The High Court has not decided whether Stepstone Mortgage Funding Limited can take possession of Alan and Ursula Clarke’s home. It directed the lender to file a further affidavit with documentary evidence addressing whether its Mortgage to Rent activity was only a pilot scheme.
The application concerns the Clarkes’ jointly owned home at 47 Dunard Road, Crumlin, Dublin 12. They borrowed €300,000 under a mortgage signed in November 2007. Arrears began in June 2008 and stood at €32,579.72 when possession proceedings began in March 2010. The court recorded that the couple could not meet the instalments or clear the arrears, and that attempts to agree alternative repayment arrangements had not succeeded.
The dispute before the court concerned the 2013 Code of Conduct on Mortgage Arrears and whether it required Stepstone to explore the Mortgage to Rent scheme with the borrowers. The lender said it did not participate in the scheme, but had a pilot involving ten borrowers to assess whether to reconsider its policy. The Clarkes’ representative disputed that account, saying Stepstone offered the scheme to borrowers and should have considered the couple’s request. The judgment records this as a conflict of evidence; it does not resolve which account was correct.
Justice Michael White held that the 2013 Code applied because the proceedings remained current when the revised code took effect and no possession order had been made. He interpreted the code as requiring a lender to explore Mortgage to Rent if it had signed up to that voluntary scheme. If it had not, the code imposed no duty to explore the option.
The judge said Stepstone had to satisfy the court that it had not signed up and that its engagement with borrowers was only a pilot. If that was established, it had not breached the code on this point and the borrowers could not rely on such a breach to resist possession. If Stepstone had participated in the scheme, it was required to explore it with the Clarkes.
The court directed Stepstone to address the issue through another affidavit exhibiting suitable documentary evidence of the pilot scheme. The judgment does not grant possession or record a final ruling on the application.