Two directors of a firm that claimed to act as a sales agency selling properties in Spain and Portugal have been disqualified for eight years each.

This follows an investigation by the Company Investigations Team of the Insolvency Service in Manchester.

William Mark Bingham and his wife Janet Anne Bingham of Aughton Lancashire have both given undertakings banning them from managing or controlling a company or being directors until July 2019.

The investigation found Millennium Property Investment Limited, which traded as ‘Owner Invest’, never completed a sale throughout its less than two-year existence.

At the time the company was placed into liquidation on 19 March 2009 it had an estimated deficiency to creditors of £757,908.

Robert Burns, head of investigations and enforcement at The Insolvency Service, said: “The Insolvency Service found no evidence that a single sale was ever completed on behalf of customers who paid deposits on properties in Spain and Portugal through ‘Owner Invest’.