# A Charge placed on my Daughters Home by a bank.



## ShaneS (13 Mar 2013)

Hi, some advice required please in relation to a charge which has been placed on my daughters house by ACC Bank because her ex-boyfriends debts to that bank. 

My daughter went to transfer the mortgage into her sole name as they had a join mortgage. My daughter had been single for 3 years and has paid her mortgage in full for the 3 years. When she enquired about transferring it into her sole name, her boyfriend informed her that ACC had placed a charge on the property (& 10 others) which his name is attached to approximately 14 months ago and she was never informed of this. 

We assume that he has significant debts with various banks as he was previously engaged in property development, and he now lives in the UK. 

My daughter had no dealings with ACC and her own mortgage is with AIB. she has been advised that as ACC has placed a charge on his half of the property, then she is effectively paying a full mortgage on a property that she cannot own!! Madness in my opinion!! The market value of the property is equal to the mortgage balance outstanding. 

Any thoughts people on how to proceed from here!!! 

Thank You.


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## mf1 (14 Mar 2013)

It's quite hard to work out the reality of this situation but it would appear that daughter and boyfriend own a house together. They have a mortgage with AIB on the house together. Boyfriend ups and leaves. Daughter continues to pay the mortgage. House is still in joint names. Boyfriend accumulates debts, has judgments marked against him and a judgment mortgage is then attached to the property he owns jointly with daughter. 

"she has been advised that as ACC has placed a charge on his half of the property, then she is effectively paying a full mortgage on a property that she cannot own!! Madness in my opinion!! "

Who advised her? And why is the situation madness? This is what happens when people buy and mortgage property together and one or both gets into financial difficulty. 

It comes down to this - is there any prospect that  BF can ever discharge the debt? If no, then daughter is stuck with debt. 

mf


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## Bronte (14 Mar 2013)

mf1 said:


> It comes down to this - is there any prospect that BF can ever discharge the debt? If no, then daughter is stuck with debt.


 
Would she not be better off selling then and walking away and starting again debt free?  And actually fiancially as mortgage is equal to equity she will in effect not pay off his debt.  But she will have a clean sheet.


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## mf1 (14 Mar 2013)

I don't think ( from the OP's post) that there is any equity. It sounds as if her AIB mortgage equals the property value. So she can't sell, unless she can clear the ACC debt. A purchaser won't  take on any charges attaching to a property.

mf


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## Bronte (14 Mar 2013)

Sorry for so many questions MF, how can ACC block a sale?

If the daughter doesn't pay the mortgage, can AIB ultimately force the sale?


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## mf1 (14 Mar 2013)

ACC don't need to block the sale. Their charge is on the property and remains on the property even if it is sold or the debt is repaid. So, anyone buying the property, will end up taking over the  charge. 

Now, if AIB were to repossess on foot of non payment , I don't know if the Court has the  power to remove the ACC charge so that the house can be sold. 

mf


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## WizardDr (14 Mar 2013)

If the property is in 'joint tenancy' and this happened before the debt arose, isn't it the case that the bank won't be able to act on the judgment, assuming this was all done bona fide? .. and as @mf1 says sale is a different matter.


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## ShaneS (14 Mar 2013)

Thansk for the comments all. 
The market value is equal to the mortgage balance so assuming she can sell, my daughter would have a clean slate. If there was a profit made, that goes to ACC in full I think - or is that just half the profit. My daughter runs a buisness from the house so thats the stumbling block to selling but if she had to, she has to!! I assume as long as the mortgage is repaid to AIB on a sale, then ACC cannot stop a sale? How can ACC still apply a charge to the house if they have new owners? Who in their right mind would buy the house and continue to have a charge on it.. So would ACC have to allow the sale to proceed without a charge??

Her boyfriend accumulated this debt in his own name, nothing to do with my daughter! Because they were not married, how does this affect her and her share of the house?


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## Bronte (14 Mar 2013)

ShaneS said:


> I assume as long as the mortgage is repaid to AIB on a sale, then ACC cannot stop a sale?


 
My understanding now is that if you went sale agreed you would be able to get the title deeds from AIB but on the day of transfer the solicitor will do a 'search' and the judgment of ACC will come to light and then the buyer will not proceed as this judgment is not settled. In fact it probably comes to light before this. The buyers solicitor will ask before that stage. 

Another interesting point about this is that if your daugher had her mortgage fully paid off than ACC would I presume be entitled to go to court to get a well charging order and force a sale to get at the ex's half. 


Something else that is important. The fact that your daughter pays all the mortgage should mean in fact that she would in fact have more equity than just one half.

I think you would be well advised to seek the advice of a good solicitor on this. It hasn't come up on AAM before I don't think. If you don't have a good solicitor than maybe you could try MF1 above or Vanilla who also posts on here. (I'm not sure if they are open to business from AAM though) This is quite a tricky area and no doubt a novel one in Ireland so you need to get someone very competant.  It might even require a barristers opinion.  

And also to consider is when does the time limit on ACC's judgment lapse. We would be very interested in AAM to know how you get on.


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## ShaneS (15 Mar 2013)

Thanks all. 
I will update once we progress further. 
Thanks, 
ShaneS


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