Irish property developers exit UK bankruptcy with a clean sheet

[PaddyJoe]

Several Irish property developers have moved to the UK since the property crash in order to take advantage of the user friendly bankruptcy laws.
It looks like John Fleming is going to be the first of the property dev pioneers to come out with a result:

DEVELOPER JOHN Fleming, whose businesses were placed in liquidation last year with debts of €1 billion, was discharged from bankruptcy in Britain yesterday, giving him a financial clean sheet in that country.
The UK’s Insolvency Service, confirmed Mr Fleming was discharged from bankruptcy with effect from yesterday, November 10th. He was originally declared bankrupt in Southend County Court on the same date last year.
The British court’s discharge of his bankruptcy means creditors will not be able to pursue any assets or wealth he creates or develops in the UK from now on.

The group owed its banks, Anglo Irish Bank, AIB, Dutch-owned ACC and Bank of Scotland, over €1 billion. Only ACC, which was owed €22 million, opposed the examinership.
Much of the debt was related to a site that the group was developing for residential commercial purposes in Sandyford in Dublin.
Mr Fleming’s bankruptcy and discharge could have implications for State assets agency, Nama, although it was not clear yesterday what these may be.
Last year, the agency took over €260 million that the Fleming group owed to AIB and Anglo Irish Bank (now the Irish Bank Reconstruction Corporation). Those debts were backed by personal guarantees given by Mr Fleming.

Under normal circumstances, if Nama cannot recover the full amount of a developer’s debt from the sale of the assets involved, it can pursue the individual for the balance, and demand that they use other resources or sell other assets, to repay whatever is due.
However, if Mr Fleming has used other assets to discharge his UK bankruptcy, that option will not be open to Nama.
The agency will not be able to pursue any wealth that he accumulates in Britain following yesterday’s discharge by the Southend court. Nama did not comment.

This gets very interesting when it comes to working out just how much NAMA is going to lose by developers opting for the British bankruptcy courts.
Ray Grehan was the latest to move to the UK a few months back
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...307371387.html

[Baron von Biffo]

Sean Quinn has applied for bankruptcy in Belfast so UK law will apply.

[DCon]

Sean Quinn has applied for bankruptcy in Belfast so UK law will apply.

and the Irish State will pick up the tab for yet another patriot

[Baron von Biffo]

and the Irish State will pick up the tab for yet another patriot

Our thoughts should be with his wife and children today. Hopefully they wont face destitution.

[ang]

Several Irish property developers have moved to the UK since the property crash in order to take advantage of the user friendly bankruptcy laws.
It looks like John Fleming is going to be the first of the property dev pioneers to come out with a result:
This gets very interesting when it comes to working out just how much NAMA is going to lose by developers opting for the British bankruptcy courts.
Ray Grehan was the latest to move to the UK a few months back
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/...307371387.html

Update on John -

A TOP Irish developer who went bankrupt two years ago is living back in his former home in west Cork at weekends after his son-in-law bought back the property.

John Fleming looks set to become the first major Irish developer to make a dramatic recovery after writing off massive personal debts. His property empire collapsed in 2010 owing €1bn.

Mr Fleming, once one of Ireland's top builders and a prominent supporter of Fianna Fail, led the way two years ago when he went bankrupt in Britain.

The one-time property baron was discharged from this bankruptcy last November after just a year. Under Irish law he would have had to wait up to 12 years.

http://www.independent.ie/national-n...e-3243821.html

[DCon]

Bernard Mc chooses the UK bankruptcy route

http://www.independent.ie/national-n...k-3290666.html

Indeed, when the Sunday Independent first raised questions in May 2008 on Mr McNamara's sheer indebtedness and its sustainability, he broke his silence and took to the airwaves on RTE's Marian Finucane Show to decry our assertion that his companies owed €1.5bn.

Unfortunately for him, that damning figure was accurate, a fact he readily admitted in an emotional interview on RTE Radio 1's Drivetime in January 2010 after consenting in the Commercial Court to a personal judgement of €62.5m against him by a group of Davy investors who had backed his involvement in the ill-fated redevelopment of the former Irish Glass Bottle site in Ringsend.

As a €412m speculative punt, the IGB deal still stands out for many as the point at which Bernard McNamara had finally flown too close to the sun.

