Priory Hall, Clongriffen residents told their apartments unsafe - another disgrace

Bullseye1

Thoie wrote: »

How did the place get a fire safety cert in the first place though?

A FCS is issued before you start work. It was probably designed correctly but no professional supervision during construction. Developers did not want to employ professionals.

Bullseye1

If the building was registered with Homebond, Homebond and the certifying Engineer/Architect has some questions to answer. It really depends on the level of supervision.

Joey the lips

I dont mean to be padantic but are clongriffen and priory hall not 2 different places...

Milk & Honey

username123 wrote: »

In that case Id tell the bank that they are welcome to repossess.

Fat lot of good that would do. The bank would would sue for the full amount of the loan rather than repossess.
If judgement is entered against the owner their credit rating would be shot to bits for years.

username123

Milk & Honey wrote: »

Fat lot of good that would do. The bank would would sue for the full amount of the loan rather than repossess.
If judgement is entered against the owner their credit rating would be shot to bits for years.

You cant get blood out of a stone - they bank could sue - but what are they going to take if the people have nothing to give? They will have to swallow it and write these loans off.

Credit ratings mean zilch in the current environment, half the countries credit ratings are shot to bits. Even people with great credit ratings and good salaries are not being approved loans - a credit rating is the last of anyones worries these days.

older i get better i was

Folks I think your city council has let you down badly, they issued the certs without inspecting the buildings and got a couple of grand per development, a very good pal of mine is in the brigade and told me apartment complexes all over the city are unsafe, no fire breaks, means of escape etc. the council are the relevant authority for all this and have sat on their hands while it all went on.

Milk & Honey

username123 wrote: »

You cant get blood out of a stone - they bank could sue - but what are they going to take if the people have nothing to give? They will have to swallow it and write these loans off.

Credit ratings mean zilch in the current environment, half the countries credit ratings are shot to bits. Even people with great credit ratings and good salaries are not being approved loans - a credit rating is the last of anyones worries these days.

The banks might write the loans off but he owners would be exposed to enforcement action by the banks, meaning a visit from the sheriff, examination in the District Court, garnishee applications and possibly the appointment of a receiver by way of equitable execution. A bad credit rating means they will not get credit for years, such as car loans, credit union and HP.

username123

Milk & Honey wrote: »

The banks might write the loans off but he owners would be exposed to enforcement action by the banks, meaning a visit from the sheriff, examination in the District Court, garnishee applications and possibly the appointment of a receiver by way of equitable execution. A bad credit rating means they will not get credit for years, such as car loans, credit union and HP.

When you owe a bank a huge sum of money and you have no assets and there is little likelihood of the bank recovering that money, then the court will examine your financial situation, unless you have money or assets - there is little can be done.

Its unlikely it would ever see the inside of a court anyway, it costs the bank money to take people to court and unless there is a good chance of them seeing their money there is no point in them doing it.

What is a far more likely solution is that they engage with the former homeowner and come to some agreement to write off some or most of the debt.

With such a highly publicised case, and given the current public feeling towards the behaviour of bankers these days, its even more unlikely the banks are going to torture the former homeowners further on it - there would be public outrage. Someone is going to end up being sued for this by the former homeowners, so hopefully that will recover them some of their money.

Credit ratings are meaningless in the current environment.

michael999999

Judge should have issued an arrest warrant for the two developers!

CiaranC

michael999999 wrote: »

Judge should have issued an arrest warrant for the two developers!

The judiciary is too busy sending people to jail for not paying their TV licence

Milk & Honey

username123 wrote: »

When you owe a bank a huge sum of money and you have no assets and there is little likelihood of the bank recovering that money, then the court will examine your financial situation, unless you have money or assets - there is little can be done.

Its unlikely it would ever see the inside of a court anyway, it costs the bank money to take people to court and unless there is a good chance of them seeing their money there is no point in them doing it.

What is a far more likely solution is that they engage with the former homeowner and come to some agreement to write off some or most of the debt.

With such a highly publicised case, and given the current public feeling towards the behaviour of bankers these days, its even more unlikely the banks are going to torture the former homeowners further on it - there would be public outrage. Someone is going to end up being sued for this by the former homeowners, so hopefully that will recover them some of their money.

Credit ratings are meaningless in the current environment.

Banks will always seek judgement in order to get a tax write off for the debt.
It is not a defence to say that one can't afford to pay, judgement will be entered anyway. Look at Mick Wallace.
The court only examines the financial situation of a person after judgement has been entered, when an examination order is sought. It does not cost a lot to seek an examination order.
A bad credit rating will linger like a bad smell for years.

