Spanish bank eviction policy - repossession insanity

[Janet]

Los Reyes have delivered their presents and the banks got carbon ... what naughty girls and boys get ...   

DA

[Perikles]

Bankia is the first bank to fall foul of this new protocol as a result of its decision to evict Carmen Omaña, a single mother without work and whose unemployment benefit has expired. Instead of dealing with the municipality to solve the problem of a home for her and children, the bank ignored the Ayuntamiento's communications, going to Court for a fifth time to evict the woman from her property in Los Gladiolos in the capital. She has now been dispossessed of her home and has gone on hunger strike, setting up a tent outside the Bankia branch in Santa Cruz. All she is asking for is that Bankia should write off her debt: she is in negative equity and the bank has already taken her property back.

That was the beginning of the story. It attracted the attention of El País today because this woman has now returned to the apartment for which €1800 per year rent will paid out of public funds by the Ayuntamiento, she paying only €50. You would think that would be the end of the crisis for her, wouldn't you? It seems though that her torture is being extended by another notice to quit, because the Ayuntamiento has failed to pay the agreed €1800 for the year. The reason for this is rather unclear, but bureaucratic incompetence is my guess. Meanwhile, the Mayor of Santa Cruz has said he would pay from his own pocket if that would stop this second eviction procedure.

What appalls me is this heavy-handed mechanism for dealing with a debt. Immediate issue of an eviction notice just because €1800 is overdue, from an entity which can obviously pay, without any regard for the worry it might cause this woman.

[El Profesor]

What appalls me is this heavy-handed mechanism for dealing with a debt. Immediate issue of an eviction notice just because €1800 is overdue, from an entity which can obviously pay, without any regard for the worry it might cause this woman.

I wonder what the Spanish is for "Kafka"?

[Janet]

I wonder what the Spanish is for "Kafka"?

lo normal ...

[Janet]

Members of the Plataforma de Afectados por la Hipoteca (PAH) have removed their camp in Santa Cruz since it would be a security risk with the main part of carnaval about to start. They staged a demonstration today through the streets of the city between the two banks involved, carrying a banner saying "when injustice becomes law, rebellion is an obligation". Protesters said that although the 49-day-old camp has been lifted, they would continue to mobilize protests on a daily basis in front of the banks during their opening times.  JA

[Janet]

It's beyond any particular Ayuntamiento now. The Tenerife Cabildo, the island council itself, has requested the Consorcio de Bomberos not to participate in any bank evictions. The fire brigade are often the first called in order to break down doors of those who are resisting being forced out of their homes. Some bomberos on the mainland have already said they will not do so. Now, in Tenerife, they're under official instructions to refuse to help the banks. JA

[Janet]

I agree, G, and the national Government says it's going to "bring forward" plans to look at the problem in the wake of two suicides now on the mainland, both of them just before the point of eviction for the properties to be repossessed.

How many people have to die, or threaten to die? The banks have to cave in at some point before that sort of social pressure.

Another one, in Bilbao ... a 50-year-old man who leapt from his 4th floor window as the locksmith was breaking in to allow police to evict him. LO

How many more?

[Janet]

The European Court of Justice has this morning ruled that Spanish law contravenes EU law by refusing judges the freedom to stop an eviction even where a judge deems a mortgage contains abusive clauses. According to the EU Court, judges must be free to determine that a mortgage is abusive, and that an eviction may not take place.

At present in Spain, any legal view on abusive mortgage clauses require further Court action: now the EU has ruled that a mortgage default hearing may take abusive clauses immediately into account and stop an eviction if the mortgage has been deemed to include them. The ECJ says, however, that the present requirement for a second hearing is insufficient justice because it does not avoid the definitive loss of a property and resulting eviction, but is only concerned with the bank compensating for its abuse.

In short, the ECJ said that Spain had made it excessively difficult for normal people to stand a chance at proper justice against abusive mortgage clauses, and that its mortgage legislation seemed designed to deny consumers rights guaranteed by EU directives. The judgement was in response to a case brought in Barcelona against the CatalunyaCaixa bank, which had evicted someone for mortgage default. It really does seem, at times, that Spain has to be dragged, kicking and screaming, through the Courts before it will behave decently, but whatever one's views of the EU, in this instance, householders may find themselves grateful beyond measure to its justice. JA

[Nova]

Have you found any examples of what constitutes an "abusive mortgage clause"?

[Janet]

Not specific examples, but one newspaper was reporting interest at 18% in the case of default. I guess, though, that really it will be for a judge in an eviction case to determine "abusive" according to his/her personal judgement. I can see various interpretations coming through various Courts ... which in another matter is what is happening with some appeals for illegal letting cases.