28 possession order

[excel1]

Hi,

 

My friend, yes not me honest! has just recieved a 28 possession order yesterday. He is beside himself with worry and has suffered a serious breakdown before, which is why i writing on his behalf, also im not new to this so can help as well.

 

He went to court, told him to get there early as mediation or a"chat" with the other side is usually possible, he offered the contractual payment plus £100 per month, he is currently unemployed as was also made bankrupt which meant he couldnt find any work in his field which is mortgages ironically.

 

He was unemployed for a while and was getting DWP mortgage relief and has told he will get that again in April which will cover most of the contractual interest only payment.

 

What can he do? he has a partner and 2 kids, and the arrears are about £18k. The other side didnt reach an agreement and asked for either a 28 or 56 day possession order and the judge gave a 28 day one.

Please advise on what to do next, and any other info needed to help answer this one.

 

Many thanks in advance

 

Excel

[newstarter]

Hi there excel,im sorry to read about your friends situation,after a breakdown this is the last thing he needs.Just bear with me here as i have to be careful what im saying as a couple of people are reading in my posts words which are just not there.Right so there is 18k arrears,your friend is getting most of the mortgage intrest paid by the D.W.P,so the contractual payment can be made plus 100 each month to pay towards the arrears.Isuspect that the judge ordered the 28 day repo order to give your friend and the lender time to discuss this further.Can you say who the lender is and if they mentioned any figures that they would be agreeable to,im not saying try to meet their demands but it would give us a good idea as to what they were looking for.Another question im afraid,has the lender added charges to the arrears figure do you know?,in fact regarding charges are they being racked up unfairly.Sorry about the questions but the more information the more we can help.

[excel1]

Hi,

 

lender is Santander was Alliance and Leicester and just enquiring about charges and will post back ASAP

 

Thanks

[newstarter]

No problem

[excel1]

Hi

 

Total arrears is £19000 with £1700 charges included in that amopunt total loan is £321215.69 contractual amount due £561 DWP did pay 468 and will do again from April 8th onwards, can anyone help ?

 

Ellenn?

[Killerschick]

Hi Excel,

 

Are you sure about those figures? £561 on £321k is an APR of 2.10% which seems very low? Mind you if your friend was in mortgages perhaps he spotted a brilliant deal and snapped it up.

 

Either way, I'm afraid it sounds as though the judge has already considered your friend's proposal to pay £100pm towards the arrears and has decided he either hasn't got discretion to grant an order on those terms or your friend has not evidenced that he can afford it.

 

On the discretion side - £19,000 arrears at £100pm would take almost 16 years to clear so your friend would need a remaining term of at least that for the judge to have discretion to grant the order in accordance with Norgan v Cheltenham and Gloucester.

 

The other factor might be your friend's ability to prove he can afford the money towards the arrears and to be honest if he is unemployed with three dependants I don't see how he could on benefits. The judge might have granted a suspended order if the arrears had been lower and there was lots of equity (£19,000 is the equivalent of about 34 month's payments although you don't mention the equity) to give your friend a chance even if the evidence wasn't really in his favour but with arrears that high the judge is less likely to be generous. Your friend's prospects don't sound brilliant either given that he wouldn't be able operate in financial services with serious financial problems.

 

Harsh though it may sound, with your friend in a delicate emotional state, it might be better for him to consider options other than trying to keep the property. If there is equity perhaps a sale is a possibility but he will need to act quickly to demonstrate this is a realistic possibility to the court in order to apply for an extension to time before they can enforce the order. I would also suggest seeking advice from his local authority about being rehoused or looking into entitlement to housing benefit for privately rented accomodation.

[newstarter]

If your friend was employed or with some prospects of employment i would say lets have a go at this.You see to go to court to apply for this order to be suspended we need something to work with,some aspect which we could defend on on in this case there is very little. 19k is a lot of arrears especially when your not working,defending in court would mean showing a judge your friend could pay off the arrears within a reasonable period of time,and i reckon any judge would be looking at 200+ a month on top of the normal contractual payment,230 per month would bring it down to about 7-8 years,however with no job and the D.W.P comming up short by 93 quid a month this is not looking too good.I was hoping there may have been more in the way of charges added to the account,anything that may have given us half a chance but to be honest i think a sale is on the cards here.If it were me i would put the place up for sale apply for a suspended order to give myself chance to sell the place and look for alternative accomodation.

[excel1]

Hi,

 

what about if he could get a afamily member to pay say £5000 of the arrears off for him? any help or a waste of time?

[newstarter]

I would say waste of time,the whole arrears would need to be cleared then he would stand a chance with the D.W.P paying most of the mortgage