Minha casa Minha Vida
Hi Chre,
Apologies for the delay in responding, My experence of Minha Casa Minha Vida investments is only through Obelisk International, who's lawyer of choice would appear to be Manzanares International. Interestingly, Manzanares put a disclaimer on the bottom of their documents, which states they are not responsable for the views expressed by individual lawyers, so no protection there !! Obelisk try to claim that the failure of their project, which was a partnership between M&K constructors and a real estate company called Manha, was due to the delays in the Town Hall which was inundated with planning applications etc. However, in April 2011, they told me everything was in place and constuction of the first phase was set to begin. Except that nothing happened, M&K refused to start construction stating that too many appartments where being built and they would have difficulty selling them. Yet, pre-sales had been going well according to Obelisks CEO (moderated)
I've since found out that M&K don't have the best reputation for fulfilling their obligations and both Manzanares and Obelisk would have known this as they have all had dealings with each other on other projects that have also failed.
It seems to me from reading 'Posts' relating to various Brazilian consruction projects, that reliability is not considered to be particularly important. There are unfinished projects all over Brazil where constructors have just walked away, and everyone tries to claim 'Force Majure' in the event of court action. My contract, drawn up by Manzanares, is barely worth the paper it is written on. Undoubtedly, there are success stories with Minha Casa, but be careful if you are going ahead with your investment. Do your own research, don't believe all the company management say to you, once they have your money you are in their hands and at their mercy and you have to hope that they can deliver on what they promise. (moderated). Please be careful and if in doubt just walk away yourself.
Jethro