Billionaire couple win refund after buying US$40 million moth-infested UK mansion
The seller was found to have known about the issue since 2018 but failed to tell Iya Patarkatsishvili and Yevhen Hunyak
A judge has ordered a refund for a billionaire couple who paid £32.5 million (US$40 million) for a mansion with a “severe moth infestation”.
A UK High Court judge ruled that Iya Patarkatsishvili, daughter of the Georgian billionaire tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili, and her husband Yevhen Hunyak, can hand the home back to the seller, the property developer William Woodward-Fisher.
Patarkatsishvili and Hunyak bought Horbury Villa in Notting Hill, west London, in May 2019. However, the judgment states that within days of moving in, they started noticing moths flying around and landing on their cutlery.
The couple found moths in clothes, wine glasses, and toothbrushes and swatted away hundreds a day, the judgment stated.
Pest control companies found that insulation in the ceiling was the source of the issue. The works to replace the insulation cost £270,000 (US$335,000), the hearing heard.
The claimants accused Woodward-Fisher of knowingly selling the house with the moth infestation. He was found to have known about the issue since early 2018 but failed to tell Patarkatsishvili and Hunyak.
Woodward-Fisher told the court he had been informed that moths were not vermin and “therefore not relevant to this inquiry”.
