Vulture funds and looming evictions as the housing crisis grows bleaker
Today, journalist Carol Hunt published an Irish Independent opinion piece about the sorry state of “modern-day Irish eviction.” In the article, she describes a terrifying scene that can happen when tenants, for whatever reasons, are forced to leave their homes. She refers to alarming video footage which shows “a number of men, hooded, black scarves covering their faces, attempting to gain access to a private home” with “no paperwork which allowed them to legally enter the property.” The car the men allegedly arrived to the scene in, “has no insurance or tax disc displayed and the registration number is covered over with tape.” Of course, the car is illegal. It’s easy to see that, and onlookers who are witnessing the events unfold report this to gardai standing nearby. Unfortunately, to the surprise of the observers, the gardai clearly have “no intention of noting these offences” and in a shocking turn of events, it becomes evident they “are there purely to assist the hooded men in gaining access to the house. They are on the side of what looks like the bad guys.” According to Hunt, this is what an eviction looks like in Ireland today.
The escalating state of Ireland’s housing crisis doesn’t end there. Recently, many mortgages around the country have been sold to vulture funds. Just last week, Ulster Bank said it intends to sell over 2,900 of its customers’ mortgages to these vulture funds. Instead of dealing with repayment to the issuing bank, residents across Ireland must now deal with these international firms. According to a recent report by the Debt and Development Coalition Ireland (DDCI), “The arrival of “vulture funds” in the Irish property market means an increased likelihood of people being evicted from their homes.” Most surprising, however, is that this same report says the Irish government has ““wholeheartedly embraced vulture funds.”
A journal.ie article entitled, Vulture funds pick and peck and they’re not finished yet describes more specifically what these funds are:
“Vulture funds’ is a term used to describe hedge funds and private equity firms, companies that target countries and businesses in dire straits to make higher than normal profits. The vultures arrived in Ireland after the crisis when they realised there was a lot of property up for grabs at knock down prices… They take risks other investors wouldn’t take, but in compensation they want to make super profits and they want to do so quickly. They do this through aggressive strategies which can have very negative consequences for tenants, home owners and cities in general.”
To summarise, the “narrow commercial priority of these firms and the fact that they are based in other countries also underlines the sheer injustice at stake.” The results of these new arrangements have left many of those in debt wracked with fear. Anna Flynn is one such example. The divorced mother of four was working on repaying her debt after the crash “attacked her investment” and she lost her job. The stress this caused “saw Flynn hospitalised twice. She contemplated taking her own life. Twice she overdosed on pills and was brought back from the brink.” When her loans were transferred to the vulture funds, she says “I was given no real notice that it was being sold and I was certainly given no chance to buy it at anything close to the same rate the fund had paid…once I was with the vulture fund they did not want to know. Basically they were saying repeatedly, ‘We don’t care, we just want the arrears to be paid off in full or we want the house’.” This is only one illustration of the dire circumstances inflicting residents across the country.
Carol Hunt’s Irish Independent opinion piece also asks why the government isn’t doing more to help the citizens out of the messes they (the government) led us into: “The average Irish worker took the hit for all those bondholders and bankers who were allowed play financial roulette with no consequences to themselves if they lost everything.” National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA) chief executive Conor O’Kelly revealed that “every worker in the country pays an extra €3,400 in tax every year compared with just €900 in 2007,” and that Ireland’s state debt pile of €207 billion, which is €102,000 per employee, is “easily the highest in Europe, by a mile…It’s one of the highest ratios in the world.” Because of all this, Hunt says, “You’d think the Government would feel a little bit sheepish…that they would go a bit easy on Joe and Josephine Soap who were unfortunate enough to need a mortgage when prices were beyond the moon and the banks were happy to feed the insanity.”
In conclusion, we must ask: why isn’t the financial side of our government doing more to help? When can we expect them to take responsibility? Where is that dose of humanity it seems we so desperately need? What can we expect a year from now?
If you or someone you know is currently suffering due to a housing-related issue, there are resources to help:
And if you need someone to talk to:
Feature image via thejournal.ie
