The High Court ordered Alex Martin to complete the sale of a site at Reaghstown, Ardee, County Louth to Gerald McKenny, after finding that Martin breached a contract by withdrawing while McKenny’s third planning application was pending.
Miss Justice Laffoy directed that the contract be completed by 18 June 2010, with special condition 4 excluded. McKenny must pay the remaining €7,748.69, and Martin must transfer the site and provide marketable title. The order gives effect to McKenny’s decision to pursue the purchase while waiving the condition that made the sale subject to obtaining planning permission.
The dispute concerned a deal made in 2002 for a 0.331-hectare site for €38,092.14. McKenny paid a deposit of €31,743.45, which was released to Martin. Although Martin had not signed the contract, his counsel accepted at trial that a binding agreement existed. The judge found that the parties’ agreement to release the deposit brought the contract into being.
The contract allowed the planning-application period to be extended by agreement. The judge found that Martin had implicitly, if not expressly, agreed to extend it beyond McKenny’s third application, filed in August 2005. She said Martin withdrew in February 2006 after learning McKenny might obtain permission and sought an additional €30,000. The judge concluded he could not withdraw unilaterally while the application was pending and found him in breach of contract.
The judgment records that McKenny’s third application was refused. A fourth application was also unsuccessful after a local-authority refusal and an unsuccessful appeal to An Bord Pleanála. McKenny told the court he remained hopeful of obtaining permission under the current development plan and was prepared to take that risk. The court’s order did not determine whether a future planning application would succeed.
McKenny also sought damages for €3,000 in consultants’ fees and €1,100 for spreading soil on the site. The judge refused damages, finding the expenditure related to McKenny’s own efforts to meet his contractual obligations and could not be laid at Martin’s door.
The court refused Martin’s late application to have a counterclaim treated as properly served. It also deferred deciding costs until evidence of the site’s rateable valuation was provided, listing that issue for 22 June 2010. The trial took place on 11 May 2010, with McKenny appearing in person and Martin represented by a solicitor and counsel.