likely to cost €60k – €80k. Major works of this nature are capital expenditure which has to be approved prior to and not retrospectively of a capital spend.
- That this is on top of the €60k that has already been spent on the main and childrens’ pools in the past 2 years, approved with less than 300 Escritura votes, of which over 100 belong to ONA Wimpen. Club owners have been prevented from having any say in the DOA, so all this expenditure has been approved by less than 3% of all resort owners excluding Ona WimPen.
- That legislation of the Munich system of filtration was dated 2004 and Ivan Pengelly said it applied to new builds.
- Why it is so desperate that the work has to be done now, what the claimed legal requirement is, and why no notice was given of it at the 2019 DOA AGM.
- Who was invited to tender for the work, who has been contracted to do the work, and how they were selected.
Last year over €90k was spent on bar and restaurant renewal which was inappropriately classed as maintenance expenditure in the current account budget instead of capital expenditure.
This year more money is planned to be spent on kitchen renewal.
Now ask yourself who is really in control of your resort?
This is your money that is being spent without your approval. Don’t be complacent, oppose it forcefully. If you don’t, ONA WimPen will do the same with Los Claveles as they are doing with other resorts they manage i.e.
1. Build a premium brand/price resort (which by inference will entail significant levels of investment over the forthcoming years)*.
2. Look to owners to finance its significantly increased expenditure through hiking up maintenance fees on a year by year basis PLUS invoking additional incremental charges – ONA WimPen has already written about reduced income in 2020 BUT is recklessly spending cash reserves.
3. And, based on reports from other resorts, willingly pursue recalcitrant owners through the courts (even owners who have previously exited their contracts – mysteriously losing details about the ‘exit’ from its records).
Send an email to Roger Barrow to let him know what you think. rogerbarrow@losclaveles.eu
Do it now, before it’s too late.
Albert Fletcher, JP
Chairman, Club Los Claveles
* Onagrup’s Hotel style
Numerous media websites and forums as well as Onagrup themselves report that upon acquiring a resort, Onagrup will commence to modernise, re-structure, re-decorate and re-work the resort to bring it up to Onagrup’s standard and to fit in with Onagrup’s style; the cost of this all falls on the timeshare owners through their fees.
Click “English” on the Google Translate pop up that appears top right when you open these websites:
Why is Los Claveles so different to the other resorts
Unlike Wimpen’s and Onagrup’s other resorts, each of which are a mix of either outright owners, weekly Escritura owners and Club members and form part of larger residential developments or are leased or wholly owned by Onagrup, Los Claveles is so very different.
Los Claveles is situated within its own stand-alone boundary, not being integrated within a larger residential development and has no outright owners. The resort is majority Club, 85% to 15% Escritura. As experienced at Cala De Mar, having a trustee is no safeguard for the Club’s escrituras. This makes it ideal to be re-marketed as a high class premium hotel, as the late Ivan Pengelly warned us.