Nama puts receiver into Faxhill Homes over €77 million debts

The National Asset Management Agency (Nama) has installed a receiver to Faxhill Homes, a building company run by the developer Jack Tierney that owes the agency about €77 million.

Documents filed recently in the Companies Registration Office show that Nama has appointed Jim McStay of accountants McStay Luby as receiver, following a refusal by the High Court to give Faxhill protection from its creditors.

Faxhill had applied for examinership in April along with two other companies it owns, Craigfort Taverns and Marchford.

Craigfort, which trades as the four-star Killashee House Hotel in the Kildare town of Naas, and Marchford, which trades as Lawlor’s Hotel on Poplar Square in the town, were both granted court protection last month after Nama said it would not stand in the way of their applications.

The agency, however, objected to Faxhill’s examinership application on the grounds that the process should not “be used as a kind of receivership just to sell off properties”.

It told the court that Faxhill’s assets, which include development lands around the hotels in Naas, are worth “substantially less” than its debts to Nama. Mr Tierney is personally liable for €16 million of Nama debts.

Kieran Wallace of KPMG is the examiner to the two Naas hotels that employ 260 staff, and is understood to have already made contact with prospective investors. The directors sought court protection after fears Nama would seize control of the properties as a result of cross-guarantees across the group.

Accounts for Marchford show Lawlor’s had accumulated losses of almost €8 million at the end of 2012, after taking a €4 million writedown. Craigfort, trading as Killashee, made a €6.2 million loss in 2012 after a €7 million writedown.

Mr Tierney is a high-profile builder who featured prominently in the McCracken tribunal of inquiry into the affairs of former Fine Gael minister Michael Lowry and former supermarket chief Ben Dunne, after it emerged Faxhill had done building work on the homes of both men.