“They have achieved their goal, a probable bankruptcy on Monday.” Oscar Properties CEO Richard Bagge draws the bitter conclusion after the Stockholm district court rejected the application for reconstruction.
Perhaps the successful saga has now completely reached its end, the one about a young guy, Oscar Engelbert, who in the early 2000s realizes that there is an interesting niche in the housing market in Stockholm that can be developed – converting older properties into attractive condominiums . You can read about it here.
Everything went smoothly until the company started larger and luxurious new construction projects in a market that became increasingly price sensitive and when interest rates pick up, it’s the nail in the coffin. The bankruptcy has hung over the company for a long time and it is symptomatic that the real prestige project in Oscar Properties’ history, the two luxury buildings Norra Tornen by Hagastaden, are the ones that finally sink the ship, and the reason is that under the luxurious shell there were leaking sewer pipes and unreliable elevators.
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The housing association Innovation in the Towers has, in a lengthy legal process, asked Oscar Properties to declare bankruptcy, and the last straw – a reconstruction of the company – has been knocked over by the Stockholm district court. In its decision, the district court writes that Oscar Properties has not shown that it exists “reasonable reason to assume that the viability of the business can be secured through the reconstruction”.
Oscar Properties CEO Richard Bagge is critical and bitter. In a comment on the decision, he writes: “It was a sad news. The district court hinges much of its reasoning on the question of the company’s ‘viability’. That they think it is missing. They don’t understand that you can acquire a new, different business in an attractive shell.”
He also gives the condominium association a boot: “At the same time, I have to hope that Brf Innovation is satisfied. They have achieved their goal, a probable bankruptcy on Monday. In the event of a bankruptcy, the outcome for them is zero, zilch as they say in English. I have tried to explain that to them so many times, both by phone and email. They are left with their lawyer’s bill, which they hope the bankruptcy estate will pay, but they have to join the ranks of all other creditors.”
For the founder Oscar Engelbert, life is not so bright either. His own company Parkgate has debts to the Kronofogden of SEK 77 million and the authority has made home visits to secure values in, among other things, paintings, designer furniture, a high-class bureau for half a million and Engelbert’s favorite armchairs by the Danish designer Hans J Wegner – this according to Expressen.
