Sharon Delaney and John Boland (foreground) speak to Ann Keane and Patrick Halpin at the Aberdeen Lodge Hotel at Ballsbridge, Dublin 4
This morning.
The Irish Times reported that US investment bank Goldman Sachs would today move to take possession of the Aberdeen Lodge Hotel in Ballsbridge, Dublin 4.
Further to this…
Sam Boal, of Rollingnews, writes:
Sharon Delaney and John Boland from Paul McCann’s office arrived [at the hotel] at 11am this morning asking the occupants Ann Keane and Patrick Halpin if they intend to hand over the property, before leaving shortly after.
Resident Patrick explained this morning: “We are not in a position, we have no where to go, we have given our last shilling every month to make this morgage, this is a little B&B business, we have a family, we have to keep going and we have done nothing wrong and we are prepared to go to the courts and expalin we have done nothing wrong.”
US investment bank Goldman Sachs are looking to take possession of the hotel on the back of almost €26million in boom-era borrowings.
the sense of entitlement is strong in this one…..
Another little business
A 26 million bog standard hostel
A big question is why the banks loaned the money in the first place
Reckless lending
Even to pay back the loan with no interest having 16 rooms I doubt borrowings totalling a quarter of that would even justify the loan
So where is the due diligence here by the banks here?
I would say its criminal negligence on the banks behalf
As for the two Muppets operating it
They actually need to pack their bags and be thankful they are not locked up
We now the taxpayer are saddled with the debts dumped on us by the excesses of madness
And I wonder how exactly have they got the money to defend this case
Took on too much secured debt, couldn’t pay it back. Life is so sad, Boo hoo.
Just get the hell out and hand back the keys.
“Paul McCann’s office”? That’s Paul McCann of Grant Thornton, the accountancy firm down by the Beckett Bridge?
It’ll be hard for these people to get sympathy because of the size of their loan, but at the end of the day, it is their home, where are they to go.
Are Goldman Sachs one of the vultures operating in Ireland criticised by the UN this week? Much of the reportage about the UN report on Ireland focusses on Blackstone, but they’re relatively small players, aren’t they?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/mar/26/blackstone-group-accused-global-housing-crisis-un
“at the end of the day, it is their home, where are they to go.”
If everyone adopted that attitude then nobody would bother their mortgage.
bother PAYING their mortgage.
There’s not going to be a huge outpouring of sympathy, that’s for sure.
But roughly speaking, they have a €26 million loan secured on their B&B which is also their home. Goldman Sachs might have acquired the loan for €3 million, I don’t know. The borrowers are paying some amount on the loan which might service a €5 million loan, but Goldman Sachs is not here for 25 years, it want’s payback in a matter of months or a small number of years, so it lawfully seizes the property and sells it for €4 million, and hey presto, Goldman Sachs has a 33% profit and the borrowers are homeless. A traditional bank might have let the borrowers work it out over several years and maybe see a return of €6 million or 5% a year, but that’s not how vultures rock. They want their payback now.
“A traditional bank might have let the borrowers work it out over several years”
Or a traditional bank might sell the loan to someone else, recover some cash and rid themselves of the problem.
They can’t buy loans if nobody’s selling them.
the only thing accurate you’ve said in that piece Eoin is “i don’t know”
‘that’s not how vultures rock. They want their payback now.’ – a mere 6 years later, after the first order of possession, so guesstimating another year or 2 on top. Quick buck artists indeed.
“The borrowers are paying some amount on the loan which might service a €5 million loan..so it lawfully seizes the property and sells it for €4 million, and hey presto, Goldman Sachs has a 33% profit.”
There’s not a hope in hell of them servicing a loan of that size (it would imply repayments of c.€20-25k per month over 30 years). They have offered to ‘pay’ (refinance presumably) €1.25m to close out the €25m loan, which is probably about the limit of what they could generate out of the B&B (they’re currently paying €5k per month).
Further, if the Goldman’s fund did manage to turn a 33% profit as suggested, this would have been generated over 4-5 years (they acquired the loans in 2014-15), and is on foot of the borrowers having a judgement made against them on the original Irish Nationwide loan in 2013.
