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The Block winners Jimmy and Tam Wilkins have lost their $1million prize and have been forced to put their home back on the market after its buyer failed to pay up.
Cyber security specialist Emese Fajk, 28, was the mystery buyer who snapped up Jimmy and Tam’s winning property on The Block last month.
Ms Fajk presented receipts of bank transfers indicating the money for the home had gone through, but the large sum never reached Channel Nine’s bank accounts.
The settlement period for the Brighton property, which fetched $4.256 million on auction day at a profit of $966,000, has now passed and the original contract is void.
The devastated Brisbane-based couple choked back tears as they told A Current Affair how they’d been left blindsided by the strange turn of events.
The Block winners Jimmy and Tam have lost their $1.06million prize and have been forced to put their home back on the market after its buyer failed to pay up
Cyber security specialist Emese Fajk (centre), 28, was the mystery buyer who snapped up Jimmy and Tam’s winning property on The Block last month. Pictured with the couple
Ms Fajk, who was born in Hungary and spent time living in New York and London, insisted she has paid the money and said she still hopes to one day own the house
‘Here we are now not knowing what’s going to happen. It’s something no one ever saw coming, no one ever expected, but it’s something we now have to deal with,’ Jimmy said.
An emotional Tam said Ms Fajk even went to the couple’s house to watch the final episode, and celebrate over a bottle of wine.
‘She actually cried with us when the result came over, it was like we knew her as a friend and we welcomed her into our family as a friend,’ Tam told ACA.
Tam said the disastrous outcome has tainted her and Jimmy’s experience on the hit TV show.
‘This was meant to be something huge for us and now it’s just horrible,’ she said.
‘Why us? Why did she choose us to do this to? I honestly have no idea, I don’t get it. It’s really bizarre.’
Jimmy said the payment process has been ‘strung along’ leading up to the settlement date, which was yesterday.
‘[There were] no signs whatsoever that she was not going to buy the house,’ he said.
Tam said Ms Fajk even went to the couple’s house to watch the final episode, and celebrate over a bottle of wine. Pictured: Jimmy, Tam, their daughter and Ms Fajk
Jimmy said the payment process has been ‘strung along’ leading up to the settlement date, which was yesterday
Ms Fajk, who was born in Hungary and spent time living in New York and London, insisted she has paid the money and said she still hopes to one day own the house.
‘I don’t know what happened, I’ve paid for everything,’ she said.
When confronted by Nine reporter Alison Piotrowski, she insisted she had paid the deposit for the property and had receipts to prove it.
‘I’m trying to find out what’s going on,’ she claimed.
She then took to social media to claim she had been ‘thrown under the bus’.
‘I didn’t get forms in time that I needed to sign, I had to find crucial information on my own, even though I paid someone else to make sure there are no hiccups,’ she wrote.
‘I still believe there is a happy ending here somewhere for everyone involved.’
Ms Fajk’s LinkedIn profile claims she has a degree in Behavioural Science at the University of West London.
But the prestigious university revealed they had not given an award to anyone by the name of Emese Fajk.
The Block host Scott Cam told ACA the situation was ‘disappointing’.
‘We trusted her to have that sort of coin… Stuff happens, and it’s happened to us… It’s about human nature, it’s about honestly. I suppose.’
The Block host Scott Cam told ACA the situation is ‘disappointing’ but said Tam and Jimmy are still the winners and will get to keep their $100,000 prize money
Cam said despite the unfortunate outcome, Tam and Jimmy are still the winners of the 2020 season and will get to keep their $100,000 prize money.
He also revealed the house will go back on the market, and will likely fetch even more money than at the aired auction in November.
‘It’ll sell – there’s no doubt. It might even sell for more because the market’s going up,’ he said.
He said there was ‘no doubt’ the house would sell the second time around, claiming it might even fetch more due to the rising housing market.
The 2020 Block season’s monster auction day – which aired in November – saw all five luxury Brighton houses soaring more than $460,000 above reserve.
Jimmy and Tam’s renovated 1950s house at 360A New Street smashed its reserve of $3.29 million by a whopping $966,000.
The rookie renovators then jumped to a seven-figure sum, as an extra $100,000 in prize money was thrown in on top.
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