A couple who feared their Dublin home would be repossessed later this week over mortgage repayment arrears have secured a court order which prevents repossession pending the outcome of their legal proceedings.
Mr Justice Michael Peart today granted leave to Peter and Anne Byas to bring judicial review proceedings challenging a county registrar’s order for repossession of their home at Navan Road, Dublin. The repossession order was sought by the Educational Building Society over some €37,000 arrears on mortgage repayments.
The judge found the couple had made out the necessary “arguable” case for judicial review. The granting of leave to bring the proceedings would also act as a stay on the order for possession, he added.
The couple are represented by the “New Beginning” group of lawyers and businessmen recently formed to support homeowners with mortgage difficulties.
In an affidavit, Mr Byas, an unemployed business consultant and former publican, had said he, his wife and three children would have nowhere to live if the repossession proceeded. “I am desperate and unable to see my way through this predicament,” he said.
The repossession order was made in May last by a county registrar but was stayed for six months and was due to expire this weekend.
The court had heard the couple bought their home at Navan Road for €670,000 and put an additional €150,000 into renovating it. They took out a €470,000 loan with EBS in 2005 to purchase the house and it and two further loans — of €150,000 in 2006 and €30,000 in 2007 — were all secured on the property.
Mr Byas said he was initially not concerned about this level of borrowing as he had expected he would be able to redeem his shares, with an estimated value of £300,000 in Belgrave Trading Limited, a London based private equity firm, which employed him as a business consultant.
Mr Byas also said he had previously owned three pubs, including Daly’s of Stoneybatter, all of which he had sold in the 1990s. He had also secured third level degrees.
Mr Byas said he was out on unpaid sick leave from Belgrave for some months in 2006 after cancer polyps were diagnosed on his bowel. It was only when he returned to work he became aware his contract was terminated and the company was in liquidation. His shareholding in the company became worthless overnight.
As a result of these and other factors, including the wiping out due to the financial crisis of the value of shares held by him in a pension fund, banks and insurance companies, the couple were unable to meet their repayments and had mortgage arrears of over €37,000, he said.
While Mrs Byas recently procured part-time employment in the public service, her income is some €310 a week while her husband had been told he was ineligible for unemployment benefit as he was self-employed, the court also heard. He intended to formally apply for benefit this week.
Mr Byas said they had attempted to sell their home but were unable to do so. He had made strenuous efforts to find employment but has been unsuccessful.
In their action against the County Registrar for County Dublin, Ireland and the Attorney General, the couple are seeking to quash the County Registrar’s order and also want declarations it breaches provisions of the Constitution and European Convention on Human Rights.
They claim the entrusting of powers to registrars to make such “severe” orders with far-reaching effects interferes with the necessity for the proper administration of justice. The order is not justified as necessary in a democratic society and is disproportionate having regard to the significance of the rights interfered with, it is contended.
The law and practice here concerning applications for possession of a family home on foot of a mortgage, because it is made in the absence of any independent consideration of the proportionality of the order in light of the rights of home dwellers, is incompatible with provision of the ECHR, it is also submitted.
