Bankers? Off with their heads, says ISABEL MORTON
THE French celebrate Bastille Day today. There will be parades, family events, parties and firework displays in every village, town and city throughout France, as its people rejoice in the fact that they are a republic and living free from the tyranny of the ruling classes.
When I was chatting with a French letting agent yesterday, he laughed and joked about how Ireland was no longer a republic, as its people were living under the dictatorship of the banks, both our own and Europe’s.
He was curious as to why we were so docile and wondered why we weren’t marching in the streets. I told him I thought we were still in a state of shock and were so busy trying to negotiate our own personal survival that we had no time to consider collective action.
He expressed his amazement at our lack of initiative and camaraderie and reminded me of the French battle cry: Liberty! Equality! Fraternity!
All I could think of was Ireland’s historic predisposition towards infighting and civil wars and how of late a number of divisive elements have been creeping into different areas of Irish life.
We could do well to remember the old American motto, later adopted by the Ulster loyalists: “united we stand, divided we fall”, but joining forces to fight for the common good was never our forte.
“You even use two lawyers when you conduct a property transaction,” the French agent pointed out, “why create a war where there is none? Why not use one notary?” He seemed bewildered. “Of course, we don’t have any more Irish buyers now. Pity, they were always funny.”
He had a point. Every aspect of life in Ireland these days appears to be fraught with angst and upset and there’s very little laughter anymore.
Even earlier that morning, talking with a Dublin solicitor regarding a second attempt at selling a client’s property, I cheerfully commented that this time the buyers confirmed they had mortgage approval. But, he was not so confident, as apparently, apart from dragging their heels for as long as possible, our banks have recently adopted a new and particularly cruel method of avoiding lending.
Their modus operandi is to give people the impression that they would be “approved in principal” for a mortgage but that each application would have to be considered individually, depending on the property.
This means that would-be buyers end up going around in circles, viewing properties they think are within their price range, falling in love with them, making offers and doing deals, only to have their banks, at the last moment, find some excuse to avoid financing the purchase.
This merry little dance continues until many of the potential buyers give up in despair. When queried on why they have yet to buy, they will say that prices are still too high and they intend holding off until they drop even further, but in reality their reticence to buy is directly related to their banks’ continuing reticence to lend.
According to this solicitor, of the 90 per cent of live mortgage applications, banks claim 70 per cent have been issued with loan approval but say that their customers are choosing not to draw down their loan to purchase property. (Curious, considering that the few cash buyers around are showing no such reticence.)
Conveniently for the banks, this means that these applications are seen as “approved”, despite the fact that they may never have been “drawn down” and may even have been “withdrawn” by the customers themselves. Technically, however, as far as bank figures are concerned, they would never appear to have been “refused”.
Cruel as it is to build up the hopes and expectations of both the potential buyers and the stressed-out vendors, this behaviour is hard to prove. Worse, however, is the fact that once again our banks are pulling the wool over our eyes, manipulating the figures and presenting them in such a way as to make us believe they are starting to lend again, when in reality, they are not.
As my French friend put it, “you Irish are always in dispute with yourselves”– which pretty much sums us up. Apart from our banking problems, there is the ongoing battle between the public and private sectors, and now mini civil wars are breaking out within the private sector between those who are working for Nama and those who are scrabbling for the few remaining crumbs of work.
“You see! We are back again to the subject of the crumbs of cake and bread,” he laughed, referring to my earlier quip about Marie Antoinette and how a certain section of our population appear oblivious to what’s going on around them.
When I tried to explain the purpose of Nama and the reason it was set up, he stopped me mid-sentence. “In fact, it is simple,” he said. “ The elite have made another big cake for themselves to eat, while the workers continue to starve”.
Only a Frenchman could relate the entire Irish economic mess to food, but, as he pointed out, “Obviously, you are not yet hungry enough to start a revolution”.
Isabel Morton is a property consultant
