ANALYSIS:It appears there has been a move away from the public repossession of family homes in the last few weeks at the High Court, writes FIONA GARTLAND
SINCE THE end of January, numbers of cases for the repossession of family homes have dropped from double figures on a weekly basis to between three and six orders for possession being granted a week.
There seems to be some reluctance by lenders to be exposed to the sort of negative publicity that follows, for example, the sight of a tearful mother standing without legal support and fighting to hold on to her home.
Before Christmas, one case in particular attracted a lot of attention. It involved a woman who, along with her partner, had lost her job at Waterford Crystal.
The couple had attempted to renegotiate their mortgage, but their letter had not been passed on to the relevant section.
They had then been frightened by letters from the lender telling them they had to leave the property. They did leave and so accrued further arrears before the case came to court.
By then it was too late for the couple and their special needs son and their home was repossessed.
Yesterday at the High Court, six orders for possession were granted. In three of the cases, the property was described as vacant or abandoned; one involved the repossession of a pub and one was not a family home. In the sixth case, the borrowers had not appeared in court to plead their case. Some 62 cases were listed, but almost all were adjourned after a request by counsel representing the lenders involved. Following a pattern of the past few weeks, subprime lender Start Mortgages Ltd, which has dominated High Court lists for months, adjourned most of its 14 cases.
Asked by The Irish Times why there has been so many adjournments requested in the last few weeks, the lender said the media publicity meant home owners were now more proactively contacting them about settling their arrears.
But it seems the reverse may be the case; lenders are now more proactive about making new arrangements with borrowers or getting agreements to voluntarily surrender properties. After all, there is little to be gained from repossessing a house in court that may now only be worth half what it was mortgaged for except bad publicity.
And the balance of the debt may never be secured because though the lender has legal recourse to chase the borrower for the balance, there seems little point in chasing a person who has nothing left to give.
Lenders are now more likely to visit a borrower in his or her home to try to come to a new arrangement or a voluntary surrender than move straight to court action.
This could be attributed to a 12-month moratorium announced by the Financial Regulator last week. The moratorium means all lenders must wait at least a year from the time arrears first arise before applying to the courts for a repossession order. This followed on from a six months moratorium introduced last year.
The latest one applies to mainstream institutions as well as subprime lenders, which account for more than 40 per cent of repossession orders coming before the courts.
But in reality, it takes an average of 18 months between the time a couple or individual goes into arrears and the time they first appear in the High Court anyway. So the moratorium may not be as useful as it appears.