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DreamHome.bg......... ........More Like NightmareHome I first came across the company DreamHome, owned by Borislav Tochevski, through correspondence with Plamen Bonev (office manager for the Varna office of DreamHome) on the internet forum, ExpatFocus.com. At the time I owned a plot of land in the village of Yulievo, Magleesh district, which had a small old house on it. I wanted to build a new, larger house on this plot and had some rough ideas as to what I wanted but was looking for ideas. On 22nd March 2006 Plamen Bonev recommended I visit a website showing houses DreamHome had built for a client. By April 2006 I had made contact with one architect and builder in the Stara Zagora area but felt the price they gave me to design and build the house was far too high. I was therefore looking for alternative options. I then contacted Plamen Bonev privately by private message through the ExpatFocus website on 2nd May 2006 and also by email. I received a response the next day suggesting I go to Varna to discuss my ideas at the DreamHome office and they would show me houses they had already built for clients. I also sent Plamen a copy of my house plans and over the next couple of weeks we exchanged emails and revised the original plans for my house. On 31st May 2006, myself and my partner at the time, flew to Bulgaria. We had hired a car and so drove to Varna and visited the DreamHome office there and met with Plamen Bonev and also someone in their office who could do 3D views of the finished house. We were give printed copies of the house plans and designs. The next day we drove with Plamen Bonev from Varna to a small village near Veliko Turnovo to view houses that DreamHome had built. We then returned to Stara Zagora where we were to meet with Borislav Tochevski. When we arrived in Stara Zagora, later that evening, we were taken to a meeting with Borislav Tochevski’s lawyer at his office and also there was someone we were told would be the building manager. It turned out that Borislav Tochevski’s car had broken down and so did not arrive until much later that evening. The next day we met with Plamen Bonev and Borislav Tochevski at the restaurant in the Forum Hotel. We discussed ideas for the house. On returning from Bulgaria, discussions continued with Plamen Bonev via email and revised house plans were done and sent to me and on 5th July 2006 a quote for 63,500 Euros including the architect fees, for the fully finished house build. Over the next couple of weeks I put many questions to Plamen Bonev as to what would be included in the quote and about certain finishing works. On 24th July 2006 I received a preliminary contract and annex for the house build and my lawyer at the time was also copied in on the email. There were then several emails between myself and Plamen and the lawyer making amendments to the contract and annex and I understand Borislav Tochevski contacted my lawyer at one stage to discuss penalty clauses for late completion of the build. By the second week in August the contract had finally been agreed and I printed off two copies of the contract and two copies of the annex and signed these and sent them to DreamHome in Bulgaria for their signature and company stamp. On 20th August 2006 I received an email from Plamen Bonev saying that no contract had been received, so as I was visiting Bulgaria at the end of the month, the best idea was to print off a further two copies of the contract and annex, sign and stamp these and bring with me to Bulgaria to give to DreamHome in Varna. I had already arranged the first payment under the contract so that work could begin and had been asked to send this in two parts – half to Mrs Tochevski and half to Mr Tochevski (Borislav Tochevski's parents). When I questioned this I was simply told that as Borislav’s parents lived in Stara Zagora it was easier for the money to be sent to their bank account so they could pay the builders directly on behalf of DreamHome. On 26th August 2006 I flew from Manchester to Varna with a friend. Plamen Bonev picked us up from airport and took us to the hotel he had booked for us – the Cherno More in the centre of the city. He came up to our room with us and I gave him the two copies of the contract and annex that I had brought with me, already signed and stamped by myself. He said he would take these back to the DreamHome office for Borislav Tochevski to sign and the contracts would be returned to me shortly. The following day my friend and I hired a car and drove to Stara Zagora, where we were staying in the Yagodite Holiday complex in Yagoda. Within a day or two, I received a phone call to say that Borislav Tochevski was driving from Varna to Sofia and would call into the complex to see me for a quick chat and to give me the signed and stamped contract from his company, which he duly did and I requested designs and costs for a terrace out the front of my house and was told this was no problem and I would receive this shortly. I visited my plot while I was in the Stara Zagora area and saw that the old house had been demolished and work had started on clearing the space and digging the foundations. Towards the end of my trip, around the 8th September 2006, I was informed that the architects plans were all ready for inspection and signing and so I arranged to meet with the architect and builder in my lawyer’s office. This was the first time I met with Mr and Mrs Tochevski, although it was never explained who they were or that they were the parents of Borislav, just that they were involved in the building of my house. I did not have much spare time as I had to drive back to Varna but I was taken through the architects plans quickly and told where to sign and stamp. I questioned the terrace that appeared on the plans as I had yet to agree to any design or size and was told that the terrace had already been built but that it would only be a small amount extra to the original quote. On 25th September I emailed Plamen for an update on building work and details and costs for the