Escrow One Inc.

Victim Location 75048

Total money lost $78,699.50

Type of a scam Travel/Vacations

I purchased a timeshare in late-2016. I was given the name of EscrowOne by the timeshare salesman so that I could get rid of my current timeshare. I looked up EscrowOne when I returned and it appeared to be a legitimate company (through the BBB). I contacted EscrowOne when I returned to the United States. It started pretty standard with me working with David Alderman (of EscrowOne) to get closing documents completed. But from November 2016 to October 2017, there was one fee after another, all supposedly from the Mexican government to complete the sale of my timeshare to Grupo Modelo. I wired funds to Alejandro Aguilera Venegas (a Mexican Escrow Officer) at Banco del Bajio. Both David and Alejandro continued to stated that the Mexican laws relating to timeshare sales had changed in 2016 and require that the purchaser provide the security that it is a valid transaction and not an illegal transaction. There were a total of 29 fees that were "requested" by David/Alejandro under the auspices of being required by the Mexican government to complete the real estate sale to a foreign buyer (Mexican Federal Tax (10%) / Mexican State Tax (8%) / Escrow Fee / Closing Costs / Certificate of Release / Notary Fee / Customs Doc Registry Fee / Transfer Fee / Legal Fees / Capital Gains Tax / Title Search / Customs Process Fee / Luxury Tax / Customs Valuation / International Transfer Fee / Notary Fee #2 / EscrowOne Commission (7%) / Erasing of Records / Additional Legal Fees / Currency Fluctuation / Resort Transfer Registry / Bank Surcharge / Excess Tax / Inflationary Gains / SAT Validation / Foreign Exchange Registry Fee / Liberation of Funds / Customs Passageway Tariff / Border Adjustment Tax). I have the initial copies of the closing documents that were prepared by Resorts Planning Group (that I assume are affiliated with EscrowOne) and all subsequent documents (sent to request payment for each of the payments above).

Both David and Alejandro continued to mention that the Mexican government reimburses sales tax and fees associated with transactions to foreign entities. For each payment I wired, it was "confirmed" that those funds had been moved to the reimbursement account to then be sent back to me once the transaction cleared customs.

I informed David Alderman that in October, I would not send any additional monies. He stated that if the transaction did not complete, we could request for cancellation; however, the Mexican government processes cancellations on a quarterly basis and would take roughly 6 months to return a portion of my monies. He had stated this before and I refused to allow them to keep my money so I would send the next payment and so on. In October of 2017, I had enough and I held to the point of not sending any more money. Since that point, all contact numbers and email addresses do not work.