Bridgewater Aged Care home went into administration on May 23 with $8.5 million in missing money

Melanie Olson is devastated that she stands to lose more than two thirds of the money she invested. Picture: JULIE BEST

INVESTORS in a failed Roxburgh Park aged-care home have been offered less than a third of what they paid because $8.5 million is missing.

Roxburgh Park mother-of-five Melanie Olson broke down last week as she told the Leader the latest offer for her investment a single-bedroom was $41,000. She paid $127,000 for it in 2005.

She and her husband thought the investment, in Bridgewater Aged Care home, would secure a future for her children. Now she fears she will leave them in debt.

“When we were first hearing the returns it was like a dream, then one morning it’s just turned into a nightmare,” Mrs Olson said.

The couple thought they had covered the element of risk by enlisting a financial adviser.

“People get old all the time. How could you go wrong?” she said.

“We’re just ordinary citizens trying to get by.

“I never had a lot of money. We did this to have something. To try and climb the ladder and we got shot down.”

The financial strains were more than she could afford and more than she could take while her husband fought cancer.

“I keep thinking one day my husband might not be here and I’ll be left with all this on my own. What I am I going to do?”

Bridgewater went into the hands of administrators on May 23 with $8.5 million in missing money.

Administrator Stephen Longley, of PricewaterhouseCoopers, said there were enough funds to continue operating the centre until mid-October if a sale was imminent by the end of September.

Source: Leader News - Kelly Brown