Edel Morgan's latest Home Truths blog, Would a younger investor garner as much sympathy as Killiney couple? (see irishtimes.com/blogs), had received 49 comments at the time of writing. Here are five of the best.
Retep: I passed an old lady on Dawson Street, in Dublin, on Tuesday night trying to bed down in a doorway. She looked new to it, like she was in a house last month and now she’s in a doorway. I wonder where the lights, camera and action were for her when her world lit up.
This event is good if it raises the growing plight of people forced to the streets of Ireland.
George W Kenny and George W Gilmore need to grow up and help Irish people in desperate need!
Catherine II: The situation is awful for the couple but as you said there would not be the same reaction for a younger couple. Considering that they have other properties I’d imagine they could have downsized and rented out the “family home” for more money than a smaller property? And have they made any payment on the loan since 2009? what would happen if someone didnt pay rent for 2-3 MONTHS let alone years? Would their picture be on the front of the newspaper?
Jaygee: I don’t think age is a factor in this case. The ludicrous situation of a couple with a large portfolio of expensive properties, and what must be a considerable income from same, trying to garner sympathy for their “plight” when thousands of couples are trying to hold on to their own home is a bit of a joke.
Catherine: Even if they owned the Taj Mahal and the Cullinan Diamond to boot, is not the issue. They are business people who have found themselves stranded in the sea of negative equity as a result of the unprecedented global economic crisis. As far as I am aware (media reports) these people are landlords and their other properties are leased out to tenants, so in effect, following eviction from the family home, they are as homeless as homeless can be.
I do not envy these people the beautiful home in Killiney that they owned . . . but I suspect envy is at the root of many commenters having no sympathy for this couple.
Catherine: Still, I admire this couple for taking it “to the wire”. No matter where families are on the mortgage scale (high or low end and everything in between) “ability to pay” in the current economic climate is the X factor. This much-publicised eviction is a taste of things to come I fear and I don’t see this coalition government being in tune with reality on the ground, so to speak.
