Drumm’s wife agrees to sell US home

DAVID DRUMM’S wife has agreed to the sale of the couple’s home in the upmarket Cape Cod area of Massachusetts.

The house, bought by the couple in early 2008, will go on the market for $5.5m (€4.2m) after Lorraine Drumm signed off on the sale in an agreement with her husband’s bankruptcy trustee.

Ms Drumm will receive half of the proceeds of the sale after a mortgage of just over $1m is paid off, while Mr Drumm is claiming an exemption of $500,000, which he wants to protect from creditors. But real estate analysts do not believe the house will sell for even close to the asking price, with two separate websites that track prices estimating its value at just under $4.2m.

If the property does sell for the listed price, creditors other than the mortgage holder, including Anglo Irish, will share $1.75m.

The couple bought the house for $4.6m in March 2008, with the help of a $1.2m mortgage from a Cape Cod bank, of which they have paid off just under $200,000. Ms Drumm agreed to an initial listing period ending April 31. If it is not sold by then, the trustee overseeing the bankruptcy case will have sole responsibility.

She has also agreed not to touch any belongings in the house without the approval of the trustee.

Mr Drumm, the former chief executive of Anglo Irish, moved to the US permanently after he was ousted from the bank in early 2009.

The couple and their two children initially lived at the house on Stage Neck Road. But the family has since moved to Wellesley outside Boston, bought for $2m earlier this year by a trust. Mr Drumm has a half interest in the property.

Mr Drumm filed for bankruptcy in the US in October, listing debts of over $14m and assets of just under $14m. By far the largest creditor is Anglo Irish, which is trying to claw back loans totalling more than €8m from Mr Drumm.