Actually after my scathing post I started looking into it with solo check and following a trail
It seems this is a left over from IBRC
No wonder they were so intent on liquidating that bank but the putrid past seems to be resurfacing
Maybe it seems not only Quinn but many more individuals are involved in cases that are not in the public eye
This guy has quite a few companies that has had dealings with this bank and he has issued proceedings regarding deception by individuals employed by that bank in special liquidation from circa 2013
I just wonder there must be a massive Pandora’s box that needs to be opened and reported on regarding what was and is still possibly going on as after the crash we paid the price
We are the ones with over 200 billion debt because of the banks
Its simply not good enough
This could be the Magellan laundries clerical abuse scandal of the banking world that government ants to bury deep
“it is their home, where are they to go.”
If you want to continue live in your home, then don’t put it up as a security.
Either a law should be pass to prevent people from using their principal private residence as security OR people can be turfed out of their homes if they don’t pay their loans.
Very true. Although from what I heard on the radio this morning, it sounded like they were denying that they put the home up as security on the €26 million loan. Anyone know?
26,000,000.
Where did it all go I wonder, no new hotels on merrion road. They say they disagree with the courts view and the fund have no rights, every court disagrees though. I’d say freemen and their ilk wont be too far away.
What would you even spend 26m on
I’d spent €20m on gambling, alcohol and wild women. The rest I’d waste.”
Very shrewd of you
“the original development site, which Halpin drew the €25 million loan for, was sold by IBRC for around €2 million”
So 23 million just sort of disappeared because I supose IBRC were just impatient?
https://www.premiersuitesdublinballsbridge.com/
This is where the €26 m went. This is what they bought and attempted to refurbish. Subsequently sold by the receiver for €17m.
Surely, they need to go into bankruptcy or insolvency?
but then they don’t get to keep the house that has 26mln invested into it
Who says?
“Just a little B&B business”…..in a huge property in the heart of the most expensive area in the country
that’s right up there with the gaff in Dalkey being described as a bog standard house
Reminds me of the St. Matthias Wood couple. The Occupy movement supported them. Can we expect to see Rich Boy Barret or Eoin O Broin down to support them?
https://www.joe.ie/uncategorized/remember-the-evicted-coupled-from-killiney-they-have-13-flats-in-london-too-35226
If the home is actually owned by a company which put it up as security for another company can they really claim that it is their family home. Surely they are technically tenants.
I dont really have any sympathy for anyone who goes to such extremes to try and make such a legal constuct that property isn’t really a security…
If they can secure a 2nd mortage on the property for 1.2mill and can cover the other 800k from ‘other sources’ they clearly have the means to down size
Tenants who have families still live in a family home.
Legally “family home” doesn’t apply to tenants, as i understand it. Also, that these two aren’t married seems to have complicated matters (family home seems to apply to married couple, not cohabiting, or at least it did when this sorry saga began)
I doubt that’s the case any more since the cohabitation laws came in
Naw! I’d say it would more likely be Ben Gilroy – Oh! he’s indisposed at the moment – maybe Jerry Beades, he of the ‘bog standard house’ remark.
where did the 26 million go?
26 million + a small family B&B = does not compute.
I think we are about to discover the biggest fraud ever committed in the history of this state
No wonder they were so quick to liquidate what was Anglo
Or IBRC as it is known
After 10 minutes on solo check tracing halpins name I discovered 4 v companies from investments to hotels and articles about cases of deception against individuals like a certain Mr Buckley from IBRC
Its time some outside agency from the EU started looking into IBRC
Especially as Michael D Higgins rushed back home in February 2013 to sign the order to liquidate this bank at the same time Mr halpin issued proceedings against Buckley in 2013
Sounds like coincidence?
Google the article posted Breaking news 15/7/13 IBRC failed to block prosecution for deception
It makes very interesting reading
http://www.pushthefilm.com
The article is awful,it appears they are current on their mortgage and quite prepared to continue servicing it.
Not sure why GS is attempting to perfect a PG on a failed project,from the original lender that was predatory and corrupt (Irish Nationwide), they erroneously accepted a private residence as collateral,the outstanding amount appears to have been grossed up to include fee’s/penalties and outrageous costs thats most judges would dismiss as usurious.
The reporting is really awful its so hard read-good luck to these people I’d tell GS to go foop themselves,NAMA under FG has let many borrowers walk away from billions in PG’s for failed projects.
a private residence? how did they come to live there? was it already a B&B when they moved in? was the whole place not already a live-in business
Hold on Steve let me crank up my time machine and go back, who knows who cares they live there now,I barely waded though the article the first time,life’s too short read that rubbish again,the hack doesn’t understand finance 101.
