Exclusive: It was launched by a Westminster law grad
A website that allows people to flog their homes via a raffle inadvertently published its lawyer’s legal advice online.
Houseagogo’s users can enter a special prize draw to win a property listed on the site by purchasing raffle tickets for as little as £2.15 each. In addition to the tickets, homeowner-hopefuls must correctly guess the year the property was built. A winner, who guesses the year correctly, is then selected at random and handed the deeds to their new home.
Unfortunately, the site — which is the brainchild of University of Westminster law graduate Lara Buckler and her property developer husband, Chris — accidentally featured a host of comments from its lawyer on its terms and conditions page.
Legal pointers, now removed, included: “[I] suggest you do your own due diligence to confirm that the owner does have legal title to sell the house” and “if a winner does not want to participate in any marketing/publicity, this would be hard to enforce”.
Elsewhere, referencing a term that allows Houseagogo to recover a property that is awarded incorrectly due to human error, the lawyer states: “in practice this would be very problematic”.
A spokesperson for Houseagogo told Legal Cheek:
“Thanks for bringing this to our attention. At least you know we got the legal advice. It’s a new company and so teething problems are bound to happen (as well as happening) so bear with us!”
Property consultant Buckler and her partner initially set up the site to help sell their £300,000 studio flat in Nunhead, South London, according to reports. They now hope to expand the site and raffle off other people’s properties too.
But this isn’t the first time a property has been sold in this way.
Earlier this month, a £300,000 three-bedroom bungalow near Birmingham hit the market with tickets costing just £1. The winner of the house will be announced early next year. Meanwhile, a chance to win a £700,000 flat in Dalston, East London, will cost you as little as £2.