Enforcing judgement – urgent advice needed!

carpetfluff

Thanks very much for the replies, the advice is greatly appreciated.

We went to our local county court yesterday, and they were able to confirm that our N316 application would not be suspended due to her submitting the N245. They also confirmed that if the court makes an instalment order, then we will lose the right to enforcement. Although the N316 application will continue unhindered, the information gained from it will be pretty useless to us if an instalment order is made, as we will no longer be entitled to enforcement (unless she defaults on payments).

If we act quickly, we may be able to apply for enforcement before returning the N246. However, without the information from the N316, we are unsure which would be the most effective method.

On the N245, she has stated that she is married with 2 dependent children, has a bank account overdrawn by £1000, and a savings/building society account containing £200. Her home is jointly owned (presumably with her husband). Her total income is £200 per week from take home pay and her pension, but nothing is stated under ‘Other income’ such as her husband’s contribution towards running of the home, or income from the property we were renting (which she said in court she is still renting). Priority debts are £250 per month on mortgage arrears, £500 in water charge arrears, and £435 in gas debt. Her weekly expenses are stated as £190 per week, and she has credit card debts of £80 per month. From this information there is no way she can afford £50 per month (on her own), so we are concerned that the court would order her to pay even less than this.

Although we dealt with husband and wife as joint landlords throughout the tenancy, the wife was the only one named on the tenancy agreement, so the judgement was made against her. As a result she seems to have detailed only finances relevant to her, rather than jointly as a married couple. Is this correct, or should the court consider their joint income? Despite her individual financial situation seeming poor, her husband clearly supports her, so I doubt she would miss any of the monthly instalments.

An attachment of earnings order would be pretty useless considering the income she has stated on the N245. A third party debt order would be preferable, but she has stated that she only has £200 in a savings account. We paid our rent into a joint account, which we have details of, but we don’t know whether this is the account mentioned on the N245. In any case, we cannot request a third party debt order against a joint account, since the debt is only in her name.

A charging order on their home seems like the safest option, but without much chance of getting an order for sale, we would most likely be waiting several years for them to sell their house. Without the results of the N316, we don’t even know how much equity there is in either property. Monthly instalments would be preferable to this, as then at least we’d be getting some money.

We have no idea whether they own anything of value, so a warrant of execution may be a waste of time. However, my partner is on JSA and we don’t have to pay for court fees, so it might be worth a try anyway? If we were to go down this route, should we apply through the High Court rather than the County Court?

I feel as though a warrant of execution may be the most effective method, but we don’t want to be accused of abuse of process by attempting to enforce judgement after receiving the N245. Ideally, we would be allowed to wait for the results of the N316, and then follow an appropriate line of enforcement.

I think the only way this will be allowed to happen is if we are able to provide strong objections to an instalment order being made. Would it be reasonable to state that we do not trust the information she has provided (based on lack of evidence), and are waiting for the results of our N316 application, where questions must be answered under oath? We would also state that we wish to enforce the judgement, and would provide evidence of her assets from land registry records. Is this going to be enough to stop an instalment order going ahead?

ItMightBeUsefulOneDay

Carpetfluff - I suspect that the husband is the one with all the money.

All debts will be in his wife's name so she can claim utter poverty in this situation. Do you know her residential address? Not for anything sinister, but to help you gauge whether or not the real money is being hidden somewhere. Do they live in a 4 bed detached property with pony paddock and 3 acres of back garden? What are the cars outside? I've seen people living like kings yet the wife is able to claim every benefit going as she only earns £5,000 per year and has no declarable assets.

RAS

Hi

Check out the ownership of the rented property on the Land Registry web-site.

You need to read lisawaters' https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/2280981 and blueback's https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/1839539 threads on charging orders.

personally, I would go for bankruptcy (Statutory Demand) if there is equity in either property, even if she is not listed as owner. The OR would probably consider her to have BI and would take the rental proprty off her.

princeofpounds

You've done great stuff investigating all that, I'm afraid my advice kind of runs out here but I hope it goes well. Do keep us informed.

Did you try landlordzone or CLS direct by any chance?

princeofpounds

Here's Tessa's guide on the subject (an authority on the subjects we discuss here on the web). She is brief on instalment orders, but appears to point out two interesting things

- Firstly, they are meant to repay the debt in a reasonable amount of time. 84 months is not that reasonable and you should certainly raise that objection along with as many others as you can think of.

- Secondly that if an instalment order is made and she defaults you are in a much stronger position.

http://www.landlordlaw.co.uk/content/ArticleEnfCCJ.pdf

If I were you'd I'd contact Tessa for more info, though you might have a pay a little I suppose.