The original lender failed it was corrupt and predatory, you guys bailed it out.Now an offshore vulture fund wants take someones home to collect on a PG, tax free and move any profits of shore.This vulture fund is subject too numerous criminal charges over a corrupt Malaysian deal that went south.
“The Federal Reserve Board announced that it is prohibiting Tim Leissner and Ng Chong Hwa from the banking industry for their participation in a scheme to illegally divert billions of dollars from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund.
Leissner and Hwa are former senior investment bankers employed by foreign subsidiaries of The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.”
https://www.wlns.com/news/two-former-employees-of-goldman-sachs-permanently-banned-from-the-banking-industry/1843820293
“they erroneously accepted a private residence as collateral” They accepted a B&B owned by a company as collateral.
-its a home-GS is unsecured they are behind a first on it-please don’t make me read that drivel again:)
GS would never have made this loan in states or taken a PG from these small time people-only a corrupt failed irish bank would have done it.
johnny, please tell us more about the wonderful home loan practices of US banks? :)
GS doesn’t doesn’t do home loans, it doesn’t do PG’s its for big boys, they do non recourse lending-project fails they get own it but not the home of the promoter/developer who keeps that.
This home has per IT…”They have offered to repay €1.25 million in debt secured on the property.”
If it was in states you’d puke the two co’s into Chapter 11 or 7 and tell GS to go foop themselves, they unsecured.
@johnny – https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/we-are-standing-our-ground-couple-refuses-to-hand-over-dublin-4-b-b-to-goldman-sachs-1.3841778
An updated article, sheds more light, basically, same as above but they mention they moved into the B&B in 2012! From where I wonder?
‘Goldman Sachs has argued successfully in court that the development loan was subject to cross guarantees from the company which owns Aberdeen Lodge, and that the B&B, as an asset of that company, is fair game for repossession. They have argued that Halpin and Kean have lived their since February 2012 as trespassers, “with no right, title or interest in the property of any kind”’
You are right though a lot of drivel filler!!
Thank you Qwerty123-just giving JackJo a hard time he’s actually quite a decent hack, but so what if its a nice area, it reads like something from the property porn section of the IT-the part about the nice lady hands shaking while making her tea was a lot for me-GS are dirt bags they can well take this hit.
I really can’t follow the whole thing as it involves cross company guarantees-but appears that the companies are still active ?
Anyway good luck to this lovely irish couple hope they get keep their home and GS gets another bloody nose.
-not sure which pool this loan was in but for example GS paid 30 cents for this pool- so its 7.5 million take off the few million they got for other site and the offer of 1-2 million from this nice couple is extremely generous:)
“The balance of the Project Quartz loan portfolio, at just less than €1bn, was sold to Goldman Sachs and CarVal for a price thought to be in the high 30 cents in the euro range, implying a sale price of between €360m and €380m. Lone Star, the single largest acquirer of legacy IBRC loans in both Europe and the US, was among the underbidders.”
https://costarfinance.wordpress.com/2014/12/22/goldman-sachs-and-carval-investors-win-last-major-ibrc-loan-portfolio/
Suds bigged up his role at GF,he was a notorious spoofer and thats been kind, it was something of a joke,bit like his so called rugby carear.However,he was the most profile representative or ‘face’ at Goldman Sachs in Irl and just look who showed up to pay their respects and mingle with the ‘great and good’ from GS.
“Current and former politicians present included the Fianna Fáil leader, Micheal Martin, and Green Party leader, Eamon Ryan; former taoisigh Enda Kenny and Bertie Ahern; current Ministers Paschal Donohoe, Eoghan Murphy and Richard Bruton; former ministers Alan Dukes, Michael Noonan, Gemma Hussey, Charlie McCreevy and John Gormley.”
“Numerous legal luminaries attended, including the Attorney General, Seamus Woulfe; former attorneys general John Murray and John Rogers; the Chief Justice Frank Clarke and former chief justice Ronan Keane; current judges included President of the High Court, Mr Justice Peter Kelly; Mr Justice Michael Moriarty of the High Court; Mr Justice George Birmingham of the Court of Appeal; Mr Justice John MacMenamin of the Supreme Court; and retired Court of Appeal judge, Garrett Sheehan, a family friend who gave a eulogy.”
Not sure which judge is hearing this on behalf of Goldman Sachs, but if it was me i’d be moving for a mistrial.
