Section buyer Sujan Kotha was devastated when his contract on the McMenamin Place property was cancelled.

A young couple say they were duped out of their dream home when a developer cancelled the sales agreement on their section so it could resell the property for more money.

Aucklander Sujan Kotha and his wife Kavya Reddyreddy were looking forward to building their family home in a 28-lot development at 6 McMenamin Place, near the Northern Motorway in Albany.

In November 2013 they paid a 10 per cent deposit on a $403,000 section, with the condition that the owner would gain resource consent for the project before the sale was settled.

CHRIS MCKEEN / FAIRFAX NZ Kotha surveys the Albany property where he and his wife had hoped to build their dream home.

They waited patiently for 15 months, denying themselves holidays and outings in order to save more towards their new home.

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﻿Suddenly, in January 2015, the owner, J&H Development Ltd, cancelled the contract, claiming it had been unable to get resource consent.

Kotha and Reddyreddy were devastated.

"I was totally upset when I heard, I didn't know where to go," Kotha said.

Checks with Auckland Council revealed that J&H Development had never applied for resource consent to develop 6 McMenamin Place.

The couple were then shocked to see their section re-advertised by Barfoot & Thompson, the same real estate agency which had originally sold it to them.

The couple got a friend and a relative to email Barfoots separately, pretending to be interested buyers.

They were told the section would sell for between $460,000 and $480,000.

QV figures show average property values on the North Shore rose 12 per cent between November 2013 and January 2015.

Auckland Council confirmed it received a consent application for a 28-lot subdivision at 6 McMenamin Place in November 2015, 10 months after the couple's contract was cancelled.

The application was currently on hold, awaiting further information, a spokesperson said.

The Home Owners and Buyers Association (HOBANZ) believes the case is far from an isolated incident in Auckland's hot property market, and hopes Kotha and Reddyreddy's story will prompt other affected buyers to speak out.

"The fact that J&H Development made no effort to obtain resource consent clearly indicates that they were not intending to do anything for a while," HOBANZ project director Alan Nicol said.

HOBANZ wrote to the company's lawyers asking for the difference between what Kotha and Reddyreddy paid for the section and what the company on-sold it for, but received no formal reply, he said.

The couple did eventually get their deposit back but without interest, and still don't have a home.

"My money was sitting there for 18 months with no interest," Reddyreddy said.

"And then you re-advertise (the section) again. What are you trying to do?

"We're really scared to invest now."

Barfoot & Thompson managing director Peter Barfoot said J&H Development told the agency it was having difficulty obtaining resource consent because of the challenging geography of the site.

Barfoots relisted the property after the first contract was cancelled and sold it in April 2015 for $460,000.

That contract was also cancelled last month. No commission was taken in either instance, he said.

The developer has since told Barfoots' Takapuna manager that the plan for the subdivision has changed. The manager was due to meet them on Friday, but the agency currently had no listings for McMenamin Place, Peter Barfoot said.

​Because the site has not been subdivided yet, no separate titles for the sections exist, so property records do not show sales and prices to date.

​The director of J&H Development is listed as Jun Zeng, who is also a shareholder along with Yan Qu.

The firm's lawyer, Michele Lu, said she had no authority to speak to media.