Central Bank: 100,000 home mortgages owned by vulture funds or sub-prime lenders

The accounts in arrears over 10 years account for 11% of all the 47,681 accounts which were in arrears. 

Over 100,00 home mortgage accounts in the Republic are now in the hands of vulture funds or sub-prime lenders, new official figures reveal. 

The non-traditional lenders own 14% of all the 722,886 home mortgage accounts in the Republic, according to the figures from the Central Bank. They also control over two-thirds of all the home mortgage accounts in arrears for over one year.

"Non-bank entities continue to hold an increasing proportion of PDH (principal dwelling house) mortgages, specifically in relation to PDH accounts in arrears," the Central Bank said.

"At end-September, non-banks held 14% of all PDH mortgages outstanding and 67% of all ODH accounts in arrears over one year," the Central Bank said.

Non-bank entities include credit and servicing firms which act for their foreign fund owners, widely known as vulture funds, who are the ultimate owners of the mortgage loans.          

There were 722,886 outstanding home loan accounts, of which 47,681 were in some type of arrears, at the end of September.    

"That means that over 100,000 accounts in the Republic are paying their mortgages to agents acting for vulture funds and to sub-prime lenders," said Paul Joyce, senior policy analyst at the Free Legal Advice Centres.

He said the number of accounts ultimately owned by vulture funds will jump further should the banks exiting the Republic next year decide to offload their problem loans to the funds.       

Experts and debt advisers have repeatedly said Ireland has faced a long-term problem with mortgage arrears that the officially-sanctioned policy of allowing banks to sell problem loans to non-bank entities or vulture funds has done little to help.

The accounts in arrears over 10 years account for 11% of all the 47,681 accounts which were in arrears.