The High Court granted summary judgment for rent arrears of €604,556.50 accrued up to 17 December 2010, rejecting a guarantor’s claim that the collapse in the construction sector gave him a defence. The court left claims from that date onwards, and a separate dispute about a demand on the guarantor, for plenary hearing.
The plaintiffs, executors of the estate of the late Josephine Behan, sued Behan’s Land Restoration Limited and John Behan over rent under a lease of lands at Punchestown, County Kildare. The lease, delivered in December 2007, ran for 12 years and required an initial annual rent of €416,667.67, payable quarterly. John Behan guaranteed the company’s obligations.
The dispute arose from a settlement following earlier litigation over the estate. The defendants sought leave to defend the claim, arguing in part that the lease rent had been calculated on expectations about demand for landfill space. They said the construction-sector collapse soon after the lease was agreed made the rent unrealistic and that both sides had shared an understanding that demand would continue.
Mr Justice Birmingham held that disappointment caused by an economic downturn did not provide a credible basis to escape obligations freely entered into with legal advice. Applying the low threshold for allowing a defendant to contest a summary judgment application, he concluded that the affidavits disclosed no arguable defence to the rent claim up to 17 December 2010.
The plaintiffs accepted that the portion of the claim from 17 December 2010 onwards should proceed to a plenary hearing, including because the parties disputed whether a rent review fell due in December 2010 or December 2011. The court also left for further proceedings the guarantor’s contention that a demand had been made on him for only €312,500.25 and that any larger claim against him was invalid.
The judgment records that the plaintiffs were entitled to summary judgment for the arrears through 17 December 2010. The supplied extract does not state the amount of any final judgment order or set out the further hearing arrangements.