Cornish repossessions soar, homes auctioned off to companies, then squatted!

Repossessions are up by 300 percent in many Cornish towns and villages, with some seeing as much as a third of their entire housing stock sold off to property holdings companies at knock down prices, according to the latest housing figures for Cornwall. These empty houses are then squatted by the same families that were evicted from them, and because of the huge financial incentives for squatting, this trend is set to continue.



One family who couldn't afford their mortgage repayments explained to rentfreecornwall how they managed to keep their 'home' despite no longer paying any mortgage or rent on it. 'The business I work for is in manufacturing, and because of the strong euro and credit crunch, our orders went down, and I had to go from full time to part time,' said a family member. 'We couldn't afford the repayments for the house, so it was repossessed and sold off at an auction. I bought the house for £150,000 five years ago, but it went for under £70,000. But when I found out no one had actually moved in and it was just owned by a foreign holdings company, I used existing squatting laws, and legally gained entry and our family is now in occupation of it again.

'It's great. The sale cleared the rest of my debts and because our outgoings are less I can start saving for another house - they're going so cheap in Cornwall now that I reckon after 7 years of squatting our old Cornish house we will be able to afford a new house in Cornwall.'

Holiday home owners with second homes in Cornwall have been less fortunate. Unable to keep up with repayments on their Cornwall holiday homes, thousands have been repossessed and sold off at auction, often at a fraction of their original price, only to be squatted by other Cornish families, students, or just people fancying a free place to stay in Cornwall.