terrace. I was told it was still not possible to tell me how much the terrace would cost but that it would not be much. I was told the foundations were now complete and so the second installment under the contract of 12,300 Euros was due. Again I was asked to send this payment to either Mr or Mrs Tochevski. Myself and Plamen corresponded mostly by Skype about updates on the build progress. I was very busy planning my move to Bulgaria in October and towards the end of October I arrived in Varna to stay with friends for a few days. I then travelled to Stara Zagora at the beginning of November. I was expecting my new house to be nearly complete but it was actually only 4 walls with not even a completed roof. Not long after my arrival I met with Mr Borislav Tochevski in my lawyers office. He proceeded to tell me he required a further 15,000 levs to complete the house as it had cost more than he had anticipated. He said the slow progress in the build had been caused by the builders he had employed but now he had engaged different builders to ensure the house was finished on time. I later found out through my lawyer, who had been contacted by Mr Tochevski senior, that in fact initially Borislav had employed his father as building manager but had now sacked him and asked a friend of his to take over the role of building manager and over see the finishing of the house. I refused to pay the additional 15,000 levs and stated that DreamHome should finish the house build under the contract as agreed. Borislav Tochevski stopped all work on the house and I therefore consulted my lawyer to prepare a Notary Appeal in order that experts visit the house and see the build quality and to ask DreamHome to complete the house under the contract. On 4th December a meeting was held at my house and was attended by Borislav Tochevski and his parents, their lawyer and my experts and the building supervisor, myself and my lawyer. During this meeting, I was taken aside by Borislav Tochevski and his lawyer and separated from my own lawyer, and pressure was put on me to allow them to continue the work and to pay them more money and not commence any legal action. Following this meeting my experts confirmed the build quality of the rough construction was of a satisfactory standard and I agreed to allow DreamHome to complete the build subject to it being done for the price agreed under the original contract. The cost of terrace, however was still in dispute. Work continued on the house but as the finishing work began it became obvious that that the builders were not competent of doing the job to a good standard. I agreed to extend the deadline for completion until the end of January, a month later than in the contract but the house was still nowhere near completed. There was still a dispute over the cost of the terrace but in January I texted Tochevski to say I would agree to pay 6000 levs for the terrace in order to settle the matter and have the property completed. He texted back to say he would agree to 7000 levs. This matter settled I hoped the house would be shortly completed. However, by March there were more problems. The wooden floor had not been laid properly and was not level so it blocked doors to the terrace from opening, the painting was of poor quality, sockets and switches were not level, the beamed ceiling in the main bedroom was a mess and there were many other problems. I therefore decided that enough was enough and terminated the contract by Notary Appeal. I had already paid for internal doors, expensive tiles and a wooden oak floor that had not been fitted. Mr and Mrs Tochevski were reluctant to give me back the keys to my house and phoned my lawyer several times asking that they be allowed to complete the house. But I felt DreamHome and their builders were not capable of finishing the project to a good standard and so I employed other builders to complete the work and sent a further Notary appeal asking for the money back that I had paid for the more expensive tiles (cheaper ones were put in the bathrooms), the wooden floor, the internal doors and for late completion of the project and the cost of having other builders finish the house to a good standard. All Notary appeals were ignored. Around April/May 2007 I launched a court case against DreamHome in Stara Zagora. We received no defence or acknowledgement of the case but eventually they applied to move case to Varna, where the company is registered. The court date in Varna was scheduled for September. In the meantime Borsilav Tochevski’s parents (Tochevski OOD - a company I had never even heard of, let alone employed to build my house) launched a case against me saying they had built my house and it has cost them around 150,000 BGN and they had done this because at the start I had appeared so nice and lovely but then had refused to meet them to sign a contract and I had never been in the country. But in another paragraph they would say that each time they met me I made excuses not to pay. They produced pointless evidence at court with figures of what things had cost but never once gave any invoices or receipts. Even their experts came up to me after court to say they knew it was all a farce. At the first court hearing in Varna against DreamHome, their lawyer had the audacity to claim that the contract we had was not legitimate as the signature of DreamHome was not valid, they denied any relationship with me, that they had received any money for the build or that they even knew me. Various evidence was submitted by both sides. A new date was scheduled for January. I requested a meeting with DreamHome to try and settle the matter. A further notary appeal was sent and ignored and who should turn up for the meeting but Mummy and Daddy Tochevski. They continued to tell me I owed them money for my house build but they would settle for the 6000E due as the last payment under the contract with DreamHome, the contract that they said did not exist!!! Anyway a few days later they phoned my lawyer to say they were not pursuing the case against me and hoped I would reconsider