Debt resolution options can provide a way of holding family home isi

Friends and family can have a role to play in encouraging people to explore the options open to them for debt resolution, the director of the Insolvency Service of Ireland (ISI), Lorcan O’Connor, said at a 'town hall’ meeting held at Mullingar’s Park Hotel during February.
“Quite often, people need encouragement to take that first step, and hence, it’s of value if a friend or relative informs them of these possible solutions,” he stated.
“It’s clear to very many that financial difficulties do extend well beyond the money problems, and can affect people in many different ways, and clearly, can affect other family members as well,” he said.
Almost 40 people were in attendance at the event, including politicians, representatives of the approved intermediary service provided by MABS, local personal insolvency practitioners, MABS and members of the public.
The ISI is an independent government body set up to help tackle personal debt problems, and Thursday’s meeting was part of ISI’s recently-launched information campaign, 'back on track’, aimed at getting the word out to people in difficulty that there are options open to them, such as debt relief notices (DRN), debt settlement arrangements (DSA), personal insolvency arrangements (PIA), and in the more extreme cases, bankruptcy.
Mr O’Connor said that 100,000 mortgages are in arrears - and when buy to let mortgages are added in, the figures show one in every eight Irish mortgages is in arrears, which, in consequence, may be impacting on the lives of up to a quarter of a million people.
“It is a very significant challenge to our society,” he said.
However, many don’t start to take action until they receive a MARP (Mortgage Arrears Resolution Process), letter, even though, if they were to contact a Personal Insolvency Practitioner, “a host of other solutions come in to play”. After the meeting, Mr O’Connor revealed that despite the fall in the overall mortgage arrears figures, the number of people entering into long term mortgage arrears on their homes continues to grow with more than 37,000 principal private residences in arrears for more than 2 years.
In addition to this, there are an increasing number of lenders issuing legal proceedings - 8,881 cases - to enforce the debt/security on family homes in the first 9 months of 2014.
He said that when the ISI researched the behaviour and attitudes of debtors last year, it became clear that people are not aware of the supports that are available to them. As a result, to encourage people to seek help, the ISI is has waived all its fees to the end of 2015.