Today, administrators DVT McLeods revealed the extent of the Sunshine Coast company’s financial woes during the first creditors meeting.<\/p>\n
Nearly 50 customers face losing $2.25 million in progress payments for unfinished and unbuilt caravans.<\/p>\n
About 70 employees are short $2.16 million in unpaid wages, superannuation and leave entitlements.<\/p>\n
The Australian Tax Office is owed at least $2.72 million, and suppliers are $1.6 million in the red.<\/p>\n
But the company has assets worth approximately $755,000, the administrator told creditors.<\/p>\n
There are 47 customers who have paid deposits up to $120,000, but only 13 caravan chassis have been physically located.<\/p>\n
Customers outraged<\/p>\n
Sandra Muller flew to Brisbane from regional NSW for the creditors meeting.<\/p>\n
She has paid $101,000 towards her dream van and said she feels deceived.<\/p>\n
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Sandra Muller from NSW Southern Highlands attended the creditors’ meeting in person. (ABC News: Lucas Hill)<\/p>\n
“Disbelief, anger \u2026 You just feel like you’ve been had, basically,” she said.<\/p>\n
“Next year it was our plan to go to Western Australia for three months or so.”<\/p>\n
Ms Muller said she “panicked” after realising the company was in trouble when the company’s website shut down.<\/p>\n
“There was no sleep that night \u2026 it was not good,” she said.<\/p>\n
Ms Muller said her caravan was originally due for completion in July, before delivery was delayed multiple times.<\/p>\n
“There seems to be a lot of inconsistencies about the production process or the time frame,” she said.<\/p>\n
“It seems like there’s a ploy there to get as much money in quickly.”<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Lester Jerman’s caravan was in for repairs when AOR collapsed, and it has gone missing. He says the administrators have not responded to his questions.\u00a0 (ABC Sunshine Coast: Josh Dye)<\/p>\n
Another customer, who asked not to be named, said they were asked to bring forward their payment of $61,000 by one week.<\/p>\n
The money was due in mid-August, but the company re-issued the invoice and requested payment in early August.<\/p>\n
The ABC has seen one instance of a customer emailing the company in April asking whether their deposit was safe.<\/p>\n
The sales manager replied, saying AOR’s order book was full for the next six months.<\/p>\n
“Whilst there is uncertainty in all markets with the war in Iran, this isn’t stopping our operations,” he replied.<\/p>\n
“I have no reason to think there would be any chance of AOR closing.”<\/p>\n
The ABC previously revealed that AOR was spruiking a bonus deal to entice new customers in the weeks before it stopped trading.<\/p>\n
Director under microscope<\/p>\n
A sale campaign is under way to find a possible buyer for the business, in the hope of returning money to creditors.<\/p>\n
“If the business and assets cannot be sold as a whole, our current intention is to proceed with a separate auction of plant, equipment and stock,” administrator Nick Keramos told creditors during the three-hour meeting on Thursday.<\/p>\n
AOR’s directors were founder Steven Budden and Barry Russell Evans.<\/p>\n
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Russell Evans became a director of AOR in 2021. (Supplied.)<\/p>\n
Mr Keramos criticised the way Mr Evans has engaged with administrators.<\/p>\n
“It has been average,” Mr Keramos said.<\/p>\n
“The questions we’ve raised \u2026 a lot of the time those responses aren’t satisfactory.<\/p>\n
“We’ve had to continue to follow up responses to those particular issues.<\/p>\n
“[Mr Evans] has responded, but it’s not to the extent we require \u2026 so we can continue with our investigations.<\/p>\n
“We’re trying to reconcile the customers’ orders \u2026 because there’s just not sufficient information in the books and records to identify who the 13 [caravan] chassis belong to.”<\/p>\n
Mr Evans was contacted for comment.<\/p>\n
Decisions referred to ASIC<\/p>\n
Records show AOR’s trading names were transferred to a related company, AOR Holding Co Pty Ltd, several days before the business collapsed.<\/p>\n
The administrator said this move was under investigation.<\/p>\n
“We’ve already written to ASIC with regard to freezing any transfer of those business names over to the new entity,” Mr Keramos told creditors.<\/p>\n
ASIC, the corporate watchdog, declined to comment.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
Australian Off Road blamed the company’s demise on competitors copying their designs and wage increases. (ABC Sunshine Coast: Josh Dye)<\/p>\n
Mr Keramos said he would investigate whether completed caravans were delivered to people related to the company in the weeks leading up to the collapse.<\/p>\n
“The reason we’re investigating this matter is it’s come to our attention that there may be some caravans that may have been issued to certain related parties,” he said.<\/p>\n
AOR’s directors are also facing questions about assets located at a different factory in Kunda Park operated by another of Mr Evans’s companies.<\/p>\n
“Our auctioneer has inspected this site and advised it appeared preparations may have been underway for an alternate business operation involving a similar line of business,” Mr Keramos told creditors.<\/p>\n
“We’ve received these claims, and we’re continuing to investigate these matters, including the assets located at the site.”<\/p>\n
![\"Close-up](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/1790244972_291_b08e54af7316da72bd8df42c94a2e5ec.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n
AOR collapsed into administration last week.\u00a0 (ABC Sunshine Coast: Josh Dye)<\/p>\n
Property records show Mr Budden is a landlord of AOR, with his personal company owning a 15 per cent stake in the factory that AOR leases.<\/p>\n
Mr Keramos said he has discovered two shipping containers at the Port of Brisbane, which may have come from an AOR factory in China.<\/p>\n
“We’re currently investigating the contents of those containers \u2026 including their ownership condition, status, and potential realisable value,” he said.<\/p>\n
AOR’s troubles follow the collapse<\/a> of another Sunshine Coast caravan manufacturer, Zone RV, which was liquidated<\/a> earlier this year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Administrators for a collapsed Queensland caravan manufacturer that owes $9 million have written to ASIC about the company’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":903601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[197449,303127,5799,64,63,461322,99,181484,471813,471814,263238],"class_list":["post-903600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-administrators","tag-aor","tag-asic","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-off-road","tag-business","tag-caravan-industry","tag-caravan-payment-deposits","tag-creditors-meeting","tag-insolvencies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/903600","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=903600"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/903600\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/903601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=903600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=903600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=903600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}