Since when has public outrage stopped the banks?

vonbarracuda

I hear its all kicking off in the court now. It was on rte there

Extraspin

Bullseye1 wrote: »

A FCS is issued before you start work. It was probably designed correctly but no professional supervision during construction. Developers did not want to employ professionals.

Yes, but these developers employed a fairly reputable Dublin architect on this project. The real question is how in the name of God did the architect involved sign off on certification??

jmayo

michael999999 wrote: »

Judge should have issued an arrest warrant for the two developers!

Maybe they are afraid one of them will go on hunger strike.

Oh and this developer has form, and it wasn't of the shooting at RUC type either.
In 2006 his company had proceedings initiated against it by Offaly County Council for failing to finish a housing estate in Portarlington, Na Cluainte estate, two years after the last of 85 houses was finished.

This is also the guy that went out and spent $279,000 on a Bently to give the two fingers to CAB.
In other words give the two fingers to the Irish taxpayers.

I’d read he drove a Bentley. “There it is,” he says pointing to the Bentley parked in the driveway. “It cost me €279,000 and I’ve put only 12,000 miles on it in four years. I just bought it to sicken Cab [Criminal Assets Bureau]. I’d to give them €9m in unpaid taxes. When I wrote the last cheque, I went out and bought the Bentley. I was saying, ‘F**k you!’”

Check out this article...
http://saoirse32.blogsome.com/2009/07/14/the-hunger-of-tom-mcfeely/

I wonder what he will go out and buy after this ? :rolleyes:


BTW I got a great laugh out of this comment left on the above site...

We need more republicans like Tom Mcfeely. The Brits were so destructive its a wonder guys like Tom build such great appartments @Priory Gate

Comment by john — 15/10/2011 @ 3:35 pm

Monty Burnz

Extraspin wrote: »

Yes, but these developers employed a fairly reputable Dublin architect on this project. The real question is how in the name of God did the architect involved sign off on certification??

Was it the architect's role to do that? I'd imagine final responsibility would rest on the developers, but I've no idea about the legalities.

joe stodge

anyone else hear that pr1ck tom mcfeely today addressing angry residents outside the courts today???

he basically told them that they should be felling sorry him because he has had his accounts frozen and property sized, what an absolute appalling human being.

DonegalMick

older i get better i was wrote: »

Folks I think your city council has let you down badly, they issued the certs without inspecting the buildings and got a couple of grand per development, a very good pal of mine is in the brigade and told me apartment complexes all over the city are unsafe, no fire breaks, means of escape etc. the council are the relevant authority for all this and have sat on their hands while it all went on.

As far as i know there is no requirement on the fire brigade or the council to inspect any premises after a FSC has been granted. The process is the same as planning, an architect or engineer is suppose to sign off on the completed project, e.g that it conforms with the building regs. I suppose we all complain about over regulation until regulation is needed.

Thoie

DonegalMick wrote: »

I suppose we all complain about over regulation until regulation is needed.

I'd say that we complain about regulation because we pay through the nose for shoddy service. If I'm paying for people in the county council to approve things, or for the financial regulator to keep things under control, I expect them to do their jobs and do proper inspections. What I invariably seem to end up paying for is the council to say "I'm sure it's grand" when dealing with big companies.

This is the same situation that's contributing to troughs being dug across roads around the place. Contractors are supposed to pay the council a bond before they dig holes across a road. Invariably the roads are not returned to a decent state, yet apparently no-one from the council checks up on what's been done, and the bond is automatically returned.

Luke G

This might ring a few bells,

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2011/0208/1224289257312.html

Thoie

And from this morning's news:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/1018/1224305995438.html

Luke G

Thoie wrote: »

And from this morning's news:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2011/1018/1224305995438.html

Hopefully their passports are the first in a long list of things they'll have to hand over...

mjth2004

Light touch regulation that all the professional bodies (CIF, RIAI, IEI, Law Society, etc)  are happy to work with! 

http://www.nda.ie/cntmgmtnew.nsf/0/D7B9326DE8BF2CBA802570CF00348A4C/$File/07_part_m.htm

Link above is a number of years out of date, 04/05, but it shows statistical  low numbers of inspections carried out in 2003.  This didn't change much to the height of the boom, if anything more was been built with no increase in staffing numbers!

