We were quoted in three separate articles in the Sunday papers this week.
The Sunday Times mentioned the report we did with MyHome.ie on property prices for investors (here), the full report is available over on MortgageBrokers.ie on the blog (here). Our view is that for investors there is still not a highly compelling reason to get into property.
We are delighted at the announcement of the new Personal Insolvency Bill and while there are issues around it (as there would be with any new legislation); on the main we are satisfied that it is fit for purpose and is a big step in the right direction.
We were pleased to feature on this story by Paul Colgan of RTE about banking and rates charged by different lenders. He also considered whether or not future ECB rate cuts would be passed on to borrowers.
This time on the Morning Show we talked about ideas for personal finance in the new year, how to get ‘financially fit’ and some simple steps to help get you there.
We were interviewed by RTE News at One with John Finnerty. The topic was a potential bonus scheme that PTsb are likely to announce for tracker mortgage customers who pay down their loan early. They are doing this because they want to deleverage and if they include repricing in the option then it may give them the ability to make money on these loss making loans.
Our regular piece on The Morning Show with Sybil & Martin was about debt forgiveness this week, great conversation in an easy to interpret manner.
We were delighted to help out again on The Morning Show on TV3 with Martin King & Aisling O’Loughlin who was sitting in for Sybil Mulcahy. We spoke about credit cards and then ran a live twitter personal finance clinic
We had a piece in today’s Examiner on the topic of Debt Forgiveness, see below: ‘Debt forgiveness’ is an undefined expression, we have no commonly held interpretation of what it is. For that reason the debate rages as to whether it can occur or not; but without definition the argument cannot advance.
On one side you have household name economists and on another you have Fine Gaels Briay Hayes (Minister of State at the Department of Finance) saying it is an impossibility along with most of the banks.
Operations manager with Irish Mortgage Brokers, Karl Deeter said banks will claim they are lending but on the ground it’s an “entirely different story”. “They don’t want to know except where you are a public sector worker or the type of person who banks would always lend to anyway,” he said. “With figures showing that 80% of mortgage applications are being rejected, it puts the banks in the enviable position of being able to cherry-pick only the best applications, declining even cases that fit criteria but are marginal. “This is contrary to giving the taxpayer back a return on our national investment because they need to lend to make profit, but equally, our pillar banks are charging artificially low rates versus the rest of the market, so not only are they cherry-picking but there is an implicit subsidy being paid to those who borrow via taxpayers who fund the banks. It’s a crazy set-up,” he added.
In answer, let me quote Irish economist Karl Deeter, who recently said: “I think debt forgiveness is generally a terrible idea, and have only become an advocate as I watched a system evolve whereby investors have been insulated from taking loss at the expense of largely innocent bystanders [taxpayers]. In chasing the crisis down this rabbit hole we have perhaps avoided creating zombie banks, but we are creating zombie households in their wake.”
He continued: “The idea that this is a ‘punishment to the prudent’ [debt forgiveness] is a mistake. If so, then where is the ‘prudent rage’ against people receiving taxpayer-funded Mortgage Interest Supplement, which is paid to more than 18,000 households, while on the same street another person slaves to make their payments?
“Or the ‘prudent backlash’ by people who stayed out of the market entirely, against taxpayer money spent on rent supplement, which allows a person around the corner to enjoy a similar property for free?”