Irish Times"home repossessions accelerate to 60 per week"

I see respossessions are on the rise, according to the Irish Times, particularly in Cork

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/soci...sessions-accelerate-to-60-each-week-1.2308040

Almost 1,000 repossession orders were granted in the courts in the first six months of this year, with the number granted in the Circuit Courts up almost 200 per cent on 2014.
A total of 900 repossession orders were granted in the State’s 26 Circuit Courts between January and June, compared with 313 in the same period in 2014.

The highest number was at Cork Circuit Court, where 123 repossession orders were granted – 91 for primary homes and 32 for buy-to-lets and others. In Dublin Circuit Court, 116 orders were granted – 77 for family homes and 39 for others.

I have suggested to Séamus Coffey to write a response to this.

Brendan Burgess said:

I have suggested to Séamus Coffey to write a response to this.

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Why? Is it wrong?

A 200% increase makes a good tagline but on a de minimis amount is meaningless.

Brendan Burgess said:

I have suggested to Séamus Coffey to write a response to this.

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He has updated his blog Brendan

Are there 60 home repossession orders being made every week?

Today's Irish Times has published Séamus Coffey's brilliant response to this scaremongering.

Opinion: Repossessions needed if borrowers don’t pay mortgage

Some extracts:


"Figures released by the Courts Service show there were 900 possession orders granted in the Circuit Court in the first half of 2015 (as reported in The Irish Times, yesterday). One-third of these were for non-residential property such as land, sites, farms and commercial premises and residential buy-to-let properties.

There were 616 possession orders granted for what are, or at least at some stage were, principal primary residences. Over the 26 weeks of the first half of the year, that is an average of 24 orders per week with the likelihood that about half of those are for vacant properties."

So, not 60 homes per week, but about 12 occupied homes per week.


Séamus gets what I have long been saying in a nutshell:

"The courts are not open season on hard-pressed borrowers. The banks may be heavy-handed in their approach, but it is the courts that enforce the law. If a genuine borrower makes regular payments – or even promises to make regular payments – and shows up in court, they are extremely unlikely to have a possession order granted against them."

And here is the sub-heading from Kitty Holland's article:

"Cork Circuit Court registers the highest number of repossession orders – clocking 123"

Now wouldn't that frighten the life out of any struggling borrower in Cork. There is obviously some demon judge in Cork taking people's homes from them with gay abandon.

Here are the underlying figures which the Courts Service provided to the Irish Times:





Séamus observed all the cases in Quarter 2

"During the second quarter of this year, [broken link removed] had more possession orders for residential property than anywhere else in the country.

As an observer, I have attended 14 civil possession sittings in Cork, including all six sittings by the county registrar at which these 30 orders were granted.

The details given in the court indicate that 10 of these were principal primary residences, seven were buy-to-let properties, and 10 were entirely vacant properties. The status of three was not given. For most of the vacant properties, no mortgage payment had been received for five years or more.

In the 30 cases where an order was granted, the borrowers were absent from the court in 27 of them. There were two orders granted where the borrowers had legal representation in court but this was merely to consent to the order. Across all 30 cases, there was just one borrower present who was hoping that they would not have a possession order granted against them. This borrower had made no mortgage payment since 2012 and had accumulated substantial arrears."

So only one borrower in Cork who showed up in court had a repossession order awarded against him, and he had paid nothing since 2012.

Edit: 5 more borrowers had repossession orders granted against them by the court rather than by the Registrar. Unfortunately we have no information on these cases. We don't know if they were occupied family homes, buy to lets or commercial properties. If they were occupied family homes, we don't know if they were paying anything to the lender. We can assume that the borrower did show up in court as they went to the trouble of defending the proceedings.

I'm confused with the figures BB, you said Coffee for Quarter 2 says, 10 homes, 7 BTL and 10 vacant. But in the table supplied by the courts for Q2, it's 34 homes, I get it can be 10 that are lived in and 10 vacant = 20, but where is the 34 then coming from. Or are there cases Coffee did not witness. Odd he says 7 BTL and it's 1 in Q2?

Is other/unknown = commercial/land etc. ie not houses.

That's an excellent article by Coffee

- repossession in general does not mean you lose your house as a stay in put on the order
- banks who get the order do not immediately repossess, they may still engage with the borrower
-most orders for vacant properties
- showing up and offering something stops the whole thing
- possession is granted where people have paid ZERO for 5 years !

Séamus makes the point that a vacant house is not a family home, but everyone classifies it as such.

The main point is that he witnessed only one person who showed up in court who tried to keep their family home, losing it.

I have seen this happen on three occasions, out of over 500 cases I have witnessed.

Brendan

Brendan Burgess said:

Séamus makes the point that a vacant house is not a family home, but everyone classifies it as such.

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I'd agree with that, it would be more helpful if the courts service changed it's table to reflect this. Also I wonder how long these properties are vacant and falling into disrepair before the bank acts. I'm aware of boarded up houses going on years now.

Brendan Burgess said:

Hi Bronte

Séamus sat in the court and witnessed 30 repossessions - of buy to lets and family homes. The Courts Service says that there were 35 in total (34 homes + 1 buy to let).

I would guess that Séamus's figures are more accurate.

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In his article, Seamus said

There were 30 orders granted by the Cork County Registrar with another five granted by judges at full sittings of the Circuit Court.

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So both seem to come to 35.

Hi Aidan

Well spotted.

Séamus's figures cover the Registrar's Court only.

I have updated my earlier post accordingly:

Edit: 5 more borrowers had repossession orders granted against them by the court rather than by the Registrar. Unfortunately we have no information on these cases. We don't know if they were occupied family homes, buy to lets or commercial properties. If they were occupied family homes, we don't know if they were paying anything to the lender. We can assume that the borrower did show up in court as they went to the trouble of defending the proceedings.

Brendan Burgess said:

The main point is that he witnessed only one person who showed up in court who tried to keep their family home, losing it.

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And that was this guy:

This borrower had made no mortgage payment since 2012 and had accumulated substantial arrears. Although the borrower did have some medical issues, the county registrar noted that “the loan was in difficulty long before the illness”. The borrower acknowledged that they did not have the repayment capacity to service the loan and the order was granted with a stay of 12 months.

That was the only one of the 30 orders granted where the borrower was present – but with nothing paid on the mortgage for nearly three years and no repayment capacity the order was justified, in my opinion.

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With this one the mind boggles...!

In April, a case came before the Cork County Registrar where no payments on a residential mortgage had been made since April 2009 – fully six years previously. The borrower had not engaged with the lender and had accumulated over €75,000 of missed payments.

In court, the borrower said they hoped to be in a position to resume making payments on the mortgage. The case was adjourned for three months. This case has since come before the court again and it was revealed that in May, June and July payments of €600 per month were made. The required monthly payment is just over €1,000 per month. Although the borrower had made the partial payments, they had not engaged with the lender who wished to proceed with its application for a possession order. Once again the case was adjourned, this time to the end of November.

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