the case against their son. This was possibly because I had launched a police investigation into Borislav Tochevski and his parents for money received from me, if indeed they were saying they had not done any building work for me and there was no contract. In January 2008 I was served with a court summons from the lawyer for DreamHome, from him personally against me personally. WHY? Because back in summer 2007 I had made an official complaint against him to the lawyers council here in Stara Zagora has he had phoned me several times to try and persuade me to drop the court case and telling me I was stupid to pursue it and would cost me a fortune and they would ensure it went on for years. Indeed he told my lawyer the same. I was advised by my lawyer to write an official complaint about him and did so using the proper channels. Yet, despite the system being in place so clients could legitimately complain about the actions of lawyers, I was slapped with a criminal action against me for slander. The court case with DreamHome in January was rescheduled to February and so on Valentine’s day we again travelled to Varna. The hearing was a farce. The judge rejected 20,000 levs of our appeal because of some technicality and because my case had not been well presented by my lawyer (we appealed against this decision), she rejected much of the evidence we wanted to submit but accepted DreamHome’s request for a financial look into my company and expert to check whether the signature on a separate protocol was that of Borislav Tochevski, even though obvious it was not but they did not want the signature on the contract checking! On 20th March there was
the next hearing in Varna against DreamHome - I decided there was
no point in going to sit there, not contribute, pay for translator and
waste time so the lawyer just went. Police prosecutor decided
that this was a civil matter and while I could try and pursue the
matter to ensure they were punished for not declaring money for tax
reasons, quite frankly could not be bothered with hassle. I understand a final conclusion/report was meant to have been sent by me summing up my side and evidence within 7 days of final hearing, however, as it was going to cost even more to have this prepared and sent I decided not to bother. I had at this point had another lawyer review my case and been told it had been very badly handled and presented by my lawyer and if done another way, I would have stood a good chance of winning. I eventually heard that I had in fact completely lost case. All I knew at this point was that it was a 'bad claim' and that there was 80 levs to pay DreamHome for their expert fees. A while later I received a demand for over 5000 levs in costs from DreamHome. This amount was appealed and reduced to around 1,500 levs which was immediately paid. However, despite winning the appeal, DreamHome re-appealed and apparently won, as the bailiffs turned up at my door demanding over 6,500 levs for unpaid legal costs, the costs for the bailiffs and 350 levs for God knows what. To avoid additional hassle I just paid this. So hopefully that is the end of the Varna case. Overall it has probably cost me around 50,000 levs in legal costs, court fees, money paid to builders for work not done and materials that never appeared, getting other builders to put right bodge jobs and complete house, bailiff fees etc...
******************************************************************* In May 2008 there was the main hearing. Again a complete farce. He had brought along 4 witnesses to say how upset he had been, how depressed he was and unable to work properly (despite actually carrying on the other other case with DreamHome during this period) due to my letter of complaint and how it had effected his reputation and business. His 'witnesses' claimed they had to give him medication for stress. They all said how he had showed them my letter of complaint (meant to be confidential to lawyers council) and how he had told them about how I had written about my experiences on the internet. If he had not told them any of this, they would never have known about the complaint against him, yet this appeared to make no difference. He was also claiming 20,000 levs in damages. Another court date was set for September 2008 so the Judge could check whether I have a criminal record or not. At this hearing, not much happened as the court translator did not turn up but basically the case was adjourned again so further translations could be made of the my letter to the lawyer's council. The final hearing was in November and I was found guilty of defamation and causing the lawyer stress, possible harm to his business etc and was ordered to pay around 6,500 levs in compensation and costs. Luckily the 20,000 levs civil claim was rejected. At this point I was ready to just pay and be done with it but my layer insisted we should appeal as there was no way 3 judges on the appeal case could be 'influenced' as one appeared to have been in this case. The appeal was heard at the end of February, although I could get no information from my lawyer. It then seemed there were two or three further hearings although for what I have no idea. I was under the impression no decision had been given by the appeal court and the matter was still ongoing. Indeed my lawyer had said as much. Yet at the beginning of June I was handed a court paper from the bailiff, stating my company shares had been frozen and I was to pay 6,500 levs for losing this appeal. Yet when I asked my lawyer about this, he was still insisting there was another hearing. Luckily a friend who is a lawyer in Sofia checked for me and confirmed the appeal had been decided against me and I needed to pay this money urgently. My lawyer dealing with the appeal then suddenly decides I have to pay as soon as possible as the other party want to claim all my houses and will do so unless I pay up. So with interest (as I had never been told about the appeal decision and to pay up), bailiff fees, court fees, taxes and compensation, there was an additional 7,220 levs to pay. |