About two year ago my roomate worked for a company name Bowne & Company of New York. He was asked by them to relocate from his office in New York to a new Building in New Jersey. He really didn't want to move we owed a beautful house in Long Island, all our family and friends lived there and we were familar with the area.
My room mate at the time was commuting about 5 hours a day. It's was very stressful but we really didn't want to sell our house, a year went by since Bowne first offered us to relocate the they made it clear to him that if he didn't move his job was no longer safe.
He dissued it with me and we agree that his job was more important ant the time i had just closed a Business that had failed. So he was the only one make money so we desided to accept the offer. Because of the failed business our credit was not so good.
My roommate told the president of human resourse at Bowne about our credit problems. The president assure my roomate that it would not be a problem. He also said " Bowne will do what ever it takes to make sure you get a new house". Bowne also said if he moved it would great benifit him.
My roommate cam home and told me what the president has told him. So i said let do it. The president also told him that bowne would be hiring a relocation company name CitiCapital Relocation to handel the move. He said he would have someone contact me to see what are need were.
He said he would do what ever we need to have a smooth, and streefree move (what a Joke). Marcha Wilson from CitiCapital called from texas were the company is located. She told me that she would be handeling everthing and to call her anytime if we need or were unhappy with anything. Everything seem to being going really well. Marcha hired a locate realitor to help list and sell our house.
Marcha said the only thing she wanted me to do was ant repairs that the house needed. She asked me to dicribe the house and i told how how things looked like i told her the carpet was a little dated so she told me i had to change it, i also told her that the master bathroom needed so repairs she asked me has it ever been update i told her no why she told me that everthing had to be perfect so we could sell it. So we spent over ten thousand dollars Marcha told me what ever we put into the house we would get it back when we sold it.
She joke with me and told that she did this for a living so me and my roommate said she must know what they are doing so we change all the carpet and but in a new Mater bath, re-blacktoped the driveway, paints the whole house and the list goes on all so we could have a quick sale. As she said there is nothing worst then have some one intrested in our house and the sale goes bad because the buyer see something.
After all the money was spent on the house it was then put on the market (the deal we had with the relocation company was as soon as we get a buyer the relocation company would buy our house and give us pack the money minus the mortage we had left. My roommate and I discussed kepping the house and renting it just incase we weren't happy in New Jersey we could alway move back. Marcha told me when i asked he about it she told me we had to sell the house that is the only way the relocation will work.
I started felling like something was fishy so i asked Marcha if i could get that in writing she told me they don't do that. When my roommate got home from work that night i was disturbed i told him i told him I had spoken to marcha about keeping the house and she told me no i asked he to but that in writing and she refused.
I told him i was getting a little concerned because i thought about it we didn't have anything in writing either from Bowne or CitiCaptital i asked my roommate to as Bowne for some kind of relocation Package. He agreed the next day i told Marcha that i was having the Pesident of Bowne give us a relocation Package so there would be no misunderstandings I also said we were thinking of getting a lawyer to make sure everything goes smoothly she got reall mad and said there was no need to hire a laywer she said that the laywer they had respresent us and that if we has a nother lawyer he would be in the way.
I told he i was nervos because this is our first house and we neverdid a relocation before, we didn't have a reloctaion backage, and we didn't get an approvel about out new morgage which we were told citicaptal would handel it. Then about a month after we started the relocation Marcha told us that they would not be able to get us a mortage and we would have to get one on our own. I told my roomate and he went to the president and told him what had happened he once again said i promise you Bowne will get you a new house" we will do what ever it takes" just go a find a new house and don't worry.
So we trusted him " he said it was a stressful time and that things will seem to be crazy at times. He told him to relax and just have me start looking for our new house. The next day i called Marcha and said i wanted to start looking for a new house in New Jersey she told me that was fine and she would have someone from her office contact me and send me some demographic because i knew nothing about New Jersey.
A few day later i recived a stack of books they were no help so i just randomly pick places close to were my roommate was working now so he would have to go far to work. CitiCapital called a realtor in New Jersey to show me around. I was told to find a house and area that was like were we lived now. I told the reltor about were we lived and show her some piutures of the house we were living in now and around town she said she kwew what we were looking for and we told he we wanted to spend what we bought our house for four years ago se told me she ould try but because the market was so good we propbely would get what we wanted, she started show us house in the price rage we asked for the were dumps worst then a fixer-up more like a knock down.
