A €2.3 million contract for the sale of a house at Morehampton Road in Dublin, now at the centre of a legal dispute, had been secured on a deposit of €25,000, a High Court judge observed today.
However, Mr Justice Peter Kelly remarked, the contrast between that contract price and deposit was not as "dramatic" as that in an earlier case where a €19 million contract was secured on a deposit of €100.
He made the comments when transferring to the Commercial Court yet another action aimed at having a party honour a development contract.
The number of such "specific performance" claims has been mounting in the Commercial Court for some time and the judge dealt with several more today.
The €2.36 million contract before the judge related to an alleged agreement of July 12th 2007 between Colum Mackin, a builder, of Morehampton Road, Donnybrook, against Gerard Deane, Rathmore Glebe, Naas, Co Kildare.
Mr Mackin claims he had purchased property at Morehampton Road to commercially develop it with the intention to sell on to Mr Deane, who had recently purchased two other adjoining properties at Morehampton Road.
He claimed the July 12th contract involved an agreed purchase price of €2,365,000 million with a deposit payable of €25,000. A completion notice was served on October 21st last but the sale had not been completed. In November last, solicitors for Mr Deane wrote purporting to rescind the contract and requested the return of the deposit.
Mr Mackin said he had been ready and able to complete the contract at all relevant times and remains anxious to do so.
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