A COMPANY owned by former Orange mayor John Davis and his son Ben has been put into liquidation, with the company also set to face the Supreme Court of NSW.
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The court hearing has come following a land sale dispute with Sentinel Property Group, the owners of the Orange Homemaker Centre.
Davis Investment Group Holdings allegedly agreed to purchase the former Bunnings Warehouse site on the Mitchell Highway, with John Davis Motor Group to relocate from East Orange to the new location.
JDMG lodged an application for a $3 million redevelopment of the site which was approved by Orange City Council on March 17, 2020.
A month later, DIGH terminated the sale contract and then its directors and shareholders, John and Ben Davis, appointed O'Brien Palmer Insolvency and Business Advisory's Liam Bailey as liquidator on April 17.
Mr Bailey said a condition in the contract was that the sale would not be finalised until the development application was approved by council. He said DIGH terminated the property sale contract and that "the vendors had advised the intention to take action to enforce the contract".
"The company [DIGH] being without resources didn't have any assets to deal with the legal action so they put it into liquidation," he said.
Sentinel managing director Warren Ebert said there had been other interested parties in the site but that SPG had acted in "good faith at all times" while it waited for JDMG's development application to be approved.
He said while settlement on commercial sales can be lengthy, JDMG allegedly asked for numerous extensions even though Mr Ebert said it had paid less than a 10 per cent deposit.
Mr Ebert said SPG waited an "extraordinary amount of time" before JDMG terminated the sale contract 2.5 years after agreeing to purchase the site.
"One thing I can assure them is we have the resources to do this [launch legal action]," he said.
The CWD contacted John Davis for comment and was issued with a statement by Ben Davis.
It said that DIGH was solely established for the single transaction of purchasing the former Bunnings site.
"Due to conditions not being met and the effect COVID-19 is having on the motor industry, the purchase did not proceed and subsequently Davis Investment Group Holdings Pty Ltd has been wound up as this entity is no longer required," the statement read.
"Davis Investment Group Holdings Pty Ltd although having the same directors as John Davis Motors, is totally separate." The land sale contractual dispute has been set for a directions listing in the NSW Supreme Court later this month.
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