She told us if we wanted a house and a area like we had we would have to spend more. I drove to New Jersey evryday to meet her we look at 100's house all garbage nothing had been repair or updated, which really pissed me off because i hasd spend a foutune fix our house to get it ready to sell. I told my roommate he would have to ask the presdent what we should do because it seem that a house and area like ours would cost alot more and at this point i have been looking on the border on Penivana and at this point his commute would be shorter if we say on long Island. At the same time we were me and my roommate were thinking of calling the whole thing off we were told we had an offer on the house.
At this point everythings was going wrong so we were not happy. We couyldn't find a house that we could afford. We didn't get a new mortage offer yet, we hadn't recived a relocation pageage, or anything else in writing. And now we had someone that wanted to buy our house and wanted to close in a month we felt so presuured because we were being told by both marcha and The president of Bowne not to worry about anything it would all work out.
I didn't know what to do so we made an offer on a pick of garbge home we had seen it was in a nice area so we thought we could fix it up but we need to find something, We were told by bowne that they would be giving us the down payment and the closing cost and the president himself would right a letter saying that Bowne would be doing what ever was need. We he faxed the letter to the realtor in New Jersey it said nothing like what he had told us.
So i tryed calling marcha she wouldn't return my calls and neither would the presdent talk to my roomamte. We didn't know what was happening put we felt like we were getting screwed. When i finally got in toch with Marcha I told her that you lied to us and so did the preseident and we wanted to call the relocation off she said that if i tryed anything she would sue us.
And she was having the movers come and get our things, i told her were are you going to take them we have no were to live she said it was too bad and that if i said and thing to the new buyer i would be sued. She told me our thing were going to a stoge unit in New Jersey and when we got a place we could pay to get them back. I said that was not the deal. She told us that if we were not out of the house by the end of the month we would be throw out. The movers came a pack our things did let us look at what we wanted and waht we didn't.
They didn't speak english so i couldn't explain what i wanted done. The took all the stuff and the day everything was moved the new buyer came over to take to us they came over to tell us they didn't need to move as soon as they thought and that if we wanted we could stay in the house we told them that we couldn't we had to bew out. And i said we didn't want to talk about it. Evrything seemed to go so fast and we load up some clothes and the dogs and moved into a hotel in New Jersey. My roomate contuned to go to work at Bowne he could not belive that they would do this to him.
The president was away so luis and i wated for him to get back so we could retify this. He avided myroomate untill i wrote him a letter tell him he didn't meet with us we would be forced to take action. He meet with us the but waited a few days to try a piss us off. He told me how dare i write a letter like that. I said how dare you lie to us he got mad and jump at me from across the table. At the meeting the president was there as well as another president he asked us what happened when we told him he kept lying and tell us well you going to need to rent we told him we made it clear and we wanted the house like we were promised he said"you got screwed what can you do about it get over it and move on" I was so mad but i kept clam and said we were going to go back to the hotel and think about renting he even had the nerve to offer us to rent an apartment he owned. It was clear we had be screwed.
My room, mate went back to the hotel and i call a lawyer to see what our option were. We met with him but at the time my room mate tought that bown would see what they did and fix it and still work even after what had happend. Then to top it all off his new
boss say he didn't want him there and he sould start looking for a job or department.
Then i had to get out of the hotel because it was expesive and bowne was paying for that like the said i went to look for and apartment so i found something but i was told i had to act quick i told myrooomate i need him to work for home so he could see an appartment so us and the two dogs could get out of the hotel. He call in like he had done for years and said he woul be working out of the office and when his ne boss because in never was in or anwered his phone when he got the message for my roomate say he would be in today he begain to flip out curseing tell erverone he was fired and calling him names. So someone from the office calle my roomate and told him how his boss was acting my roomate called and sent him and email.
He never responded to him so luis called and email his bosses no one would respond to him so he was fired so that when we hired a lawyer. Since then because they are both foutune 500 companies they have really good lawyer and we have a really bad one. We still have no home, no money and are living in a basement at my parents, Both Bowne and Citicapital ar playing games and still lying. No new channel will help because their scared of the companies. We just finnally got our belonging back for the storge unit because Bowne refused to release them they were hoping our things were sold after a year and a half costing over $50 thousand.
Because we have no house but we had a house worth of things we had to make a makesift tent on the backyard deck with everthing we one it has been getting wet, snowed on ect. They are still playing games. My adivse to anyone think of a company relocation or even hiring a relocation company don't you might have to be in hell like us.
Anyone that can help us that has gone through this or what we can do or help us get our story told to the news or lastly write letters on our pehalf to Bowne and Citicaptal and tell them to stop the games and take responiblty for their action. It is so unfair how big companies can just walk allover people and get away with it. If you can help us fight
Thank you
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