The PR agency for Bradkeel Developments, which is building Belfast's Sugar Walk scheme, sent out a press release entitled 'Worth the Wait', with photos of people queueing, one sat in a deckchair and wrapped in a sleeping bag.
The press release claimed: "A group of potential purchasers queued outside the Templeton Robinson estate agent's Lisburn Road office yesterday, preparing to register for an iconic apartment in the Sugar Walk complex, based in the heart of Cathedral Quarter in Belfast."
However, the photos have been exposed as at least partially fake, according to the Irish Times. The woman in the deck chair at the head of the queue is actually a model paid by PR agency Michelle McTernan Management.
"I did put a good-looking girl at the front of the queue and paid for her to be there as a model," admitted the agency's Michelle McTernan. "I know if there's someone good-looking in the photograph it has more chance of being in the papers."
Bradkeel Developments' Paul Fitzsimons defended the stunt, saying the other people standing in the photos were genuine potential buyers who had been told to gather there last Thursday to receive brochures and see a special sculpture of the complex made from sugar cubes.
He said deposits had been paid on 35 of the apartments retailing from £135,000.
John Davis of property consultants Davis and Armstrong, told the newspaper: "Everyone and his dog is trying to talk up the market so that people again feel panicked that they should get back on to the ladder.
"The reality is that there is very little demand for property in the north of Ireland."
David at Moray Rentals unhappily commented that 'You never see any good looking women queuing to get into our shop.......'
I won't tell your wife David.....!
Until the next time,
Jackson.
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