adminNqobile Tshili Chronicle Reporter
FIVE houses from Bulawayo’s eastern suburbs that were part of the 23 houses on sale, were sold for a song during a public auction conducted at a city hotel yesterday. The upmarket houses are in Burnside, Kumalo and Fortunes Gate. A Burnside house worth more than $150,000 was sold for about $62,000 while a Fortunes Gate house valued at $120,000, was sold for $49,000.
Houses in the western suburbs such as Nketa valued at about $25 000, were sold for as little as $7,000.
The houses were owned by Bulawayo families who owed banks, micro finance companies and the Bulawayo City Council varying amounts.
The move to auction the houses has irked Bulawayo residents who accuse the creditors of thriving at the expense of their helpless victims.
Bulawayo United Residents Association chairperson Winos Dube said the creditors should have engaged their debtors and come up with payment plans instead of leaving residents homeless.
“It’s disheartening to hear or see such things happening. We want Bulawayo to grow but this can’t happen when people are losing their properties. The creditors should have allowed the owners to sell their houses at the right prices and not what has happened which has worsened their plight as their houses went for a song,” he said.
Dube called on government to stop the auctioning of people’s houses as a way of recovering debts.
“These are signs that the economy is not doing well and people are being exploited. Imagine what would happen if service providers like Tel-One and Zesa start auctioning people’s houses,” he said.
Affirmative Action Group vice president Sam Ncube said his organisation was going to approach the courts to nullify yesterday’s auction which he said was meant to rob people of their properties.
“It’s not acceptable. The laws of the country don’t support this. A house in Kumalo can’t be sold for $33,000 when its value is more than $180,000,” he said.
An estate agent official who requested anonymity said most houses in the city’s eastern suburbs were worth more than $100,000 while the minimum price for most western suburb houses was $10,000.
Online Reporter