Two families have been evicted by Dublin City council for not paying their mortgages.
The local authority was the lender of last resort for many people who were on low incomes and couldn’t get mortgages to buy homes from banks or building societies.
But 891 of those loans are in distress with over 15.5 million Euro owed to the Local authority in arrears although officials say most people are trying to find a solution.
However, they did go to court for possession orders on two properties, which saw the owners evicted and made homeless.
Sinn Fein’s Noeleen Reilly wanted to know what happened to the families:
“Is there a chance that perhaps they may have been turned away from the homeless section because they have repossessed a property? Some people would come to me that they wouldn’t b e offered emergency accommodation by Dublin City Council. They would be told the only option available to them would be rent allowance or HAP”.
Daithi Downey from the Dublin Regional Homeless Executive said both were given help to find new places to stay:
“None of them were refused access, certainly that would not be allowable in the way that we try to proceed and maintain access to any household at risk of rough sleeping or experiencing homelessness. But both those two families were assessed and placed in private rental and found and supported into new tenancy arrangements there”.
Councillors were told that around 154 people are in the process of moving their payments to the mortgage to rent scheme.
