Jeremy Damaris, the owner of a popular Kenyan diaspora YouTube channel known as Kenya Diaspora Media has been caught up in a home buying scam.
According to a report that appeared in the Daily Nation on Wednesday, Damaris who is a Kenyan residing in the US, has been the advertising fuel behind real estate projects that has seen unsuspecting Kenyans based in the US lose millions of money.
Although Damaris resides in the US, the Daily Nation report says that he is a frequent traveler to Kenya where he carries out his marketing gigs on land and property.
The report says that Damaris was the marketer of a housing project dubbed Manna Residence that was being undertaken by Willstone Homes Limited, a company that is owned by Ejidio Kinyanjui who was a former sales manager of Banda Homes Limited. Banda Homes collapsed with investors money.
Investing in with Willstone turned into tears for Julius Njeru, who the report says learned about the project from Damaris’ channel in July 2022.
Apparently, Njeru approached Willstone Homes Limited to buy a three bedroom bungalow with a domestic servant quarter (DSQ) at Sh8.95 million. He was allocated unit number 13 which was to be constructed on a 50*100 plot. He then made a deposit of Sh2 million to the real estate company two months later, with the balance of Sh6.95 due in installments of Sh463,333.
However, by November 2022, construction of the house was yet to start. When Njeru asked Willstone what was going on, he received inconsistent images about the development. He then hired a private investigator and an advocate who carried out due diligence and found out that the property Willstone Homes Limited had sold to him belonged to a third party known as Majik Consultancy Limited.
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According to the Daily Nation report, Njeru decided to withdraw from the project citing deceptive marketing and misrepresentation of facts. On March 8, 2023, the Daily Nation reported that Willstone gave him a proposal to refund the money with a deduction of 2 percent on the total purchase price. 5 months later, it made a payment of Sh653,322 then cut off communication forcing Njeru to run to the courts for help in recovering the balance of Sh1,306,668.
The report also highlighted Joseph Kiiru’s case. Kiiru is in court fighting to recover money from Willstone after undergoing through a similar ordeal as Njeru.
According to the Daily Nation, Damaris was also the media marketer of an off-plan investment project by Mahiga Homes known as Mahiga Homes Rock Garden 2. This project is located a few metres from Willstone’s Manna Residence. The Mahiga project has since been abandoned by the company which the paper says may have pocketed up to Sh110 million from unsuspecting investors.
The Daily Nation quoted Damaris as saying that he “was willing to help our Kenyans to own houses” in one of his marketing videos. Incidentally, as the Daily Nation ran this story, Damaris was in Spokane with Willstone’s Ejidio Kinyanjui, and posted marketing videos of homes in Joska and Thika Road that he alleged are going for Sh10.8 million!