Just to add I know of two cases were a Local Authority & Government Dept could not hire inspection staff as they were offer salaries 10-20k below what industry was paying in 2007!

JohnnyTodd

Was this social housing or do people actually own these dumps?

Lantus

mjth2004 wrote: »

Light touch regulation that all the professional bodies (CIF, RIAI, IEI, Law Society, etc) are happy to work with!

http://www.nda.ie/cntmgmtnew.nsf/0/D7B9326DE8BF2CBA802570CF00348A4C/$File/07_part_m.htm

Link above is a number of years out of date, 04/05, but it shows statistical low numbers of inspections carried out in 2003. This didn't change much to the height of the boom, if anything more was been built with no increase in staffing numbers!

Just to add I know of two cases were a Local Authority & Government Dept could not hire inspection staff as they were offer salaries 10-20k below what industry was paying in 2007!

An interesting report. It confirms several things that I recently wrote in a short report and send to the department responsible for planning law: -

1/ Planning and Building control authorities have only TWO levels of enforecement at their disposal. The first is to write a very stiff letter saying how bad you've been. The second is to take you to court. There is NOTHING inbetween! Give that letters are worth nothing. (Imagine if we had a letter system for parking infringements or dropping litter.) And court is a very expensive and time consuming route most contractors operate in total comfort that nothing will ever come of any shortfalls in their build quality.

2/ The report shows very few complaints. Hardly surprising as it's doubtful anyone would even know to complain to building control. Just as so few know about planning conditions on sites and report them. (Again same problem, see no.1.....nothing happens no matter how many times they break planning conditions like working out of hours in residential areas or depositing mud all over the roads.)

I have reported over 100 breaches to the local coco on various conditions being broken by the contractor working on a project over the road from us. The result is 2 strongly worded letters. On occassions where there were health and safety breaches and they came to site they rang the contractor and gave notice!!! allowing hime ample time to tidy away whatever mess he'd made so the coco could report "nothing wrong"

In contrast to being a few seconds past your time on the parking meter, 40eu fine, clamped, and certain court if you dont pay a few weeks down the line. dog fouling and littering attract equally stiff 1500 to 2000 fines if caught.

Does that sound like a fair system given the importance and value of buildings?

Regulation is just non existent really. It's the last cowboy industry.

Monty Burnz

JohnnyTodd wrote: »

Was this social housing or do people actually own these dumps?

I think most of them are private homes.

the_syco

Lantus wrote: »

On occassions where there were health and safety breaches and they came to site they rang the contractor and gave notice!!! allowing hime ample time to tidy away whatever mess he'd made so the coco could report "nothing wrong"

This doesn't surprise me at all. A past place of work (restaurant) would often get a call two days in advance of a "suprise" visit by the health inspectors...

mrgaa1

Homebond, the developer and the architect should be prosecuted.

However in the north they have building control within each council who inspect at certain stages. They are known to be as tight as ducks ar*e in water over buildings and can stop building at any stage and they will not certify.
There is no building control officer / department within any council or body within ROI - this is a serious issue and should be implemented.

I don't think we have heard the end of this.

Elmer Blooker

ABajaninCork wrote: »

I find it absolutely amazing that this situation was allowed to develop at all.

I don't find it amazing at all. FF basically handed the country over to cowboy builders and fast buck speculators. ie their Galway Races friends.
What do we expect? Well for starters we can expect more Priory Halls!
* not all builders are/were cowboys. I'm aware that there are many second and third generation reputable family businesses in operation.

John Mason

I feel so sorry for anyone who has bought a house/apartment in the last 10 years who knows how many other Priory Halls are going to come to light.

I feel sick at the thoughts of what these people are going through and think to myself "there for the grace of god, go I "

These apartments now have a zero value, they can never be sold and people are trapped with them.

I was thinking there are a thousands of construction workers out of work, why cant the governement organise to get these builders back to work fixing the problem ??

or what about organsing volunteers to go in and start to fix the problem - there are a load of Irish Charities doing this overseas i.e. Haven.

I really feel so sorry for all these refugees and their children

mikemac

I'm not trying to be dramatic by bringing up Stardust

Just to say Priory Hall was built in 2006
At the same time there were boycotts of certain businesses, organized groups and placards going on nearby in Artane, not so far away

I would have thought the fire officers, the council, architects and realy everyone in North Dublin would be aware and it may have served as a reminder to them on standards.

This self regulation is a joke
If it's not fire standards it's the frozen pipes around the country last winter as the trenches were not deep enough