Six orders granted to possess homes

A HOME repossession case was adjourned at the High Court yesterday after a father of one of the borrowers pleaded for time to allow his daughter and her husband to get marriage counselling.

Mr Justice Brian McGovern granted six orders for possession, including for a family home in Galway with mortgage arrears of over €150,000.

In a case involving Stepstone Mortgage Funding Ltd, the court was told a couple had made their last repayment in May 2008, and now owed €31,000 in arrears.

The father of one of the borrowers asked for a three-month adjournment. He told Mr Justice McGovern the couple had been going through a separation. His daughter had applied for State mortgage assistance, and he also hoped there might be some “coming together” for the couple. He asked for time to allow them to get counselling.

The judge said he could understand why the parties needed time, but could not see what bearing that might have on the money they owed. However, he agreed to adjourn the case for 10 weeks.

ACC Bank applied for repossession of a family home in Kilcolgan, Co Galway. Counsel for the lender said the couple had taken out a mortgage of €425,000 in 2004. The last repayment was in May 2007. There had been various arrangements agreed but never honoured, including that the home would be sold along with a property in Cyprus. Arrears now stood at €152,000, and the total owed to the bank was over €540,000.

Mr Justice McGovern noted there had been no payments “for a very long time”. The couple had not engaged with the lender or the courts, and he had no choice but to grant the order. He put a stay of six months on its execution because it was a family home.

In other cases, two orders for possession each were granted to Stepstone Mortgages and Start Mortgages Ltd. GE Capital Woodchester Homeloans Ltd was given one order.

At bankruptcy hearings earlier yesterday, Mr Justice McGovern lifted protection orders in four cases. Protection orders are granted to debtors when they apply to the court to make an arrangement to pay off creditors. In all four cases the arranging debtors failed to keep up the repayments they had agreed to.

In another case, Chris Lehane, the court’s official assignee, told Mr Justice McGovern he was ready to discharge one man from bankruptcy after he had paid off all his debts. “I’m sure he’ll be relieved to hear that after 46 years,” said the judge.