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/peter-sutherland-s-tolerance-and-generosity-recalled-at-funeral-1.3352449
This is a complicated case and most of the trite comments posted so far don’t seem to understand it. Goldman Sachs did NOT buy the €26million mortgage on the hotel on Merrion Road. Aberdeen Lodge guesthouse was in the ‘bundle’ which GS bought (for calculated price of €33K). The mortgage was over a million. In the course of monetising their bargain bundle of mortgages they noted that Aberdeen Lodge had been used as part collateral for the Merrion Road hotel. This hotel mortgage was not in the ‘bundle’ which GS bought but they used the opportunity to gouge even more out of a deal that cost them €33K. GS are not called vulture funds for nothing although it is an insult to real vultures who are useful.
-that makes absolutely no sense-they can not try perfect a PG/Guarantee on a loan they don’t own.
INM have an opening for a business editor, I’d have a go given your grasp off complicated matters like this:)
“That is the argument which Halpin and Keane is putting forward.”
No idea who Halpin and Keane are
1-Merrion Road- Crossplan Investments Limited
2-Aberdeen Lodge-Elecktron Holdings Ltd.
All loans/borrowings were funded by Sticky Fingeleton’s Nationwide,transferred to IRBC and sold on at massive discounts in pools.Receivers are attempting on behalf GS to evict the home owners and their two children, and take Aberdeen Lodge.
Elecktron according GS provided ‘guarantees’ for a hotel development by Crossplan that went south, or didn’t work out.
The owner occupiers should insist on reviewing ALL the original loan documentation, the credit committee file, the presentation made by the credit officers to the Nationwide board in approving this loan.My hunch is that GS has ‘bad paper’ or its scratched and dented.Insist on reviewing the lender files and original approvals….
You can NOT pursue a borrower/client unless you own the loan that you are trying collect on!
The Phoenix as usual has by far the best coverage on this mess.
Best luck Anne and Patrick.
They took the equity out of the property, where did it go ? . Or was this a blanket mortgage covering other properties either way the got the 26million ,they are lucky that they can quit claim and not have whatever income , pensions , retirement planned income garnished .
Sorry if I’m a bit naive, but as they’re there since Feb 2012, don’t squatters rights apply after 7 years?
They own and live in this home,that’s not in dispute,the vulture fund is trying collect on a unsecured debt from a different property development deal,involving a completely seperate company and site that didn’t work out.
It’s extrenly unusual for Goldman Sachs to so aggressively purse a home like this over an unsecured debt,more likely it’s the irish team which involves the receivers,that have taken this highly unusual and aggressive position,not the guys in NY who generally avoid evicting families.
I’m not sure who their lending officer or account person at Nationwide was,but they are notorious for bad paper,corrupt and fraudulent practices,with the x CEO providing 5 letters from various ‘medical’ types on different occasions,to avoid questions recently.He has basically refused cooperate in any way with any inquiries and should be subpoenaed.
My understanding is that Crossplan Investments Ltd. bought three large houses on Merrion Road across from the RDS. I don’t know what was paid for them but they were bought at the peak of the so-called Celtic Tiger. That gobbled up a good few million. Then the three houses looked for planning to amalgamate as a hotel. Planning ran into difficulties when neighbours objected so the work on the hotel was held up for a number of years. Anyone passing along Merrion Road would have seen the site blocked off for what seemed an inordinate amount of time. IRBC sold the 3houses and partially built hotel for €2.5million!! Pat Halpin said on Prime Time that he would have bought it himself if he knew that they were going to give it away at that price. Both Pat Halpin and Ann Keane are caught in a web of skulduggery woven by GS and IRBC. The Government is aiding and abetting this by it’s non-taxation policy. Goldman Sachs claim that the property is worth €3million (back of the envelope job). Pat Halpin has a written valuation from Lisnney and Sons for €2million So GS are going to all this trouble for a gross €1million which will be well-diluted by stamp duty, fees, lack of monthly repayments while awaiting sale which could take many months. Is it worth it? Why not do a deal?
It’s to normalize evictions,the govt approved and encouraged this to divide irish people.Most of FG attended the head of Goldman Sachs Ireland’s funeral recently,it’s a strategy of FG to evict Irish family’s.They deliberately picked this situation that would normally not evoke much sympathy and involves somewhat big numbers.
It’s an unsecured debt GS can go foop themselves.
Can you give the mansplaining a rest.