Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/731331
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 25 SEPTEMBER 2016 4 News The Government of Malta through Projects Malta Ltd intends to proceed with awarding the Concession for car park facility/or facilities in Mosta. Relevant Request For Proposal document can be downloaded free of charge from Projects Malta's website: (http://projectsmalta.com/tenders) The closing date for the submissions: Monday 14 th November, 2016 at 10:00am (Central European Time). A non-refundable participation fee of €5,000 must be made prior to the submission of the RFP. The proof of payment must be included with the RFP submission. Submissions are to be delivered by hand to Projects Malta Ltd weekdays between 9:00 and 16:00 (Central European Time) at the address below: Projects Malta Ltd The Clock Tower, Level 1 Tign‚ Point, Sliema Enquiries or requests for clarifications relative to this RFP shall be submitted by e-mail to PML on admin.projectsmalta@gov.mt under the subject title "Request for Proposals to design, build, operate and maintain a multi-storey underground car park and other facilities in Mosta". Verbal questions will NOT be accepted. Such queries or request for clarifications shall be received by not later than Monday 10 th October 2016 at 12:00 (Central European Time). Objective of the Request for Proposals: Request for Proposals Request for Proposals to design, build, operate and maintain a multi-storey underground car park and other facilities in Mosta REF. No: PML /07/2016 C M Y CM MY CY CMY K Output file 20 x 3.pdf 1 Thursday/September15/2016 9:5920AM Business groups join forces in White Rocks development CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 A case in point is including the self-made billionaires, the Liv- ingstone brothers, together with prominent Maltese companies that include Tony Zahra and Charles Ellul. He is also associ- ated with interests at the Malta International Airport, the Drag- onara Casino, Vodafone, and Maltco Lotteries. The Livingstone brothers, Ian, 53, and Richard, 51, ranked 26th in the London Sunday Times 2015 rich list – they are owners of several properties, including the Park Lane Hilton in Mayfair and Fairmont in Monte Carlo. They are presently involved in a consortium constructing 20,000 residential homes in Panama City. The WRDC consortium has said that it will be investing €200 million in the project, with most of its revenue coming from the sales of the villas which are ex- pected to fetch at least €300 mil- lion. The project will also include a small quality hotel and some re- tail outlets, apart from the villas. The consortium includes Mi- chael Bianchi, the Livingstone Brothers, the Alpine Group, headed by MHRA president To- ny Zahra, Bonnici Brothers, the construction company owned by Emanuel Bonnici, John Bonnici and Mario Bonnici; Mizzi Hold- ings Ltd, with Maurice Mizzi, Brian Mizzi and Kenneth Mizzi as directors; Sea Estate Ltd with Joseph Eucharist Vella of Kar- kanja Ltd; Elma Ltd with Den- nis Baldacchino of Tal-Maghtab Construction Ltd, and Charles Ellul of Elbros Construction Ltd. Billionaires Ian and Richard Livingstone. Together with Michael Bianchi, the White Rocks consortium will be selling villas of up to €5 million each YANNICK PACE NO agent fees? Sounds good enough, and 'Not Greedy' – yes, that is the name – is making a point of telling people they can bring change to the real estate industry by removing agent fees from transactions. John Zammit, director of the Not Greedy start-up, told Malta- Today that he was amazed at how many people think that agency fees on property transactions are paid for by the seller rather than the buyer. Transactions conducted through a real estate agency incur an agency fee, which is payable by the seller but usually passed on to the buyer through an increase in the cost of the property. Fees are usually in the range of 3.5% and 5% of the value of the property. With real estate agent fees cal- culated as a percentage of the value of a property, fees will con- tinue to rise as the property mar- ket continues to grow. Someone buying a property val- ued at €150,000 in 2010 would have had to pay up to €7,500 in agency fees, assuming a 5% fee. Over the past five to six years, house prices have risen on aver- age by roughly 50%, meaning an average €150,000 property is now worth €225,000, driving agency fees up to €11,250 for essentially the same service rendered. Not Greedy has set up an online portal which allows sellers to ad- vertise their property by signing up and uploading photos to the website. Once online, buyers can arrange to view the property and even make an offer through the website itself. Sellers using the website's service will be required to pay a standard fee which will never exceed a value equivalent to 1% of the value of the property. However not everyone believes that the industry can do without agents. Ian Casolani, managing director of Belair Property, said that the job of a real estate agent that takes his work seriously goes far beyond simply showing prop- erties and that they offer a more tailored service that a website cannot offer. "Many people underestimate what goes into the day to day job of an agent, dealing with the au- thorities, permit issues, legal pa- perwork and a lot of other small jobs that go unnoticed," said Casolani. Zammit agrees that the indus- try contains many hard working agents, however he is adamant that the industry itself is flawed due to issues such as a lack of transparency, unjustifiable fees, and often poor service. He added that while the price of property has shot up by 67% in the last 15 years, real estate agency opera- tional costs have not. "It is a time when the average buyer is being hit harder than ever financially, yet at the same time the agencies are making more money than ever, instead of passing on savings to their cli- ents," said Zammit While the idea of saving buy- ers money is a positive one, one can also envisage sellers inflating their price to take advantage of the fact that there are no agency fees. Mr Zammit acknowledged that this was a possibility but added that in most cases the sell- er has one asking price in mind, which he communicates to the agency. "Sellers are usually happy to get that amount irrespective of what the property is advertised at. The agency then increases the price by 5% and sometimes a little bit more to round off the price, I'm not too sure sellers would in- crease their asking price if the commission is removed, and this can be seen by those owners who try and advertise on other web- sites they use their asking price and not the inflated price." added Zammit. 'Greedy' agents are target of start-up slashing fees