We were happy to take part in a more light hearted segment of radio on Today FM when Matt Cooper had Karl Deeter in to discuss different news items from the week that was. He was joined by the journalist Larissa Nolan to discuss many different topics from ‘beer goggles’ to property prices and slavery.
We were asked to speak on the Sean O’Rourke show about one landlords experience and how the experience left them feeling very negative towards the local authority.
We would believe that in order to remedy our housing crisis, in particular the homelessness element of it, that state power must to work as positively as possible with all of those who are involved including landlords. Serving a notice of a €5,000 fine and threats of prison for minor infractions is not part of how that comes about.
Dublin City Council have turned the landlord in question diametrically against helping more people in homelessness in the future. If this pattern of behaviour is repeated again and again across the city it is no wonder that helping people out of homelessness has become such a slow process.
Karl Deeter and Brendan Harbor of the Forsa Union discussed whether or not the state should agree to have the members of Forsa work fewer hours per week and maintain the same pay. Karl strongly disagreed making the case that if things like the health service are not working well now that you can’t expect them to maintain current levels or improve if everybody is working fewer hours, such an assumption is simply illogica.
The full clip of the segment is below.
Aengus Cox in RTE did a piece on funds who buy loan and there are sound clips and a written report on it here.
We made the point that “quite often do deals that the banks won’t do and that’s the frustrating thing – there’s massive write-down being done by these funds, and to me that’s a very positive development. They’re putting an end date – an end point – in situations that the banks have not had the courage or capacity to do. And sometimes finalising something is actually part of the solution. Now it might not end the way the person wants but this is an adult world where outcomes are based on decisions and consequences, not on what you want.”
The piece does a very good and fair job of looking at all sides of the argument, those of debt advocates, the funds themselves and market participants.
Politicians are prone to playing politics, that’s a given. What is strange is that so few demonstrate a knowledge of the regulatory environment that banking exists in. While decrying a ‘lack of regulation’ they fail to see that loan sales are actually a result of regulation, the very thing they are saying they want.
If you have a long term agreement with a borrower that is a contract, it can and does stand the test of the courts. A fund buyer won’t seek to overturn that contract even though the loan is technically ‘not performing’.
This is an important point, if you got a split mortgage and it was agreed on a long term basis (as they are) then your loan is non-performing because part of the loan isn’t accruing interest. You are making payments in full on the other part, but it is less than the original contracted agreement. Any losses of interest are accounted for and already booked, but the loan itself is still going to be classified that way.
If somebody buys your loan they have to …
We were pleased to take part in a panel discussion on PTsb loans and how the sale would or would no imapct borrowers. We were on the panel with TD Mick Wallace and Fianna Fail TD Marc MacSharry. Later the head clerk of the high court Edmund Honohan joined the discussion.
Pat Kenny spoke to us about the issue of housing, he also had Fintan MacNamara from the landlords association on the show to look at the issues from the landlord perspective. There was a lot of consensus but some disagreement in particular about how special treatment should or shouldn’t be given to the property sector.
Matt Cooper had Karl Deeter (Irish Mortgage Brokers) and Tom Lyons (Sunday Business Post) on his show to discuss recent developments in housing and how rents are rapidly rising. The focus was very much solutions oriented and some interesting thoughts came out of the conversation, in particular on the area of accountability.
Antoin Murphy was and remains one of the most fascinating economic historians in Ireland, his work on John Law is internationally recognized as being the best there is. Here is a paper he did on how Ireland operated without banks, it is a must read for anybody who wants to know more on how the world can work without banks (in a paper oriented system).
Antoin Murphy, Money in an economy without banks, The case of Ireland – bank strike paper
We were on Today FM to talk about comments made by the Taoiseach regarding how people come up with money for a deposit to buy a home. While many were finding it a source of outrage, we were making the point that it’s incredibly common and that it actually is a normal occurrence albeit not ‘the norm’ for everybody (because nothing is universal).
This is a good discussion because in our view it shows the way that housing shortages can turn into all manner of talking point arguments, we don’t think it’s realistic to tell parents you can’t help your kids or to say that it’s wrong in any way, but we do agree with Sinead from TheJournal that we have a housing shortage and that this is really where the problem lies.