http://www.flickr.com/photos/ableman/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Update: February 23rd 2010, the owner of HungryHammer wrote to tell us they will be back soon. ?
Remember HungryHammer.com? Some of you may remember it more than others, those of you who were victims of their shoddy penny auction business, which published dozens of press releases telling us that they planted trees, spent over $200K on the website alone and tried to convince us that their testimonials were real.
In real estate there’s a term
Now take a look at the following testimonial by a user who also made the website Hungry-Hammer.com, he claimed that this site was made in an effort to obtain affiliate money, but when we found it ranked very high in Google for the keywords “HungryHammer.com Scam,” we believe that this website could possibly have been made by someone working for or affiliated with HungryHammer, however we could be wrong, but- the domain name does not expire until July of this year and the site, like HungryHammer.com is gone.
“(runs) smoother and better than their main competitors!!
Thanks to everyone at hungry hammer! I joined the site within the first few days of launch and have won many items at massive discount rates!! 🙂 🙂 I have seen a few problems with the beta site.. Alex, Ruby and Nick have all done everything right at fixing all the problems very fast and compensating members for any inconvenience!
After all it’s the Hungry Hammer’s team that works the site which is now out of Beta and running smoother and better than their main competitors!!
So come on everyone ˜Grab yourself a Bargain” from this trusted site!
Username: anotherterror
Why would a satisfied user use marketing terms in his testimonial, why would he create a website with the company name in the domain in an attempt to receive affiliate money? He also used the HungryHammer.com background, he said he had permission.
Were the people behind HungryHammer.com just good at making things up?
This is feedback from a penny auction bidder who used HungryHammer:
“I am unable to find a current e-mail for Hungry Hammer / High Cloud Media LLC. I am still owed over $1000.00 worth of prizes dating back to Aug. 2009. I was promised in late Oct. and early Nov. that the items were being sent. If anyone knows how to get ahold of these people, will you please let me know? I cannot believe that this so called trusted site is not following through. I hope no one else out there is still owed their
“items won”.
Never once did we say HungryHammer.com was a trusted site.
We must have missed the press release where we found the following:
“HungryHammer is one of the world’s best penny auction sites with 25,000 users and growing. HungryHammer was established by the High Cloud Group in 2009 after identifying an obvious gap in the entertainment online penny auction industry for providing personal customer service and a transparent bidding engine.”
One month after we posted about HungryHammer.com they gained 15,000 users? Really?
Enter Alistair Powell
Alistair Powell, a young 20-something real estate investor associated with the property company Seven Continent Investment (www.7cinvest.com), 7cinvest has since undergone voluntary liquidation. Alistair Powell was listed as the owner of High Cloud Media, LTD, his name was also on the domain whois registry for HighCloud’s website. Today a reader sent in some interesting information about Mr. Powell which led us to dig a little deeper:
Vanessa Warwick, a professional landlady, said the following on the online property investment community, SingingPig.co.uk, in the thread: “7 C Invest in LIQUIDATION POSSIBLE FRAUD“
“I think his personal investment strategy, investing in mainly tertiary markets, and thinking rental guarantees are a good thing, shows that he actually knows nothing about property “investment” and should never have been “advising” others. However, you could say that he knows how to “speculate”, and has has lost the gamble, and that is why his business, and no doubt his private portfolio, have gone down the pan.
Like many other companies who have gone before him, Mr. Powell made outrageous claims of no risk/high return. The old saying still holds true that if something seems too good to be true, it generally is ….
I agree that the reasons given for his company’s failure – such as “jealous rivals” – were absolutely ridiculous.
Also, interesting to note that he received a hefty 10% commission on all sales, which is rather steep and was most likely accommodated in an over-inflated price.
I would imagine it very unlikely that he could start up another business now. He has alienated many big players in the property industry and owes them a lot of money. It would be hard for him to get back into the industry on that basis. With the transparency that the web now brings, there are fewer dark areas for him to hide and continue his unethical business practices.”
Another commentator said,
“However their “due diligence” on investments that they sold left more than a little to be desired and mostly centered around commission payments and marketability rather than investment fundamentals. Attractive marketing, nicely packaged but a very variable quality of investments and a very obnoxious owner.”
A blogger for an Albanian real estate team said the following of 7Cinvest:
“7Cinvest were considered one of the better property investment companies. The properties they offered seemed to be good value as an investment, clients seemed to be happy with their service, and the company appeared to be booming – opening new international offices at a rapid rate, and hiring many new staff.
So how did it all go wrong?
How did Alistair Powell and his 7Cinvest (Seven Continent Invest) company end up filing for Administration in early 2009 and owing their creditors over £2 million?
Apparently 7Cinvest did not have a client account for their investors’ money, and they took deposits directly into their main account for off plan projects, and they did not forward the funds to the developers. This is crazy!”
After all of the poor reports about Mr. Powell’s Seven Continent Investments LTD, 7CInvest denied allegations.
Both 7cinvest.com and hungryhammer.com are now gone:
Our reader told us that no charges were pursued against Mr. Powell in his previous role- cites that he was a ‘victim of the recession,’ however he doesn’t believe that to be true.
While we are not too sure what role Mr. Powell played in HungryHammer.com we do know that he was connected in some way, if not the owner.
Did you win and ever receive items from HungryHammer.com?
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Alfred April 9, 2011, 9:46 pm
Alistair Powell was involved in Hungry Hammer – He was the owner of High Cloud Media and he was also one of the previous owners of 7CI Investment which was shut down prior and/or during his entry into the Penny Auction website business.
The ownership address for the domain names of 7CIinvest and Hungry Hammer are the same addresses, which were the address of record for Alistair Powell.
After Alistair Powell’s investment company was shut down by the government he then tried his luck in the penny auction business with less success at making money than he did with his off-shore real estate investment business.
No matter, Alistair Powell still left the UK to try and start fresh in the U.S. as a real estate agent for One Sotheby’s Realty in Miami Beach.
But not before also declaring bankruptcy and insolvency in the UK (copy and paste the link below to view Alistair Powell’s bankruptcy record)
http://www.insolvency.gov.uk/eiir/IIRCaseIndivDetail.asp?CaseId=42482683&IndivNo=1&Court=HIGH&OfficeID=600000071&CaseType=B
He still tells all in the US that his problems in the UK were not his, but were due to the economy and other issues that were out of his control. As one that has investigated his “career” – I doubt that claim.
A previous comment in your post doubts that Alistair Powell would be able to start up a new business after his “unethical business practices” – unfortunately, it appears he has been able to latch onto a truly legimate business such as One Sotheby’s Realty in order to try and reinvent himself while trying to rewrite his own history.