Selling houses involved in multi-level marketing schemes like Thien Ngoc Minh Uy.

Enticed by the sweet promises of getting rich through Thien Ngoc Minh Uy's agency, Ms. Tran Thi Lan found every reason to sell her spacious 5-story house for 12 billion VND to join the multi-level marketing scheme.

Million-dollar roses: They fry themselves in their own fat.

Through a close friend's introduction, Ms. Lan joined the multi-level marketing system of Thien Ngoc Minh Uy (TNMU) in January 2015 at the Ngoc Thai branch (Dong Da, Hanoi). Initially, she purchased 26 health and wellness product codes at 11.8 million VND per code, hoping to recoup 25 million VND per code after one year.

The multi-level marketing scheme of Thien Ngoc Minh Uy that Ms. Lan was involved in.

Ms. Lan recounted: At that time, she was taken to seminars with thousands of attendees, and the commission bonuses amounted to billions of dong. The presentations about functional food products that claimed to cure even cancer captivated her.

Her close friend was just as drunk, even dragging her husband along. Because this friend was both her direct superior (receiving a commission for inviting Ms. Lan) and a close acquaintance, she encouraged Ms. Lan to raise as much money as possible to participate.

"When I told her I was running out of money, she said she was planning to mortgage her house to borrow an additional 4 billion VND to buy more stock at TNMU's dealership for both of us. If I wanted, I could borrow along with her, and I would only have to pay the interest on my portion. Seeing that she wanted to help me make money, I agreed," Ms. Lan recounted.

Later, this person lent Ms. Lan 2 billion VND. Immediately, that money was converted into nearly 200 orders for ozone machines at this distributor, each priced at 10.7 million VND. That month, Ms. Lan received nearly 400 million VND in commission without realizing that this money was actually her own, paid in a way that was essentially "using her own money to pay herself."

Selling houses for multi-level marketing schemes.

After receiving the huge commission, Ms. Lan only received small amounts of money in the following months. At this point, the pressure from paying bank interest was increasing. To have money to pay off the loan and continue her "dream of getting rich" with TNMU's agency, Ms. Lan considered selling her house.

Ms. Lan owns a five-story house on a major street in Cau Giay District, Hanoi. The land area is 100 square meters. The house is registered in her name.

According to Ms. Lan, when rumors spread about her intention to sell the house, a "colleague" at TNMU's Ngoc Thai branch suggested that she temporarily transfer ownership of the land and house to someone else so that this person could take out a bank loan on her behalf.

"However, I disagreed because I didn't know who was supposed to be transferring ownership of my house and land. If they went back on their word after the transfer, I would lose my house and only receive a small amount of money," Ms. Lan said.

"Desperate, I came up with the idea of ​​selling the house. I gave the reason that I wanted money to divide among my children. As soon as I put it up for sale, someone immediately came to buy it for 12 billion VND. I gave my children 6 billion VND, and with the rest, I paid off a loan from a friend and quickly bought an apartment to live in temporarily. If it weren't for my involvement with the Ngoc Thai branch of TNMU, I would never have sold the house," Mrs. Lan said bitterly.

Rescued from the multi-level marketing "den".

After reading VietNamNet's articles about TNMU's distributors, Ms. Lan realized that the idea of ​​getting rich from these products was a pipe dream. Encouraged by her children, Ms. Lan submitted a request to verify the information and seek legal assistance in her journey to "withdraw her capital" from TNMU's distribution.

Despite having submitted her resignation, after each interaction with her "colleagues" at the Ngoc Thai agency, Ms. Lan wavered because of the arguments they presented, such as: she would receive a huge commission next month; if she withdrew now, she would only receive 60% of the money she had invested; she would have to compensate the higher-level agents who had received commissions from inviting her to buy their products...

Upon receiving Ms. Lan's application, we reviewed the file and sought advice from legal experts. After a thorough explanation based on legal grounds, Ms. Lan submitted a request to Ngoc Thai Agency of TNMU Co., Ltd. to repurchase her goods in accordance with Article 26 of Government Decree 42/2014/ND-CP on the management of multi-level marketing activities.

On April 15th, four days after submitting her complaint, Ms. Lan was scheduled to sign a liquidation contract. According to the contract, the goods she could return to TNMU's Ngoc Thai agency were worth over 2.3 billion VND. However, because she had already received 557 million VND in commission and a 10% storage fee had to be deducted, she was only entitled to 1.527 billion VND.

"In the end, I didn't receive any commission or salary. On the contrary, I lost nearly 400 million VND due to deductions and the inability to return nearly 20 items I had used. However, I was still lucky. I am very grateful to VietNamNet for advising and supporting me," Ms. Lan said.

According to Vietnamnet