[DCon]

Bernard Mc chooses the UK bankruptcy route

http://www.independent.ie/national-n...k-3290666.html

Bernie and the wife got some pocket money from flogging property here before choosing bankruptcy

An investigation carried out by the Sunday Independent in the wake of Mr McNamara's adjudication as a bankrupt three weeks ago can reveal that he and his wife, Moira, sold nearly €2m worth of personal property assets in Dublin alone in the last 12 months.

http://www.independent.ie/national-n...t-3305033.html

[DCon]

Grehan is in the clear. The State will now probably pay his debts.

THE developer who set the record for land prices during the boom – €84m an acre in Dublin's Ballsbridge – today walks away from debts of €300m, having applied for bankruptcy in London exactly one year ago.

While Mr Grehan declined to make any comment on his emergence from bankruptcy when contacted by this newspaper last night, it is understood that he is now no longer personally liable for the €300m debt owed to Nama – his biggest single creditor.

http://www.independent.ie/national-n...t-3338787.html

[DCon]

NWL has a list of the NAMA developers who chose bankruptcy overseas

As you know, the focus on here is NAMA, and we have been tracking the NAMA developers who have shimmied over to the UK (and US) to secure bankruptcy under terms which are a great deal more lenient than those available in Ireland. This is the current list, and it may not be exhaustive.

What the UK’s Insolvency Service has done is provided a list of 75 records of people with Irish addresses whose bankruptcy has yet to be discharged. Some people have given more than one Irish address and in total there appear to be 61 individuals on the list who will have declared bankruptcy in the past 12 months.

In the past year, there were an estimated 30 bankruptcies in the Republic of Ireland. So, 61 (at least) bankruptcies in the UK means there are more Irish people being declared bankrupt in UK than in Ireland.

http://namawinelake.wordpress.com/20...f-information/

[DCon]

A developer has had his UK bankruptcy overturned

ACC Bank has just succeeded in overturning the August 2012 bankruptcy of Wicklow property developer Sean McCann. Back in August 2012, ACC Bank had been pursuing Sean through the Dublin courts in respect of €5.5m loans provided to his development company, Killorglin Investments Limited.

But in a surprise move, Sean was bankrupted in Northern Ireland on foot of a GBP 1,400 (€1,600) bill for rent arrears.

ACC Bank then contested the bankruptcy, apparently claiming that Sean’s centre of main interest (COMI) was in the Republic and not Northern Ireland.

The High Court in Belfast last week accepted ACC’s case and overturned the bankruptcy. The High Court judged that Sean had only “a very tenuous link” to Northern Ireland. Furthermore the person to whom Sean owed the GBP 1,400 in rent was described as “at very least” an acquaintance if not a friend.

http://namawinelake.wordpress.com/20...nd-overturned/

[DCon]

The brother of J.P McManus, who ran businesses in Limerick, has been declared bankrupt in the UK

Michael McManus (52), who ran property and car companies in Limerick, declared bankruptcy last November. Listing his address in the town of Amersham, Buckinghamshire, Mr McManus is to be discharged of his debts a year from that date.

Michael McManus is well known in Limerick for his previous work through a car-dismantling business.

'Mick McManus Dismantlers' was run from a previous family home in Fortfield in the Limerick city suburb of Raheen.

Five of the bust businessman's former companies are listed as dissolved by the Companies Registration Office.

KBC Bank secured a €9.2m judgment against him in the High Court in 2009.

Mr McManus wasn't home at his apartment in Amersham when the Irish Independent called and could not be contacted last night.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news...-29185721.html

[DCon]

Not so clean a sheet in this case

A UK bankruptcy official has cleared the way for NAMA to repossess the €6m home of Priory Hall developer Laurence O'Mahony.

Mr O'Mahony, and his wife, Christine Connolly, have been told that the Trustee in Bankruptcy in the UK, where he declared himself bankrupt, will not oppose efforts by NAMA to seize the house in Ballsbridge, Dublin.

Mr O'Mahony told the Circuit Civil Court yesterday he had been adjudicated a bankrupt in England in April 2011 and a year later had been "discharged from all bankruptcy debt".

He claimed his €6.5m liability to NAMA subsidiary National Asset Loan Management Ltd (NALM) was a bankruptcy debt and accordingly on the date of his discharge from bankruptcy in April 2012 he had been released from this liability.

Barristers Seamus Breen, for Mr O'Mahony, and Frank Beatty, for Ms Connolly, said they had received from Mr McDowell just before the court sat a "potentially game-changing" letter from the UK Trustee in Bankruptcy stating he had no interest in the property.

The letter stated that because the house was so heavily indebted, the Trustee, in whom the property was vested under the English bankruptcy, had no interest in defending a claim for possession and was willing to have such an order made by the Irish court.

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news...-29352224.html